Besides being the best fighting force in history, the modern US Army apparently possesses multimedia capability. AFN (American Forces Network – which I used to know as Armed Forces Network) is sponsoring a Super Bowl commercial competition. Because it doesn’t air commercial commercials (which some find to be the highlight…
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Looking forward to the President’s State of the Union address tonight. Remembering January 2009 and the massive gathering on the National Mall for the Inauguration of President Barack Obama. Here’s a look at the scene by Susan Walsh, a photographer from the Associated Press (web photo courtesy of boston.com) Here’s…
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Check out Lowell Resident, the latest addition to the city’s always-active blogosphere. I’ve added a link to the site in our Blog Roll in the right hand sidebar. Let me also invite others to jump in. The mechanics are pretty easy. Just create a Google account (or log in if…
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Edgar Allen Poe Lowell, Massachusetts, late May to early June 1849 Daguerreotype On this day – January 19, 1809 – American short-story writer, poet, critic and editor Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Poe poularized the short-story and his tales of mystery and horror gave birth to the modern detective story. Among…
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Harvard University just celebrated its 375th anniversary. But the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War is also of importance to Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust. A noted historian and scholar of the Civil War, Faust will speak in April at the Boston Public Library as part of the Lowell Lecture Series. Her lecture will focus on…
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Here’s a memory painting of a night scene at the movies on Central Street in Lowell: “The Strand” by Richard Marion (c) 2012 See more artwork at www.richardmarion.net Here’s a link to Nancye Tuttle’s museum exhibition brochure about the movie theaters in Lowell. Her 1993 exhibit was called “Picture It: Lowell Goes to the…
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Today in the sun-drenched lobby of the Tsongas Center at UMass Lowell, the 14th annual Lura Smith and Family celebration of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. took place. For two hours, the crowd was transported and inspired by prayer, music, dance and inspirational words. The annual “Living…
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With Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. being remembered tomorrow in a special way across the nation, I went back to a prose poem written after a family visit to Washington, D.C., in the early summer of 2004, another presidential election year. We were months away from seeing Barack Obama make news with a…
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James Whistler “Nocturne, Blue and Silver: Battersea Reach” – Whistler’s emphasis on sensation and atmosphere over detailed description has been compared by some to the philosophy underpinning Gardner’s whole museum. “I see the entire museum as a correlative to these shadowy tone poems,’’ wrote the poet and critic Wayne Koestenbaum…
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