For obvious reasons, the 5-cent stamp honoring “Amateur Radio” that is today’s #stampoftheday made me think of the “Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map,” an amazing website curated by David Goren, my talented brother-in-law. An award-winning radio engineer, Goren has been tracking these stations since the mid-1990s. In July 2018, he launched the sound map, which […]

Consider the following, which appeared in the December 14, 1952 edition of the Sunday New York Times: “Philatelists, an impatient species in the hobby world, are prone to consider attention to their demands as one of their own special human rights.” So wrote Kent Stiles, who from 1937 until his death in 1961 wrote a

I haven’t thought about Jean Shepherd for a long time. But there was a time – I think it was when I was in junior high school – when, like many adolescent boys in metro New York, I couldn’t get enough of him. You may know Shephard are the voiceover of and inspiration for the

When you are travelling in Ecuador, there’s no good reason to read Carl Hiaasen’s “Stormy Weather,” a dark and humorous novel that, like all his books partially takes place in the Everglades, which are the subject of today’s #stampoftheday, a 3-cent stamp issued on December 5, 1947. But that’s what I did in 2011 (back

About 15 years ago, while driving on a highway just north of Palm Beach, I asked Ed Glaeser, the noted urban economist, if we were in that mythical place economists call “the featureless plane.” I thought it was funny; I don’t recall if Ed was amused, annoyed, or indifferent. That story came to mind as

Although I hadn’t heard of Ephriam McDowell before today, in turns out that I might owe my life to him. It also turns out that I can learn a lot from him as well. For others who also had never heard of him, McDowell was a surgeon in the late 1700s and early 1800s who

I’m a longtime member of the intramural softball team fielded by Tufts University’s Art History Department. But, as anyone who knows me can attest, I do not have a strong sense of design. This is salient because today’s #stampoftheday was the first US stamp to feature an abstract piece of art. A 5-cent stamp honoring

“Have you gotten to the part where Beth dies?” my wife innocently asked her younger sister, who, many years ago, was eagerly reading “Little Women.” Her sister, of course, hadn’t and the knowledge of what was coming detracted (to say the least) from her experience of the book. To be clear, my wife didn’t do

In 1969, my father took me to Shea Stadium to see the third (and final) playoff game between my beloved New York Mets and the Atlanta Braves. At some point in the game, the Braves, who were losing, brought in Cecil Upshaw, a forgettable relief pitcher with an unforgettable name. Although Upshaw didn’t give up

“Never let the truth get in the way of a good story ,” is a saying falsely attributed to Mark Twain that I’ve often jokingly quoted in my work as a reporter and editor. The advice Twain didn’t offer came to mind as I considered what to write about today’s #stampoftheday, a 1-cent stamp issued