Kept safe in US, Iraqi royal statue heads home – MassArt professor helped in recovery
By Farah Stockman – Globe Staff / September 7, 2010

WASHINGTON — It took four men to lift the wooden box in the lobby of the Iraqi Embassy. They carried it gingerly to the waiting truck, then loaded it into the belly of a commercial plane. Hours after President Obama announced the end of US combat operations in Iraq last week, one of that country’s most precious artifacts — the statue of an ancient king — began its journey home to Baghdad.

In a saga that reads like the plot of an Indiana Jones movie, the 4,400-year-old statue of King Entemena was stolen from Iraq’s national museum in 2003, during widespread looting in the early days of the US invasion. It then moved through an underworld of black-market art dealers until it was recovered in a 2006 US sting operation, with help from a professor of antiquities in Boston.

Then, for four more years, it sat in a glass case at Iraq’s embassy in Washington, waiting for Baghdad to be safe enough for its return. It is expected to arrive later this week, the final chapter in a tale of the anarchy of war and the fragile promise of peace.

“Now he’s going back where he belongs,’’ said John Russell, a professor at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, who was hired by the State Department to help preserve Iraq’s ancient art. Russell verified Entemena’s authenticity for US officials.

Hey, students, here’s the lowdown on Beantown
By Tenley Woodman/Boston Herald – September 7, 2010

Attention, college students and other newcomers to the Hub – there’s more to understanding Boston than watching “The Departed” or “Good Will Hunting.”

Here, it’s tonic, not soda or pop. There are four seasons:Red Sox, Patriots, Bruins, and Celtics.

And the underground transit system isn’t the subway, it’s the T.

Visit Fenway Park: This is a must. Whether you like the Red Sox or not, Fenway is a piece of history and source of Boston pride. It’s the oldest Major League Baseball park still in use, and catching a game here is a rite of passage for locals. 4 Yawkey Way, Boston.

To take a tour, call 617-226-6666, or go to mlb.mlb.com/bos/ballpark/tour.jsp.
…snip…
Check out Avenue of the Arts: The intersection of Huntington and Massachusetts avenues starts what was once known as the Avenue of the Arts. This stretch of real estate is home to institutions such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Museum of Fine Arts.

HuffPost ranks BU as one of 11 strictest colleges
By Meaghan Beatley/BU Daily Free Press – Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Boston is known for having some of the most prestigious universities in the country, but according to The Huffington Post, it’s also home to one of strictest in Boston University.

BU was listed by the website as one of the 11 ‘strictest colleges’ in the United States in early July, citing its “zero tolerance policy for parties in residence halls” as the reason for its selection.

BU outlines its policies, ranging from drug and alcohol consumption to moped ownership, in the Lifebook located on the BU website.

According to the Lifebook, BU’s alcohol policy accords itself with state laws. However, “the University’s standards of personal conduct substantially exceed the minimum expectations of civil law and custom,” the website states.

Stem cell work in limbo awaiting court’s decision – Ruling on temporary stay may come today
By John A. Hawkinson/The Tech NEWS EDITOR – September 7, 2010

Many stem cell researchers have been left uncertain about their own future and the future of their field as they wait for a federal judge to decide whether to allow the NIH to fund human embryonic stem cell research, within and without of its walls.

A recent federal court injunction barred NIH labs from performing human embryonic stem cell research, and also stopped the NIH from funding grants that supported such research. The judge is currently considering an emergency stay which would temporarily allow the NIH to continue its research and to continue funding research.

The NIH has interpreted the court order to bar work with any human embryonic stem cell lines, but the plaintiffs in the case say they only meant to roll back the additional stem cell lines allowed by the Obama administration in 2009. Those plaintiffs, James L. Sherley and Theresa Deisher, said in a court filing Friday night that the Court’s ban does not apply to research approved under the Bush administration’s stem cell guidelines in 2001.

[James L. Sherley, a former MIT professor, is a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the NIH to halt federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research.]

Wedding went swimmingly
By Mark Shanahan & Meredith Goldstein – Globe Staff / September 7, 2010

North Shore-bred Olympian Jenny Thompson, who’s now an anesthesiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, got married over the weekend to Daniel Cumpelik, a co-owner of RadonSeal, his family’s business. The wedding took place at Hammond Castle in Gloucester. The couple will honeymoon in Zanzibar.
Tattoos on view
Illustrated bodies flocked to the Sheraton over the weekend for the Boston Tattoo Convention, an orgy of ink-related entertainment. Personalities of note at the festivities included Manny Ramirez, who stopped by to see the body art when his game was rained out on Friday, renowned tattoo artist Natan Alexander, and MTV personalities Evan Starkman and Kenny Santucci, who showed off their fashion line, Suck Yeah, with their partner Brett Nimphius. Hamilton’s own Emilee Fitzpatrick of “The Real World: Cancun’’ served as emcee during the weekend.

1533 – Elizabeth I is born in Greenwich, England.  More anniversaries.

Brigham and Women’s to offer hand transplants – At least six people already screened
By Elizabeth Cooney – Globe Correspondent / August 24, 2010

The Boston hospital that last year performed the country’s first face transplant now plans to offer hand transplants under an experimental program announced yesterday.

Brigham and Women’s Hospital has screened at least half a dozen people who have lost one or both hands and may be eligible for the complex surgery, Dr. Matthew Carty, a reconstructive plastic surgeon, said in an interview.

“We’re extremely excited about being able to offer this to patients,’’ he said. “There’s a huge potential pool of candidates in our soldiers returning from the front lines who have had severe limb injuries.’’

Fewer than 50 hand transplants have been performed worldwide, and only three US hospitals, in Louisville, Ky., Pittsburgh, and at an Air Force base in Texas, have undertaken the procedure. UCLA Health System launched a program last month.

Face and hand transplants are considered more complex than transplants of organs such as livers or kidneys because surgeons must also fuse bones, tendons, muscles, ligaments, nerves, and blood vessels, requiring delicate microsurgery.

High note for Framingham music student
By Cindy Cantrell, Globe Correspondent – August 23, 2010

Eighteen-year-old Lauren Fuller of Framingham said she was so excited that she cried when her name was called on Aug. 10 as one of 14 recipients of full scholarships to the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

The students were among 82 teens enrolled in Berklee’s five-week summer performance program with the help of the City Music Summer Scholarship program.

Greater Boston student musicians who received City Music scholarships are trumpeter Matthew Hull of Boston; vocalist Terrell James of Chelsea; vocalist Bianelys Javier of Lawrence; vocalist Juliana Davis of Lynn; guitarist Joseph Santiago of Revere; saxophonist and drummer Alexander Macrides of Roslindale; vocalist Franchesca Phillip of Roxbury; and guitarist Kadeem Roberts of Roxbury.

Scholarships also went to five student musicians who attended the Berklee program from across the country.

The Wild Reeds
Mennonno Sapiens – Posted by Mike Mennonno at 8/23/2010

The Boston Courant  reports that the famous Fenway reeds, hated and beloved, are “likely here to stay”.

An article in this week’s edition says: “The city’s Parks and Rec Department anticipates being denied a request to mow a larger area of the invasive phragmites, commonly known as reeds, which residents and city officials cite as a public safety issue.”

This is the latest in a long battle to Esplanadize that bend of the Muddy River, a move that some claim would eliminate unwanted elements from the area.

Hat tip to UniversalHub – ed.

Boston Latin Special Snowflakes melt in the rain
By Brett – 8/23/10 – 12:12 pm

Avenue Louis Pasteur is currently jammed up with cars idling with parents picking up their kids from…something. On both sides of the road, they’re double-parked, as well as filling bus stops, blocking crosswalks, and all manner of annoyingness. It’s got traffic backed up onto Longwood Avenue, which is one of the major routes ambulances take, and is also causing problems for the MBTA busses and shuttlebusses that use that road.

[Don't neglect to read the comments (110 as I post this) - not many commenters respond positively to Brett's condescension. - ed]

79 – Mount Vesuvius erupts. The cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae are buried in volcanic ash.

410 – The Visigoths under Alaric begin to pillage Rome for three days.  More anniversaries.

Designing a legacy – Celebrated African-American architectural team helped shape city
By Meghan E. Irons – Globe Staff / August 22, 2010

Their designs are part of the fabric of Boston — they can be seen in the new police headquarters, the Ruggles T station, Roxbury Community College, the Southwest Corridor.

But there is much more to the 40-year legacy of Donald Stull and David Lee, nationally praised and one of the first African-American architectural teams in the country.

Stull and Lee were tops in their field in the 1960s, and forces for change in one of Boston’s most tumultuous eras. With major projects in neighborhoods like Roxbury, they are credited with helping to unify neighborhoods and redraw a city that had been socially and racially divided.

Now that they are aging — Stull is 73 and Lee is 66 — they want to pass on their work to the next generations, and it is a legacy that Northeastern University wants to help preserve.

The university, which has collections from other black Boston trailblazers, recently acquired 1,400 tubes and boxes containing their sketches, designs, and drawings, and it plans to apply for a grant to hire staff to sift through the papers and archive them.

Turner issues appeal for witnesses at trial
Political Circuit – August 22, 2010

Boston City Councilor Chuck Turner is taking his criminal defense to the people.

Literally.

Turner sent a note to supporters last week and placed ads in community newspapers looking for witnesses who would be willing to testify at his trial, which is scheduled to begin Oct. 12 in US District Court in Boston. He is accused of accepting a $1,000 bribe and lying to the FBI.

“My lawyers plan to put on the stand those who can testify regarding help received from me and whether money ever stood between their needs and my service,’’ Turner wrote in the note.

The Letter

Incoming college freshmen face lessons in handling credit, staying out of debt
By Michelle Singletary – Washington Post / August 22, 2010

Entering freshmen at colleges across the country will be the first class of regular semester students to face credit card restrictions under the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act of 2009.

If you are under 21, to open a credit card account you will need to either show you have the income to make payments or get a cosigner 21 or older who has the ability to do so.

Credit card companies are prohibited from marketing credit within 1,000 feet of a college campus. This limit would include related college events. Companies are also banned from offering certain “tangible’’ gifts.

But I wonder how successful the Credit CARD Act will be. There will be locations near a campus that will give credit marketers a chance to pitch to students. The companies may not be able to offer a free T-shirt or stuffed animal, but they can entice students with discounts, reward points, or promotional credit terms, according to final rules released by the Federal Reserve.

And I’m sure there are plenty of parents who are convinced that their kid needs to establish credit. So they will be all too willing to cosign. By the way, the Federal Reserve says that anyone 21 or older can cosign. This means it’s possible that older siblings or even friends may be persuaded to cosign. But no one should ever do this.

Divine Dixie – Bullock Brothers and Hot Tamale Brass Band come together
By Andrew Gilbert – Globe Correspondent / August 22, 2010

As befits a tradition dedicated to sharing a timeless message, the lifespan of a gospel ensemble is often measured in decades and generations rather than years. But even by gospel’s temporally expansive standard, the Bullock Brothers represent a triumph of familial harmony.

Founded in 1950, the soul-stirring vocal ensemble starts celebrating six decades of spreading the good word at the MFA on Friday as part of a double bill with the Hot Tamale Brass Band. Tickets for a 60th anniversary party Oct. 9 at Lombardo’s in Randolph went on sale last Sunday.

With two founding members still on board, Rev. George Bullock and his older brother Rev. Richard Bullock, the group provides a vital bridge to gospel’s golden age, when African-American sacred music produced a current so powerful that it transformed American popular culture, providing rock ’n’ roll, soul, and R&B with an essential jolt.

“What we have planned for the 60th is a lot of oldies but goodies,’’ says George Bullock, 75, who composes most of the group’s original material. “We’re always adding new songs, and old pieces sometimes fall by the wayside. Some of our children who grew up listening to those songs started asking to hear them, so I made a list of songs we hadn’t sung for years and we performed them at our church last month. But with any of our songs, old or new, you know it’s the Bullock Brothers when you hear them.’’

You can’t fight City Hall, but you can marry there – Hall-marked weddings
By Renee Nadeau Algarin/Boston Herald – August 22, 2010

City Hall’s stark, concrete walls may not stir thoughts of romance, but for some, the government building has become a little white chapel.

Last year alone, more than 1,000 couples said their “I do’s” at Boston City Hall, city clerk Rosaria Salerno said.

“It’s their very brief moment and it ought to create an environment in which they can really appreciate each other’s commitment,” the clerk said. She presides over ceremonies in her sixth-floor office, with dark wood furniture, reddish-orange accents and a view of “that terrible, distressed concrete” of the building’s exterior walls.

Devika Dammanna, 30, and husband Venkateshwar, 34, of Boston held a Hindu wedding ceremony last year but officially wed at City Hall on July 22. Despite the grim, bureaucratic surroundings, love was in the air.

“It was just a legal aspect we needed to take care of, but I ended up shedding a few tears,” Devika Dammanna said.

Salerno, who said her busiest wedding days are Mondays and Fridays, takes a little time to speak with each couple to personalize the ceremony, which centers around the themes of commitment and a love that grows.

[Rosaria Salerno lives in the East Fenway. - ed]

565 – St. Columba reports seeing a monster in Loch Ness, Scotland.  More anniversaries.

Fenway’s other athletes – For hawkers, a summer job that is no walk in the ballpark
By Andrew Ryan – Globe Staff / August 17, 2010

Any baseball fanatic dreaming about a lazy summer selling peanuts and popcorn at Fenway Park should know this: Lazy won’t schlep that case of bottled water up and back to the nosebleed seats at the top of the bleachers.

Lazy won’t keep your hair from being singed when you hold that portable hot dog oven over your head.

Lazy certainly won’t cut it on “Hot-dog Christmas,’’ that hallowed 11:05 a.m. game on Patriots Day, when crowds arrive ravenous for lunch and hollering for a taste of summer.

And lazy didn’t earn Fenway hawkers such a vaunted reputation in the industry that a team from Boston recently traveled to Toronto to tutor their Canadian counterparts.

“These guys are probably — and we could get some nonsense for this — some of the best hawkers in the country,’’ said Rich Roper, regional vice president of Fenway’s food provider, Aramark. “I can honestly say that, by the numbers.’’

Markoff scrawled messages in blood – Craigslist suspect wrote ex-fiancee’s name as he took his life
By Maria Cramer and Shelley Murphy – Globe Staff / August 17, 2010

In a macabre twist in the already bizarre tale of Philip Markoff, the accused Craigslist killer scrawled in blood the name Megan, that of his onetime fiancee, and the word pocket on his jail cell wall before dying, four law enforcement officials with knowledge of the case said.

Megan McAllister had broken off the couple’s engagement shortly after Markoff was arrested. There were photos of her placed around the cell, according to one of the officials.

The meaning of the word pocket smeared nearby confounded investigators, the officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the news media.

The chilling image emerged as authorities disclosed other circumstances of Markoff’s apparent suicide, which came a day after what would have been his one-year wedding anniversary. EMTs arriving at the scene said they found wounds on his neck and ankles, according to Boston Emergency Medical Services officials. Other officials have said Markoff was found alone in his cell with a plastic bag tied over his head and a severed artery.

One of the officials said yesterday that Markoff apparently used a piece of a razor to pierce his carotid artery. Attempts to reach McAllister or the lawyer who represented her last year were not successful.

See also:  Victims ‘cheated’ by Philip Markoff’s death

Pub tiff allegedly resulted in death – DA says beer glass wound was fatal
By Brian R. Ballou and Alex Katz – Globe Staff And Globe Correspondent / August 17, 2010

Mike DiMaria drove to Boston from New York last Friday to meet up with old friends from college, as he often did. Later in the evening, the group went to a popular bar in the shadow of Fenway Park, where they sat at a table and passed the night chatting and laughing.

But at nine minutes after midnight, the get-together took a tragic and bizarre turn. Authorities say Hector Guardiola of South Boston, angry after a brief run-in with one member of the group, hurled a beer mug toward the table, hitting a partition. The impact shattered the glass container, sending shards flying through the air inside the well-lit Lansdowne Pub at 9 Lansdowne St.

One piece struck DiMaria, 23, who worked for a compliance firm on Wall Street, perforating his jugular vein, according to authorities. DiMaria, bleeding profusely, was rushed to Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he died less than 30 minutes later. Two of his friends, Danielle O’Brien, a 23-year-old teacher in the New York City public schools system, and Andy Britto, 22, who is studying dentistry in Connecticut, sustained cuts.

O’Brien needed six stitches to close a wound on her shoulder, and Britto was hit in the head so hard by a projectile that he sustained a possible concussion and needed medical staples to close the cut, authorities said.

Magazine ranks Harvard top US college, nods to 8 other schools in Mass.
By Sean Teehan – Globe Correspondent / August 17, 2010

US News and World Report has again ranked Harvard as the best national university, the Associated Press reported yesterday.

The top ranking for 2011, which is to be announced today, returned Harvard to the spot at the top, which it shared last year with Princeton. Harvard took the coveted top position the previous two years.

The US News and World Report annual best colleges list ranks 262 national universities, 266 liberal arts colleges, and 179 northern regional universities. Altogether, 1,477 schools were ranked.

The judgments are based on factors including class size and alumni satisfaction.

Williams College in Williamstown was ranked the best liberal arts college for the second consecutive year. Westfield State University, ranked for the first time this year, was slotted as the best tier-3 university in the Northeast.

Other Massachusetts colleges and universities also received noteworthy positions on the 2011 list. Massachusetts Institute of Technology was number seven in the national universities category. Five other Massachusetts schools (Tufts University, 28; Boston College, 31; Boston University, 56; Northeastern University, 69; and University of Massachusetts Amherst, 99) placed in the top 100 in the category.

Hospitals spent to keep talent – Documents show executives received hefty 2008 payouts
By Robert Weisman – Globe Staff / August 17, 2010

Seven-figure pay packages for several top Boston hospital executives were propped up in 2008 by retention payments, according to a batch of documents filed with regulators yesterday. The hospitals said the lucrative payments were intended to keep academic medical talent in Massachusetts at a time when leading hospitals across the nation were recruiting heavily.

The filings with the state attorney general’s office — the first requiring reporting of compensation by calendar year — showed the highest-paid was Elaine S. Ullian, then Boston Medical Center’s chief executive.

Ullian, who has since retired, earned nearly $4.8 million, including $3.5 million in deferred compensation granted to get her to stay at the Boston University-affiliated hospital.

Retention payouts also figured in the pay packages reported at Partners HealthCare Systems Inc., the state’s largest health care system, and its two founding hospitals in Boston.

Health centers a dose of relief for ailing system
By Christine McConville / The Pulse – August 17, 2010

At 84, Sarah Favuzze has seen her share of hospital rooms and doctors offices, but for a routine checkup, she still heads to the North End Community Health Center.

Situated just a few short blocks from Favuzze’s longtime home, the Hanover Street nonprofit has weathered some seismic shifts in the neighborhood.

The red-brick tenements that once housed multigenerational Italian families now mostly shelter single professionals, but the health center designed with neighborhood folks in mind is still bustling.

If the Obama administration has its way, it will continue to grow.

Yesterday, Dr. Howard Koh, assistant secretary of health for Health and Human Services,dropped by the North End center to detail the government’s plans to help community centers treat 40 million people nationwide by 2015 – more than double what they’re seeing now.

Gov. Deval Patrick: Ethics rules in T chief’s favor
By Jessica Van Sack/Boston Herald – August 17, 2010
Gov. Deval Patrick acknowledged yesterday that the MBTA has a lot riding on the outcome of a lawsuit seeking to halt the proposed Fenway Center – a case that features the wife of the T’s general manager as lead counsel for the plaintiffs.

“We want to win the lawsuit,” Patrick told the Herald, contradicting administration aides who insisted last week that the state’s connection to the suit was tangential. “That’s the first order of business.”

MBTA General Manager Richard Davey disclosed his wife’s key role in the lawsuit on July 29, four months after he was appointed.

Davey’s wife, Jane Willis, a partner at law firm Ropes & Gray, represents HRPT Medical Buildings Realty, a neighbor of Yawkey station – which is set to be renovated as part of the $500 million Fenway Center residential and retail development. The suit was filed in March 2009 against the Boston Zoning Board and takes issue with the board’s approval of the project.

Bad map affects parks, foundation
By John Ruch/Jamaica Plain Gazette – August 16, 2010 – Web Exclusive

A deliberately incorrect map of Jamaica Plain and other neighborhoods produced and distributed by the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) has skewed major reports from the Boston Parks and Recreation Department and The Boston Foundation (TBF), the Gazette has discovered.

The Parks Department and TBF both told the Gazette that they were unaware that the BRA gave them an incorrect map. TBF is “shocked and appalled” by the situation, said spokesperson David Trueblood.

The incorrect map means that the Parks Department’s inventory of parks—and the way that inventory sets the department’s parks policy agendas for the neighborhoods—is significantly inaccurate. In one example, the inventory describes McLaughlin Playground at the peak of Mission Hill’s Parker Hill as being in JP.

Even more significant is the use of the incorrect map by TBF, a non-profit organization that is perhaps the city’s most influential think tank and source of funding. The incorrect map skews TBF’s data analysis in such major projects as its Boston Indicators Report.

1959 – Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, the much acclaimed and highly influential best selling jazz recording of all time, is released.  More anniversaries.

Train (wreck) kept a-rollin’ – 40 years, 17 albums, multiple trips to rehab, and countless appearances in the tabloids later, Aerosmith is back and ready to rock Fenway
By Sarah Rodman – Globe Staff / August 8, 2010

IRVINE, Calif. — Backstage before an Aerosmith show, a sort of happy chaos reigns.

Bassist Tom Hamilton is gabbing with Liv Tyler, the actress daughter of frontman Steven. A calm and collected Brad Whitford talks about being pumped for the show as he sidles by the catering table. A set list from the last gig the band played in the area — the Hollywood Bowl in 2006 — is taped to the wall to remind the band to change up the song selection. Guitarist Joe Perry chats amiably while warming up in his dressing room, strumming an unplugged guitar. All the while, as openers Cheap Trick blare in the background, minions and managers and photographers and techs race around, and the clock counts down to showtime.
Then a new wrinkle to the evening’s preparation arrives with the breaking news that Tyler is rumored to be in the running for a judging spot on “American Idol.’’

When asked about the rumor, Hamilton, drummer Joey Kramer, Perry, and their manager (who remains separate from Tyler’s management) all profess ignorance, and you get the sense this is not the first time they’re hearing potential Tyler news from a third party. Perry tries to choose his words about the speculation carefully. “How shall we put this?’’ he says. “It’s an interesting rumor.’’

As the lights go down, four members of Aerosmith huddle together while Tyler preps elsewhere.

When the lights come up, it’s a whole different story.

Leak case spotlights an MIT divide – A defense research giant, with a long tradition of defiance
By Tracy Jan – Globe Staff / August 8, 2010

It was once called the Pentagon on the Charles, a campus of imposing limestone structures connected by long corridors where some of the nation’s most significant military advancements were hatched.

Here, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, scientists developed radar used to help track and direct fire at German cruise missiles during World War II. During the Cold War, university researchers designed the nation’s air defense and missile guidance systems. More recently, its professors and graduate students have been working with the Army on nanotechnologies to protect soldiers on the battlefield.

But MIT, which has received billions in military funding over the past six decades, has also been home to some of the Defense Department’s most notorious antagonists. Daniel Ellsberg, the former Marine officer famous for leaking the Pentagon Papers, spent a year there as a research fellow prior to the 1971 publication of the secret history of US involvement in Vietnam. Noam Chomsky, the MIT linguist-turned-antiwar activist, landed on President Nixon’s enemies list. In 2000, physics professor Theodore Postol began a decade-long battle with the university, accusing MIT officials of covering up fraud in missile defense testing in order to maintain lucrative military contracts.

And just a week ago, the university’s name became intertwined with another act of Defense Department defiance when several MIT students and graduates were linked to an Army private accused of funneling thousands of pages of classified war records to the whistleblower website WikiLeaks.

John Williams on parade – Celebrating 30 years of music and friendship with the Boston Pops conductor
By Caroline Taylor / Boston Globe – August 8, 2010

IT WAS a frigid night in January, 1980.

John Williams, who had recently been appointed the long-awaited successor to Boston Pops maestro Arthur Fiedler, had just conducted a triumphant concert at Carnegie Hall. I had been dispatched by my new boss at the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Peter Gelb, to stand guard at the Russian Tea Room.

Like John Williams, I had been recently hired, although our stations could not have been more different. So there I stood, a lone sentry in an unheated corridor, watching steaming samovars on gleaming silver trays pass by, desperately trying to look as tall and as menacing as I could to ward off would-be party crashers.

After what seemed like an eternity, Gelb and other esteemed guests swooped in as I maintained my lookout. I borrowed a chair and sat down, my new and only pair of high heels killing me.

I felt a tap on my shoulder and looking up, saw the outstretched hand of John Williams.

“Hello,’’ he offered. “We haven’t met.’’
From Universal Hub:  Before there was a library in Copley Square

1974 – Watergate scandal: U.S. President Richard Nixon announces his resignation, effective the next day.  More anniversaries.

With art, students express unspeakable anxieties – Remedial courses a creative outlet for social issues
By June Q. Wu – Globe Correspondent / August 4, 2010

Ask a classroom full of summer school students to open up about violence, sex, and drugs, and they will likely revert to second grade shyness, school officials say.

But sub in a 20-something instructor for the veteran teacher, blast music from The All-American Rejects from a laptop, give the students glitter, glue, and blank postcards, and the secrets might just come out.

This summer, some Boston public school ninth-graders have been asked to write their innermost thoughts and offer them to PostSecret, a group art project that publishes anonymous secrets sent on postcards online and in print.

Of the nearly 370 ninth-graders in summer school, 125 are wrapping up a new arts-centric curriculum the city piloted this year to help students grapple with social issues through creative outlets.

For five weeks, the students have spent Fridays at the Boston Arts Academy, where recent graduates led group discussions and encouraged the ninth-graders to express themselves through such disciplines as music, theater, and martial arts.

2007 sodium drop lawsuit against TEPs is dismissed, probably settled
By Jessica Liu/TECH STAFF REPORTER – August 4, 2010

The Tau Epsilon Phi sodium drop case, a civil suit filed by two river clean-up volunteers against two MIT graduate students and a former undergraduate, has been dismissed.

The court received notice of a settlement this past May, and therefore acted to close the case after 60 days. The case was dismissed without prejudice, meaning the plaintiffs could sue again for the same cause.

In September of 2007, Thomas Soisson and Katherine Nardin, volunteers for Charles River Cleanup Boat (a non-profit organization that removes floating debris from the Charles River), suffered chemical and thermal burns after a piece of sodium they retrieved from the Charles exploded. Three paramedics sent to treat them also received chemical burns.

After it became increasingly clear that the East Campus sodium drop was not the source of the sodium, the focus of the investigation shifted to another sodium drop held by Tau Epsilon Phi, an MIT fraternity, several days before this block of sodium was found.

1892 – The parents of Lizzie Borden are found murdered in their Fall River, Massachusetts home.  More anniversaries.