Massachusetts Facts

In 1659, it was illegal to celebrate Christmas in Massachusetts.

Four Coast Guardsmen took a 36-foot lifeboat into a 70-knot snowstorm off Cape Cod, out to a tanker snapped in two. A wave knocked their compass loose. Then 32 sailors came down a rope ladder into a boat built for about half that many, and one small red buoy light guided them in. That boat still floats at Rock Harbor every summer, cared for by volunteers.

A 73-year-old flower delivery woman in Lawrence, Massachusetts was pinned under a 4,000-pound car when it rolled onto her leg. About a dozen neighbors and police officers lifted nearly two tons off her as she screamed in Spanish, clutching a stranger's leg. She walked out of hospital on her own two feet.

A 58-year-old man was pinned face-down under a car at a Somerville, Massachusetts intersection. Somerville police officers and nearby construction workers rushed over and physically lifted the vehicle - rolling it onto two wheels and pushing it back 10 feet - to free him. He was conscious and speaking when paramedics took him to Mass General.