Archive for June 18th, 2012

June 18th, 2012

Lowell’s Hotel Vendome connection

by DickH

Hotel Vendome Boston

Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of the tragic 1972 fire at the Hotel Vendome in Boston (corner of Commonwealth Ave and Dartmouth Street) that left nine Boston firefighters dead (See Globe story of memorial ceremony). The 1871 building was under renovations at the time and was largely unoccupied. The fire wasn’t necessarily a bad one; it was quickly doused and many fire units had already left the scene. With a few units remaining behind doing cleanup, a substantial corner of the building suddenly and without any warning collapsed, burying two fire trucks and 17 firefighters. Nine of the men lost their lives. A subsequent investigation concluded that some structural alterations made in the course of renovations had weakened the building and the weight of the accumulated standing water that had run off from the fire suppression made the building structurally unstable and caused its collapse.

The Lowell connections? The Hotel Vendome was constructed by two brothers from Lowell, Henry C. Howe and John F. Howe (no relation to me). The Howe brothers had started their working life as carpenters but quickly progressed to be master builders, specializing in mill construction in Lowell and all over New England. From massive mills to massive hotels was an easy and predictable leap.

The Vendome still stands, now as condominiums that few readers of this site could afford. There is a monument to the firefighters across the street from the Vendome on the tree lined mall that bisects Commonwealth Ave.
 

CategoryHistory | CommentNo Comments »

June 18th, 2012

The Suicide Squeeze

by DickH

This year, my interest in pro sports waned I think because of some combination of the late season collapse by the Red Sox, the loss in the Super Bowl by the Patriots, and the refusal of Tim Thomas to join his Stanley Cup winning teammates at the White House. I don’t watch much TV but there’s a small one perched next to the computer which I do watch often enough and so sometimes the TV get turned on as background noise. But not to sports. At least not very often.

Last night was an exception. ESPN Sunday Night Baseball from Wrigley Field with the Red Sox v Cubs with Terry Francona doing color commentary: that was worth reaching for the clicker. It didn’t take long to understand why both teams are currently at the bottom of the standings in their respective divisions. There was a lot of sloppy play. (The Sox won, 7 to 4)

One play that wasn’t sloppy occurred in the seventh inning with the Red Sox at bat. Ryan Kalish was on third and Daniel Nava was at the plate. As the pitcher cocked his arm to throw, Kalish broke for the plate and Nava squared around to bunt. Nava made contact, the ball dribbled out in front of the plate. I had just seen one of baseball’s most exciting plays – the suicide squeeze. It’s called that because if the batter fails to get his bat on the ball, the catcher ends up with the ball well in advance of the arrival of the runner coming from third base who will easily be tagged out. The photo below (which is NOT of last night’s game) shows pretty well the alignment of the various players in a suicide squeeze. In the play depicted in the photo, the batter missed the ball, the catcher has it in his glove and the runner is soon to be out – hence the term “suicide” – you run yourself into an out unless the batter gets down the bunt. Last night, the Red Sox worked the play to perfection.
 

CategoryCurrent Events | CommentNo Comments »

June 18th, 2012

The debate about debates: enough already by Marjorie Arons-Barron

by Tony

The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog.

It’s the next phase of silly season.  U.S. Senate candidates Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren are to-ing and fro-ing about how often they’ll debate one another and in what settings.  So far, she has agreed to four televised debates and he, to two televised debates and two radio debates.

Included among those she has agreed is one sponsored by the Kennedy Institute, moderated by newsman Tom Brokaw, aired on MSNBC.  Given the Kennedy association (Vicki Kennedy issued the invitation) and the decidedly liberal bent of MSNBC, Brown doesn’t want to do that.  Warren, for her part, doesn’t want to do a radio debate on conservative-leaning Dan Rea’s WBZ program.  But Brokaw and  Rea are both  consummate journalists, more than capable of fair moderating.

The candidates need to smarten up. They need to acknowledge that the more debates they do, the more we benefit.  Granted, I speak from the perspective of a political junkie, one who watched every one of the Republican primary debates. By the end,  despite the flawed formats,  I had a better sense of them all.

In 1996, there were eight debates between Sen. John Kerry and Governor Bill Weld for the Senate seat, and the public benefitted.  As the Harvard Crimson noted at th time, “the differences between Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and his Republican challenger, Gov. William F. Weld ’66, have become almost as clear as the disparities between their alma maters–Yale and Harvard.”

As for  venues, if Brown and Warren are afraid to go into what they think is each other’s territory, how can we have confidence that they’ll zealously face up to entrenched powers in the Senate or make the tough calls on war and peace?  Elizabeth Warren showed courage in standing up to Wall Street and its proxies in Congress on the matter of regulating financial services.  Where is that courage now?  Scott Brown claims to have a record of independence, able to stand on his own feet and not bow to others if he disagrees with them.  Why should he fear going into a debate in uncertain territory?

It’s really disappointing to see this focus on gamesmanship rather than significant issues facing our nation. Control of the Senate will have a lot to do with the fate of our fiscal condition, energy policy, education, environment, health and, yes, jobs. Sending Warren and not Brown, or Brown and not Warren, does matter.  Both owe the public more than just their controlled avertisements. Even though current debate formats usually prevent  extended thoughtful discussions, they are far better than not having them.  In addition to general debates, there should be others focused specifically on domestic and foreign policy issues.

The bottom line is: we need as many  debate opportunities and venues as possible to learn, in a relatively unscripted way,  what these candidates all about.

I welcome your comments in the section below.

CategoryUncategorized | CommentNo Comments »