News
The Ipswich Mills Dam and fish ladder
by Russ Harris
People driving through small Massachusetts towns pass them every day without much notice or care.
A quiet pond in town. A low stone or concrete dam across a narrow river. Sometimes a converted mill building nearby, now apartments or offices.
Once you start looking for them,...
Two young people were safely rescued after becoming stuck in thick brush and mud in a marsh off Broadmeadow Road, prompting a coordinated response from Groton Police and Fire personnel.
According to officials, the two had been exploring the marsh when they became unable to free themselves....
A cyberattack on municipal systems disrupted operations at the Patriot Regional Emergency Communications Center in Pepperell early Tuesday, affecting the regional dispatch system that serves Groton, Pepperell, Dunstable, Townsend, and Ashby.
Because Groton Police dispatch is handled through the...
A presentation by the Groton Sustainability Commission to the Planning Board on April 2 exposed clear divisions over whether to support the Specialized Stretch Energy Code ahead of the May 2 Town Meeting, with some of the sharpest skepticism coming from member Paul Hathaway.
The commission’s...
Article 9 appears to be without precedent in Massachusetts. Town Manager Mark Haddad said he has discussed the concept informally with a small number of colleagues in other communities, as well as with state Sen. John Cronin and state Rep. Margaret Scarsdale. Their response, he said, has been...
Col. William Prescott stands at the center of this engraved version of John Trumbull’s Battle of Bunker Hill. By the 1820s and 1840s, reproductions like this made the Revolution visible to everyday Americans, turning a distant event into a shared national story. [see detail in story below identifying William Prescott]
A Legend Turns 300: He wasn’t the richest Prescott—or the most powerful. In fact, when his father’s vast estate was divided, William Prescott was left with a remote “Mill Lot” on the edge of town, while his brothers became a politician and a Harvard-trained physician. In a family of influence and...
The Groton Select Board voted 4-1 to recommend Article 9 at the upcoming Annual Town Meeting, a proposal that would ask the Massachusetts Legislature to exempt municipal health insurance and pension costs from the town’s Proposition 2½ levy limit—allowing property taxes to rise above the standard...
The Massachusetts House has approved the PROTECT Act (H 5305), a bill that would limit how local police and courts cooperate with federal immigration enforcement while setting new rules for schools, employers and correctional facilities. Local representatives Margaret Scarsdale and Dan Sena voted...
by Groton Parks Commission
In Groton, Cow Pond is more than a collection of athletic fields—it is a daily gathering place where the rhythms of community life unfold. From youth soccer games to adult leagues, more than 1,700 children and adults register to use the fields each year, often drawing...
Shorty: So . . . nothing happened. No rolling blackouts. No rate spike that made you wince when you opened the bill. Is that news? Makes you wonder—how much of what keeps our town running feels invisible? And if it works well, don’t we take it all for granted?
As sub-zero temperatures and heavy...