Massachusetts

• 
• 8/22/2022
  

  What Elizabeth Johnson’s Exoneration Teaches about the Salem Witch Hunt

  by Tony Fels

  The Massachusetts legislature recently exonerated Elizabeth Johnson, though her confession and conviction shows how "members of the Puritan communities of early Massachusetts could readily convince themselves that in some way or other, perhaps at a moment of weakness, they really had allowed Satan into their lives."

• 
• SOURCE: NPR
  8/10/2022
  

  Massachusetts Indigenous Groups Call for Boycott of Living History Museum at Plymouth

  Members of the Wampanoag nation say that Plimoth Patuxet Museums has failed to honor a pledge to create a truly bicultural museum depicting indigenous history respectfully. 

• 
• SOURCE: ABA Journal
  8/5/2022
  

  Civics Teacher and Students Help Win Exoneration for Last Convicted Witch in Massachusetts

  Carrie LaPierre of North Andover turned a project on the legislative process into an amendment to the state budget bill. Elizabeth Johnson's 1693 conviction was finally overturned. 

• 
• SOURCE: Boston Globe
  8/5/2022
  

  Commission Recommends Change to Massachusetts State Seal, Motto

  Activists and members of the state’s Indigenous population have long objected to the image, which one critic called the “last state flag of white supremacy.”

• 
• 8/8/2021
  

  A Community of Necessity: The Quabbin Reservoir's History and the Future of "Managed Retreat"

  by Elisabeth C. Rosenberg

  In 1939 the dammed Swift River submerged four Massachusetts towns beneath the new Quabbin Reservoir. The story of the residents, politicians and engineers of the Swift Valley foreshadows the negotiations that will accompany a managed retreat from places jeopardized by climate change.

• 
• SOURCE: Commonwealth
  5/1/2021
  

  Stark Differences Make Many Mass. Communities Neighbors in Name Only

  The boundaries separating the many small towns of Massachusetts don't just contribute to local color; they've historically worked to structure significant inequalities even among neighboring municipalities. 

• 
• SOURCE: Public Books
  4/27/2021
  

  Literary and Manual Labors: Pittsfield, Massachusetts

  by Jeffrey Lawrence

  Herman Melville's move to Pittsfield in western Massachusetts wasn't a withdrawal from society; he was active in building the cultural life of the Berkshire region. 

• 
• 4/18/2021
  

  Who Won the American Revolution?

  by Guy Chet

  Almost since the smoke cleared after the Battle of Lexington, Americans have debated the relative merits of the militias and the Continental Army in fighting the British. The relative esteem of each group has followed changes in the politics of the nation. 

• 
• SOURCE: Lowell Sun
  12/31/2020
  

  Partnership Led By UMass Lowell Preserves “Little Canada”

  An undergraduate honors course in history led by Robert Forrant is developing public history markers to commemorate the Le Petit Canada neighborhood of Lowell, Massachusetts. 

• 
• SOURCE: Boston Globe
  10/7/2020
  

  Once a Ku Klux Klan Stronghold, Groton Fights its Reputation as a ‘Sundown Town’

  Recent instances of racist graffiti in the Boston suburb sparked local government to pass a resolution renouncing any past actions that made it unwelcoming to racial minorities. It is uncertain if Groton was a "sundown town" but it is widely known as a hotbed of Klan activity in the 1920s.

• 
• SOURCE: MassLive
  7/28/2020
  

  Massachusetts Senators Form Panel To Suggest New State Seal, Which Would Replace Version Native Americans Call Racist

  The current seal depicts a Native man standing beneath a disembodied arm and sword, implying violent subjugation of the Indigenous people. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  3/10/2020
  

  A Fresh Take on the Mayflower’s History

  “We are changing the narrative at this moment in history,” said Michele Pecoraro, executive director of Plymouth 400. Today, she said, “it is all about a shared history among four nations, that looks at it from that perspective probably for the first time. The Wampanoag involvement is a first. The Netherlands involvement is a first. Those added perspectives offer more of a balanced picture.”

• 
• SOURCE: NY Times
  9/7/19
  

  A State Wrestles With Its Imagery: A Sword Looming Over a Native American

  The debate in Massachusetts comes at a time of reckoning over the nation’s history.

• 
• SOURCE: NY Times
  2/21/19
  

  Black History Trail Makes 200 Stops Across Massachusetts

  A Tufts University project seeks to make “history more visible” — from slavery to Black Lives Matter — with a map of historic African-American sites in Boston and beyond.

• SOURCE: FoxNews
  03-04-13
  

  Insurance When Your Home's a Piece of History

  A home in Massachusetts has been in the same family since it was built in the 1600s -- less than 20 years after the Mayflower landed. Though nearly four centuries have passed, one room in the home remains just as it was in the 1600s, with the same hand-hewn floorboards. There are special -- and more expensive -- historic-home insurance policies to protect houses such as this. But they vary in what they'll pay for. You might be able to replace 1775 windows with something close to the real thing, or just historic look-alikes....