Real super doom and gloom on the business and economic pages, web pages and otherwise, as to the doom and gloom of our national economy.

And, yes, this may sound weird coming from me, skeptic (this is a vast understatement) that I have been, but it feels to me that Newburyport, although not completely bullet proof in a lousy economy, would still be a good place to live, work and own a business, and part of that would be to, yup, Stephen Karp, Newburyport’s biggest landowner.

How about that for more weird apples from moi.

Mr. Karp indicated, I believe in his visit to Newburyport, MA recently, that New England Development would be able to ride out less than favorable economic times.

I actually feel like Mr. Karp is a buffer for my beloved home town, after reading stuff after stuff about communities and areas in real trouble.

Who knew that I would ever come to this frame of mind. Not moi.

And the other thing, in the doom and gloom of economic lousiness, is that economic lousiness has always been good for historic preservation, something that the readers of the Newburyport Blog know that I’m real big on.

Terrible economic times in Newburyport, MA during the mid part of the 20th Century, kept people from demolishing and butchering Newburyport’s large stock of historic dwellings.

But in good economic times, according to the National Architectural Trust, “…demolition, development and period inappropriate alterations and additions have effectively replaced one third of these (Newburyport) historic properties.”

As I read the financial stuff (the Huffington Post has become a favorite, who knew about that one either), I keep thinking that so far, Newburyport, MA has been pretty lucky.

Mary Eaton
Newburyport