October Surprise
Or how my photo of the Hood Blimp made the Official Red Sox Post-season Program
Lord knows I waste my share of time on social media, even though I’ve never been a huge Facebook user and by most standards, tweeting 7,000 times and sharing 4,000 photos on Flickr barely qualifies me as a piker among the ranks of the social media obsessed.
Every now and then it pays off, however, as it did on the morning of Tuesday, Sept. 5. I was wasting time of Twitter when my old-school land-line phone rang just after 9 a.m. I didn’t recognize the number which displayed with a 207 area code. Despite being on the National Do Not Call Registry, I still get lots of unsolicited calls from guys willing to power wash my siding or install free home security systems. So if I don’t recognize the number, I don’t answer.
But a few minutes later, I noticed there was a voicemail. A caller named Chris left a message saying that he was with an advertising agency in Portland Maine and they were interested in purchasing for commercial use a photo that they had found on my Flickr page.
Continue reading ‘October Surprise’
Filed under: Art, baseball, Columns & Essays, Feature stories, Opinion, Photography | Leave a Comment
Tags: ALDS, baseball, Boston Red Sox, Fenway Park, Hood, Hood Blimp, Mark Sardella, photo, photography, Richard Tisei, Scott Brown, social media
The Massachusetts Tech Tax is going to be repealed, and that’s a good thing.
But now that repeal appears certain, all this “let bygones be bygones” stuff is just a little nauseating.
Massachusetts is Democratic state – I assume we can all agree on that much. A state’s political leanings tend to be reflected within any of its sectors and that’s certainly true in the high-tech sector, which tends to skew young.
Tech professionals who support liberal Democratic values recognize the need for tax revenue to fund their agenda, including things like public transportation. But when faced with a Technology Tax that threatened to not just hurt their pocketbooks but to undermine their entire industry and send companies and jobs scurrying for cheaper pastures out of state, well that was a different matter.
Continue reading ‘Repeal, but Don’t Forget the Tech Tax’
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Tags: Brad Jones, Bruce Tarr, High Tech, Karen Spilka, Katherine Clark, legislature, MA, Mark Sardella, Mass., Massachusetts, repeal, Software Services Tax, taxes, tech tax, technology, technology tax, Wakefield Daily Item
Through September 22 at Gloucester Stage Company
Despite the fact that that Driving Miss Daisy won a Pulitzer, an Oscar and a Tony Award, I had somehow never gotten around to seeing the stage or movie version of Alfred Uhry’s masterpiece about the friendship between a sharp-tonged southern widow and her black driver set against the backdrop of a burgeoning civil rights movement.
Any disadvantage resulting from that omission may have been offset by an ability to approach the current production at Gloucester Stage Company unencumbered by preconceived notions about the characters or the plot.
Continue reading ‘GSC’s ‘Miss Daisy’ Is a Funny, Moving Ride’
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Tags: Alferd Uhry, Benny Sato Ambush, Civil Rights Movement, Driving Miss Daisy, Gloucester, Gloucester Stage Company, Jenna McFarland-Lord, Johnny Lee Davenport, Lindsay Crouse, Robert Pemberton, theater, theatre
GOP Legislators meet with members of business community
Wakefield last week became a flashpoint of opposition to the broad new 6.25 percent sales tax on custom software and network design services when The Savings Bank hosted a roundtable discussion with state legislators and technology industry professionals. Thursday’s meeting was the last of eight such technology tax business roundtables that have been held around the state.
Several dozen people attended last Thursday’s meeting, including seven Republican state legislators led by Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr of Gloucester and House Minority Leader Bradley H. Jones of North Reading, who have spearheaded the effort to repeal the tax. Other legislators in attendance were Rep. Donald Wong who represents Saugus and part of Wakefield, Rep. James Lyons of Andover, Rep. Leah Cole of Peabody, Rep. Lenny Mirra of West Newbury and Rep. Brad Hill of Ipswich.
Jones called the tech tax “a mindbogglingly stupid idea” and a “tax on innovation,” while Tarr said that the tax “reflects how out of touch the leadership in the commonwealth is.”
The technology tax was part of a transportation financing bill that also included a three cent hike in the state’s gas tax. GOP lawmakers maintain that the tech tax will be a job-killer and hurt the technology sector in particular, which has been a mainstay of the Massachusetts economy. They fear that inherently mobile technology firms will simply relocate out of state rather than deal with the tax.
Continue reading ‘Opposition to Tech Tax Comes to Wakefield’
Filed under: Feature stories, News, Politics, Wakefield | 1 Comment
Tags: Analogic, bnmc, Edgewater Technology, Mark Sardella, Massachusetts, Rep. Brad Hill, Rep. Bradley Jones, Rep. Donald Wong, Rep. Jim Lyons, Rep. Leah Cole, Rep. Lenny Mirra, Sen. Bruce Tarr, State Street Staffing, tech tax, technology tax, The Savings Bank, Wakefield Daily Item, Wakefield MA
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Suspicious 1940 blaze linked to union activity
On the afternoon of July 18, 1940, the Wakefield Fire Department received a frantic call from the caretaker of the former Arthur G. Walton property at 108 Main St. Hans Meyer, who still lived in the caretaker’s house, reported that the old Walton family mansion was on fire.
The structure was vacant and was in fact was in the process of being torn down by the property’s new owner, developer Pasquale DeCristofaro. Although demolition had begun, the main structure was still standing on the day of the fire.
Around the same time, businessman Lester Russell of Foster Street was returning from Reading. He had just turned on to Lowell Street when he “heard and felt and explosion,” the Daily Item reported. He stopped to see if something had happened to his car and saw the mansion in flames.
When the smoke cleared, the Massachusetts State Fire Marshall’s office would investigate the blaze as suspicious following reports of union trouble earlier in the day among demolition workers.
Continue reading ‘Fire Finished Off the Old Walton Mansion’
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Tags: A.G. Walton, Arthur G. Walton, fire, Lake Quannapowitt, Mark Sardella, Massachusetts, Pasquale DeCristofaro, unions, Wakefield Daily Item, Wakefield MA, Walton, Walton Family
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Daring payroll Robbery of Walton shoe factory compared to Sacco & Vanzetti
When it comes to Wakefield’s prominent old families, chances are you’ve at least heard of the Hartshornes, the Beebes, the Wakefields and the Eatons.
But what do you know about the Walton family of Wakefield, Massachusetts?
There are three streets, a school, a field and an entire block in Wakefield Square that bear the name Walton, and yet, as Walton Lane resident Brian Coughlin points out, the vast majority of people in town probably don’t know much about this once prominent and influential Wakefield family.
Coughlin decided to find out who his street was named after.
“Once you get into it,” he says, “one thing leads to another.”
He wound up with a thick folder of news clippings from the New York Times, the Boston Globe and the Wakefield Daily Item that told the story of payroll heists, union strife, arson and Walton family connections to Yale University, Major League Baseball and Hollywood.
“It has all the elements of a compelling miniseries,” Coughlin says.
Continue reading ‘The Walton Family of Wakefield, Massachusetts’
Filed under: Columns & Essays, Family, Feature stories, History, Profiles, Wakefield | 8 Comments
Tags: AG Walton & Co., Arthur G. Walton, Chelsea, Mark Sardella, Mssachusetts, robbery, Sacco & Vanzetti, shoes, Wakefield Daily Item, Wakefield MA, Walton, Walton Shoes, Waltons
The Young and the Reckless
Kenneth Lonergan’s “This Is Our Youth,” currently on stage the Gloucester Stage Company, paints a compelling, passionate and funny – if not pretty – picture of disaffected upper-class youth in Manhattan’s Upper West Side in 1982. I found myself wondering if the play’s title was intended as an observer’s commentary about the play’s twenty something characters or a lament of the characters about themselves.
It’s likely both.
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Tags: Alex Pollock, Amanda Collins, Gail Astrid Buckley, Gloucester, Gloucester Stage Company, Jenna McFarland-Lord, Jimi Stanton, John Malinowski, Kenneth Lonergan, Lewis D. Wheeler, Mark Sardella, Marsha Smith, theater, theatre, This Is Our Youth
It’s the parking…
Pop quiz: What’s the first thing you do if you’re a new business moving into Wakefield Square?
If you answered, “Hire Brian McGrail to go before the Zoning Board and get a waiver from the parking requirements,” you would be correct!
Bonus question: Why do you need a waiver from the requirements for parking?
If you answered, “Ain’t none,” you would be right again, but we’d be forced to subtract points for grammar.
A recent Wakefield Daily Item story about measures that the Economic Development Committee is taking to revitalize Wakefield’s downtown area listed some of the businesses that have vacated the business district of late. None mentioned their reason for leaving except one.
Can you guess what that reason was?
Lack of parking is correct! Have you considered trying out for Jeopardy?
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Tags: business, economic development, Lexington, Lynnfield, Mark Sardella, MarketStreet, Massachusetts, Melrose, revitalization, Wakefield, Wakefield Daily Item
A Fine Kettle of Fish
Israel Horovitz’s ‘North Shore Fish’ at Gloucester Stage Company
When Israel Horovitz wrote “North Shore Fish” in 1986, the Gloucester fish packing industry was already in trouble. Plants were closing, and with the local fishing industry sputtering, those that remained in business were reduced to repackaging frozen filets from overseas rather than fresh local fish.
That’s the setting of Horovitz’s play, currently on stage at the Gloucester Stage Company. The North Shore Fish of the title is a fish packing plant that has provided a living for generations of Cape Ann working class families, but now finds itself on the cusp of extinction. Jenna McFarland Lord’s authentically austere set reflects the bleak circumstances that the plant and the employees are facing.
Continue reading ‘A Fine Kettle of Fish’
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Tags: Aimee Doherty, Brianne Beatrice, drama, Erin Brehm, Esme Allen, Gail Astrid Buckley, Gloucester MA, Gloucester Stage Company, Israel Horovitz, Jenna McFarland-Lord, Lowell Byers, Marianna Armitstead, Massachusetts, Maureen Lane, Nancy E. Carroll, North Shore Fish, Robert Walsh., Russ Swift, theater, theatre, Therese Plaehn, Thomas Phillip O’Neill
Commencement Speech
We are right in the middle of the graduation season, and I am again available for a small stipend to deliver the keynote address at any commencement ceremonies. Or you can save yourselves the money, save me some time, and spare your graduates a few minutes of agony and just read it here.
Graduates, distinguished members of the faculty, valedictorian, salutatorian, and Sagittarians. I trust that covers everyone.
I did not come here today to bore you. That’s the superintendent’s job. Nonetheless, I am here to tell you that you truly can live your dreams. In fact, I note that several in the front row have already begun. Wake up! There will be ample time to sleep during the valedictory.
This day brings back memories of sitting on folding chairs with my classmates on a sweltering June day many years ago, tuning out my commencement speaker. So today, it is my distinct honor to go unnoticed by the class of 2013.
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Tags: commencement, graduates, graduation, Mark Sardella, school, speech, students, Wakefield Daily Item
Mark Sardella 