Published February 14, 2011

Boston cartographer Andy Woodruff walked and boated through Boston, Somerville and Cambridge — GPS unit in hand — to create this nerdy valentine. It’s a Google Map.

[googlemap height=”400″ title=”A Cartographer’s Valentine”]http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=217390199258743014037.00049c222f218a5780c68&ll=42.357149,-71.069355&spn=0.070783,0.137157&t=p&z=13[/googlemap]

Woodruff documented the journey in words and pictures, too. He learned a lot about our city in the process:

First of all, finding a decent-sized heart shape in the local street system is not quite as easy as I expected. It is certainly much easier than in a city with a strict rectilinear grid, but a heart requires something like an octilinear (transit map style) system, ideally with ample curves. Boston’s streets may not be well-organized overall, but they do follow some order within neighborhoods and don’t leave a lot of options for hearts. As it turns out, the key here—and totally the best thing about this project—was to make use of the Charlestown Navy Yard–Long Wharf ferry, something I had yet to experience in my time living here.

So why do this? Apparently this is a thing with map makers. “After concluding that simply projecting or arranging maps into heart shapes has been played out, I decided to work for it this time,” Woodruff says on his cartography blog.

Speaking of nerdy Valentines, NPR has some for you die-hards out there.

Published February 14, 2011

In 1775, Joseph Warren asks that his letter be shared with someone -- it's not so clear whom.

There’s a new wrinkle in the story of Joseph Warren’s long-lost letter, and it doesn’t come until the tiny postscript. In that letter, Warren reports Continental victories at Fort Ticonderoga and Crown Point.

Last week the state recovered Warren’s letter, dated May 1775, some 60 years after it was stolen from the Massachusetts Archives. The secretary of state provided me with one transcript of the letter, which concludes:

PS you will be kind enough to communicate the contents of this Letter to General Knox as I love to give Pleasure to good men

That would be Boston revolutionary Henry Knox, right?

Boston history buff and blogger J.L. Bell isn’t so sure:

I’m eager for any evidence of when Henry and Lucy Knox left Boston. The earliest statement of a date appears in Francis Drake’s 1873 biography, which says they departed “Just one year from the day of his marriage,” which was on 16 June 1774. That meant the couple was out just in time for the Battle of Bunker Hill. Thus, if the Committee of Safety was in a position to pass news to Knox on 25 May, then he must have been out earlier.

However, Knox did not become a general until 1776. In May 1775, he held no rank in the New England army, and had been only a lieutenant in his prewar militia company.

Warren’s handwriting is hard to decipher — he was a doctor, after all — but he might not have written “Knox” at all. Bell posits the PS might have actually said “General Room,” “the general’s room,” or “General Thomas.”

Interesting. You can try to decipher the letter for yourself by viewing the super high-res version on Flickr.

Published February 11, 2011

NOAA has released images and video from its recovery of the Two Brothers, a Nantucket whaling ship that sunk near Hawaii almost 200 years ago.

Marine biologists discovered the wreck by happy accident at Papahānaumokuākea (PA pa huh NOW muh KOO uh KAY uh) Marine National Monument. The evidence found helps tell the story of poor George Pollard, a sea captain with terrible luck.

“The captain of the whale ship Two Brothers is a pretty famous whaling captain — famous for his misfortune,” said Kelly Gleason, the lead researcher, in a WBUR interview.

In 1820, Pollard was captain of the Essex, a ship that was attacked and sunk by a sperm whale. Pollard and his crew survived the wreck but nearly died while lost in the Pacific. After 95 days, driven by starvation, Pollard cannibalized his own cousin. He somehow made it back to Massachusetts.

A friend told Herman Melville the incredible tale, and the story of “Moby-Dick” was born.

Amazingly, Pollard and two men from his crew took to the high seas again, this time on the Two Brothers. (These are the same crew members who watched their captain eat a man.) Disaster struck again, or rather, the ship struck disaster, when the Two Brothers ran aground on the French Frigate Shoals, in the northwest Hawaiian islands.

Pollard survived again, but he would never embark on another mission.

“The community of Nantucket really did give this man and the entire crew kind of a second chance, and they didn’t pass judgment right away,” Gleason said. “But after that experience with the Two Brothers, he really was marked as an unlucky man. And sailors are pretty supertitutions.”

Pollard ended his career as a night watchman in Nantucket.

NOAA produced a video interview with Gleason about the remarkable discovery, which you can watch on our YouTube page.

Published February 11, 2011

Brady, Allen, Ortiz (AP Photos)

Time slows. Fans fidget. Everyone wants to scream, but no one wants to distract the offense, so that pent-up energy is released through their legs, arms and fists — until, finally, Tom Brady throws a strike to the end zone. And the stadium erupts.

Those, for me, are special moments. They’re moments that make stop and say, “Remember this. Being a sports fan will never be better than this. No matter how long you live, your favorite teams won’t be this good.”

Every time Ray Allen rises quickly above a defender to shoot a three-pointer, I say a silent prayer of thanks. When David Ortiz rounds first base as flashbulbs sparkle, tiny legs churning like pistons in overdrive, I can’t help but smile.

That’s why I declared Brady, Allen and Ortiz the three Wonders of the Boston Sports World.

But as commenter “Gogreen” wrote Wednesday:

my one issue is… just 3 wonders? what about a paul pierce step-back elbow jumper?

We all have our moments, our favorite memories. So I want to hear yours. What are your Wonders of the Boston Sports World? We’ll break it down into wonders past and present. Respond in the comments or on twitter @jeremybernfeld.

Published February 10, 2011

On May 25, 1775, as the American Revolution was just getting started, a young Boston physician wrote of victory at Fort Ticonderoga and a somewhat egotistical colonel named Benedict Arnold.

Joseph Warren was the patriot from Roxbury serving as president of the first Provincial Congress of Massachusetts. He sent the good news from Watertown in a letter to the revolutionary Committee of Safety, asking that it be forwarded to the good Gen. Henry Knox.

Warren’s letter has been missing since the 1950s, when it was stolen from the Massachusetts Archives. On Thursday, the commonwealth got it back for $8,000.

[sidebar width=”200″]

Watertown May 25 1775

Gentlemen
Upon my Arrival here just
this Minute I had the Pleasure
of being informed that our worthy
Friend Col’l Arnold, not having
had the sole Honor of reducing
Ticonderoga and Crown Point
determined upon an Expedition
against St Johns in which He
happily succeeded — the Letters
were directed to the Committee
of Safety but were supposed to be
necessary to be laid before the
Congress, I have not yet seen them
but you will have the particulars
from the Bearer — I have also
received A Letter from the Congress
at New Hampshire informing
me of a Resolve to raise forthwith
2000 Men and more if it should
be necessary — the Troops, at least
one company with a Train of Artillery
from providence are in the upper
End of Roxbury to say the Truth
I find my Health much mended since
the Morning

I am Gentlemen your
most obed’t Servant
J Warren

PS you will be kind enough to communicate the contents of this Letter to General Knox as I love to give Pleasure to good men[/sidebar]

“We were simply anxious to get our hands on the document,” said Secretary of State William Galvin, who talked to me by phone. “It’s obviously worth a great deal more. The costs of securing it will be minimal now that it’s in our hands, but obviously it was important for the state to get it back.”

Just three weeks after Warren sent the letter, his death in the Battle of Bunker Hill would galvanize the colonists. Warren is immortalized there today as a statue, not far from the oldest tavern in Massachusetts, the aptly named Warren Tavern.

For years, historical documents like the Warren letter were kept on Beacon Hill in a building with lax security. Priceless documents would go missing, many of them turning up years later in private collections and auction houses around the country. Galvin’s office routinely scours the Web for artifacts that belong to Massachusetts.

Warren’s letter recently turned up in a catalog for a Sotheby’s auction. Alan Cotes, the state’s supervisor of public records, negotiated to get the document back from a private collector in California.

“Whenever we see (documents) in the name of the commonwealth, I lay claim to them,” Galvin said. “Sometimes we have to make some financial accommodations. Obviously they’re our documents, but if there are costs attendant we are willing to pay them.”

Galvin could not be more excited about getting the letter back.

“He’s laying out some of the major events that are coming to pass in the Revolution,” Galvin said. In the letter, Warren celebrates the battles for Fort Ticonderoga and Crown Point, at the edge of Lake Champlain in New York. Warren had authorized Benedict Arnold and Ethan Allen to seize the large stock of artillery there.

“Of course, this artillery that was captured and brought down to Boston was critical in the final defeat of the British in Boston in 1776 — on March 17, 1776, Evacuation Day — when Washington put the same artillery at the heights of Dorchester Heights,” Galvin said.

Arnold apparently wasn’t willing to share his glory, Warren remarks, perhaps sarcastically:

I had the Pleasure of being informed that our worthy Friend Col’l Arnold, not having had the sole Honor of reducing Ticonderoga and Crown Point determined upon an Expedition against St Johns in which He happily succeeded

“The issues that Warren is dealing with in his letter — the concerns about a possible invasion from Canada, how the provincial army was to be strengthened — all of these issues, I think, demonstrate the depth of his intellect. He was thinking ahead as to how this revolution would proceed,” Galvin said.

Warren reports that New Hampshire was amassing 2,000 troops to fight an incursion from the north, and that troops from Providence were stationed in “the upper part of Roxbury.”

Warren’s letter is fragile and not available for public viewing, Galvin said. Today the Massachusetts Archives are carefully stored, catalogued and guarded at a facility in Columbia Point.

Related Stories:

• Radio Boston: Joseph Warren and the story of Bunker Hill

Published February 9, 2011

The MSPCA has had a unique view of the economic downturn.

Since 2007, the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has seen a dramatic shift toward financial constraints as a primary reason people give up pets.

In 2007, 111 animals were surrendered to the Boston shelter due to owner cost concerns, spokesman Brian Adams told me. In 2010, that figure more than doubled — to 258. Across the MSPCA’s four shelters, the trend was similar: 278 animals surrendered due to cost concerns in 2007; 456 in 2010.

The organization keeps detailed records about why owners give up their animals, including moving to housing that isn’t pet-friendly, divorce and allergies. But in 2008, with the recession first striking, the MSPCA felt compelled to create a new category: foreclosure.

Full Pooch Disclosure: A family member's new dog, a 4-year-old Border Collie/German Shepherd mix, was surrendered to the MSPCA following a foreclosure.

“Prior to 2008, we would hear that people were being foreclosed on, but it was very rare,” Adams said. “However, in 2008, much like the entire nation, foreclosures became much more prominent, and people started citing foreclosure to us more, at which point we decided, ‘We need to add a category for this.’ ”

In 2008, 27 animals were surrendered to the Boston center specifically because of foreclosure. The last two years saw 44 more animals surrendered to the city shelter for that reason.

Despite the shift toward cost-driven surrenders, the MSPCA says it’s caring for roughly the same number of animals over the past few years.

Surrenders due to financial concerns present specific challenges for the MSPCA. Allergy information provided to owners, for example, can help keep an animal in the home. For financial surrenders, the options are limited. Adams said certain low-cost services can help pet owners get over “small humps,” but a major decrease in an owner’s finances is harder to combat.

Further, many animals surrendered to the MSPCA for financial concerns require “extra care,” Adams said, perhaps to make up for a surgery cash-strapped owners could not provide.

It’s an emotional situation that’s become more common for the shelter.

“The one constant that comes with surrenders, especially for foreclosure or financial concerns, is you’re dealing with people who, on a very gut level, do show a sense of shame as if they have not been able to provide for this animal that they love very much,” Adams said.

The MSPCA, which also cares for thousands of stray animals every year, has felt the pinch itself. In 2008, its private-supported endowment lost nearly 26 percent, or more than $11 million, which led to the closure of shelters in Brockton, Martha’s Vineyard and Springfield. Adams said the organization worked with entities in those communities to “ensure animal welfare programs would continue.”