Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Monster.com and Corporate Volunteering

Monster.com blimp visits Maynard. From the collection of the
Maynard Historical Society. Click on photos to enlarge
Third in a multi-part series AT THE MILL.

Back in the spring of 2014, Monster.com, at one time a famous technology disruptor in the jobs search industry, moved away from Maynard, giving up on its lease of 300,000 square feet at the mill and moving 625 jobs to a smaller space in Weston. Monster had arrived for the birth of Clock Tower Place in 1998. Its growth, shrinkage and finally, abandonment contributed mightily to the arc of Clock Tower, which came to an inglorious end a year later. For such a large company, Monster was a lightly visible presence in town, sponsoring blood drives and an annual road race to benefit the Boys and Girls Club. At its peak a thousand employees showed up every day, but the company did not work as hard as it might have to be an actively participating citizen. 

Monster.com hot air balloon
For Monster, the arc of the company's presence in Maynard roughly paralleled the company's course from a technology innovator to a technology can-it-catch-up-again. When men stand on a corner near a Home Depot, and other men drive up in pick-up trucks looking for day labor, that's a job exchange. Ditto a bulletin board covered with business cards next to the door of a diner. Put the jobs offered on paper and disseminate copies, and it's a newspaper's jobs section. Now suppose the match-ups are computerized. Potential employers post and search. Potential employees search and post. Inclusion and exclusion criteria filter the searches. Voila, Monster!

Initially, Monster owned the niche. It was the first public job search on the Internet, first public resume database in the world, and the first to have job search and job alerts. The company went public, i.e., sold shares on a stock exchange, in December 1996. Valuation peaked in 2000 at $8.5 billion.

Much was written about Monster’s decline. What went wrong? From Woody Allen, in the movie Annie Hall: "A relationship, I think, is like a shark. You know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is a dead shark." Monster was a dead shark. It was too late to social media, to apps, to niches, to better search engines. These days, CareerBuilder. Indeed, Glassdoor and LinkedIn dominate the generalist jobs market, while DICE, TheLadders, USAJobs and LookSharp service niches. In 2016, what remained of Monster was purchased for only $426 million. The company continues to downsize. This fall the monster itself was re-imaged as large, purple and hairy, with glowing eyes, but it is in no way clear that this will reverse the trend.  

The new (2017) Monster is large, furry and purple. Interestingly, this monster,
the old Monster and Gossamer (below) have  a thumb and three fingers on
each hand. It's an American animation thing dating back to the 1920s.

Much like Monster, most of the companies in the mill, and for that matter, the owners and operators of Mill and Main, are near-invisible to the inhabitants of the town. One exception is Battle Road Brew House, which has involved itself in Octoberfest, the veterans-support pub crawl and a 5K road race. The other tenants, the ones whose employees step out for meals and shopping in Maynard’s stores, are the economic engine helping this town prosper. Can they do more than just shop? Yes!

Monster's monster has more than a
passing resemblance to Gossamer,
from the Bugs Bunny years.
Corporate volunteer programs are a means of committing to a cause or a community. Especially in a small town, a company can become a useful, visible presence that improves quality of life. And, as these days, more people are looking to live near where they work, contributing to the community benefits the company, as a vibrant community makes it easier to recruit and keep employees. Research clearly shows that a well-organized company volunteer program lowers employee turnover, more than paying for any outlay the company makes.    

How to make this work? Corporate leadership needs to ask employees what they believe or are already involved in as volunteer activities. From this, companies may decide to officially sponsor specific activities, or else have an action plan that acts as a clearing house for company approval of ideas that employees want to pursue. Paid time off and matching funding are useful ways to commit. Lastly, companies need to close the loop – get reports on what employees are volunteering for, and share those stories within the company. And it won’t hurt to coordinate public relations publicity with the town and the local media.

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Maynard in Boston Globe 1909

Second in a multi-part series AT THE MILL

Edmin J. Park, reporter for The Boston Daily Globe, must have been a phenomenally fast typist, because his May 13, 1909 opus titled “Maynard’s Fate Hangs on Tariff” clocked in at 2,900 words, with a finishing note that the next day’s column in this series will be from Canton. I have a hard time with 700 words once a week, and this guy was doing four times that, daily.

Park’s title referred to the fact that Congress was in the process of changing tariff law. Twelve years earlier, a loosening of tariffs on imported woolen cloth and clothing has contributed to the bankruptcy of Maynard’s mill, and also Damon family owned mill on the road toward Concord. The American Woolen Company ended up owning both, and prospered greatly when the tariffs were reinstalled. What Park was referring to in his title was the fact that Congress had just passed the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Act, which softened some tariffs, but left the protective tariff on woolen goods unaffected. President Taft was expected to sign the bill into law.

New Village houses, 1902. Click on photos to enlarge. Photo
courtesy of Maynard Historical Society.
The article described in detail the addition of mill-owned housing called New Village – about 300 residences built on streets named after Presidents. Park lauded the factory owners for eschewing row housing in favor of individual buildings, each with its own greenspace. New Village was also called out for having a sewer system – something the rest of Maynard would not begin to have until 1929.

Maynard was described as very much a one industry town, with more than half the men plus many of the women and children working in the woolen mill. Park added that the mill was also generating electricity, both for its own use, and selling to Maynard and South Acton to power street lights. Not mentioned in the article, but it is likely that power – and lights – stopped at a specified hour, as people were expected to be home already. Back in Amory Maynard’s day, the mill rang a curfew bell at 9:00 p.m. Mill workers were warned they would lose their jobs if they were found on the streets after the bell tolled.

Park noted that a large number of immigrants from Finland were employed at the mill, and that Finns made up fully one third of the population of the town. He described the Finns as “somewhat clannish,” but also as good citizens, active in town affairs, having their own church, and and a brass band that performed concerts.

Park added that the Town of Maynard had just voted itself “no-license” (no sale of alcohol) by a vote of 487 to 408. Prior to national Prohibition (1919-1932), individual towns were voting themselves wet or dry. Earlier that year Marlborough and then Hudson had voted themselves dry, so there was a concern that out-of-towners would be descending on Maynard’s bars and pool halls en masse. No-license did not stick. Maynard voted itself wet the next year and the four years after that. Maynard voted dry in 1915, but by then Marlborough had gone back to wet.

Riverside Cooperative Building, corner of Nason and Summer Streets.
Major fire, January 30, 1936. Photo courtesy Maynard Historical Society.
Several paragraphs describe the rise of the cooperative store movement in Maynard. Way back in 1875 a group of employees at the mill called themselves the Sovereigns of Industry. They decided to start buying groceries and provisions wholesale, in Boston, rather from the local stores. Buying trips evolved into having their own store. In time, this cooperative effort was incorporated as the Riverside Cooperative Association, with its own building open to the general public who could become members for an annual fee, and become stockholders for a higher fee. The building was at the corner of Summer and Nason Streets. The Co-op burned in January 1936. The site now hosts a brick building that had been erected for the Knights of Columbus.

The newspaper concludes with a mention that a man did not have to be from a family of wealth or long-time residence to be elected to office. By example, he named one William Jones, Chairman of the Board of Selectmen, who in his day job was a motorman on the Maynard-based trolley that served Maynard and neighboring towns.

Banner of the newspaper in 1877. Typeface similar to present-day Boston Globe.

The Boston Daily Globe (1872-1960) was the earlier name of The Boston Globe. After troubling early years, the paper firmed up to become one of Boston’s larger newspapers. Competitors were The Boston Post (1831-1956) and the Boston Herald (1846-present). The Globe went public in 1973, was bought by The New York Times in 1993 for $1.1 billion dollars, was sold to John Henry by the Times in 2013 for $70 million dollars. He also owns other stuff. 

Wednesday, December 6, 2017

The Incredible Shrinking Millpond

First in a multi-part series AT THE MILL. According to one account the millpond was 18.2 acres and the Ben Smith impoundment between the dam and White Pond Road bridge was 18.8 acres. 

Then genius of Amory Maynard was to separate the mill from the dam. By doing so, a large dam could be constructed upstream from where a small dam was, at Mill Street, and the new woolen mill located downstream. This separation created a larger vertical drop. And as water power is created by a combination of volume and vertical drop, more power. By creating the Ben Smith Dam, connecting canal, mill pond, and securing water rights upriver, including to Boone Pond and Fort Meadow Pond, the mill was able to operate year-round with a volume of 100 cubic feet per second, equivalent to 50,000 gallons per minute, and a vertical drop of close to twenty feet.

Aerial view drawing of the center of Maynard, MA (1879), showing the
mill pond much larger then compared to today. Click on photos to enlarge.
Canal enters pond from left. Water exits under mill to river on right.
Power production was on the order of 50 horsepower. Not much, which is why not too long after the railroad reached Assabet Village the mill was adding coal-fired steam engines. By 1879, the year the aerial view image of the center of Maynard was published, the mill complex had grown to six major buildings and two smokestacks. Water was still essential for the steam engines, and to wash the raw wool and the finished cloth after the dyeing process.

The aerial view shows a much larger mill pond than we have now. Size was not essential to maintain an adequate water reserve, as the canal connected the mill pond to the much larger body of water held back by the Ben Smith Dam. Through the years, various projects nibbled away at the pond. The three large mill buildings fronting the pond are partially over the water, and actually required draining the pond in 1916-18 during construction of the last one. When this was taking place a trestle and flume (large wooden pipe) crossed the drained pond from the west side. This was to provide water necessary to wash and process the wool. The trestle had still been relatively intact during a partial pond draining back in 1977. Remnants of the trestle can be seen protruding above the water’s surface when the pond level drops in summer.

Trestle across the millpond, 1977. The trestle was built in 1916 when the
pond was drained for construction of Building 1. It had held a flume that
conveyed water to the mill. Courtesy Maynard Historical Society.
West of Sudbury Road, land was filled in for construction of the school that was associated with Saint Bridget Parish. A large part of the south side of the pond was filled in to create the parking lot that extends to Building 5 (Stratus Technologies and Battle Road Brewery). Land was created on the north side for the parking lot that serves as the site for the Maynard Farmers’ Market. Before the 2008 recession, Wellesley Management, the past owner/operator of the mill complex, had proposed to build an office building on the south side, and either a multi-level parking garage for more than 1,000 cars, or else fill in much more of the pond for parking. This did not come to pass, but clarified that the owners of the mill own the pond. One restriction on the pond owners is that water cannot be diverted from the river to the millpond when volume in the river drops below 39 cubic feet per second.

Mill pond partially iced over, circa 1930. Note that the pond is much larger
than it is today, and there are no parking lots. Estimated date from fact that
Riverside CO-OP building (burned Jan 1936) is in photo.
The amount of water in the pond is controlled at both ends, a gatehouse on the canal for flow in, and a similar gate near the end of Building 3 for flow out. This past summer, Mill & Main had some problems with the pond mysteriously filling to overflowing despite the summer drought and despite periodically letting water out. Problem solved when water was observed entering at the gatehouse, with an estimated round-the-clock inflow of 10,000 gallons per minute. Scuba divers were hired. Turns out that a tree stump had become wedged in the opening, preventing the gate from closing completely.

Back in the day of looser regulations and liabilities, the mill pond provided recreational opportunities for residents of Maynard. People fished, boated and swam. The pond, fed by water from the river, was far cleaner than the river downstream of the mill’s discharges. But not entirely clean, as upriver, Hudson, Stow and other towns were discharging their own mill wastes. Even so, an ice house was filled with ice every winter. Ice skating took place, with the occasional fall-through, and either rescue or fatality.


Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Clematis, Fall-Blooming

Fall-blooming Clematis across top of fence
Sweet Autumn Clematis (Clematis terniflora) differs from most of the species in this family in that it is a fall bloomer of small flowers rather than a spring bloomer of conspicuously large flowers. It is also an aggressively fast climber of arbors, fences and other plants to a height of 10 to 25 feet in a single season. In late August and early September it displays a mass of white flowers suggesting, if anything, a covering of snow.

A couple of months later the plant is visually transformed. The flowers are gone. In their place are the maturing seed clusters. Against a background of green leaves, the seeds appear in starfish-like arrangements of five or six reddish seeds, each attached at one end to a central node, and with a white filament/tail extending from the outer end. En masse, this display could be taken for some under water coral- or anemone-like growth. For whatever reasons, the maturing seeds do not appear to be attractive to birds or other seed eaters, as the display remains intact as time proceeds into fall.

Clematis seed clusters in October.
Click on photos to enlarge
In fact, it is possible that the red coloration is protective. When berries, grapes and fruit first appear on plants the coloration is green. And the sugar content is low. As these seed delivery systems mature, carbohydrates are replaced by sugars and the surface skin takes on a distinct color - think blueberries, cranberries, blackberries. Most of the color is due to the creation of a family of chemical compounds called anthocyanins. These are a fraction of a larger family of compounds called polyphenols - all known to have anti-fungal and anti-bacterial activity. In effect, the dark coloration taken on by maturing fruits and berries (and clematis seeds) is a natural protection against rot.

The second function of coloring up, for grapes and berries called "verison," is a signal to animals that the plants' creations are now ready to be eaten. On the face of it, this feels counterproductive - why go to a season-long effort to create packaging around seeds only to see the end product hijacked by some hungry herbivore? However, the point of being eaten is that  the seeds will pass through the animal's digestive system intact, and because defecation will likely take place distant from the starting point, help distribute seeds to new locations.

Autumn Clematis seed cluster, October
See heads are red, and tails are
beginning to change.
Autumn Clematis seed cluster, November
Seed heads have lost color and
tails have become 'feathery'
This distribution story does not apply to Autumn Clematis. Come late October to early November the clematis seed clusters undergo a gradual transformation. The red fades. The white tail of each seed develops a 'feathery' look. There is no tasty outer fruit to shout "Eat me." Instead, the individual seeds, now too dry to allow bacterial or fungal infection, will in time detach from the core and be borne away on the winds of chance.   

Autumn Clematis is native to Japan; introduced in the United States in the late 1800s. Here, it has no serious insect or disease problems, and in some southern states is being designated as a category II invasive species. Individual plants can get out of hand, for example growing up through a hedge and then completely covering the top with a blanket of white flowers.  Gardeners can control size by cutting a plant to within a couple feet from the ground; the next year it will start its rampant growth all over again. Flowering is on new growth, so there is no loss of a year's flowering after aggressively pruning in the fall.

Pronunciation: Accent on first syllable or second? KLEM-uh-tis or Klem-AH-tis? Various expert sources favor the first, but enough of them acknowledge that the second is valid, too.


Wednesday, November 15, 2017

Winter Moths - Act Now to Save Your Trees

December 3rd update: Male winter moths are seen flying after sunset. Our birch tree is trapping far more males than females. This indicates that after four years of tree banding our local infestation of females is lessened, but the pheromones the trapped females release are attracting males from a larger distance. In effect, we are doing the neighborhood a favor. It is not necessary to band every tree every year.

November 15, 2017: Winter moths, previously written up (Nov 2014 and May 2016) as an invasive species, will soon be starting to emerge from their pupal state, triggered by the first few frosts. If you start seeing large numbers of moths flying around in the evening, it’s time. And if you intend to protect your trees, act now. Garden supply stores, including Russell's Garden Center (Wayland), carry Tree Tanglefoot in 15-ounce containers. One container should be enough for a few trees. The product can also be ordered on line in that size or five-pound pails.

White birch tree with plastic wrap covered with Tree Tanglefoot. Females
get stuck at the bottom edge. Males, attracted to their pheromones, get
stuck higher up. Click on photo to enlarge.
The procedure for using this sticky stuff is to wrap the trunk of the tree two or three feet off the ground with clinging plastic wrap. Optionally, secure this with a band of duct tape on the top and bottom edges of the plastic wrap (not touching the tree). Then, open a container of the product and use a 1.0 to 1.5 inch wide spatula to smear the stuff on the plastic. Do not apply directly to tree. Wearing disposable plastic gloves while working with this stuff is a good idea, as it is hard to wash off bare hands. The wrap should be left on until late December.

Garden supply stores also sell a roll of a paper product that has the sticky stuff pre-applied. All you have to do is unroll it around the tree trunk. Negatives with this version of the product are that it's expensive, moths may be able to pass under the band if the tree bark has deep fissures, and the sticky band is so narrow that it can become completely filled with moths within days. This means you will have to remove it and repeat the process, else the next wave of females just climbs over the dead bodies of the early ones.    

Female winter moths climbing up a birch tree trunk.
The reason this works is that winter moths have an interesting dimorphism. Males have strong flight muscles, with an ability to pre-warm these muscles through shivering before cold weather flight. In contrast, females have only vestigial wings. Sacrificing flight capacity allows more than fifty percent of their adult body weight to be given over to eggs. Mating is achieved after the females climb up tree trunks and then release scent pheromones into the air. Males fly to them. Both sexes get stuck in the sticky stuff.  

Winter moths, native to northern Europe, reached Canada in the 1930s. The introduction was accidental, the problem monumental.  The "winter" part of the name refers to an evolutionary strategy used to avoid predation. Most insect eaters are active during warmer months. By not emerging until after late November frosts, there perils are avoided. This plague appeared in eastern Massachusetts around 1990 and to date has slowly spread to affect land east of Interstate I-495 and down into Cape Cod, but not farther west. Yet.

Female winter moth, with vestigial wings.
The trees to protect are birch, maple, and any type of fruit trees. Winter moth eggs hatched in early April. The tiny, tiny hatchlings climb inside beginning-to-open leaf and flower buds and nibble from the inside. By early June the full-sized, green, inch-worm-like caterpillars will descend to the ground where they will transform into pupae, not to emerge as adults until next winter.

Help is on the way. Canada successfully introduced parasitic flies and wasps from Europe. Both prey specifically on winter moth caterpillars, with eggs hatching inside, and larvae consuming the caterpillars from the inside out. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been experimenting with this approach. The net result is a downgrade from traumatic damage to minor damage, with occasional bad years. However, until these bio-controls are introduced locally, best advice is to sticky-band your favorite trees in the fall as being much less expensive than spraying in early spring.

Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Carbone Park, Maynard, MA

Site of bridge-to-be
Click on photos to enlarge
On September 23rd, Boy Scout Troop #130 – 23 strong – showed up at Carbone Park, Maynard, to give it a makeover. Troop members removed trash, repainted the sign, cleared the woodland trail and replaced one of the bridges that cross the modest, muddy stream which transverses the park.

Completed  ten foot long bridge
The day-long (pizza interrupted) event was organized and managed by Evan Jacobson as his Eagle Scout project. To earn the Eagle Scout rank, the highest advancement rank in Scouting, a Boy Scout must fulfill requirements in the areas of leadership, service, and outdoor skills. Although many options are available to demonstrate proficiency in these areas, a number of specific skills are required to advance through the ranks of Tenderfoot, Second Class, First Class, Star, Life, and Eagle. The top three ranks require community service projects. Approximately five percent of Boy Scouts reach Eagle Scout.

This was just the latest of several Eagle Scout projects that have benefited Maynard’s trails and conservation land. In 2015, Scouts constructed a sixteen foot long bridge for the Assabet River Trail, accessible from Concord Road and Colbert Avenue. Other past efforts improved ability to walk on the future route of the Assabet River Rail Trail, and also clearing the historic Marble Farm site on the north side of Maynard.

Carbone Park is very much a “pocket park.” Located at the corner of Summer and Florida Streets, it is approximately 70 x 100 yards. The front third facing Florida Street is a grassy area with five benches. The back two-thirds are wooded and hilly, with a dirt trail that crosses two short bridges over a muddy stream.  The woodland is dominated by maple trees plus a sprinkling of beeches, oaks, and a few dying elm trees. The stream is a remnant of a longer creek that once started farther to the north and bisected the land where the ArtSpace building now stands.

Carbone Park: Art installation by Catherine Evans (2015). 
Trees at the entrance to the trail sport colorful plastic fringes. This is an art installation “Thistle” by ArtSpace-based artist Catherine Evans. This example of public art is supported by the Maynard Cultural Council. In early spring the park is a good place to spy emerging skunk cabbage – first the alien-looking spathes, followed by the unfurling of green leaves. Farther up the trail there are examples of glacial erratics – rounded boulders left behind by glaciers. One large boulder is spotted with lichen. The park has a bit of an invasive species problem. The Scouts cut a goodly amount of burning bush, which was dominating the undergrowth. The woodland closest to the grassed area has some Japanese barberry, Oriental bittersweet and multiflora rose. Toward the northeast border there is some poison ivy, but this is a native hazard, not a foreign one. 

Carbone Park sign. Size ~ 1.4 acres.
Carbone Park was named after Walter E. Carbone, a life-long resident of Maynard, and according to the Maynard High School yearbook from 1927, “Boy who has done most for the class.” The town’s Conservation Commission was founded in 1967. Walter, who had served on the Planning Board 1951-1959, was one of the original appointees to ConsCom and remained a member until his death in 1993. The park was so-named in 1987 to honor Walter’s twenty years service. However, the town did not get around to erecting a sign until 2005. Twelve years later the sign was showing its age, so the Scouts included repainting the sign as part of their makeover.

Walter is not the only Carbone who triggers memories in long-time residents. Edith, his wife, served Maynard as librarian from 1953 to 1972. She was in this position in 1962 when the library got its own building (now the police station). For many, many years, Uncle Pete Carbone’s Twin Tree Café prospered on Powder Mill Road. It was well known regionally for Italian-American food, with seafood a specialty. Pete was actually Vito A. ‘Pete’ Carbone. He and Walter were not related. Anyway, in 1965 the business was sold to Pete’s chef, John Alphonse, Sr., in time going to John Alphonse, Jr., always named Alphonse’s Powder Mill Restaurant. Today, the building is home to the Maynard Elks, Lodge #1568. 

Tuesday, September 12, 2017

Historic Hurricanes Massachusetts

Hurricane Irma, east of Puerto Rico, Sept 5, 2017
If any remnants of Hurricane Irma reach eastern Massachusetts, all we are likely to see are rainy days. But there are historical records of much, much stronger storms having a direct, catastrophic impact locally.

1635: The Great Colonial Hurricane made landfall at Narragansett Bay in late August as a fast-moving Category 3 hurricane. It crossed directly over the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Historians consider this "… probably the most intense hurricane in New England history.”

1938: The practice of naming Atlantic hurricanes with women’s names did not begin until 1947; or retiring names of major storms after 1955, or having men’s names rather than only women’s starting in 1979. Thus, the storm of 1938 came be known as the Great New England Hurricane, also the Long Island Express. Mistakes in interpreting weather data had led to a prediction that this storm would dissipate to gale force before making landfall. Instead, on September 21, 1938, it reached Long Island with hurricane force winds and a significant storm surge. More than 600 people died – mostly in Rhode Island. The oldest residents of Maynard and Stow remember vast numbers of trees being blown down, blocking streets and damaging buildings.   

The 1938 hurricane downed trees and telephone poles on Maple Street,
Maynard, MA. (courtesy Maynard Historical Society)  
1954: A double-header! Hurricane Carol also crossed the east end of Long Island, reaching landfall as a Category 2 storm. In Boston, high winds destroyed the steeple of the Old North Church. Hurricane Edna crossed Cape Cod as a Category 2 storm just ten days after Carol had tracked a bit farther west. Locally, rainfall of 5 to 10 inches on ground already saturated by the passage of Carol flooded basements and rivers. Combined, the storms destroyed much of the peach and apple crops just weeks before harvest time. 

1955: Hurricane Diane waltzed ashore in the Carolinas, wandered across New Jersey and southern New York, before heading eastward across much of Massachusetts. By this time it was weak wind-wise, but very, very wet. Much of southern Massachusetts, from its border with New York to the ocean, experienced flooding. Half of Worcester was under water. Locally, an estimated 15 inches of rain fell in four days. The Assabet River crested at 8.93 feet, the highest it had been since 1927 and the highest since. (The flood of 2010 crested at 7.1 feet.) Main Street flooded, as did the first floor of the mill building closest to the river. No bridges were lost.   

1991: Hurricane Bob!!! This storm of August skirted the coast before making landfall at Newport, Rhode Island as a Category 2 hurricane. Forecasting was good, so Rhode Island and Connecticut were able to declare of emergency before the storm hit. The storm crossed eastern Massachusetts fast and relatively dry, so most of the damage was due to high winds and storm surge along the coast. Provincetown reported sustained winds exceeding 100 miles per hour. Locally, downed trees and minor damage to buildings. The name “Bob” was permanently retired, joining Diane, Edna and Carol as other New England hurricane names we will never hear anew.

An explanation of ‘storm surge’: coastal flooding can be severe during hurricanes (and also northeasters). Storms are centers of low air pressure, meaning less weight of air on the water, causing water level to rise underneath storms, which have low barometric pressure. Of much greater importance, the push of wind across long distances of water for prolonged periods of time not only generates large waves, but pushes water. When this reaches shore at times of high tide, the water can be five, ten, fifteen, even twenty feet above normal high tide. The Galveston, Texas hurricane of 1900 pushed a storm surge of 10 to 15 feet across a city that was mostly 10 feet above sea level, flattening the city and resulting in a loss of an estimated 10,000 lives, making it the deadliest natural disaster to every strike the United States. The Texas flooding from Hurricane Harvey was from rain, whereas the coastal flooding from Hurricane Irma was mostly storm surge (as when Hurricane Sandy hit New Jersey and New York).

One oddity - a storm tracking north along a west coast, much as Irma tracked north along the west side of Florida, will initially push water away from the shore, as wind direction on the north side of the storm is east to west. After the eye passes, the winds on the south side of the storm blow west to east, pushing all the water back.

All Irma delivered to eastern Massachusetts was scattered showers. Jose blessed Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket and the outer Cape with gale force winds and inches of rain, but much less west of Boston. Maria is too far away to guess what it will bring to New England.  

Wednesday, September 6, 2017

Consider the Muskrat

Caltech mascot is a beaver
MIT mascot is a beaver. Officially,
"Tim the Beaver"
Consider the muskrat. A muskrat can be thought of as a low-rent version of a beaver – they toil but do not build, their tails make no signature slap upon the waters when startled, trapped, their fur is worth less, and no college (and only one high school – Algonac, MI) ever selected the muskrat as its mascot; this versus the beaver mascots for MIT, Caltech, Babson College, Oregon State University, University of Maine at Farmington, and others. For more than 125 years there was a Beaver College, originally located in the town of Beaver, PA, but later relocated across the state to near Philadelphia; from 1907 to 1972 it was Beaver College for Women, then co-ed, meaning that it was also Beaver College for men, but finally undertaking a name change in 2001 to Arcadia University. (Past graduates were able to get replacement diplomas with the new name.)  

Muskrats (about three pounds) are rarely far from water. (Internet download)
Enough with run-on sentences. The muskrat is small. Adults weight about three pounds (compared to 30 or more for a beaver). The muskrat is short-lived. Average lifespan in the wild is 3-4 years. The muskrat is prolific. Females reach sexual maturity at one year, and can have 2-3 litters per year, 6-8 kits per litter. The muskrat is omnivorous. While the roots and stems of aquatic plants are a diet mainstay, muskrats will eat insects, crayfish and dead fish. In turn, the muskrat is food for many predators, falling prey to mink, coyote, fox and raccoons on land, owls descending from the air, lastly snapping turtles, otters and large fish in the water.   

Muskrat swimming.  When startled, they can
dive, and stay under water several minutes.
Muskrats are covered with short, thick fur brown or black in color, with the belly a bit lighter. The fur has two layers, which helps protect them from the cold water. The tail is hairless, rat-like in appearance, and used for swimming. The tail drags on the ground when walking on land, and so leaves a distinctive trail when walking on mud or snow.

Muskrats spend much of their time in the water, typically the shallow water of marshlands, streams and small ponds. Muskrats will reside at beaver ponds, and may even move into an abandoned beaver lodge. Otherwise, muskrats create modest-sized mounds of soft vegetation (not sticks or branches) near the shore, with a living chamber inside and an underwater entrance, or else burrow into river banks and live in these tunnels. The combination of less vegetation (eaten or for habitat) and shoreline burrowing contributes to erosion and flood risk.    

A muskrat "push-up", in this instance using stems from marsh plants,
provides some shelter from weather and predators, but is not nearly
as large or as sturdy as a beaver family's branches and mud abode.
Muskrats are indigenous to North America. Because many people in many countries thought it would be a good idea, muskrats are an invasive species across much of northern Europe, across much of Siberia, and also in parts of South America. The animals were imported either for fur farms, and then escaped, or were released to the wild with the idea that local trappers would have one more species to trap. The consequences are the same ecological impacts seen in North America – erosion and flood risk – made worse by the absence of mink, the primary predator. (Mink is also an invasive species in parts of Europe, but that is another story.)   

In Massachusetts, shooting muskrats is against the law, but a license can be obtained for trapping. The season opens on November 1st and closes at the end of February. Muskrat fur does not have the same cachet as mink, but there is some demand for muskrat pelts, especially from Korea and China. Prices at auction are about $3-4/pelt. Wild mink brings about $10-12/pelt. Farmed mink, a larger animal with a higher quality fur, brings $50-80/pelt. The official winter hat of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police is made with muskrat fur.    

Wednesday, August 16, 2017

Congregational Church, Maynard, MA 1852-2017

Congregational Church, Maynard, MA 1852-2017. Click on photo to enlarge.
The Union Congregational Church was Maynard’s first parish, established as a Evangelical Union Society in 1850, when eight locals decided to form a Sunday school. This predated the creation  of the  Town of Maynard by 21 years. Amory Maynard became the Sunday school’s first superintendent. The next step was to engage a preacher for Sunday services. Both school and services took place in the newly constructed train station. Prior to this, people walked or traveled by wagon the three miles to Stow’s Evangelical Church.

Within a few years these residents of Assabet Village incorporated as a church and selected a committee to find a site to build a house of worship. What came to pass is that Amory and his business partner William Knight donated land on Main Street (the same street they had petitioned Sudbury to build for access to their factory), and the building was built, financed by members. Buying in got these families reserved pews, as was a common practice of that era. The congregation dates it start to 1852, but did not move into the completed church building until spring of 1853. The cost of construction and furnishings came to $3,876. Rev George W. Frost was the first Pastor.

Stained glass window in chapel of Congregational Church, Maynard, MA.
Gift from Lorenzo Maynard in 1892, along with other windows.
A sampling of important dates: The steeple acquired a bell in 1855; the church its first organ in 1959; the church was enlarged in 1866. In the early 1890s, Deacon Lorenzo Maynard (son of Amory Maynard) contributed funds for stained glass windows in the church. Four of the windows bear the names of his daughters – Frances, Mary, Victoria and Hattie – who predeceased him. He also donated toward the addition of the building on the west side, to house a chapel and classrooms, including a glorious stained glass portrait of Jesus holding a lamb, over the words “I AM THE GOOD SHEPHERD.” A similar window graces the Lorenzo Maynard family mausoleum in Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, where Lorenzo, his wife Lucy and their five children are interred.

The building has no steeple from 1909 to 1920. The original had been blown off the building in a great storm on April 9, 1909. The church was officially renamed the Union Congregational Church in 1927. The bell was replaced by chimes in the mid-1940s.

1902 photo for 50th anniversary. Shows the
original steeple, and a picket fence bordering
the sidewalk rather than the current stone wall.
(Courtesy Maynard Historical Society)
A number of the students who attended services and the Sunday school at Congregational Church went on to find a vocation in the ministry, some in the armed forces in time of war. Corinna Shattuck, orphaned as a young child, was raised by her grandparents, in Acton. She was a member of the church 1866-1871, and taught Sunday school during that time. In 1873 she began missionary work in Turkey, where she remained – with interruptions to treat her health problems – until 1910. Miss Shattuck was in the city of Oorfa (now going by Urfa or Sanliurfa) in December 1895 at the time of attacks on Armenians and other Christian sects. She personally sheltered 300 men, women and children on or near the mission grounds, sparing them the fate of thousands of others. Afterwards she created shelters and schools and employment for orphaned Armenian children. She established a school for the blind. She was known and honored as the “Heroine of Oorfa.”

The closing of one church (Congregational 2017) or two (Methodist 2014) or three (Episcopalian 2006) is not unique to Maynard. Across the United States, what are referred to as the mainline Protestant churches have been undergoing a prolonged decline in attendance, membership and number of parishes since the 1960s. Estimates are that membership has dropped by half. In contrast, membership in Catholic and Evangelical Churches has been increasing, albeit not as fast as the population increase as a whole.

The re-use of church buildings as such is problematic, characterized by problems with an aged infrastructure, and a question of what use the main nave and altar space can be put to. Two churches in Maynard were deconsecrated and converted to private residences. One in Acton became home to a theater group. The future of the historic Methodist and Congregational Churches in Maynard remains to be seen.




Thursday, July 13, 2017

Thoreau's Thoughts on Walking

See also a March 2017 posting on poem "The Old Marlborough Road."

"If you are ready to leave father and mother, and brother and sister, and wife and child and friends, and never see them again; if you have paid your debts, and made your will, and settled all your affairs, and are a free man; then you are ready for a walk."

May 2017: U.S. Post Office issues a first class stamp honoring
the bicentennial of the birth of Henry David Thoreau.
Click on photo to enlarge.
July 12th was the 200th anniversary of the birth of Henry David Thoreau. [Actually, birth-named David Henry Thoreau after his deceased uncle, David Thoreau. Thoreau reversed the order of his names shortly after he graduated Harvard College, in 1837. Apparently, growing up, his family had called him Henry rather than David.] The Thoreau Society recently held its annual gathering of Thoreauvians, to discuss all things Thoreau, and to celebrate the bicentennial of his birth. Many newly published books, and the U.S. Post Office issued a stamp.

“Walking” was the title of one of his essays. His first public reading was at the Concord Lyceum on April 23, 1851. Between 1851 and 1860 Thoreau read from the piece a total of ten times, more than any other of his lectures. “Walking” was published in the June 1862 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, shortly after his death from tuberculosis at age 44. The essay’s length is slightly more than 12,000 words. Various internet sources have the complete essay available on line – some with researchers’ annotations. A few excerpts:

“The West of which I speak is but another name for the Wild; and what I have been preparing to say is, that in Wildness is the preservation of the world.” Thoreau felt that it was necessary for one’s soul to be able to walk in wildness every day. He was aware, however, that his Massachusetts terrain was not true wildness, but rather a post-colonial return of once-farmed land to wild meadow and forest. Thoreau's three excursions to Maine had brought him into true wildness ("grim"), so he knew the difference.   

Thoreau was not a casual walker. “It is true, we are but faint hearted crusaders, even the walkers, now-a-days, who undertake no persevering, never-ending enterprises. Our expeditions are but tours and come round again at evening to the old hearth side from which we set out. Half the walk is but retracing our steps. We should go forth on the shortest walk, perchance, in the spirit of undying adventure, never to return; prepared to send back our embalmed hearts only, as relics to our desolate kingdoms. If you are ready to leave father and mother, and brother and sister, and wife and child and friends, and never see them again; if you have paid your debts, and made your will, and settled all your affairs, and are a free man; then you are ready for a walk.”

Thoreau’s opinions were not humble opinions: “I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits unless I spend four hours a day at least — and it is commonly more than that — sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields absolutely free from all worldly engagements… When sometimes I am reminded that the mechanics and shop-keepers stay in their shops not only all the forenoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting with crossed legs, so many of them — as if the legs were made to sit upon, and not to stand or walk upon — I think that they deserve some credit for not having all committed suicide long ago.”

Wooden dumbbells were a popular type of
exercise equipment in the 1800s.
Thoreau was aghast at the idea of exercise for its own sake: “But the walking of which I speak has nothing in it akin to taking exercise, as it is called, as the sick take medicine at stated hours — as the swinging of dumb-bells or chairs; but is itself the enterprise and adventure of the day. If you would get exercise go in search of the springs of life. Think of a man’s swinging dumb-bells for his health, when those springs are bubbling up in far off pastures unsought by him.”

Thoreau cherished the meditative rewards of wildness walking: “I am alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods bodily, without getting there in spirit. In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations, and my obligations to society. But it sometimes happens that I cannot easily shake off the village. The thought of some work will run in my head, and I am not where my body is; I am out of my senses. In my walks I would fain return to my senses. What business have I in the woods, if I am thinking of something out of the woods?”

A human trial conducted at Stanford University (Bateman 2015) concluded that walking surrounded by nature reduced risk of depression more than walking an equal amount of time in an urban setting.


Wednesday, July 5, 2017

Boston Post Cane - Maynard and Stow

The Boston Post was a popular and influential newspaper some 100+ years ago.  In 1909, Edwin Grozier, the publisher, decided to promote the newspaper by donating ebony shaft, gold-capped canes to the Boards of Selectmen of 700 towns in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island.  Engraved on the top of the gold head of each cane were the words "Presented by The Boston Post to the OLDEST CITIZEN of __________ [name of town and state] (To be transmitted)."

The idea was that the towns would award these BOSTON POST CANES to the oldest male citizen for the remainder of his life, to be returned to the town upon his death, to be awarded to the next oldest, and so on.

Maynard's Boston Post Cane (click on photo to enlarge). This cane was
presented to Maynard in 1909, awarded to a series of men in honor for
being the oldest male resident, went missing in 1928 and was recovered
in 1981. Honoring the oldest resident (male or female) started again in 1999.
The canes were made by J.F. Fradley and Co., a New York City silversmith and cane maker. Joseph F. Fradley (1843-1914) began a silversmith business in 1866. His business had an excellent reputation. J.F. Fradley items appear for sale in  fine arts and crafts auctions. The business was managed by his son, George F. Fradley, at the time the canes were made. Although many of the newspaper articles about recipients of Boston Post Canes describe the cane heads as 14 karat gold, some of the internet photos show wear to reveal non-gold metal underneath, confirming that the cane heads were gold-plated rather than all gold. This makes sense. Gold, rather than gold plated, would have made the canes prohibitively expensive, even back in 1909.  

Women achieved the right to vote in 1920, but it took ten more years before The Boston Post approved a changing of the rules to allow women to be awardees.  

The Boston Post went out of business in 1956, but the Boston Post Cane tradition continues in many towns. As years went by some of the canes were misplaced, stolen, sold, lost or destroyed. Some went missing for years, decades even, only to surface again. In time, most towns decided to keep the original cane in a town office or at the local historical society, and either discontinue the practice entirely or else award a plaque to the oldest resident in lieu of the cane. 

The Boston Post Cane Information Center [http://web.maynard.ma.us/bostonpostcane/], maintained by the Maynard Historical Society has become a clearinghouse for all things BPC. The starting point was a 1985 article written by Maynard historian Ralph Sheridan. After his death in 1996, David Griffin took up the traces, and still gathers news of canes lost, found and awarded.

Side view, showing ebony shaft of the cane. "Ebony"
comes from the heartwood of several species of tropical,
slow-growing trees. It is black or near-black in color, and
extremely dense (will sink in water). The tree species are
endangered, and in many countries, harvesting or selling
of ebony is illegal. Well known uses include the
black keys of pianos, and parts of stringed instruments.
A few facts plucked from the BPC website: As of last count, 517 towns continue or have resumed honoring their oldest citizens. Most have the original canes gifted them in 1909, but some are using brass-capped mahogany replicas purchased from the Town of Peterborough, NH. Some towns stipulate that to qualify, a person must be a current resident and living in the town the past 10 or 15 years. Watertown's cane went missing in 1910, and did not return until 99 years later. At the time Mary Josephine Ray of Westmorland, NH, passed away, age 114.8, she was not only the oldest ever holder of a Boston Post Cane, but also the oldest person in the United States.

Stow's Boston Post Cane is kept in the Town Vault in the Town Hall building, along with other historically important artifacts. Recipients are presented with a Boston Post Cane lapel pin. The cane had gone missing 1951 to 1971. Actually, it was in the Vault all the time, but misplaced. Since 1971 there have been 12 recipients. The most recent was Dr. Donald Freeman Brown - awarded the cane when he reached 99 years. He passed away in 2014, age 105. The honor and lapel pin have not yet been awarded to a new oldest resident.

Top of cane showing non-gold metal. This may be silver. If so,
there may have been layers of copper and nickel between the
silver and gold, to prevent tarnish bleeding through the gold.
Maynard's Boston Post Cane is on permanent display at the town building. It had gone missing around 1928, not recovered until 1981. In 1999 the Maynard Historical Society decided to revive the tradition of honoring Maynard’s oldest citizen by presenting him or her with a plaque from the Maynard Board of Selectmen. The most recent five: Elizabeth Dodd, Dorothy Barlow, Arlene Cook, Mildred F. Duggan, and currently Ben Sofka. Ben, a life-long Maynard resident, received his plaque in February 2017, and is at present 101 years old.

Stow's and Maynard's neighbors do and do not continue the Boston Post Cane tradition. Hudson, Harvard and Sudbury awards plaques to their most senior citizens. Acton is considering restarting the same practice. Bolton and Boxborough apparently do not participate, either because these towns had too small a population to get a cane back in 1909, or because the original canes went astray. Starting in 1962, Concord decided to change to an annual Honored Citizen Celebration. The awardee is steward of the Boston Post Cane for a year and leads the Patriots' Day Parade.  

Tuesday, July 4, 2017

Ticks: Lyme, Anaplasmosis, Babesiosis

From left to right: larvae, nymph, adult male, adult female.
Nymphs and adult females are the vectors for human infection.
Ticks get on your shoes, socks or legs when you brush against
vegetation. Ticks do not drop from above. The CDC website
recommends chemical repellants, also how to do a tick check
and how to wash and dry clothes to kill ticks.
June and July are the prime months for contracting a tick-borne disease. During these months the vector is the nymph stage, which is about the size of a poppy seed. There is a lessening incidence in August, September and further into fall and winter, as the vector becomes the more easily seen adult female tick (the size of a small apple seed), and also because people spend less time outdoors with the onset of colder weather.

An observation here: the term 'bite' is not descriptive. If not detected, a nymph will latch on for 3-4 days for a blood meal before dropping off; adult females stay attached for 7-10 days. Adult males are not on you for a meal. Rather, they are wandering around looking to find and fertilize a female. This meet-and-mate part of the tick's life cycle is the reason that deer are integral to a region harboring a serious tick disease problem. Small mammals (mice, chipmunks, etc.) are vectors for the larval and nymph stages to become infected, but a large mammal species such as deer is essential for the mating and final blood meal that allows the fertilized adult female tick to lay up to 3,000 eggs.    

Lyme, Anaplasmosis and Babesiosis are the big three for New England, but the full count for tick-borne diseases now overtops a dozen. More information on tick-vector diseases can be seen as the Centers for Disease Control website: http://www.cdc.gov/ticks/. The CDC has great information on the tick diseases, and also on practical matters such as how to avoid getting bitten by a tick, and what to do once you have been bitten.

Lyme starts subtle. If the stricken person missed the actual bite, then the first sign is often but not always the signature "bull's eye" rash. Moderate fever, chills, fatigue, muscle ache and a headache may accompany the rash. Only months after the rash and the initial set of symptoms are gone is there a possibility that really bad consequences set in: arthritis, partial facial paralysis, meningitis, limb weakness, and so forth.

Anaplasmosis is not subtle. The symptoms are more akin to being run over by a car, having it circle around to hit you again, and then one more time to park on your head. Some 7 to 10 days after the bite the symptoms arrive all at once: extreme fatigue, high fever, uncontrollable shivering alternating with profuse sweating, night sweats, headache, nausea, abdominal pain, loss of appetite, weight loss, muscle pain, cough, mental confusion, and extreme fatigue. Really extreme.

Babesiosis is not subtle. Symptoms, arriving 10-30 days after being host to a tick, are akin to those of Anaplasmosis, plus it destroys red blood cells and platelets. From the latest data published by the CDC, Massachusetts has more cases of Babesiosis than any other state.

The CDC uses the term "malaise," but this does not convey the soul-crushing lethargy of either of these full-speed infections. Not everyone exhibits all the symptoms, and many of these symptoms overlap with what people expect if they have the flu, causing many people to delay seeking a medical evaluation, or doing so, getting a misdiagnosis.

Actually, these days, diagnosis and treatment are straightforward. Do you have some or all of that litany of symptoms, especially fever and fatigue? Were you in any place a week or four ago where there might have been ticks? That's it. A blood sample will be taken, but especially early in the course of the infection the test results can be false negative (says you don't, but you do). Standard medical practice is to start antibiotic treatment immediately. Treatment should never be delayed until the lab results are back. These days, there is an assumption that more than one disease is transmitted from the same tick, so for Babesiosis, doctors may prescribe multiple antibiotics.

Neither casual contact nor intimate sexual contact will pass on any of these diseases, but receiving a blood transfusion has been a confirmed vector. There are no laboratory screening tests to verify that donated blood is not infected. 

Not treating infections in a timely fashion can have very serious consequences. Delayed treatment may require hospitalization and intravenous antibiotics. Especially in older or immuno-compromised people there are risks of compromised breathing, kidney failure, nerve damage and death. A practical point - your guests can contact a tick disease here, then travel to regions where doctors may not have tick disease awareness. Your parting words might include "Safe travels, and if you develop a rash or become ill, tell your doctor you were in tick territory."