Photos

Assorted Shots

With study and a little practice almost anyone can learn the technological aspects to taking pictures. But no one can teach you what to point your camera at! Either you have the eye for it or you don't, and that is what distinguishes the artist from the mere photographer. For example, here is a nice but dull photo I took today of the Edwards Church in downtown Northampton.



But where most people see humdrum reality, others see artistic possibilities. For example, here is the Edwards Church as photographed by Candace Hope.



I was just outside the Amherst Historical Society this morning and took this pic. I used to live a few houses down from it on North Prospect Street.

The building housing the society was constructed in 1744. The neat thing about those ancient structures is the idiosyncratic features of handmade craftsmanship. For example, I wonder what this little side window on the left was created for?

The 1700's was when the Massachusetts revolutionary Paul Revere lived. There is a painting of the patriot is on the wall outside Raos Coffeeshop in Amherst.

Inside Raos this morning.

 



I probably spend too much time in coffeeshops, but at least I don't go to bars! This is the sign in the alleyway behind one of my favorite coffeeshops - The Haymarket in downtown Northampton.

 



Flag and signs outside Northampton City Hall.

Here is me and Monique Hulbert the other day in The Evolution Cafe located in the village of Florence, which is a semi-independent part of Northampton.



The Evolution Cafe evolved out of one of downtown Hamp's most infamous establishments, The Fire & Water Cafe, which used to be near City Hall. The original joint was controversial, frowned on by the authorities for its wild bohemianism. Its old sign is now hanging over one of the toilets, which may or may not be an editorial statement of the owner's experiences at the downtown location.

A poster of UMass graduate Bill Cosby for sale at the Student Union.

 



Someone sent me this photo that proves that whatever his flaws, Congressman Barney Frank at least takes an interest in our nation's youth.

 

WMass Tea Partiers Arrested

Yesterday in Washington D.C.

 

Tea Partiers protesting in Springfield in January.

The national media was reporting yesterday afternoon that two people in the gallery of the chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives were arrested for shouting slogans in opposition to the government healthcare takeover at the lawmakers below. What wasn't discovered until today is that the two are Western Massachusetts residents - Dave Sanders of Wilbraham and William Gunn of the town of Ware. The disruption was reported by nearly all major media but the most concise account of the incident, which included expressions of outrage from Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank, appeared in the D.C. journal Roll Call:

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said Sunday that Republicans acted like “clowns” by egging on tea party protesters in the House gallery who were dragged out for shouting out against health care reform. A protester “stood up and started yelling, ‘kill the bill!’ … and then the Republicans started cheering him on,”

Frank vented to reporters after the incident. “You have dozens of Republicans standing and applauding and cheering on a guy who was disrupting the proceedings and resisting court officers. It’s really disgraceful.” Although Frank referred to only a single protester, Capitol Police spokeswoman Sgt. Kimberly Schneider later said two men were arrested in the incident. William Gunn and David Sanders, both from Massachusetts, were charged with disruption of Congress, Schneider said.

Rowdy tea party protesters have flooded the Capitol grounds in recent days to oppose health care reform; group organizers on Sunday were encouraging attendees at a rally to get gallery passes and bring their message directly to lawmakers.

A visit to the website of the activist organization to which both activists belong The Western Mass 912 Group shows photographs of both of the men who were arrested yesterday in the Capitol. Here is Sanders of Wilbraham:

This is William Gunn and presumably a young Gunn.

Gunn looks familiar to me. I suspect this is him waving a "Don't Tread on Me" flag outside of the appearance of Barney Frank at UMass recently.

If so it would be ironic that it was Frank who would later denounce him and Sanders in the national media.

Both the Western Mass teapartiers have been released from custody and are back in the area and posting on the 912 Group website, where they are receiving mostly congratulatory messages from supporters. Most of the comments reflect the sentiment that their act of civil disobedience was justified, as in the spirit of this one quote by Orwell that someone posted:

"Speaking the truth during times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act."
- George Orwell

To read all the comments click here.

Post Parade

No, I did not go to the big parade yesterday in Holyoke, but the ever intrepid Kristen Beam did and here are a few of her snaps.

Naturally the media was out in full force, but this time they were also participants, not just observers. Of course if you want good weather for the parade invite the weathermen to march! Here are the Channel 22 folks Ryan Walsh, Brian Lapis and Adam Strzempko. 

Dave Madsen and Eric Fisher of TV40. 

Springfield Mayor Dom Sarno and his police department. 

The rock star himself, Senator Scott Brown. 

Representative D. Humason and Westfield Mayor Knapik.

 



When the crowds departed, only the trash remained. 

The Music Section

Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right. 

Northampton 2010

 

I forgot about the bus schedule changes on account of the students on break, so I had some time to wander a bit around downtown. That's why I always carry a camera with me, you can always see things to photograph when you put your mind in the right place.

The gay pride flag outside the Unitarian Church.

 



Bumperstickers are big sellers around here. Nearly every car has got at least one.

 



Paintings in a window of Northampton's most favorite subject - itself. 

A mysterious gold painted brick on a wall. 

The Northampton parking garage was built in..... 

I remember what that space was like before the garage. It was a big gravelly, cracked asphalt parking lot that had a little white wooden shack in the middle of it that served as the Peter Pan bus stop.

My main memory of the Blizzard of '78 involves that shack. Despite the terrible weather, I was determined to go to Springfield that day for a big fun party. I waited and waited inside the shack with a few other people for the bus to come until finally we were told the bus was cancelled.

I was really bummed, as were my friends in Springfield, because I was bringing some of the party supplies in my knapsack, in particular some blotter acid with Mr. Natural on it (a legendary brand) and a brick of hashish so fine it would crumble at the first lick of the flame.

But I had no choice but to go back to the apartment I was renting on Dryads Green, stopping at the King Street packy before they too closed for the storm. Thus armed against whatever unpleasant realities might arise in the midst of the worst storm of the century, I really don't remember what happened next. But I feel I can reasonably guess that I faced the furies of nature with better humor than most.

One of the coolest things in Hamp is the Drive By Poets, who distribute their poetry out of boxes like newspapers.

Here is their latest by Denise Fontaine-Pincince:

To the Woman Who Was Upset With Me
For Using the Word "Miracle" In Telling
Her Seven-Year-Old Son How A Single,
Pink Impatien Had Just Bloomed Out of
the Crack Where My Sidewalk and
Foundation Meet, A Few Feet Away From
the Window Box where I'd Planted Last
Year's Annuals,

I'm not sorry.

Northampton, ya gotta love it, where even the graffiti is uplifting. 

Romney Ahead

The first major poll to look at the Republican field for 2012 has our own former Governor Mitt Romney leading the field. According to Public Policy Polling:

Mitt Romney and Scott Brown

Our first national look at who Republicans would prefer as their 2012 Presidential nominee confirms the wide open nature of the field. The leading candidates are all within the margin of error of each other, with Mitt Romney leading at 28% followed by Mike Huckabee at 24% and Sarah Palin at 23%. Ron Paul pulls 11%, 9% say they're undecided, and 6% say their preference would be someone else.

I like Romney, but he's too establishment for me and showed poor judgement in his failed Massachusetts healthcare plan. Huckabee is too religious, and Palin needs to find her true calling as a talk show host. Ron Paul is the best but he can't win. So as far as I'm concerned, no major player now on the field strikes me as a suitable challenger for Obama. 

The Music Section

Surrealistic imagary of a concert in the basement of Thornes in downtown Northampton. 

 

Valley rockstars Thurston Moore of Northampton and J. Mascis of Amherst teamed up to form an avant-garde punk band called Demolished Thoughts which performed the other day at the trendsetting SXSW conference in Austin. A video has surfaced of the madness:

Wilbraham Cop

Tells his Tragic Tale.

Wow, listen to this shocking video about what went down in the Springfield suburb of Wilbraham, Massachusetts.

Thoughts

Bumperstickers I would put on my car if I had one.

 










Eclipse Plus

Hey, Zak has opened his new restaurant called Eclipse. Here he is working in the kitchen this morning.

It's a real classy joint. Dig this artistic shiny wooden eclipse embedded in the floor. 

Here's the bar area. Ya gotta check this place out for yourself! It is located in the heart of downtown Northampton by City Hall. 

A biker observes a painter at UMass yesterday. Things are quiet while the students are on Spring Break.

 



When I was young you could always tell the upper class kids at UMass from the scholarship kids because the ones with money came back to campus from Spring Break with tans while the rest of us were still winter white because we had to stay in the area to work jobs. 

The Music Section

Too cool.

Beyond cool. 

Out of the Vault

This is a day for the Irish to get drunk and sentimental. Personally I'll forego the drunk part and go straight to the nostalgia trip with these gems from deep in the catacombs of my legendary vaults.

Here's a photo strip of my Grandmother Ida Devine in 1906.

Here is my Grandfather Clarence White at Five Mile Pond in 1930.

My father in his scout uniform in 1940.

My father's boyhood friend Doug Ariel ran unsuccessfully against Stanley Zarod for State Rep in 1972. When he ran for mayor of Springfield the year before it was my first exposure to a political campaign.

 



This is a bus ticket. They used to pass them out at school every Monday in strips of ten, and God help you if you lost any of them. The Springfield Street Railway Company was the private firm that ran the busses before the government took over as the PVTA, and the prices rose as the service declined. 

If you lost bus tickets and had to walk it might very well take you so long that you would need one of these.

Marc Walker in a picture taken in 1979. Marc was a member of Destiny's Defeat, Pine Point's first real rock band. He died five years ago of an accidental drug overdose. In fact, of the original five members only one is still alive. I guess destiny really did defeat them.

 



It's hard to believe that in two weeks it will be a mindblowing thirty fuckin years since this Martian Highway concert at UMass.

Me and my bike in 1982.

Neal Under Pressure

 



Congressman Richard Neal found his Milford office under siege from angry Tea Partiers yesterday. Read the full account here.

Assorted Shots

Bruce Adams photo of the Springfield St. Patrick's Day Committee at City Hall this morning. 

Radio dudes Bill Dwight and Monte Belmonte doing a charity gig in downtown Northampton today. 

 Dan Yorke in Rhode Island last week.

My friend Zak's new restaurant Eclipse in downtown Northampton is opening today. Go check it out!

The hot new spring fashion statement.

Me in the great wide open this afternoon atop Amherst's Mount Pollux. 

The Music Section

Trevor: The bald version.

 



 

Paul Kantner of the Jefferson Starplane turns 69 today. Here's a picture of him I took at the Springfield Civic Center sometime in the Seventies.