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By PAIGE HANSON

During his sophomore year of college in November 2021, Charley Blacker wanted to start an organization that was unique and new to the University of Massachusetts Amherst community: a group dedicated to promoting local musicians through playlists,...

By BOB FLAHERTY

Outgoing executive editor Jim Hicks of the Massachusetts Review has yet to warm up to his new surroundings.400 Venture Way looks like one of those ultra-tech monoliths that have “Solutions” as part of its name. Surrounded by a sea of blacktop and...

By ANTHONY CAMMALLERI

AMHERST — On the 10th floor of the University of Massachusetts Amherst Campus Center, Samuel Noel, a welder by trade, works as a dishwasher — his first job in the United States.Noel, a Haitian immigrant who moved to Greenfield’s Days Inn shelter on...

By STEVE PFARRER

When Stan Sherer was growing up in the Bronx in New York City in the 1950s, an uncle paid a visit to his family one day and brought along some World War II-era darkroom equipment.Sherer didn’t know it just then, but he was about to find his life’s...

By STEVE PFARRER

Augusta Savage rose to prominence as a sculptor and educator when she moved to New York City in the 1920s, where she soon became a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance.But Savage, who was also a determined advocate for equal rights for African...

By DOMENIC POLI

Experts say that if you encounter a bear it is important to immediately make yourself look big, talk very calmly and slowly back away.But after that, if you saw the carnivoran mammal in Massachusetts, you can go to bit.ly/3raabc8 to report the...

By MADDIE FABIAN

Editor’s note: This is the second of four articles from the Western Massachusetts Solar Forum series taking place in September.AMHERST — At the site of the old Mount Tom Station coal-fired power plant stands around 17,000 solar panels generating...

Featuring a folk veteranand organizerAMHERST — Folksinger and songwriter Paul Kaplan, a longtime host of the Pioneer Valley Folklore Society’s Song & Story Swap, will mark 25 years of involvement with the event Sept. 2 when he plays as the featured...

By STEVE PFARRER

AMHERST — Adding to its collection of work documenting social change, the University of Massachusetts Amherst has acquired the papers of social activist and writer Al Weinrub, co-founder of the anti-imperialist organization Science for the People...

By JAMES PENTLAND

AMHERST — Sharks have long been creatures of fascination, but having focused on them in his work for almost 10 years, UMass biology professor Duncan Irschick has found that most three-dimensional models are poor representations of the marine...

By STEVE PFARRER

A Stranger in BaghdadBy Elizabeth Loudon; Hoopee/The American University in Cairo PressBritish author Elizabeth Loudon, who once lived in the Valley, also lived for several months in Baghdad, Iraq, in 1975 to 1976 when she was in her late teens, a...

By STEVE PFARRER

April in Amherst in an odd-numbered year: It must be time for the Bach Festival & Symposium at the University of Massachusetts.The biennial event, begun in 2015, offers a wide range of J.S. Bach’s music, from solo performances to expansive pieces with...

By STEVE PFARRER

NORTHAMPTON — A University of Massachusetts professor and a filmmaker who grew up in Amherst are among eight people in Massachusetts who have won Guggenheim Fellowships.Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina, who teaches English at UMass and is a specialist on the...

By EMILY THURLOW

AMHERST — After months of searching for a home for a Craig’s Doors shelter guest who uses state rental vouchers, Jack Myers was excited to find an available unit and set up a tour.However, when Myers arrived to tour the rental unit, the guest was...

By STEVE PFARRER

The Fine Arts Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has continued to rebound from the pandemic with an expanded program this year featuring a range of shows in music, dance, theater and movement.As spring officially arrives, the schedule...

By STEVE PFARRER

AMHERST — Tibetan activist and writer Tenzin Tsundue, who’s been arrested and jailed multiple times for his activism, is coming to the Valley for a series of talks and to introduce his newest collection of poetry.Tsundue was born in 1975 in India to...

By STEVE PFARRER

The idea first came to Elijah Bynum about four years ago when he was exercising in a California gym and noticed an ultra-serious bodybuilder, a guy who was “radiating intensity” as he went through his paces.“There was this really intense energy about...

By STEVE PFARRER

The House in the PinesBy Ana Reyes; Dutton There are so many mystery novels in the world today that it can be tough to make your book stand out. But take one that’s built around around psychological suspense and the elusiveness of memory, rather than...

By STEVE PFARRER

AMHERST — Over 30 years ago, Glenn Siegel, then working as a jazz DJ at WMUA-FM at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, went to talk to Frederick Tillis, the director of the university’s Fine Arts Center. Siegel and some other jazz DJs at the...

By DUSTY CHRISTENSEN

AMHERST — Bomb manufacturers and defense contractors. Fortune 500 beverage and chemical corporations. Communications and technology behemoths.These are some of the industry giants with which the University of Massachusetts Amherst has struck sponsored...

EDITED BY MAX DUTZIK HENRICKS,PARKER PETERS, NICO RIBADENEYRA and MIRANDA DEBRUYN

Note: This is the first of three narrative reports in a special series produced by Professor Kathy Roberts Forde’s “Longform Narrative” class in the Journalism Department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.Until the COVID-19 crisis disrupted...