Page 16 THE SAUGUS ADVOCATE – FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022 By Mark E. Vogler THE SOUNDS OF SAUGUS Having earned the Eagle badge myself back in 1968 An Eagle Edition! How neat is it for our Saugus readers to have photos of local bald eagles prominently displayed this week in The Saugus Advocate in an edition that also features four young men from Saugus Boy Scout Troop 61 being honored for earning the rank of Eagle Scout? Pretty remarkable, I’d say. And a rare issue, indeed. But we celebrate Eagles and Eagle Scouts in this week’s paper. Feast your eyes on the amazing photos of a pair of bald eagles taken by Saugus photographer Charlie Zapolski and read about it in Laura Eisener’s “Saugus gardens in the winter.” Charlie accompanied his photos of the majestic birds of prey with some technical tips on how he pulled off the rare photo opportunity: “What a treat for me here in Saugus Ma. 2-12-22. This pair of bald eagles were basking in the sun and I was able to get 100 ft. from them to take the shots. They hang around the salt marsh area here and love to fish. I used my Bigma lens hand held. (Sigma 50mm500mm) at around 300mm-400mm for this outing. I was very happy with the results.” Nature-loving readers will be very happy, too, Charlie. Speaking of Eagles, Tuesday night in the second floor auditorium of Saugus Town Hall was a proud night for Saugus Boy Scout Troop 61, as they had four young men honored by the Board of Selectmen for earning the Eagle Scout badge – a challenging accomplishment achieved by about four percent of all Scouts. So, hats off to new Eagle Scouts Dominic J. Imbrogna, Michael S. Kallelis, Colin M. Wildman and David W. Woodworth and to their Scoutmaster, Kevin M. Wildman, himself an Eagle Scout badge recipient when he was a member of Troop 61 (1989), and to the other Scout leaders who assisted the Scouts along their journey and to the parents who encouraged and pushed them to finish their journey. CONTEST SKETCH OF THE WEEK with Troop 26 in Swansea, I know very well what a great accomplishment this was for these four young men. I think one of the most unheralded aspects of the Eagle Scout are the public service projects these kids work on and the great good it does for the community. When I did mine, it was three nights of supervising cleanup crews of Scouts at the Swansea Police Station. My project may have been good at the time because of tight budgets which reduced manpower and maintenance work. But it can’t hold a candle to all these elaborate projects that Eagle Scout candidates are doing nowadays. One-day holiday trash delay next week The Town of Saugus announced that the trash and recycling collection will run on a one-day delay from Tuesday, Feb. 22, through Saturday, Feb. 26, due to the observance of Presidents’ Day. There will be no collection on Monday (Feb. 21), due to the holiday. Services will then resume on a one-day delay from Tuesday through Saturday of next week. Residents whose collection day falls on Monday will be collected from on Tuesday. Collection will continue to run on a oneday delay for the remainder of the week. The compost site will be open tomorrow (Saturday, Feb. 19) and Saturday, March 19, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. We have a winner! Congratulations to Gabriella Snyder Stelmack for making the right identification in last week’s “Guess Who got Sketched!” Contest. She was the lone reader answering correctly, so there was no need to have her name selected from the green Boston Red Sox cap. Here’s the correct answer, offered by the person who goes by the name of The Sketch Artist: “The answer to last week’s sketch is … The Generous Couple Mike and Celina of Square One Mall Dunkin Donuts; our ‘Guess Who Got sketched?’ sponsors! “Mike, his brother and Celina are the owners of the Saugus Square One Mall Dunkin Donuts! Their Dunkin location is the second floor Food Court in the Mall. “Each week Mike and Celina give a $10.00 Dunkin Donuts gift card to the person whose name was drawn from the antiquated limited edition of the green Boston Red Sox hat in the Office of the Editor. “Mike’s greatest joy is spending time with his wife Celina and their two daughters. Mike has been with Dunkin Donuts for 26 plus years. Mike’s quote is ‘Another day, another donut.’ Mike gets refreshed and refueled with family times. “The whole family is such a bundle of light, energy, creativity and humbleness. Thank you for your Sponsorship with # ten Dunkin Donut Gift cards! “Yours Truly, “The Sketch Artist” Multiple “Shout-Outs” again! Once again, we received multiple nominations from GUESS WHO GOT SKETCHED! If you know the right answer, you might win the contest. In this week’s edition, we continue our weekly feature where a local artist sketches people, places and things in Saugus. Got an idea who was sketched this week? If you do, please email me at mvoge@comcast.net or leave a phone message at 978683-7773. Anyone who between now and Tuesday at noon identifies the Saugus public official sketched in this week’s paper qualifies to have their name put in a green Boston Red Sox hat with a chance to be selected as the winner of a $10 gift certificate, compliments of Dunkin’ in the Food Court at the Saugus Square One Mall. But you have to enter to win! Look for the winner and identification in next week’s “The Sounds of Saugus.” Please leave your mailing address in case you are a winner. (Courtesy illustration to The Saugus Advocate by a Saugonian who goes by the name of “The Sketch Artist”) readers this week for people deserving of “ShoutOuts.” From Michelle Hayes: Hi shout out to the Saugus masons(?) for providing beautiful red carnations to all who attended the Valentine’s Day luncheon at the Senior Center. Also want to acknowledge the couple that provided the music entertainment. It was nice to sing along with the music that we remember. We brought the house down with our rendition of Charlie on the MTA, a crowd pleaser for sure. From Doris Napier: I would like to give a shout out to Cindy Gray who is our chair yoga instructor at the Saugus Senior Center. Cindy is fun, fantastic and fabulous. She never misses a class and keeps us all going. I would also like to acknowledge the ladies at the Senior Center, who work with Joanne Olsen, for always showing kindness, patience and a smile whenever you need help. Laurie Davis, Lynette Terrazzano, Joanne Genzale, Cheryl Roberto and Cathy Strum. A corrected multiple “Shout-Out” A correction for a “Shout-Out?” How the heck does that happen? Well, it can happen very easily when an author of a “Shout-Out” uses his or her first name only in an email and the Editor mistakenly assumes the email was authored by somebody else. That’s exactly what happened last Friday (Feb. 11) when I mistakenly gave Jeannie Meredith credit for the “Shout-Outs” that Jeanie Bartolo sent on the firefighters in last week’s edition. When I read Jeanie Bartolo’s email, I assumed it was Jeannie Meredith because I had talked to her over a period of several days. I deal with so many people, I am not good at remembering emails. Jeanie Bartolo was good-natured about the goof. “It’s pretty funny because I think the world of Jeannie Meredith and besides sharing the same first name we both share the same Birthday!!!” Jeanie wrote in an email. Neither Jeanie or Jeannie would tell me when that birthday is. But we will repeat Jeanie Bartolo’s “Shout Out,” giving it proper attribution: “I have three Shout Outs: “The first ‘Shout Out’ is for Captain James Hughes. We thank you for your 35 years as a firefighter. Saugus is sorry to see you go. Have fun and enjoy your retirement, it is well deserved! “The second ‘Shout Out’ is for firefighter Billy Cross on his promotion to Captain within the Saugus Fire Department. Billy is probably one of the most popular and well known firefighters in Saugus and respected by all. Congratulations and best of luck Billy you earned it!! “The third ‘Shout Out’ goes to firefighter Donald ‘DJ’ Blandini on his promotion to Lieutenant within the Saugus Fire Department. He’s a great guy and has worked hard and has earned this promotion. Congratulations and the best of luck DJ!!” Want to “Shout-Out” a fellow Saugonian? This is an opportunity for our paper’s readers to single out – in a brief mention – remarkable acts or achievements by Saugus residents or an act of kindness or a nice gesture. Just send an email (mvoge@ comcast.net) with a mention in the subject line of “An Extra Shout-Out.” No more than a paragraph; anything longer might lend itself to a story and/or a photo. Selectmen’s salute to a Saugus scribe It’s a great accomplishment for a journalist to spend nearly two decades covering and writing stories about people, places and events in one community. So, I thought it was a great gesture for the Board of Selectmen at the end of Tuesday night’s meeting (Feb. 15) to call Saugus Advertiser Editor Michael Gaffney to the podium and publicly recognize that he will be leaving The Advertiser soon, after 18 years of covering Saugus. Eighteen years of journalism in one town is quite a commitment that entails thousands of hours of covering meetings after meetings, receiving untold phone calls, conducting countless interviews, receiving text messages and phone calls at all hours of the day and night, dealing with legions of people – many of them who are demanding and not always so reasonable, sacrificing weekends and off nights to chase down story leads, taking photographs, calling people who don’t want to talk to you for comment and the ongoing ultimate challenge of trying to avoid being so consumed by your work that it interferes with your personal and family life. I can relate to it all, because I’ve been there and I’m now in my 50th year as a professional newspaperman. My first real newspaper job was back in 1972, working weekends and part-time at the rate of two bucks an hour, assigned to the Northampton Bureau of The Springfield Union. Normally, I wouldn’t publicly compliment a competitor, mainly because most of them are jerks who wouldn’t give you the time of day. And some of the larger papers got lazy and sometimes plagiarized my work. But Mike Gaffney is different from most of the hundreds of journalists I’ve competed against over the years. Our relationship has never been adversariTHE SOUNDS OF SAUGUS | SEE PAGE 17
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