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David Brooks in today’s NYTimes wonders out loud if the contemporary American behavioral trend of heightened self-approval may be weakening the national civic culture. He often asks such “community” questions as he tries to puzzle out the workings of our democratic-republic system. He makes a comment on the connection to toxic partisanship in…
Read More »Who says most people don’t care about History? In France, there’s a public argument going on about President Sarkozy’s proposal to create a new museum about his nation’s history. The crux of the debate seems to be a struggle over the story line. Read about it in the NYTimes here,…
Read More »City Manager Bernie Lynch weighed in at Gerry Nutter’s place on the news about disruptive and worse behavior by some members of the public in the Pollard Memorial Library. The Library is like an indoor common, open to all, which means the world walks in the door, sometimes acting in ways that…
Read More »Columnist David Brooks of the NYTimes today puts on his social psychology hat and a couple of other disciplinary caps to make an opening argument for something that he calls “The New Humanism.” He wants us to start thinking and acting differently in order to make better decisions for ourselves and…
Read More »MassMoments reminds us that on this day – March 7, 1876 – Alexander Graham Bell received a patent for the telephone – a device that could transmit human speech over a wire. Bell’s patents and the success of the Bell Telephone Company, which he established in 1877, made the young…
Read More »The Eagle Tribune’s Haverhill coverage today includes a lively debate about the potential impact of author Andre Dubus III’s memoir “Townie” on the image of the city. Mayor James Fiorentini took exception to initial media coverage of Andre’s book with references to the rough side of life in the Haverhill of the…
Read More »Setting aside her poems about war, slavery, work, and spirituality for this morning, here’s an except from one of Lucy Larcom’s many poems about the environment. This poem is from “The Poetical Works of Lucy Larcom, Household Edition” (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1885). About her poems, her friend John…
Read More »To honor of Lucy Larcom’s birthday on this day – March 5, 1824 – this exerpt from her memoir – “A New England Girlhood’ – seems appropriate. Larcom was reflecting on her days in the sisterhood we know as the Lowell mill girls: In recalling those years of my girlhood at Lowell,…
Read More »From today’s Boston Herald – the Inside Track – and the beat goes on… . . . The Pride of Lowell “Irish” Micky Ward and his bro, Dicky Eklund, fresh from their appearance at the Academy Awards, where their story, “The Fighter,” took home two Oscars, delivering their message of…
Read More »We’re on the March or in the March or however we want to say it. This month and next month are huge for cultural activities in the city. Here’s a sample and by no means everything this month: Today and tomorrow: XFest 2011 at 119 Gallery, 119 Chelmsford St (www.119gallery.org)…
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