Fitchburg News

Jack Hoover, aka the King of Halloween, will be Mr. Christmas for a few hours Friday night when he opens his elaborately decorated historic mansion for tours, asking only in return a donation to Toys for Tots.

Owner Alicia Favreau cuts the ribbon for her business, Natural Balance & Beauty, on Mill Street in Fitchburg Thursday.

As if Bill May's off-the-job agenda hasn't been busy enough, the former Townsend police chief-turned author can now add teaching to his post-retirement resume.

Community Health Connections Pharmacy Team members Jim Hebert and Alicia Villagram present Arlene Betteridge, right, Community Health Connections vice president of development, with $103 donated by CHC Pharmacy patients for the Sentinel & Enterprise's "Health for the Holidays" fundraising effort.

Red kettle donations to the Salvation Army are down about 30 percent this year compared to this time last year, according to Montachusett Salvation Army Corps Maj.

Trees lie strewn across Rindge Road in Fitchburg on the morning of Dec. 12, 2008.

Rachel Smith and her husband Bruce had just moved back to Lunenburg after living in California for 16 years only two months before the December 2008 ice storm.

Members of Monty Tech's Marine Corps JROTC program are doing their part to maintain the school's longstanding tradition of helping the area's needy during the holiday season.

Celebrate the "Holidays Around the World in Fitchburg" from 6-7:30 p.m. Friday, when the Friday Nights in Fitchburg History Club meets at the Fitchburg Senior Center, 14 Wallace Ave. Arrive early for a 5-6 p.m. book signing with author Anne O'Connor.

North Central Charter Essential School students are joining millions from across the country this week in learning "An Hour of Code," an initiative of Computer Science Education Week.

There is a life-size Santa Claus in Jack Hoover's dining room and a couple of toy reindeer mingling with other animals in an office in his Merriam Avenue home.

A shoplifter who almost got away with $540 of goods from Bob's Store was arrested Saturday after he allegedly punched the store's loss-prevention employee, according to court documents.

The Sprinkler Factory 's Xmas Art Bazaar, a fine arts holiday sale, will take place in their spacious Worcester gallery on December 15th from 11 AM to 5 PM.

With snow totals measured in inches instead of feet, the storm was more nuisance than menace, but it was timed to hit afternoon commuters, particularly in Fitchburg.

This was the first year I have put a visit to Fitchburg Historical Society's 2013 House Tour in my personal schedule.

Fitchburg State University and the Fitchburg Police Relief Association are joining forces to support the Wounded Warrior Project, organizing a benefit hockey game at the Wallace Civic Center at 7 p.m. Feb. 1 at Wallace Civic Center, 1000 John Fitch Highway.

A key portion of the northern Fitchburg Reservoir watershed will be protected thanks to a state Water Supply Protection Grant.

A Fitchburg man with a prior manslaughter conviction was ordered held on $10,000 cash bail, accused of dragging a man with a car because the man hugged his daughter.

A homeless man indicted last month on a slew of charges, after he allegedly held two women at knifepoint in a Fitchburg laundromat and led police on a high-speed chase on Route 2 in October, is now also accused of stealing a washing-machine coin box from his former apartment two days earlier, according to court documents.

UMass Medical School will terminate its family-medicine residency program at Community Health Connections on June 30 -- but both entities disagree as to what led to that outcome and point to each other as the reason.