“Every bit of my inventory comes out of my pocket,” said Bresnahan. “I am being very cautious.”
Bresnahan credits support from local shopperswith helping her get through the pandemic. In 2021, they helped deliver the strongest Christmas season in the23 years she has owned the shop. She also counts on summer tourists to boost sales. This year she is seeing more…”
Front page above the fold Boston Globe article published June 27, 2022 covers school bathroom closures statewide.
The Gillnetter, Gloucester’s High School newspaper featured an on trend opinion piece by Jenna Smith published back in February 2022 — which elicited change. The local newspaper, Gloucester Daily Times, published it also. Both covered the TikTok challenge in September and fall of 2021.
“Our school has eleven student bathrooms, five designated for females, five for males, and one single stall gender neutral bathroom.
During the day, only the first floor bathroom is unlocked during passing times between classes. The science wing bathrooms are always locked, and the second and third floor bathrooms are only open if a teacher is there to unlock and supervise them. Teachers have been directed not to allow students to use the bathroom during the first and last five minutes of classes, as well as the first five, and the last five minutes of lunch. This means that students can only access the restroom during class time. Typically, the first floor restroom is the one available, however sometimes it changes, which results in students having to go on a scavenger hunt to find an open restroom. Once we manage to find the bathroom that is open, we must wait in a line as only three students are allowed in the restroom at a time.”
excerpt from Gloucester High School newspaper, GHS Gillnetter, Feb 2022 article by Jenna Smith – read the full piece here: Open the Bathrooms, Please
Jim Montagnino was literally born in Gloucester’s West End in 1941 at 57 Main Street. His father Dominic was a “high liner” fishing Captain who never would allow his son to follow in his occupation because it was too dangerous. So, Jim enlisted in the U.S. Army at 17 years old upon his graduation from St. Ann’s High School class of ’58 where he was captain of the baseball team for both his junior and senior year. He was also captain of the basketball team in his senior year.
He and his best friend, Mike Calomo had been freshman at Gloucester High School, but were both rejected at tryouts for both the baseball and football squads, so they both transferred to St. Ann’s High School where they were more than “stars” on the basketball and baseball fields.
After being honorably discharged from the Army he attended and graduated from Burdett College. After high school, Jim soon married the true love of his life, Mary Jo Pratt. They began their life together building on each other’s strengths, a true partnership and bond that lasted the test of time. They enjoyed 58 years of devoted marriage to one another. They had four children and had seven grandchildren whom he all adored.
Jim saw an opportunity to get into to fishing industry another way. He began his career in the seafood industry working in the offices of O’Donnell-Usen and later Booth Fisheries, who were both located in Gloucester. The fishing industry was evolving from smaller fresh fish companies who bought the local and Boston fleets catches to the Trans-Atlantic steamers from Europe and elsewhere who were unloading millions of pounds of frozen blocks bought by Gorton’s and Booth Fisheries He was offered a significant promotion by Booth Fisheries at their N.E. distribution center in Portsmouth, N.H. He refused the offer because his family and the were all in Gloucester. He wanted to continue playing adult Basketball, Flag football (until he was 50) and loved playing card with all his closest friends who were all here in Gloucester.
Jim then decided to bet on himself. He began in a small two-person office with himself and his godmother, Vicki Naves. Together they grew Gloucester Dispatch to a full-service logistics trucking brokerage company with fleet of over 100 tractor trailers covering the 48 states. Jim saw the vision and that those millions of pounds of frozen seafood needed to get from the Quincy Market Cold Storage (now Americold) to their destination throughout the United States.
The success of his trucking business allowed him to invest in his favorite love, the City of Gloucester. He was the first person to invest in the West End, where he bought the west end furniture building from Walter Chadwick and rehabilitated it to apartments on the upper levels and retail on the ground level. Others soon followed his model. He invested primarily at first on Main Street being a regular at Nick’s pool room since he was a kid. When the Brown family decided to sell their department store, he bought it and allowed small businesses to start with the smaller spaces and grow. He later started the first condo project “The Residences at Seaport” on the upper levels of the Main Street and Elm Street levels where National Furniture and Shephard’s Street Market were former occupants. At the time the local zoning did not allow for residences above street level businesses. Each project he developed brought him pride and satisfaction to see his interest in Gloucester was rewarded with their success.
in the 80’s he was the major developer to purchase two out of three parcels at Parker Street. These had been taken by Urban Renewal back in the sixties and never developed until he built the Head of The Harbor. Eventually, Whole Foods was a major tenant for over 25 years as the major distribution and processing center for their New England and New York area purchasing product most of their fish from the local fleet.
This momentum continued and he sold his Cameron’s building to see the latest housing development by Action Inc. and partner with North Shore Community Development at 206 Main Street (across from Elm Street). He was happy to see that project completed.
His passion was to stay in Gloucester and see the beauty and potential of each undertaking.
He was a former board member of the AGH and was an ongoing supporter of the Grace Center, St. Ann’s Parish and an original member of the original group that started the Grace Center.
Most recently, he purchased East Gloucester Marina and his love of boating and fishing continued on. His other love was golfing at Bass Rocks Golf Club which was a favorite form of fun for him and with his friends where many happy memories and were made and challenging tournaments were won.
He was thankful to all those who gave him the opportunity to see his dreams come true.
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Joey, I took shots of all 3 of the women’s teams before and during the competition and all 3 have received their copies. I thought you might like to see a before the race group shot of the 3 crews. It was indicated that they do this every year, and they not only gathered themselves but made certain I knew where to be to take the shot..They were a bit concerned about me climbing the ramp from the dock as on the way down I had tripped landing flat on the dock, and lost my phone overboard!! No harm, but I got to know all of the crew members who quickly made sure i was OK. I told them I always do that to get the crowd warmed up…. Great sportsmanship photo, pre-race which was also evident when the race was over. They all congratulated each other and the winning BackLash.
How close was the race?BackLashRogueXtraOarDinary
And since I was there and got trapped, I learned that on the Walkers parade to the boats for the Greasy Pole, they stop at the stage for a round of “VIVA!” “ST. PIETRO” before getting to the boats. One of the organizers did tell all the walkers this was not a time to drink…
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TEMPORARY SUSPENSION OF TRASH BAG POLICY – TUESDAY, JUNE 28 – TUESDAY, JULY 5. We have been informed that the vendor for the City of Gloucester trash bags continues to face manufacturing disruptions due to supply chain issues and will not be able to meet the demand for bags this week. Mayor Greg Verga has announced relief for residents by allowing each household to put out 2 – large size (no greater than 36 gallon) garbage bags for pick up, free of charge, for the following dates – Tuesday, June 28 – Tuesday, July 5, 2022. This will allow each household a free trash pick up day while we work through next steps with the vendor. We ask for your cooperation in making this possible by limiting your waste to 2 bags.
Please note, Monday, July 4th is a holiday, there will be no trash collection. Households with Monday pick up will be on Tuesday, and all remaining collections for the week will be one day later. Trash pick up the week of July 4th will run on a holiday schedule.
If you have any questions please contact DPW at 978-325-5600 or Mayor Verga’s office at 978-281-9700. We will provide updates for next week as soon as possible.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation.
Greg Verga
Mayor
City of Gloucester, Massachusetts
978.281.9700
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Sharing this screenshot of an update from the City regarding reach bags and collection. Take notes of the dates and the particulars regarding size and number of bags.
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With a work meeting on Thursday night, a son’s hockey game on Friday night and bartending duties both Saturday and Sunday night, Fiesta wasn’t in the cards for me this year. Sigh. I did make sure to take one early morning walk through though before photographing the Police, Fire Department, and Coast Guard Seine boat races. So, here are some random Fiesta pics.
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Fiesta 2022 is in the books and it felt GREAT! Thanks to the organizing committee and the scores of volunteers who made it happen for the rest of us. It was memorable. Here are a few more shots from Championship Sunday events I hope you will enjoy.
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Good Morning Gloucester 