The most important portion of Tuesday’s Lowell City Council meeting emerged from an innocuous agenda item: The City Manager notifying the council that a member of one of the city’s many volunteer-staffed boards had resigned. The board involved was the city’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB) Committee and the…

A Journey By Kevin Cavanaugh Upon a winged horse I fly Above the trees below the sky To dwell a fleeting moment with the wind To shoot the breeze and then rescind Mindless is the path I take Mindless be or mindless make Escape not life for that is death…

The American poet John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892) lived in the Essex County portion of the Merrimack Valley for most of his life, but he did live in Lowell in 1844-45 where he served as the editor of the Middlesex Standard, an abolitionist newspaper. As a professional writer, Whittier recorded his…

Voyages By Jim Provencher  1  Old Orchard Beach  In the last place, where the river enters the sea, where it ripples into a larger whole, my mother lived out her final days, wandering sea-oat anchored dunes, wading the sea-edge, gathering glinting shells that caught her eye. 2  Then, Back When…

Housing, Parking and Roadwork in 1924 Lowell – (PIP #68) By Louise Peloquin City Hall and municipal administration offices are hives where worker bees coordinate their efforts to act for the benefit of the community. Meetings are held. Commissions are created. Projects are elaborated. Sometimes however, the hives get of…

The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog. Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation of The Odyssey was a very different read for me. I had read a couple of versions of The Odyssey in my younger life. But her fresh translation of Homer came highly recommended, and I decided to give it…

The early part of Tuesday’s Lowell City Council meeting was dominated by a discussion of a memo from the City Solicitor’s office in response to an earlier motion from Councilors Erik Gitschier and Corey Robinson that the city consider adopting a “construction employment” ordinance like that in place in the…

EARLY SEASON By Terry Downes Spring Training’s just a memory The teams have now gone north To fields where fans wait anxiously New wonders to spring forth. Off the buses, trains and planes They hustle to the park To show their loyal watching crowds They’re not out for a lark.…