Author: Pat D

Are you ready for the roadwork on Bass Ave this week from the lights to Hartz Street? Prep your patience and brake pads for detours and then one lane traffic later in the week. Here’s the link for more detailed information from the City: Gloucester News.

The Gloucester HS field hockey team is holding a plant sale today until 1 PM as a fundraiser. They also have T shirts for sale and you may see GMG Jimmy around town in one.

If you can’t make it down there, donations can be sent c/o Coach Lauren Riley-Gore 42 Dennison St. Gloucester MA 01930.

I know other plant sales are occurring today, but try to stop by and give this team some support too. Captains Cate Delaney and Mia Salah with Coach Riley-Gore:

Gloucester Station Coast Guard is hosting an event today on Harbor Loop 10 am – 2 pm which will feature signal flare demos, live helicopter search and rescue, live music, search and rescue boat tours, K9 demos, Beverly dive team, free lunch, as well as other health and safety information. Sounds like it’s going to be a great day, so stop down to check it out.

I did not realize Windward Grille in Essex was open for lunch so I was happy to give it a try based on the recommendation of my aunt. I was a little surprised at how busy it was on for a weekday lunchtime (I love that retirement allows us to do this!), but I took it as a good omen.

My Texas burger was the size of a certain large southern state and it was delicious:

GMG Jimmy got a pastrami sandwich and sweet potato fries:

My dessert was a Windward coffee….mmmmm……Another place to add to our lunch options!

One of the ones Midas touched,

Who failed to touch us all,

Was that confiding prodigal,

The blissful oriole.

Emily Dickinson’s words seem very appropriate for these backyard orioles. I am so happy to see them….for me, this is a real treat….like an orange for an oriole. I will wait patiently for the male to sit still long enough for his photo shoot.

We decided to stop for dinner at the new Minglewood Harborside and check things out. As you have heard, a complete makeover of the inside was recently completed so we were curious. It was far too rainy and dreary to try the new outdoor seating so we had an inside table. The large bar area dominates the main room and it is something! Several people were seated at the bar watching the TVs and playing Trivia and having wings that were on special (Tuesday’s). There are outlets at the bar for customer convenience….how smart is that?

We ordered the Orange Chicken and Haddock Burrito which we enjoyed so much there were no leftovers.

And, as you see above, don’t forget your Serenitee card! (Have we mentioned the Serenitee card is free?) Thanks, Minglewood Harborside, we’ll be back soon to try the outdoor tables.

Fair play, we love Turtle Alley candies as well as Nichols. The downtown convenience of Turtle Alley cannot be denied, even though we lived their previous location also. I recommend the chocolate covered cherries!

As the hummingbirds start coming to our backyard around the Cape, I recall the Seals & Croft’s song: Hummingbird don’t fly away…….

Calling from the feeder

Resting prettily in a branch

No matter what your family looks like, I wish you all a wonderful Mother’s Day. These were taken at Animal Adventure in our NY hometown, home of April the Giraffe and her newest calf Azizi.

Murphy’s Law states that what can go wrong, will go wrong but my sighting of this vessel seemed to go right for me! So thanks guys.

These beautiful birds just beg to be photographed and observed. I can’t stop!

Last weekend I noticed Nichole Schrafft had the Tulip Festival Open House at The Stevens-Coolidge Place in North Andover as one of her suggestions for a weekend activity. Tulips are my favorites and I was intrigued so off I went. It’s a small property with an historic house and gardens. Several families were in attendance enjoying the nice morning. I will say it was more “Open House” than “Tulip Festival”.

The historic house was quite interesting and the gardens were lovely and well kept.

BUT it was no tulip fest in comparison to our own boulevard in all its glory. Make sure you go down, wander among the beds and bask in the brief beauty of our tulips! Thanks again Generous Gardeners! Now here’s a tulip fest:

I needed a little something as a thank you gift and Nichols Candy just seemed to call out as a solution. It’s always worth the trip! PS and FYI Mother’s Day is right around the corner.

It was a lovely sunny afternoon that hinted of summer fun so I decided to have my first lunch of the season at the Cupboard. 55 years this year….great milestone! Delicious sandwich but ice cream only available on the weekends for now.

As if returning to Gloucester wasn’t rewarding enough, I returned to find our hawk couple together at their nest. I will keep sharp eyes open for chicks but I was happy enough to find the hawks together.

And, thanks t9 a heads up from Paul Morrison in a recent post, I put the hummingbird feeder out with some sugar water and was rewarded within 30 minutes with this welcome visitor:

We were visited by a hawk during a recent cemetery stroll, which is supposed to indicate imminent enlightenment of some sort. And, in this case, it certainly held true. I was contacted by Joanne Riley, team member of a public history project at UMass researching the Boston Police strike of 1919.They had found some evidence that james Conway, one of the people on my Ancestry tree, had been one of the striking Boston police officers in September 1919. They were seeking additional information about him.

It got me thinking about how Gloucester might have been affected by this strike and I found that Gloucester and Rockport sent troops to Boston to help; Company K, L and M of the Rockport and Gloucester State Guardsmen as noted here from the Gloucester Daily Times Sept 11 1919:

I learned this strike helped get Calvin Coolidge elected President based partly on the manner in which he dealt with the strikers as Governor of Massachusetts. From Gloucester Daily Times Sept 25 1919:

And, more than anything, it made me look a little closer at James Conway who did indeed lose his job as a policeman but census records indicate he was able to find other employment fairly quickly. His police duty card sent along by the research team. It’s been an interesting exercise researching this historical event and its impact locally.

If you are lucky enough to see eagles and spend time watching them, you are lucky enough. This eagle family resides on the Susquehanna River a short distance from our New York home. We have watched them raise previous families and this was our first time to observe a little bit about this year’s family. We watched as they guarded and tended to the HUGE nest. We could hear eaglet cries, but saw none (so far).  We heard one call out for the other and watched in awe as the mate responded. I have not yet been fortunate enough to see eagles this close in Gloucester but I am lucky enough to have them nearby in New York. They are simply amazing and breathtakingly majestic.

I think this might be the female monitoring the nest from a distance.

Here  you can see both partners guarding nest. Lower right of nest for one, upper left for the other.

Dad coming in to check things out.

Calling for mate. I suspect it sounds like this to Jim’s ears when I call out for him.

Thanks to Catherine Ryan’s recent post, my attention was drawn to the Elizabeth Gordon Smith Garden project at Stage Fort Park. I am quite enamored of the Triton statute. Sculptor Walter Hancock portrays him as majestic and mighty. Thanks once again to the Generous Gardeners for their work on this hidden gem of a memorial. I look forward to the flowering trees and additional flowers. It’s worth stopping by for a little rest and meditation.

We took a walk through Mt. Pleasant Cemetery on a recent damp morning to see if we could fulfill any Find-A-Grave requests for Mt. Pleasant. Although we were not able to find any of those requested gravestones, we did notice some interesting things about this local cemetery.

Find-A-Grave provides a wonderful map (a very rare occurrence and a HUGE bonus) drawn by Matt Hautala in 1995; revised and expanded by Peter Tysver in 2008 and added to Find-A-Grave by Mark G. Spencer in 2015. Huge shout out of thanks to these guys! This kind of tool is invaluable to researchers.

Find-A-Grave states there are two famous interments: John F. Bickford Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor recipient 1843-1927 (he must have been a VERY young Civil War soldier) and Jessie Ralph, actress 1864-1944, but I think the most interesting one I located was the Amos Story family. The land upon which the cemetery is located belonged to him and his family has a long history of service to our country. Jesse Story was killed at Bunker Hill and Joseph Story died during the Civil War.

The cemetery was built Victorian style, also known as park style and you can see this in how the pathways are designed almost like sidewalks or park trails.

It was a dreary day and the ground was wet, but I found this cemetery to be peaceful and interesting in its variety of gravestone types. In fact, I do have at least one member of my family line buried here and it’s good to know he is well taken care of.  We could hear children’s voices from a nearby playground but it was otherwise quiet. We did get a visitor though! After the hawk stopped by to watch us, I knew there must be a message being shared. A little bit of research indicates that hawks forebode enlightenment and that we should be ready to receive a message. Shiver…… I should have taken note, but I think this might even be the Amos Story monument. So I am expecting a message from the past. I will keep you posted.

St. Peter’s Square reflections on a pretty spring day.