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Frequent contributor Jim Peters shares his thoughts with us . . . I promise to have an article about Native Americans in this area in the next installment. I have been doing quite a bit of thinking lately, mostly about my father who is wrestling with cancer, mesothilioma, if I…
Read More »Last night, when New York became the sixth state in America to legalize same-sex marriage, it was an event of great historic import, but from this Massachusetts perch, it was a bit anti-climatic. Contrary to all the predictions of Western Civilization as we knew it collapsing back in 2004 when…
Read More »The Globe’s writers have stepped up their game for the crime saga unfolding in real time in Boston. In today’s paper, commentators James Carroll and Kevin Cullen have their say about the James Whitey Bulger horror show. Carroll has a masterful essay that puts the crime story in perspective, both…
Read More »In today’s NYTimes, opinion writer Charles Blow thinks about poverty. Read his column here, and get the NYT if you want more. I’ve never heard of unemployed people voting to limit how many weeks they’ll be eligible for unemployment checks or people without medical insurance voting to deny themselves access…
Read More »To celebrate St. Jean-Baptiste Day in 1880, the Lieutenant Governor of Québec, Théodore Robitaille, commissioned Calixa Lavallée to compose O Canada to a patriotic poem by Adolphe-Basile Routhier. Born in Quebec – in 1857, Lavallée moved to the U.S. and lived in Rhode Island where he enlisted in the 4th…
Read More »In 1996-97, there was a lot of activity in Lowell around a concept called “Lowell: The Flowering City.” At the Gorham Street/Back Central branch of Enterprise Bank you can see a tall sign with the logo from the project, a gesture meant to help shift the nickname of the city…
Read More »Rain List Poem . rain rainbow rainbow cactus rainbow trout rain check raincoat raindrop rainfall rain gauge Rainier III Rainier, Mount rainmaker rainmaking rainspout rainsquall rainstorm rain-wash rainwater rainwear rainy rainy day Rainy Lake, Ont. . —The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1970 edition)
Read More »In today’s NYTimes, columnist Tim Egan offers a eulogy for Clarence Clemons and tells what it meant for him to see a black guy and a white guy making music together. Read his essay here, and get the NYT if you want more.
Read More »Mediabistro.com reports that Penguin Books’ new app for Jack Kerouac’s legendary novel “On the Road” is selling well and ranked at #4 on Apple’s iPad apps list. Read the news bulletin here.
Read More »I’m thinking about stories this morning, when media waves around here are dominated by reports about the capture of criminal Whitey Bulger near Los Angeles. What about all the people whose lives are entwined with this man’s almost stranger-than-fiction life story? Consider the trail of death and destruction he dragged behind…
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