Tag Archives: George Harrison

Paul McCartney and Ringo on John Lennon’s murder …. Guns and Worcester and America

John Lennon was gunned down December 8 at his apartment complex, the Dakota, in New York City years ago; fellow Beatle Paul McCartney reflects on the day. Paul says it all BEAUTIFULLY: When someone is murdered there’s no proper goodbyes, loving moments between family and the dear one. Trauma all around. George Harrison, fellow Beatle, passed away naturally, of cancer. His death, not the devil’s work of a gunman, but God’s taking away, is a sweet memory for Paul. LOVED ONES NEVER RECOVER FROM THE SHOOTING DEATHS OF family and friends…

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WORCESTER gun buy back day, December 12:

December 12th, in honor of the victims who were lost in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, on December 14th, 2012.  Mayor Joseph M. Petty is calling on his fellow mayors to join him to make the anniversary of the massacre the yearly, statewide gun buyback day.

“Today I’m asking my fellow mayors to work within their own cities, and with their elected officials and community partners, to join us and honor the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting by making our cities safer and healthier.”  Mayor Petty said, “The date of this gun buyback effort marks three years since the tragic shooting in Newtown. We remember those victims in a special way, and are dedicating this program in their memory, and to all of those that have been lost in these shocking incidents.”

“There have been so many mass shootings:  Aurora, Virginia Tech, Charleston, Umpqua, Littleton, Fort Hood and so many more.  The list just keeps growing.  I can think of no better way to remember this and every other tragedy than by honoring it with a day dedicated to gun safety,” said Mayor Petty..  “This is not just about getting guns off the streets, it’s about making sure that if you have a gun in your home, that it’s secured.  It’s about safer streets and healthier homes and making sure that the violence we saw in Newtown doesn’t happen here.”

Dr. Michael Hirsh is the medical director for Worcester’s Division of Public Health, as well as a pediatric trauma surgeon and longtime gun safety advocate.  “This isn’t just about crime; it’s about health,” said Dr. Hirsh.  “An unsecured weapon in the home is a public health danger that leads to more frequent homicides, burglaries, lethal domestic violence, accidental shootings and suicide in the home.”

The Goods for Guns program has been a gun buyback program for the last fourteen years in Worcester, exchanging firearms for gift cards.

Police departments in Worcester, Millbury, Grafton, Leicester, Southbridge, Oxford, Sturbridge, Northbridge, and Webster will exchange guns for gift cards of varying amounts:

($25 rifle, $50 pistol, $75 semiautomatic weapon of any kind).

Residents of any city or town may drop off their weapons anonymously, in exchange for gift cards.

Gun owners are further welcomed to pick up a trigger lock free of charge from the police stations listed above.

The 2014 Good for Guns program produced almost 150 firearms in one day as well as 18 lbs of TNT that was being improperly stored in Leicester.  Since the inception of the Goods for Guns program, over 2500 guns have been returned to law enforcement officials in Central Massachusetts.

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From The New York Times!

CLICK HERE to view all the (uniquely) American mass murders.

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UNIVERSAL BACKGROUND CHECKS! CHANGE LAWS FOR BUYING GUNS AT GUN SHOWS! A NATIONAL BAN ON SEMIAUTOMATIC MILITARY-STYLE WEAPONS!

NOW!

– Rosalie Tirella

Meant to share this album (it goes way, way deep!!) …

… with you last month, in honor of  my favorite Beatle’s birthday (George Harrison – 2/25/1943). I used to adore Paul (I was a girl – he was sooo cute!); then it was John (I was angry – Lennon set my feelings to music/lyrics), now it is George (because the music is so beautiful, and I see cycles and patterns in cities, nature, myself, the world … and hints of my mortality. sigh …).   – Rosalie Tirella

My John Lennon (for his 70’th birthday)

By Rosalie Tirella

It’s true – every Baby Boomer knows where he or she was the night John Lennon was killed. I was in Worcester, in the passenger seat of my pal Jane’s little gray Honda. Jane and I and my other best buddy, Tracy, had spent the evening hanging out. Then, as Jane was driving down Lamartine Street in Green Island, to drop me back home, the news came on the radio: John Lennon shot – by some nut job in the lobby of the Dakota Hotel in New York City, where Lennon and his second wife, Yoko Ono, lived.

I gasped. Jane pulled over. And we both cried. We were around 18 or so and, for me at least, Lennon and the Beatles, were a talisman for me. The ticket out of Worcester. By that I mean mentally – emotionally. A lovely musical escape hatch.

The Beatles – through their songs – told me I could transcend the crumby three-decker apartment I shared with my family in Green Island. Through my imagination, through poetry and songs and writing, I could leave our tenement. Fly away on dreams of strawberry fields, walruses, yellow submarines. The Beatles collective imagination (musically and lyrically) was enough to blast a kid right out of her poverty and dangerously circumscribed world. Continue reading My John Lennon (for his 70’th birthday)