Ryan W. Owen, Writer and Photographer
Seen from any approach to Boston, the Prudential Tower has figured prominently into Boston’s skyline since its construction in the early 1960’s. And, with 52 floors, the Pru stands as Boston’s second-tallest building, just behind the John Hancock Tower‘s sixty. The Tower, completed in 1964, rises 749 feet, or, with its radio mast (pictured atop […]
Read MoreIn those long ago days before cellphones, speed dialing, and stored numbers, folks like Tommy Tutone telephoned girls like ‘Jenny’ by actually dialing 867-5309. If he was a modern type, he may have even punched the number into the telephone’s touchtone keypad, an innovation that was several years old by the time the song was […]
Read MoreMaybe you’ve come through Billerica. On the northern approach, near the North Billerica commuter rail station, lies the site of the John Rogers homestead, marked by a sign erected by the Massachusetts Tercentenary Commission in 1930. The sign memorializes an event that happened even longer ago on today’s Billerica Avenue. Early in Billerica’s history, during the […]
Read MoreOn April 2, 2012, at 9 AM (EST), the National Archives will release the 1940 US census schedules at http://1940census.archives.gov/. The release, administered by The National Archives in partnership with archives.com, will mark the first time a census has been released online. Site visitors will gain free access to view, search, print, and download the 1940 census […]
Read MoreTo mourn the loss of the Bon Marché Department Store in Downtown Lowell is almost like mourning the loss of a beloved grandparent. On the day the Bon Marché closed, its faithful came out one last time to reflect on their relationship with the store, and to discuss among themselves what its loss would mean to […]
Read MoreToday, Downtown Lowell’s Memorial Hall is mostly known for the Pollard Memorial Library it houses, named for the city’s late mayor Samuel S. Pollard. For its first 90 years, until its renaming in 1981, Lowell residents and visitors knew it as the Lowell City Library. The library’s building, Memorial Hall, was built to remember the […]
Read MoreEastern Massachusetts has its own way of saying things. Whether you’re drinking a tonic, or slurping a frappe, or quenching your thirst with water from a bubbler, you know you’re near Boston when the letter “r” starts migrating within sentences (think ‘supah idear’). To linguists, New England breaks into two dialect regions: Eastern New England […]
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Most family historians have THAT box. The box always looks roughly the same. It’s the box that belonged to the toaster your mother had three toasters ago. Or, maybe it’s a shoebox for a pair of long-lost boat shoes from Thom McAn or a gift box from Anderson Little (remember them?). Maybe it’s a bag […]
Read MoreOn a cool, cloudy Saturday afternoon in early May 1967, two men simultaneously spotted the billowing smoke escaping from the first-story windows of Sacred Heart School’s “new building” on its Moore Street campus in Lowell, Massachusetts. John J. McWilliams, an off-duty police officer, ran and activated the fire alarm at a nearby fire-box. John Sickles, […]
Read MoreOne of the more interesting aspects of writing a blog is seeing which topics attract the most interest. In mid-December, I wrote a post about the Spanish flu (link below) and its spread across Massachusetts in 1918 and 1919. Since then, it’s been one of my most popular posts (placing fourth most popular of the […]
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Forgotten New England 