It’s not every day someone turns 375 years old. So for Duxbury’s big birthday the party is sure to be even bigger. With a variety of events for all ages, the 375th Committee has outdone itself in preparing for the milestone birthday of our beloved town.

The 375th Committee, co-chaired by Anne Antonellis and Tony Kelso along with 18 other members, has been planning this event for almost a year now.

“We began planning last July and have had several events throughout the year to raise money,” said Antonellis.

The dangerousness hearing for Brett Roderick, 19, the Oklahoma man accused of an attempted armed home invasion on Deerpath Trail, was continued until May 30 at Plymouth District Court due to scheduling conflicts. He will be held at the Plymouth County House of Corrections until presiding Judge Kathryn Hand makes her ruling. Roderick is charged with multiple counts of assault with attempt to murder and assault with a dangerous weapon for allegedly firing on Duxbury police officers responding to the call. No one was harmed in the May 21 incident.

Full story available on our eEdition

(Charlotte O'Neal, Julia Lawlor, Maddie Benoit, Mia Quigley, Savannah Blanch, Bridget Murphy, Renee Lewin, Julia Roveto, Renee Lewin, Emily van der Veen and Alex Fontana surround Malia Jusczyk as they declare it Princess Malia Day at Duxbury Middle School.)

When I meet someone for the first time, and he or she asks me what I do for a living and I tell them that I teach middle school, the first reaction I get is usually a wrinkled nose followed by the following comment:  “Middle school.  That’s the worst age.” It’s a bit awkward, standing there, looking at the wrinkled nose, and listening to the comment, which essentially is a derogatory statement toward what I love best in the world.  “No,” I tell them.  “You’re wrong. It’s the best age.”

Duxbury's former police chief Mark DeLuca has been placed on paid administrative leave as Cohasset’s police chief following multiple complaints from the Cohasset Police Department's union.

Cohasset Acting Town Manager Michael Milanoski placed DeLuca on paid leave this afternoon pending an investigation by the town. Town officials received multiple allegations against DeLuca from the town's police union according to union president Patrick Reardon. In a press release Milanoski announced that pending the investigation and its results, Deputy Police Chief Bill Quigley will manage the day-to-day operations and personnel of the police department.

DeLuca’s tenure as Duxbury’s police chief was marred by allegations of favoritism and intimidation of police officers and town officials. In February, DeLuca filed a civil suit in federal district court against the Town of Duxbury, Town Manager Richard MacDonald and former Chairwoman of the Board of Selectmen Elizabeth Sullivan claiming a violation of his First Amendment rights. In the complaint, DeLuca alleges his contract with the town was not renewed in 2009 due to his “supporting the organization of a management union.”

At Cohasset's May 12 Town Meeting, residents were forced to pass an additional $190,000 in unexpected police overtime.

Efforts to reach DeLuca were unsuccessful. His lawyer in the civil suit against the town, Gregory Aceto, said he was not aware DeLuca had been placed on leave.

(Brett Roderick)

An off duty Duxbury police officer prevented a home invasion Monday night when a masked man wielding a handgun pounded on his Deerpath Trail Home, demanding to be let in.

According to Assistant District Attorney Douglas Humphrey, the suspect, Brett Trevor Roderick, 19, approached the home at 10:45 p.m. wearing a hooded sweatshirt and mask, while wielding a semi-automatic handgun, and said, “Hurry up let me in it’s cold.” The residents of the house said Roderick appeared to try to disguise his voice.

(A piping plover at Duxbury Beach.)

United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) sharpshooters were dispatched to Duxbury Beach in early May and killed two coyotes and a lactating fox as part of the Duxbury Beach Reservation’s (DBR) new predation program. It was instituted in 2011 to protect nesting piping plovers and least terns from various predators that feed on their eggs and chicks.

In a May 12 written report issued by Michael Pforr, the Endangered Species Officer for the Duxbury Harbor Master, he wrote:

Full story available on our eEdition

Buzz, buzz, buzzzzz.

Publishing types are abuzz about Duxbury Free Library (DFL) and Westwinds Bookshop summer collaboration, Book Breeze – so much so that the series has attracted some of the top names in publishing.

Human beings are powerful creatures. According to scientists, people have the capacity to control weather, the survival of certain species, even the future of Earth.

Yet too often scientists believe that humans are apart from nature and not a part of it.

Maggie Cornelius will be joining The Clipper this summer as an intern. She is going into her junior year at the University of Massachusetts Amherst studying design and art history. She also writes for the UMass Daily Collegian online blogs page writing about arts and entertainment. She’s covered events such as The Black Keys concert in Boston and reviews of TV shows for her blog. She has experience in photography and working for the Dragon Flyer as layout editor in high school.

After almost a decade of negotiating to get Duxbury two new contracts for cable television and a third for local programming, the cable TV advisory committee has officially called it quits, a move supported by the Board of Selectmen.

Selectmen voted unanimously to dissolve the cable television committee at their meeting Monday night and they praised the volunteers for a job well done.