fb-pixelPeople & ideas - The Boston Globe Skip to main content
Best of the New

People & ideas

24 movers, shakers, and AHA! moments.

Higher Ground Farm. David L Ryan/Globe Staff/Globe Staff

Written by Ami Albernaz, Kara Baskin, Ellen Bhang, Karen Campbell, James Cronin, Gary Dzen, Geoff Edgers, Michael Farrell, Devra First, Carolyn Johnson, Susan Johnston, Sheryl Julian, Marni Elyse Katz, Deborah Kotz, Michael Morisy, Dan Morrell, Anne v. Nelson, Cristin Nelson, Martine Powers, Shira Springer, Francis Storrs, Tina Sutton, Beth Teitell, Rachel Travers, Eugenia Williamson, Glenn Yoder

A phtoo of author Alysia Abbott. (Amber Davis Tourlentes)mber Davis Tourlentes/Amber Davis Tourlentes

Alysia Abbott

In June, Cambridge-based writer Alysia Abbott published “Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father.” Critics praised Abbott for her scope: The book is a heartfelt remembrance of her late father, a gay poet and activist who raised her alone before succumbing to AIDS, as well as a window into San Francisco in the ’70s and ’80s. In December, filmmaker Sophia Coppola announced her intention to adapt “Fairyland” for the screen. “I can’t imagine a better fit,” Abbott says.

Advertisement



An Army of Skin Cancer Screeners

Talk about using your head. The Melanoma Foundation of New England has initiated a first-of-its kind program enlisting hairstylists in the fight for skin cancer detection. Sun damage and suspicious lesions often appear on the unprotected scalp and neck, difficult places for self-examination. By offering free clinics to beauty professionals, who, after all, check out scalps on a regular basis, the foundation trains the people perhaps most likely to spot the cancerous moles in the early, treatable stage.

To sign up: 800-557-6352, mfne.org

Boston, MA--2/14/2013--A proposed print design, left, is next to the newly developed can. At the Sam Adams Brewery, Roy Desrochers (cq) (sensory practice leader with GEI Consultants, Inc.) and Jim Koch (cq) (brewer/founder Sam Adams) discuss the development of a can for the beer, on Thursday, February 14, 2013. Photos by Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff Topic: beercan Reporter: J AbelsonPat Greenhouse/Globe Staff/Globe Staff

A Better Beer Can

Given the aluminum can’s cultural identity as a blue-collar alternative to its more upmarket glass cousin, there is humor in the story of Sam Adams’s high-tech, consultant-aided, $1 million quest to create the “perfect” can for its beer. But the king of craft brews — which notably followed its hipster descendants into aluminum — shared the science, making the model available to any brewer interested in upgrading. With a deeper rim and better airflow to help keep the taste intact, it’s a can worth toasting.

Advertisement



Bike Helmet Vending Machine

Somerville-based HelmetHub tested its first machine on the corner of Boylston Street and Massachusetts Avenue this past fall. The compact kiosk can dispense 36 helmets and accept 25 returns; everything is solar-powered. Expect more of the machines around Boston this spring, and with other cities interested, around the world after that.

Bourne 05/18/2013: The CapeFLYER train crosses over the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge in Bourne on route to Hyannis. The CapeFyer, a train from South Station, made a trial run from South Station to the Transportation Center in Hyannis. Photo by Debee Tlumacki for the Boston Globe (metro) Reporter: Martine PowersDebee Tlumacki for the Boston Globe/Globe Freelance

The CapeFlyer

Navigating the parking lot that is Route 6 on a summer Friday is no longer an obligatory vacation ritual. The CapeFlyer weekend train service between South Station and Hyannis was enough of a success that its summer tryout was extended through Columbus Day. Riders who’ll need to get beyond Hyannis can bring a bike on the train and transfer to a bus or ferry to get to their final destinations. Or — for those who can’t dispense entirely with the tradition of traffic — rent a car.

Cambridge, MA 081013 Cardboard cutout stood inside the bicycle cage at the Alewife MBTA station in Cambridge, Saturday, August 10 2013. (Staff Photo/Wendy Maeda) section: Metro slug: 11starts reporter: Martine Powers/Wendy Maeda/Globe Staff/Globe Staff

Cardboard-Cutout Cops

It seems far-fetched: Who would possibly be fooled by a cardboard-cutout cop standing guard over a bike rack? But when the MBTA Transit Police posted a two-dimensional likeness of a police officer inside the bike cages at Cambridge’s Alewife Station in July, reported bike thefts dropped by 64 percent the first month. Now T officials are considering installing the cardboard officers at other stations. How does it work? “Even though rationally you understand that’s not a real cop, that feeling of being watched taps into a sort of intuitive level below conscious reasoning, and that affects your behavior,” says David G. Rand, assistant professor of psychology and economics at Yale University.

Boston, MA 4/22/2013 Rachel Hamlin (cq) and her daughter, Sophia Hamlin (cq),9, area residents visitin the Mobile City Hall on St. James Street and Dartmouth Streets to find out when they will open the street to residents on Monday April 22 2013. They have to walk more than six blocks to go shopping on Newbury Streeta and it makes her feel uncomfortable to walk past the shrine with her young daughter so often. (Mattthew J. Lee/Globe staff) Topic: 23monent Reporter:Mattthew J. Lee/Globe staff/Globe Staff

City Hall to Go

With its cherry-red paint job, Boston’s “City Hall to Go” vehicle looks more like a food truck than a municipal outpost. But since its debut a year ago, the converted SWAT truck has rolled out to 58 different spots in neighborhoods across the city, in the daytime and also on evenings and weekends, helping residents complete basic transactions (paying tickets, registering to vote) without the hassle of a trip downtown. It adds new stops to the rotation based on suggestions and demand.

Advertisement



Schedule at cityofboston.gov/cityhalltogo and on Twitter at @cityhalltogo.  

Boston, MA 3/30/13 Peter DiMuro, right, gives a pointer Andy Garcia while he rehearses his "Archives and Etchings" piece, inspired by Alzheimer's caregivers - with Boston Conservatory students. It's premiere will be in April at the Conservatory. DiMuro is the focus of the story. (Michele McDonald for the Boston Globe)Michele McDonald for the Boston Globe/Boston Globe

Peter DiMuro

Choreographer Peter DiMuro was a beloved and respected figure on the modern dance scene in Boston for years before moving away to work with the trailblazing choreographer Liz Lerman outside Washington, D.C. Now back in town, DiMuro has taken up the reins of the Dance Complex in Cambridge following its founder’s retirement, and he’s a superb choice — insightful and ambitious, but with his feet firmly on the ground.

Down Syndrome Breakthrough

In a discovery that could transform research into Down syndrome, scientists from the University of Massachusetts Medical School have silenced the extra copy of a chromosome that is at the root of the condition. The research, so far performed in cells in a dish, is far from being tested as a therapy. But it provides a powerful tool for probing the underlying biology of Down syndrome and aiding the search for drugs.

Genetic-Testing Guidelines

In March, a medical geneticist from Brigham and Women’s Hospital waded into one of medicine’s newest ethical minefields — whether and how much to search for disease risks that lurk in DNA when analyzing a person’s genome. Dr. Robert Green co-led a panel of experts who set off a valuable and still-ongoing national debate with the controversial recommendation that testing laboratories should search for two dozen genetic conditions, regardless of how much patients want to know.

Advertisement



NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 09: Actress Grace Gibson attends the alice + olivia by Stacey Bendet presentation during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2014 on September 9, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for alice + olivia by Stacey Bendet)Stacey Bendet/Getty Images

Grace Gibson

Usually the most talented students scoot right out of Berklee when the professional gigs call. Not Grace Gibson. The actress, musician, and transfer student into the school could be seen this winter in the movie “Black Nativity” singing with Jennifer Hudson. Thrilling, but not enough to make Gibson forget her larger plan. “My mom always said you only have this one time in your life to be selfish and purely focus on learning,” Gibson says. Not that she’s going to disappear. Her first video, a cover of Radiohead’s “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” that she co-directed, should drop early this year. Gibson’s also been auditioning for TV pilots and film roles. “I don’t hold my breath,” she says of waiting to hear. “I’m a real believer in whatever’s meant for me will happen.”

Jennie Lamere

Hate seeing TV spoilers on Twitter? Jennie Lamere, an 18-year-old from Nashua, has the antidote: an app called Twivo. In April, then still a senior in high school, Lamere was the only woman to present at a Hill Holliday-sponsored “hack” in Boston. She won, then spent the summer interning at Twitter’s local offices before heading off to college.

LearnLaunchX

A marriage of two of the city’s defining industries, education and technology, this business accelerator program nurtures startups looking to build the next big thing in teaching tech. This year’s first class of seven companies graduated in September, featuring everything from Cognii, which offers automated assessment of students’ written answers, to Listen Edition, a startup from WBUR veteran Monica Brady-Meyrov that builds lesson plans around public radio programs.

Advertisement



Andris Nelsons Conducts the Boston Symphony on July 15 2012. Photo credit: Hilary Scott -- 21twoodHilary Scott

Andris Nelsons

He’s already thrown out the first pitch at Fenway, played a gig outside Quincy Market, and wowed the Symphony Hall audience with his reading of Wagner. But for the dynamic Latvian conductor Andris Nelsons, the real work begins when he takes over as the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s 15th music director. BSO management knows it has scored an energetic successor to the brilliant but often injured James Levine. Now the question is how Nelsons, 35, will match up as the orchestra’s leader.

Pothole Protocol

Last March, Boston’s mayor’s office hosted a competition to test new pavement materials that allow public works crews to fill potholes on nights and weekends, when local asphalt plants are closed. The winners: Aquaphalt and Unique Paving Materials, both of which make a black, sticky goo that can be poured into yawning chasms and hardens almost immediately. Unlike asphalt, which must be kept heated, these materials can be stored in bags or buckets in the trunk of a car. They passed muster with Public Works Department crews, and the city has phased both products into standard pothole-filling protocol.

Signs With the Times

The best thing to happen to traffic jams in ages? (No, you didn’t miss the introduction of flying cars.) This spring, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation rolled out 48 electronic signs that relay real-time traffic updates — such as that driving the next 5 miles will take 30 minutes — on the Mass. Pike, Route 3, and, for heavy summer traffic, Route 6 on the Cape (a pilot on I-93 launched in 2012). The $2.2-million project is high tech: Roadside detectors ping Bluetooth-enabled devices in passing cars, then algorithms determine the drive-time estimates that get updated every three minutes. But they’re a welcome addition for reasons far simpler. Traffic isn’t nearly as frustrating if you know what to expect.

Norwood-10/18/13-- Dana Gitell came up with the term, thansgivvukah and has designed t-shirts and cards with the name. Boston Globe staff Photo by John Tlumackii(lifestyle)John Tlumacki/lifestyle

“Thanksgivukkah”

Almost 400 years after the Pilgrims celebrated the first Thanksgiving, a local has done it again: Norwood’s Dana Gitell is the genius who named the calendar convergence of Thanksgiving and the first day of Hanukkah “Thanksgivukkah.” The holiday quickly garnered its own T-shirts, cards, and other products — behold the “menurkey” — and was even recognized by President Obama. “It’s an event so rare some have even coined it ‘Thanksgivukkah,’ ” he said in his Hannukah statement, to the delight of the Gitell clan. But the best part? Thanksgivukkah-related products raised more than $20,000 for the hunger-fighting charity Mazon.

Violence-Free Rest Areas

In the wake of the Newtown, Connecticut, shooting, the pow-pow-pow of a shoot-’em-up arcade game took on a new, horrifying veneer for Andrew and Tracey Hyams, a Newton couple who encountered the game’s plastic machine guns at a Mass. Pike rest station just days after the tragedy. “We don’t believe that violent video games are the singular cause of mass shootings,” the Hyamses wrote in a letter to the Massachusetts Department of Transportation. But, they continued, games that “desensitize players to the realities of mass destruction, have no place in state-sponsored highway rest stops.” The transportation agency promptly removed all nine of its shooter games and established violence-free rest areas.

Boston, MA., 11/04/13, The city of Boston has installed two high-tech seats on the Rose Kennedy Greenway that can charge smartphone and sense how much a person weighs and whether they are smoking. The seats were invented by an MIT researcher. We are going to the Greenway to see what people in Boston think about these high tech smart seats. Rocco Rossi, cq, was born and raised in the North End, and does not own a cell phone. When passing by the seats he was quizzed by a reporter about them. He said: "They look like homemade jobs." and then he offered to sit down on it. Suzanne Kreiter/Globe staffSuzanne Kreiter/Globe staff/Globe staff

The Wired Park Bench

Seat-e debuted on the Rose Kennedy Greenway this past fall as a place where pedestrians can recharge — literally. Besides offering a place to sit, the benches have solar-powered ports where passersby can juice up phones. Now other cities want the benches, too. But the true sign of their urban approval was the graffiti.

***

From left, Stan Grossfeld/Globe Staff and Jim Davis/Globe Staff

PUT ME IN, COACH: FILLING BIG SHOES

Two dramatic exits — Red Sox manager Bobby Valentine and Celtics coach Doc Rivers — had left vacancies at the city’s most-storied sports franchises. Enter John Farrell and Brad Stevens. Beneath the surface, the two arrived as similarly well-suited team leaders — humble, knowledge-thirsty, detail-oriented, and unfazed by the intense Boston sports spotlight. Both far exceeded expectations with personalities far less brash than their predecessors, giving fans reasons to celebrate. Farrell, 51, took his bearded ballplayers from worst to first and won the World Series. The clean-shaven skipper guided a team that was relentless on the field and quirky off it. Stevens, 37, silenced skeptics who questioned his readiness for the NBA after six seasons leading Butler University. Stripped of stars by trades and injuries, the whiz kid coach turned a Celtics rebuilding year into an Atlantic Division-leading start. It’s all enough to spark more championship visions.

BOSTON, MA , 7 / 24 / 13: John Stoddard ( cq) working the farm. The city's largest rooftop farm, Higher Ground Farm, has finally opened. They currently have about half of the 55,000 square feet of the roof of the Boston Design Center. The farm will continue to expand, and sell fresh herbs & veggies to local restaurants & farm stands. ( David L Ryan/Globe Staff Photo ) SECTION: BUSINESS TOPIC 26roofgarden(2David L Ryan/Globe Staff/Globe Staff

COOL CROWDFUNDED IDEAS

Higher Ground Farm

Building a farm in Boston’s busy Seaport sounds like a tough sell, but Courtney Hennessey and John Stoddard were determined. To make it work, they just set their sights higher — at roof level, to be exact. With $23,981 they raised on Kickstarter, the duo secured 55,000 square feet on the roof of the Boston Design Center and launched the city’s first commercial rooftop farm, growing herbs, tomatoes, and other produce to sell to local restaurants and grocers. (A side benefit: The farm insulates its host building in the winter and aids with heat dissipation in the summer.) In 2014, Hennessey and Stoddard hope to open a farm stand.

Ring Theory

Tired of fishing through purses and pockets for a Charlie Card, Edward Tiong and Olivia Seow, two exchange students at MIT, came up with a simple solution: Put a ring on it and have your fare ready whenever you need it. Ring Theory, their new company, puts RFID chips (the technology that powers Charlie Cards) into specially designed 3-D-printed rings. “MBTA thought that it would be a fun idea to work on and were very supportive in us exploring it from the start,” Tiong says. Kickstarter users made it possible — they’re the ones already wearing the rings.

Rings to go on sale next month at ringtheory.net and at the MIT Museum in Kendall Square

3Doodler

Churning out everything from prototype medical devices to mall-kiosk kitsch, 3-D printers have had a big year, but perhaps no innovation makes the technology more accessible than the 3Doodler. The Somerville-born project ditched complicated design hardware and software for a stubby pen with a glue-gun-like tip, inviting users to “draw” small freestanding objects as if they were sketching (very slowly) on paper. Early adopters are already crafting designs for jewelry and the like; users have an online community for showing off finished products and swapping stencils. And it’s a big community: The Kickstarter campaign raised more than $2 million from 26,457 backers eager to scribble in three dimensions.

Send comments to magazine@globe.com.