Andover, geographically one of the largest townships in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, has a long and illustrious history. Founded more than 350 years ago, Andover has played a part in several critical events in American history, including the French and Indian wars, the witchcraft hysteria of the 1690s, the American Revolution, the abolitionist movement, the Civil War, and the Industrial Revolution. It is the birthplace of the song �America,� written by Samuel Francis Smith. It has be...

The area known as Dogtown -- an isolated colonial ruin and surrounding 3,000-acre woodland in storied seaside Gloucester, Massachusetts -- has long exerted a powerful influence over artists, writers, eccentrics, and nature lovers. But its history is also woven through with tales of witches, supernatural sightings, pirates, former slaves, drifters, and the many dogs Revolutionary War widows kept for protection and for which the area was named. In 1984, a brutal murder took ...

In the tradition of 102 Minutes and Columbine, the definitive book on the Boston Marathon bombing and subsequent manhunt for the Tsarnaev brothers, written by reporters from The Boston Globe and published to coincide with the first anniversary of the tragedyLong Mile Home will tell the gripping story of the tragic, surreal, and ultimately inspiring week of April 15, 2013: the preparations of the bombers; the glory of the race; th...

The world's one-and-only PEZ historian dispenses fun facts on the candy's evolution from smoking substitute to childhood treat to pop culture collectible.PEZ is an American classic and a staple of many childhood memories. Yet it originated in Austria, where PEZ began in 1927 as compressed peppermint tablets marketed as an alternative to smoking. Upon arrival in the United States in 1952, PEZ quickly took a new direction, adding fruit flavors and three-dimensional c...

During the 1930s in the United States, the Works Progress Administration developed the Federal Writers’ Project to support writers and artists while making a national effort to document the country’s shared history and culture. The American Guide series consists of individual guides to each of the states. Little-known authors-many of whom would later become celebrated literary figures-were commissioned to write these important books. John Steinbeck, Saul Bellow, Zora Neale Hurston, and Ral...

Discover the fascinating and nearly forgotten history amid Cape Cod's salty waves and sandy beaches—photos included.From Provincetown to Falmouth, the Cape's fifteen towns offer a plethora of hidden and enchanting tales. Learn why one of the most famous rescues in Coast Guard history spent nearly fifty years in the shadows without public notice. Discover which wild creature went from the nineteenth-century soup pot to enjoying conservation protection under state law...

A first-hand account and fascinating new details of the 1952 rescue of the SS Pendleton, the true story behind the film The Finest Hours.On February 18, 1952, off the coast of Cape Cod, a fierce nor'easter snapped in half two 503-foot oil tankers, the Pendleton and the Fort Mercer. Human grace and grit, leadership and endurance prevail as Theresa Mitchell Barbo and Captain W. Russell Webster (Ret.) recount the historic, heroic res...

Puritans did not find a life free from tyranny in the new world—they created it there. Massachusetts emerged a republic as they hammered out a vision of popular participation and limited government in church and state, spurred by Plymouth pilgrims. Godly Republicanism underscores how pathbreaking yet rooted in puritanism’s history the project was.

Far from the glistening waters and gray-shingled villages of Cape Cod were the bloody front lines of the American Civil War. During this era, Cape Cod recruiting officers often urged soldiers to �raise the right arm of the old Bay State.� Learn about the Cape�s first casualty of war, Philander Crowell Jr. of Yarmouth, who was a member of the First Massachusetts Regiment; discover how local fishermen made money both by catching fish and by enlisting in the army; and read about the four bloo...

On March 22, 1990, local fishermen Hokey Hokanson and his teenage son, Billy, set sail for Cape Cod in the "Sol e Mar." When disaster struck three days later, Billy transmitted a brief, heavily garbled radio distress call. A hoax call immediately followed Billy's cry for help, and believing that the two were connected, the U.S. Coast Guard did not launch rescue units for several days. The Hokansons' deaths prompted a new anti-hoax law and changed United States Coast Guard search and rescue...

The true story of the artist whose high school years in Massachusetts inspired Riverdale.Bob Montana, creator of the Archie comic strip and one of America's greatest cartoonists, always considered himself a true New Englander. Filled with the antics of the rambunctious teenagers of the fictional Riverdale High, Montana's comic strip was based on his high school years in Haverhill, Massachusetts.At the height of his career, he lived as a beloved res...

Stories of New England soldiers who perished in this bloody battle, based on their diaries and letters.The Battle of Antietam, in September 1862, was the single bloodiest day of the Civil War. In the intense conflict and its aftermath across the farm fields and woodlots near Sharpsburg, Maryland, more than two hundred men from Connecticut died.Their grave sites are scattered throughout the Nutmeg State, from Willington to Madison and Brooklyn to Bristol. He...