In 1993, when it grappled with fundamental questions the state's educational finance system, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court used language from the state's more than 200-year old constitution as the …
Be well. Stay safe. Fight for justice.
Work for peace.
In April of 2020, not long after the COVID-19 pandemic began, I had an inexplicable urge to dig into my late father’s stamp collection, which had been sitting unexamined on my shelves since about 2012. I created a challenge for myself: each day find a stamp that was somehow connected to that day, write a short blurb about it, and post it on Facebook with a picture of the stamp. I thought I’d do that for a few weeks. But the pandemic continued and what started as short blurbs became a year of daily essays that not only discussed historic events, famous people, and obscure Americana but also recounted personal and family stories and examined how these decades-old stamps shed light on a host contemporary challenges. Thanks to my daughter Rebecca, every one of those 365 essays – from the early succinct ones to the later rambling ones – are collected on this website, where you can view them by date, by broad category, or by whether they were my “personal favorites.” I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed writing them.
Historical Figures & Events
Delving into the people and events that shaped history
Culture & Society
Exploring Americana artifacts and other obscure areas of US history
Contemporary Issues
Discussing the pandemic, 2020 politics, and other recent happenings
Personal & Family Lore
Recounting stories from my childhood, “adulthood,” and family’s history
Featured Essays
Author favorites
Oklahoma, "where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain" (and where many strange and unsettling things also have happened), takes center stage as today's #stampoftheday, a 3-cent stamp, issued on …
It is oddly appropriate that I am writing today's #stampoftheday while sitting on my back patio, having just returned from a wonderful and bucolic week on a lightly settled pond …
"From a distance the world looks blue and green And the snow-capped mountains white." I don't know if the iconic picture of "Earthrise" taken from Apollo 8 on December 24, 1968 inspired …
These days, when the worst of America has been so prominent, I'm happy that today's #stampoftheday celebrates some of the best of America. Specifically, the 3-cent stamp, which was issued …
My father never said this specifically, but I'm sure he'd agree that, in general, when faced with a choice between live chickens and deceased white men, it's best to go …