Fast Food, Spindle City By Leo Racicot In 1965, when radio and newspaper ads announced that a new type of eating place was coming to town, area excitement was high. The restaurant was called McDonald’s and promised to offer fast, cheap service, new kinds of food flavors different from the diner and…

A weekly report on things I’ve read, heard and seen since last Wednesday.  Museum Exhibit: “American Stories: Revolution to Rockwell” at Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge, Massachusetts until October 26, 2026. Anytime we visit the Berkshires, the Rockwell Museum is a regular destination, mostly because of the interesting temporary exhibits presented…

Two years ago, Louise Peloquin began sharing excerpts from L’Etoile, a French-language newspaper published in Lowell from 1881 to 1957. At my urging, she has agreed to compile some of her previous posts with added contextual information into a book manuscript to be called, L’Etoile: A Star on Prince Street.…

The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog. Years ago, when Martha Raddatz was Martha Bradlee, we were colleagues at WCVB-TV, Channel 5 in Boston — she in the newsroom chasing stories, I in the editorial department, commenting on the news from a safe distance. Millions…

The Lowell City Council met this past Tuesday evening; however, I was away and didn’t have time to watch the meeting, so I’ll write about it in next Sunday’s newsletter. Today’s topic is “title theft” the term used to describe the fraudulent transfer of real estate. The prompt for that…

Music! Music! Music! By Leo Racicot The very first music concert I attended was at Freedomland, an amusement park in The Bronx. My sister, Diane and I, were in White Plains, New York visiting our aunt, uncle and cousins for three weeks in the summer of 1962. One of the acts…

A weekly report on things I’ve read, heard and seen since last Wednesday.  Article: “AI’s Market Dominance comes With a Warning” by Jeff Sommer, New York Times, July 12, 2026 – This is the “Strategies” column in the Business section. Despite relatively high inflation driven by tariffs and the war…

Mother Earth Grumbles – PIP #111 By Louise Peloquin      “Peeks into the Past” #11 and #54 were a sampling of a local newspaper’s coverage of climate concerns. (1)      As the summer of 2026 is punctuated by horrifying images of extreme weather all over the globe, these two stories…