• Somewhat Famous: Lynn Baseball

    July 1 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
    (edited 3 weeks, 1 day ago)

      “Somewhat Famous”: Lynn Baseball

      Lynn has a proud tradition of cheering on her children in Little League and the local high school baseball teams, and it is one more New England bedroom community with a long history of cheering for and complaining about the Boston Red Sox, but long ago, when baseball was being born, it was the biggest thing in town. It combined the spectacle of a visiting circus with the chest-thumping patriotism of a battle between armies. Let me take you through a modest little history of the birth of baseball in Lynn, told in nine innings:
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    • Lynn, Lynn, the City of … Saloons, but not necessarily Sin

      June 1 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
      (edited 1 month, 3 weeks ago)

        Picture a saloon in your mind. What do you see? An old dusty place with some cowboys playing cards and drinking whiskey? Swinging doors at the entrance and maybe a piano being played and a spittoon in the corner? Thanks mainly to Hollywood, we pretty much all come up with the same image in our minds. But there really was some truth to the images – the saloons of the American Wild West were often pretty wild. The drinks weren’t called Tarantula Juice, Red Eye, and Coffin Varnish for nothing.
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      • Lynn’s Hidden Secrets

        May 1 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
          As if it was some recently discovered lost footage from the movie “National Treasure,” some heavy, dusty, leather volumes have recently resurfaced: the original records of the earliest organization of Masons in Lynn, covering its story from its creation in 1805 and throughout its existence in the nineteenth century. These ancient volumes tell, in part, of how a secret society in Lynn of long ago had its time of having to go underground, although not literally like in the movie.
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        • Lynn - Pretty as a Picture

          April 1 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
            As long as love has existed in Lynn, as long as babies were born, couples got married, family members moved away, or died too young, there was a desire to remember the occasion with a picture.

            The first portraits were paintings by skilled – and sometimes not so skilled – artists living in or passing through Lynn. Two of Lynn’s earliest recorded resident artists were Miss Lydia Mansfield, a silhouette cutter, and Mrs. Towle, a portraitist and miniature painter. Miss Mansfield cut silhouette specimens of human figures, animals, birds, trees, and urns "in the most fine, and delicate manner, far surpassing anything of the kind we have ever witnessed from any other source." In 1824 she presented the visiting Marquis de Lafayette with an elaborate and huge silhouette cutting of him standing under a triumphal arch, surmounted by a bald eagle, and adorned with military emblems; it was “made wholly of different colored paper curiously cut with scissors.” Lafayette was suitably impressed with the life-sized image and sent her a gift in return.
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          • Why Lynn Was Vane

            March 2 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
              Weathervanes have been perched on Lynn’s rooftops probably since the very first homes, barns, and sheds were erected in 1629. The weathervane was a valued tool that provided important information to its owner as well as to anyone who could see it from a distance. People who settle in Lynn quickly figure out that wind from the north brings cold weather; from the east, very stormy weather; from the south, warm weather; and from the west, wet weather. When this understanding of Lynn wind patterns was combined with a basic knowledge of the area’s climate (hot summers; cold, damp autumns; freezing, snowy winters; and changeable hot and cold, sunny and rainy springs), people could better plan their daily and seasonal activities, travel, farming, and gardening.
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            • Getting Blue in Lynn

              February 1 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting

                Each time you get to enter an older Lynn home, look at the windows. There’s a good chance you will see some set with a pane or two of blue glass. The decision to add blue had little to do with interior decoration but everything to do with disease and sickness.

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              • Hot Air Balloons

                January 3 2010 Posted by under Lynnteresting
                (edited 6 months, 2 weeks ago)

                  The long and brutal Civil War was finally over. The loss of life was enormous, but the victory had been won, and the people of Lynn were ready to celebrate. The young city felt full of patriotism and excitement as the festivities of July 4th finally arrived. A parade, firecrackers, and bands playing patriotic songs were certainties for the July 4th celebration, but a new attraction was going to be the center of attention in this year, 1865 - Lynn would have its first-ever hot air balloon lift off from the Lynn Common.
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