Following is an excerpt from an interview with Fred Faust, who has worn a lot of hats and coats in Lowell since he came to town as a radio reporter at WCAP. In 2003, historian Mehmed Ali, then on the staff of Lowell National Historical Park, sat down with Fred to…
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A very generous anonymous donor saved the famine-era St. Brigid’s Church in New York City’s East Village from the wreakers ball. The Gothic-style church was designed by Patrick Keely – a Tipperary man – who moved to New York as a young man had a long and distinguished career as an architect. The work of…
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Writer and painter Chath PierSath, a former Lowell resident who still lives in the region, crossed the Thai-Cambodian border in 1979 with members of his family on the way to Aranyaprathet Refugee Camp. With the help of his brother and aunt, he and his sister came to America in 1981,…
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Arguably Lowell’s most prominent historical figure, Benjamin F. Butler published his memoirs in 1892 under the title “Butler’s Book.” A. M. Thayer and Co., Printers, Binders, & Book Publishers of Boston, offered the autobiography to subscribers, not an unusual system in that day. The book is 1,154 pages long, counting…
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Last night Middlesex District Attorney Gerry Leone announced that he will not seek re-election in the 2014 state election nor will he seek any other elective office. Gerry is a long-time prosecutor and has done a great job as DA so his services to the people of Middlesex County (and…
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It’s a complete coincidence that on the very day this year’s nominees for the Academy Awards are announced that I finished by 15 second video submission for the 2013 City of Lowell Movie Contest. While it would be nice to win that $1,000 prize, I’m not in this for the…
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Edited by Tuyet-Lan Pho, Jeffrey N. Gerson, and Sylvia R. Cowan, “Southeast Asian Refugees and Immigrants to the Mill City: Changing Families, Communities, Institutiions—Thirty Years Afterward” was published by the University Press of New England in 2007. Among the contributors to this collection of essays is Leakhena Nou, a former…
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Sara Swan Griffin, author of “Quaint Bits of Lowell History,” published “Little Stories About Lowell: Romances and Facts of Earlier Days” in 1928. The book was produced by the Butterfield Printing Company. Following is an excerpt from the chapter “The Canals of Lowell.”—PM . “The Pawtucket Canal almost surrounds Pawtucket…
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MassMoments reminds us that on this day January 9, 1961, President-elect John Fitzgerald Kennedy addressed the Massachusetts legislature. He acknowledged in an oft-quoted reminder that “of those to whom much is given, much is required.” Yet, the main subject of his address was the unique legacy of the Commonwealth –…
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Before the Lowell Folk Festival, before Winterfest, before the Southeast Asian Water Festival. Click on image to enlarge.
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