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A blogging BPS parent

Parent Imperfect is a Roslindale father of two kids in the BPS system - Boston Latin and the Hennigan - yes, the school that delayed opening for two days because of that pesky PCB problem:

Just for the record, the Parent Imperfect contacted Robert Herrick of the Harvard School of Public Health to ask what he thought about the repairs to the Hennigan School. Paint in the school was found to contain PCBs, a dangerous family of chemicals that have been banned in the U.S. since 1978. To the PI's surprise, Herrick replied almost immediately, saying that, "if the abatement has been completed to the satisfaction of the EPA, there is no reason to be concerned about returning to school."


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After this, can there be any doubt that we're a world-class city?

The Boston Foodie fills us in: We now hold the record for the world's largest cannoli - 12 feet and 300 pounds of rich, sugary goodness.

In order to replicate the tiny chocolate bits used in the typical cannoli, full-size Hersey's kisses were brought in. I also asked exactly how they filled the entire thing. The answer: holes were drilled along the top of the shell and the filling was piped in from there. This was like the Big Dig of pastry engineering!


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Maybe the copywriters were just taking the whole Oxford Comma thing too far

Spatch rails against 30 Rock ads plastered on the T that inform us that "30 Rock, rocks!"


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The only real member of the .406 Club

The New York Times takes a long look at Ted Williams in 1941:

It is a 20th-century baseball masterpiece unlike any other, carved not across one World Series, one month or even 56 games but from April 15 to Sept. 28. Every single at-bat figured in the outcome, unlike when a hitter chases home run records.


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Rededicating the Jamaica Plain Soldiers' Monument

Steve Garfield posts photos from today's ceremonies, which included people dressed in period garb.


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Online mystery: Who's posting news about BC and the IRA subpoenas?

John Carroll can't help but wonder who's behind Boston College Subpoena News and posting news about the college's fight to block subpoenas related to material in its archive of IRA interviews: Could it be the archive's director?


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Alleged bootleggers bagged in East Boston

Boston Police report arresting an East Boston couple on charges they were running an illegal after-hours liquor store out of their house.

Luz Lozada, 57, and Jorge Lozada, 53, were charged with the illegal sale, delivery or furnishing of alcohol and being keepers of a disorderly home at 13 Marion St. around 1 a.m. after, police say, a plainclothes officer bought $30 worth of Coronas and Bud Lights.

Police say they had been getting complaints from nearby residents about double-parking customers "playing loud music while awaiting their orders and loud boisterous pedestrian traffic arriving and leaving in the early hours of the morning." According to police:

The suspect told the officer to come in because the police are outside. The officer went in and then asked suspect Lozada for 10 Coronas and 5 Bud Lights. The suspect went in to the back of a curtained door and came back out with the above items in a bag at a cost of $30.00. The officer then handed the suspect the $40.00 in marked money and was handed $10.00 in change.

In Boston, only people with hard-to-get licenses from the Boston Licensing Board are legally allowed to sell alcohol. The Lozada's house is a few blocks away from Kappy's, which, however, is only open until 11 p.m. on Fridays.

Innocent, etc.


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Nation's crime rate soars

Red Sox Nation, that is. Boston Police report arresting a Plymouth woman on charges she stole another woman's purse at last night's Red Sox game.

According to police, witnesses saw Margaret A. Donahue, 40, use her foot to move the purse of another woman seated out in the right-field area, then reach down, pick it up and walk away:

The purse along with its contents was recovered and the suspect placed under arrest. Once placed under arrest, the suspect began to struggle with officers and made numerous phone calls to 911 requesting the presence of additional officers alleging misconduct by officers.

Innocent, etc.


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The iconic statue that almost wasn't

Dallin in his later years with a model of his statue. From the BPL's Art and Artifacts photo collection.

It'd be hard to imagine the space between Hanover Street and Old North Church without Paul Revere warning the colonists the Redcoats were coming, right?

And yet, it almost wasn't there at all.

In 1885, a Boston design committee picked a young Utah sculptor named Cyrus Dallin to commemorate Revere and his famous ride. The city agreed to kick in $5,000 and the committee vowed to raise the rest of the money in donations to erect the statue - with Copley Square initially being the leading contender since, as the Globe noted at the time, that's the part of town where most of the money would be coming from:

Since it is they who will contribute to the erection of the statue, that at least they should have something to say in the selection of a site, and no place, they claim, could be more suitable than Copley square

But then nothing much happened. For 55 years. Dallin, at first fairly unknown - among the people he beat out for the Revere commission was Daniel Chester French - eventually became famous for his work, which includes the praying Indian (OK, Appeal to the Great Spirit) outside the MFA. He moved to Arlington and taught at the Massachusetts Normal Arts School (today's MassArt).

It turns out, the Globe reported (but not until 1935) that a well known local sculptor, who hadn't even entered the competition, turned his nose up at the young upstart from out West and convinced members of the original fundraising committee to just not raise any funds rather than contribute to this "height of impudence."

Dallin, though, outlived the committee, and the sculptor, helped by a campaign led by Globe art critic A.J. Philpott, lived to see his statue dedicated - in the North End - on Sept. 22, 1940.

Photo posted under this Creative Commons license.


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Citizen complaint of the day: If you see something, post something

The other night, somebody saw what appeared to be an abandoned backpack outside a laundromat on Belgrade Avenue. What to do? Report it via Citizens Connect:

I didn't want to call 911 bc ts not an emergency? But if you see something, do something, right? Thx.

The case is marked "closed" this morning:

Case Resolved. Picked up.


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