Miscellany Mondays: Happy Anniversary, part two, a look back at the first year of History Buzz
What were we buzzing about over the past year?
Wow, what a year it has been! Thank you all for reading, subscribing, liking, and commenting. A little over a year ago, we started to drop hints that something new was coming and on March 22, 2021, we launched History Buzz.
We had no idea how it would go
Would readers follow us to Substack? Would they like the stories and stick with History Buzz? Could we keep up the pace of publishing twice a week? Would History Buzz attract new readers and writers?
117 posts and emails later, I think it’s clear that History Buzz has a steady fan base…..including YOU!
I can’t thank you enough. History Buzz wouldn’t be possible without all of our subscribers and readers – free, paid, and drop-in visitors. I know I speak for the whole History Buzz team when I share our most enthusiastic THANK YOU!
Since we’re here for an anniversary celebration, I thought we could take a look back at some of the content your subscriptions and content support have made possible over the past year. Click on the links bolded below to read the original posts.
A few favorites
One recent popular post was Jim Batchelder’s Miscellany Mondays story “A Grand Pile of Bricks – the Stowe School.” Lots of likes, shares, and comments as readers shared their memories spending time in old 19th century school buildings.
Last May, guest writer Barbara Bunn wrote the two-part series on Joseph Neesima (links: Part one and Part two). Born Neesima Shimeta, he changed his name to Joseph Hardy Neesima. He accomplished many “firsts” throughout his life.
One History Buzz team member favorites was, “Tenor Roland Hayes – a star comes to Andover.” Tenor Roland Hayes (1887-1977) was the first African American to achieve fame as a concert performer both at home in the United States and abroad. He gave two performances in Andover.
Back in September, we took a three-part, myth-busting dive into the mystery of the “peculiar earthworks” formerly known as “Turtle Mound” (links: Part one, Part two, Part three). Was it built by Vikings or Irish monks who found their way to the region in 1000 CE? Or was it something else?
We were back on the myth-busting trail with the three-part series on U.S. President Franklin Pierce (links: Part one, Part two, Part three). One reader wrote, “I think it tells a fascinating, important story about how legend and lore are easily conflated with actual events, and about how some mystery person’s errant doodle gave rise to this claim about the informal summertime removal of the locus of American government to Central Street in Andover.”
Another team favorite What’s It Wednesday posts is “Soap, Soap, Soap” about the history of - you guessed it - soap. Did you know that Howard Pillsbury of Andover, MA made his own brand of hand cleaner?
And there are Toni Armstrong’s posts on Andover Bewitched, an ongoing deep dive into Andover’s role in the Salem Witch Hysteria of 1692. Toni brings stories of the Witch Trials to life and turns names into real people who lived through a horrific time. One team member wrote, “The one about a town meeting guest-starring the afflicted girls from Salem is pretty memorable. Holy smokes.” Read “An accuser and three witches” here.
A few more History Center staff favorites include:
New information about the Hinton family, on the eve of Juneteenth
Stories based on journals and diaries in the History Center’s collection written by Angela McBrien.
So many stories to share! What comes next?
A Reader Survey, March 28
As the last part of our anniversary celebration, we’ll be sending out our second Reader Survey on Monday, March 28. In addition to asking for your feedback on History Buzz in general, we’ll also ask you to share some of your favorite posts.
Watch your inbox for your Reader Survey! Your feedback will help make History Buzz even better.
As always, thank you so much for reading!
~Elaine
Love all the stories, it's nice to know what happen years ago. They don't teach it in the schools, how sad is that. Great work, We need to know what happen here it's are roots.