Every year around Patriots’ Day (in Massachusetts), a combination of photo memories and public posts from Minute Man National Historical Park remind us of a story from our family. That story? Our great-grandfather claimed that he had posed for Daniel Chester French for the statue of the minute man that stands at the Old North Bridge. The likelihood that this story is true? Very low. Very, very low. Not entirely impossible. But very unlikely. To read the rest, please click on the link to my Substack below. When Your Great-Grandfather Poses for a Statue
Riding the Hoofbeats of the Early Revolution
Today is 16 April 2025. We are only days away from what would be the opening shots of the American Revolution, 250 years ago this year. Yes, I’ve been banging on about this since, well… Basically since I started this newsletter. 250 years ago this, 250 years ago that. I think you have all been getting the idea by this point. Many of the important anniversaries thus far have been smaller events leading up to this point. Some of them are a bit bigger, such as the Boston Massacre, but we haven’t yet seen any […]
What Happened Yesterday
New Substack Newsletter out now! What Happened Yesterday – by Robin Donovan Bocchiaro
Corned Beef and Cabbage
When I was working in Boston, I would be giving tours and have to explain the history of a pretty important holiday to Boston in the early American Revolution. Suffolk County, the county in which Boston sits, has a holiday that is not celebrated in the rest of the state – let alone the rest of the country. It’s called Evacuation Day. The fact that this holiday – recognized as a day off for city offices – falls on Saint Patrick’s Day, has always seemed a bit suspicious to outsiders due to the large Irish […]
The Boston Massacre
250 years ago, on March 6th, Dr. Joseph Warren gave the fifth annual address commemorating the events of 5 March 1770 in Boston. This was the second time Dr. Warren had been chosen as the orator, the first time being in 1772. “… you will permit me to say that with sincerity, […] I mourn over my bleeding country: with them I weep at her distress, and with them deeply resent the many injuries she has received from the hands of cruel and unreasonable men.”1 This would be the last time Dr. Warren would give this […]
Nearly a Powder Keg in Salem
Do you ever write down a quote, and then years later, when wanting to use it for part of a post, discover that you can’t find your original notes, and then spend hours chasing every thread of memory you have around that research, only to come up empty? That’s where I have been for about a week now. I clearly remember reading an account of Leslie’s Retreat, 26 February 1775, that I found amusing. I also clearly remember that wherever I had read this, they had used Monty Python as a descriptor of the events. All that […]
Winter Books for Outdoor Families
Happy winter! I was realizing that I have spent a lot of time curating books on winter and being outside for my little one since the very beginning – even before we started thinking about sending him to forest school. So why not bring some coziness to the last month or so of winter by reading some of our favorites! (And yes. No list of wintry books is complete without a healthy helping of Jan Brett.)
Reading Goals 2025
It is really important to be kind to yourself when setting goals for the year. Last year, I set what seemed like a reasonable goal considering that I had managed 82 books in 2023. 84 books, or seven books per month, seemed achievable. And certainly, for the first three months of 2024, it was. Until I ran into some health issues that made reading, not difficult, per say, but definitely tricky. Did I still finish books? Yes. I managed 58 books in 2024. But this year’s goal is only 3 books a month, because that […]
Books That Stick With Me (2024)
It has been about ten years since I last wrote a list of books that have stuck with me. That’s a long time for a list to stay the same. People change, and so must the books that stay with them. So here, in no particular order, are the books that are on the list now. Squire (Protector of the Small Quartet #3) by Tamora Pierce This one I come back to again and again and again. There’s general advice for growing up (and being a grown-up) buried in there, and sometimes I need the […]
Let’s Get Hands On!
Getting at the Heart of Historic Sites with Children This has been something that I have been struggling with ever since my child was born. How do I go to historic sites and keep myself surrounded by history when I always have a child in tow? While I certainly expected much of what I have found in the historic property sphere, I also used to work at the aforementioned house in this video – so on some level, perhaps my perspective is a bit skewed by the expectation that more sites ought to have interactive […]