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The entry below ias being cross posted from Marjorie Arons Barron’s own blog. Let’s all be grateful that Boston’s bids for the Olympics have all failed. In the 1990’s, a self-appointed group, originally called The Boston Olympic Organizing Committee, conducted feasibility studies and mounted bids to host the 2000 Olympics,…

“Voilà my solution” – (PIP #34) By Louise Peloquin Over the last two weeks, our peeks into the past have presented local stories covering life journey episodes. (1)  This one deals with the most time-consuming of all – work. The text, perhaps a foreign news agency dispatch, offers a humorous twist on…

The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons Barron’s own blog. Want to get away from current news stories, weather warnings, and Donald Trump’s hush money election fraud trial? Want to stretch out with a book amidst the fragrance of lilacs, the perfume of flowering crab trees and…

A pair of recent Lowell Sun articles on the Lowell Planning Board’s review of the city’s proposed master plan update grabbed my attention so that topic will be the focus of today’s newsletter. (There was a City Council meeting Tuesday night, but it was conveniently uneventful.) The Lowell Planning Board,…

Philosophy and the Insect By Stephen O’Connor  As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods. They kill us for their sport.      –Shakespeare My father was a religious man, a devout Catholic who got down on his knees every night to pray. Though he regarded Catholic theology as the…

“Who wants to sell a day in June?” – (PIP #33) By Louise Peloquin Love’s gentle spring doth always fresh remain. Shakespeare’s verse comes to mind when perusing the following 67-year-old news items. Accounts about young couples celebrating upcoming spring  weddings and babies welcomed into the world never grow old. Ever…

It’s budget time for the city of Lowell. At Tuesday’s City Council meeting, City Manager Tom Golden presented his proposed FY2025 budget to Councilors. Other than a brief statement by Golden, there was no discussion on the budget. That will occur on Tuesday, June 4, 2024, at 6 pm at…

This article originally appeared on this website on November 10, 2022, in recognition of the fortieth anniversary of the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC. I’m reposting it today in honor of Memorial Day 2024.  1965 September 1, 1965 – PFC Donald L. Arcand 19 years old.…

Pet Soundings A Music Essay by David Daniel Let me confess right up front. When the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds album dropped fifty-eight years ago this month I was one of the naysayers. In the early and mid-1960s you bought albums (such an exotic concept today!) based upon the appeal…

Lorne Cupples was born in Canada to Simone and James Cupples and immigrated to the United States in 1886 when he was a child. He lived on Grove Street and married Lilla Simpson in June of 1905. Lilla sadly passed away in childbirth with the infant in March of 1907.…