Police Blotter

Via Universal Hub (and inaugurating a new blog category, “Boston”): the City Record and Boston News-Letter (motto: “Observe and Preserve”) has been posting items from the Boston police blotter, e.g.:

A well dressed man called at No. 721 Washington Street, walked up stairs, pocketed a silver watch, and while walking off encountered the lady of the house, of whom he very politely enquired if Mr. Atkins lived there; on receiving a negative answer, he took up his line of march and has not been heard of since!

Note that these items are from the early 1800’s.

This is also an appropriate time to note what seems to me to be an uptick in geocentric blogging (or perhaps someone can suggest a better adjective). The Internet facilitates global communication, but can also build local community. The Universal Hub is a selective (edited) aggregator of Boston-area blogs—I expect this kind of thing will be common in cities around the world if it isn’t already.