The shocking events involving soccer players from Somerville High School have stunned the city.

By Harry Kane

Three Somerville soccer players have been charged with sexually assaulting several boys at a sports camp in the Berkshires on Sunday, August 25. The juniors from Somerville High School allegedly raped one male freshman soccer player with a broomstick in their cabin at Camp Lenox in Otis.

From Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone: Disturbing rape allegations stemming from an incident that may have happened at Somerville High School’s annual sports camp have shaken our community. Three students were arraigned on those charges this week, and city and school officials continue to cooperate and provide any resources and information needed for the ongoing investigation. Our immediate focus after reporting the incident to the appropriate authorities was providing compassion, support and services to the victims, as well as the students and families in our school community. Those support services for those immediately impacted as well as the broader community, as it comes together to heal, remain our focus. I have asked Health Department Director Paulette Renault-Caragianes and Somerville Trauma Response Network Manager Patricia Contente to write this week’s column and inform all of us of the services available to our community, and to encourage anyone who needs support to reach out and get the help you need.

The Somerville Alibrandis Baseball team is the 2013 Yawkee League champion once again.

By Mike Stoller

The Alibrandis baseball team wrapped up its 14th Yawkey League title in its 17 year history last night with a 3-0 win over the Revere Rockies, winning the best-of-seven series, 4-1, at Trum Field.

Join the Somerville Chamber of Commerce for this month’s “Business After Hours” this Thursday, September 5, from 5-7 p.m. at the East End Grille located at 118 Broadway.  This month’s event is sponsored by Our City Realty. Free appetizers and excellent networking. Bring your business cards for drawing. Members and their guests are welcome. RSVP with name(s) and affiliation(s) for you and your guest(s) to smackey@somervillechamber.org.

The seemingly endless spate of fires in the city continued last week as two major blazes caused substantial damage to residential properties.
– Photo by Harry Kane

By Harry Kane

Somerville firefighters battled back-to-back fires last Wednesday in what seems like an endless season of blazes. These acts of arson, beginning in late June, are most certainly alarming, say city officials.

Eagle Feathers #34 – The Highlands

By Bob (Monty) Doherty

Some of the meanings for the phrase “head for the hills” are to take the high ground during a battle, to move away to safer ground during a flood, and to flee from danger.  If this is true, then Somerville should be one of the safest cities around, for she abounds with hills.

Nearly six years after a fire caused severe structural damage to East Somerville Community School causing its closure, the newly rebuilt school was officially opened to the public in a celebratory ceremony yesterday.

The impressive facility will serve the students of East Somerville and their families for years to come, and the sophisticated design will stand as a source of pride for the community.

Cavalia’s Odysseo which will now run through September 22. – Photo by Claudia Ferro

The producers of Cavalia’s Odysseo have announced even more opportunities to experience their larger-than-life theatrical production in the Boston area. Due to strong ticket sales, five additional performances have been added to the limited engagement of the show performed under the White Big Top at Assembly Row in Somerville, which will now run through September 22.

In my 30 plus years working at a major psychiatric hospital just outside  of Boston, I have worked with countless patients and staff on both  locked and unlocked settings. One of the most creative of these people  is Sheree Pollock, a veteran psychiatric nurse. Pollock is a dramatic  personality, and uses her knowledge of theater, literature, gardening  and other creative passions to engage the patients on a more human  level, rather than the purely clinical. The minute she walks through the door her presence is known, and  she is not too shy to quote Bette Davis, or Joan Crawford–or belt out a few lyrics from a Judy Garland song to make her point. She is a natural storyteller and thespian–and makes what can often be a purely clinical experience into a richer milieu.  I had the pleasure of interviewing  Pollock on my Somerville Community Access TV show Poet to Poet Writer to Writer.

An old friend of mine–I mean old–he is 96, sent me some poems recently. Ed Galing, from Hatboro, PA. still writes– from a wheelchair, blind in one eye, suffering from a variety of ailments that come with the territory. Galing grew up on the Lower East Side of NYC, that at the time was a home to many Jewish immigrants, and immigrants from all parts of Europe. Some years ago I published a book of poetry of his “Poems from a Tenement Rooftop” (Ibbetson Street Press). Over the years Ed has been published in hundreds of journals and he was recently profiled in the Philadelphia  Inquirer. Yes– Ed sent me some poems…  here is one of them.  He wants to leave a little bit of history before his big sleep.