Talk:History of Lowell, Massachusetts

In line citations
This is an interesting article! But, the list of references is fairly useless at the end. Some work is definitely needed to create in-line citations throughout this article (or it's legitimacy is certainly questionable). -Midnightdreary 04:21, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks, and completely fair. I've never done an inline citation pointing to a printed source.  I would love to cite the article better with an example to follow and if someone would like to  certain parts of this article.  I really don't want to go overboard on my inlines, especially when it's really common stuff.


 * Thanks,
 * CSZero 05:33, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't know if you can overdo citations! It's better to have too many than too little, I think. My first suggestion is to find places where a superlative is used (i.e. "largest textile center" in the intro) and source that so that there can't be much debate. Other questionable or opinion-like things should also be sourced, like where it says it's a model for other towns and anything glaringly factoid, like dates. If you need an idea how to format, just find an article that has a few sources and edit it to see how it was done. Leave a message on my talk page if I can help at all; I lived in Lowell for five years. =) -Midnightdreary 16:59, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Great Article
I just wanted to say that this is a great article with a ton of information on this historical town and it is a good standard for other historic towns.Yamaka122 17:08, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Praying Indian Village of Wamesit
This is in responce to the line in the History of Lowell (MA) that says that Wamiset was forcably annexed by the Town of Chelmsford (MA). This is correct, but only the part of Wamiset on the western side of the Concord River was annexed. The eastern half had already been incorporated as part of Billerica in 1655.

According to Henry Hazen's book "The History of Billerica", the praying Indian Village of Wamesit was located on both sides of the Concord River south of the Merrimack.

When Billerica was incorporated in 1655, it took in the eastern part of Wamesit. In 1724 the families that lived within the reservation wanted to incorporated ALL of Wamesit at a seperate town.

Billerica agreed to the incorporation of Wamesit as long as they met the guidelines set forth by the Great and General Court of Massachusetts. 1- Have a meeting house errected within two years. 2- Have a Minister in place. 3- Set well definded borders.

The borders were set when the reservation was established and meeting house was built, but the families failed to get a minister in place. Because of this, Wamiset failed to become a town and the western part of the reservation was annexed to Chelmsford while the easter part remained with Billerica.

In 1729, after failing to gain a charter, the families of Wamiset tried again. Only instead of trying to get the western part of Wamiset away from Chelmsford (now the village of East Chelmsford), they looked to the southeast. They wanted to take land from Billerica between the Great Swamp and the Shawsheen River.

A new meeting house was errected and a minster in place by 1730. The people of Wamiset asked the town of Billerica to support their petition for a charter. Billerica agreed to a border to be established "half way between the Andover and Billerica meeting houses". But the official incorporation of the town did not happen until December of 1734. Why? Despute over the name of the town. Wamiset was rejected because the majority of the land and the families who live there were not part of the reservation. North Billerica was considered since Andover had been split into two towns (Andover & North Andover), but it was Tewksbury that was chosen since the majority of the settlers were from Tewksebury, Gloucestershire, England.

When Lowell was settled and incorporated in 1830s, it took most of the original Wamiset Reservation. A small part still remains in Chelmsford and is still called East Chelmsford while a small part remained in Tewksbury and is called Wamiset to this day.

Along Rte 38 in Tewksbury just before the jct with I-495, there is a small common with a statue dedicated to the Wamiset Indians. This is considered the center of Wamiset Village by the Town of Tewksbury. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jph0917 (talk • contribs) 20:33, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Messed up
I just brainlessly tried to convert this to a place article. I apologize. I was confused by the "geography" section at the beginning. I wonder if that should have been there. Not sure what needs to be done to convert it back. There was a lot of WP:OR, WP:POV and needlessly display of politicians names, many of which I did eliminate. It now needs to be re-converted to a straight history. Having messed it up, I am now reluctant to try to convert it back. I do not recommend massive reversion which would simply bring in the old bad editing (as opposed to the new bad editing). Sorry. Student7 (talk) 19:37, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've been looking for help on this article for a long time, as I'm pretty much the only one who has done substantial editing on it - as the original author.  I actually liked the formatting concept for that last section you added and tweaked it a little.  I did add back in Paul Tsongas to the National Park section, as the city and the park make him an important focal point for the work he did.  I cited the Khmer Rouge bit, tried to cite everything new I added with something, except I took out the cite request for Lowell being a "traditional melting pot."  Saying a city that was over 40% foreign born at one point is a melting pot (added a citation for that one) is a little too obvious.  I'll try to fill in some more of the cite requests, I've been promising for years.  Maybe you could help?  Unfortunately, I wrote this article using 3-4 different books and jotted down factoids while (stupidly) failing to write down page numbers...  Thanks again, CSZero (talk) 00:06, 4 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks for straightening that out. I appreciate what you are saying about not keeping notes. We probably all did that on our first articles. Mine are still awaiting footnotes, as well!  :)

Recognizing politicians

 * I really dislike seeing politicians being recognized for doing the things that politicians are supposed to do to keep themselves in the limelight so they can be re-elected. National politicians just trade off points for each other, including (despite headlines to the contrary) Republicans, as well as Democrats. I think we give them too much credit. It is the taxpayers that pay for it. Worse in Massachusetts since they pay more to federal than they get back. Is that efficient?  :) But that is minor and others can weigh in on it. Student7 (talk) 20:06, 5 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't think I fully agree. I left out Marty Meehan's association with UMass Lowell as being a little too trivial of a feel-good factoid, and I added non-politician Mogan as an instrumental part of the creation of Lowell National Historical Park to make it look less like Paul Tsongas single-handedly got this park built (which also reflects the Park's article [and reality] better).  Taxpayers must pay for it, but somebody had to draft the plan and build up and expend the political capital you're talking about to actually get it done.  This New York Times article, written shortly after his death, gives creedence to him as being more than a mouthpiece needed to push through a pork-barrel project:  http://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/23/us/hometown-recalls-paul-tsongas-as-hero-who-inspired-renewal-and-pride.html.


 * I've always had issue with getting Wikipedia articles written correctly about localities. What's important in Lowell to Lowellians might not be important in Massachusetts, never mind the nation, but there has to be some weight given to the viewpoint of the residents.  Tsongas was the national-level cheerleader for a city that, as this article points out, went through a lot.  That isn't going to make too much sense to people who aren't from Lowell or at least very familiar with what happened here.  Thanks, CSZero (talk) 21:40, 5 October 2009 (UTC)


 * There are politicians in every state willing to spend the public's money if it will get them media attention. All "noble causes" of course. Only "noble causes." But it's our money, not theirs! There is very little done in the country that some politician hasn't weighed in on it one way or another. If we were to "recognize" politicians for all "their" contributions, there would be little room left in articles for anything else IMO. Student7 (talk) 19:04, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

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Timeline of Lowell, Massachusetts
What is missing from the city timeline article? Please add relevant content! Contributions welcome. Thank you. -- M2545 (talk) 11:02, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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