Yesterday, ePodunk was notified that we have been chosen as one of Encyclopaedia Britannica’s iGuide sites.

An Encyclopaedia Britannica representative wrote to us yesterday:

“Another thing we do is that for most of our topics, we identify and screen other Web sites to supplement our own content. These Web sites, called iGuide sites, are then presented as recommended resources for our online readers. Our reason for doing this is that we realize that other sites, like yours, also offer high quality content and we want to share that with our members.”

Encyclopaedia Britannica chose ePodunk because of our page for Merioneth County in Wales. Our UK site has grown a lot in the past few months. Check it out here!

It’s been a big week at ePodunk. We’ve launched three great new features, that we’re really excited to tell you about.

PHOTOS: Now you can send us your photos of your favorite places to be uploaded on ePodunk pages. We’re looking for photos that emphasize place, so we can give you an even better representation of the cities and towns we profile. I uploaded the above image of Peaks Island, ME.

To upload photo of your own, just go to any community profile, browse your photos for an image you want to send us, select it, and then click the “send” button. Label the picture with a description and the date it was taken, and you’re all set. You’ll create your own ePodunk log-in name, (a free, and very easy process) so you can check back and see the photos you’ve uploaded and see when your photos have been added to our site.

HISTORIC MAPS: If you’re looking for a different view of US cities and towns, check out the historic maps and drawings we’ve added to our community pages, like the above map of Peaks Island, ME. You can now browse more historic maps and drawings by state. Check out more Maine maps here.

AUDIO: Have you ever been confused about the correct pronunciation of a city or town? Wonder no more, because now you can hear local voices pronouncing place names across the country. While browsing our community pages, you’ll see the icon below next to the place name:
Click the icon to hear how the community’s name is pronounced.

If there is no audio icon, instead you’ll see:That means we need a pronunciation for that community! Do you live in a city or town that has a hard name to pronounce? Have a great local accent? Check and see if we need your hometown’s pronunciation. You can supply that to us, and have your voice published on the web! Call our toll-free number, 1-800-701-1266. You’ll get our voicemail, where we request you tell us the name of the community you’re submitting, and the county and state where its located. Then, repeat the community’s name, clearly, so that we can record and put your voice on the web.

More about audio.

It’s an exciting time at ePodunk, and we’re asking you to more involved with the content we provide on our site. So send us your pictures and give us a call! We’re excited to hear from you.

You may have noticed the “Well-known residents have included” section on many of our pages. A seemingly simple category, it matches celebs with their hometowns and other places of residence. But what happens when a celebrity is linked not to her hometown, but to her hometown’s rival community? We were alerted to this outrage by email yesterday.

B. wrote:

“I was born and raised in Westerly. I now live in Stonington. I could be wrong, but I do not think Ruth Buzzi ever lived in Westerly. If so, not for long. She was born in Stonington, CT and attended Stonington High School. This much I know for sure….Hopefully this will be of further assistance to you. I am pretty certain that people who have lived in Westerly and Stonington all their lives will react that same way as I did when I saw her listed with Westerly. She’s a Stonington girl for sure.”

Wanting to set the record straight on the comedian made famous from her appearances on the 1960s TV hit, “Laugh-In,” I did some extensive Googling. I soon discovered that Westerly, RI, and Stonington, CT, are bordering towns on the Rhode Island-Connecticut state line. B. described the rivalry: “If you are from one you are from one, if you catch my drift.”

Still, I was only able to find online evidence connecting Buzzi to Westerly; some sources noted that she had claimed her hometown was Wequetequock, CT, without any mention of Stonington.

The only way to clear it up, as B. pointed out in a later email exchange, was to call her family’s business, Buzzi Memorials, in Stonington. As it turns out, the facts are more complicated than I had imagined. Both B. and I made calls to Buzzi Memorials and heard the same family history from a Buzzi family member.

B. reported back:

“I’ve got some good information for you. Harold Buzzi, Ruth’s older brother, called me back. He runs Buzzi Memorials on Route 1 in Stonington. He told me that Ruth was born in 1936 at Dr. Anderson’s ‘hospital’ in Watch Hill, a village in Westerly. Watch Hill was and is a vacation hot spot in New England - great beaches. I put the word hospital in quotes because it wasn’t a modern hospital like we think of today. Westerly Hospital was the first modern hospital in the area.

“The Buzzi family was living on Dayton Street in Westerly at the time of her birth. They moved to Stonington in April of 1942 and Ruth, Harold and their other brother Edward grew up there. Ruth did indeed go to Stonington High School, graduating about 1953 or 1954. She would have been 5 or 6 when she and her family moved to Stonington, so she really grew up there, not in Westerly.

“Again, I am certain that if you polled people in Westerly and Stonington and asked them if they associated Buzzi with Westerly or Stonington, they would say Stonington.”

I also verified these facts by calling Buzzi Memorials. To sum it up, Ruth Buzzi was born in the Westerly, RI, hospital and lived in Westerly until she was about six, when her family moved to Stonington in 1942. However, because there was no post office in Stonington, the Buzzi family retained a mailing address in nearby Westerly. As for Wequetequock, CT? I was told Wequetequock is a village located in the Stonington area.

As ePodunk listings go, technically, Buzzi was a resident of BOTH places. You can see her listing as a well-known resident on both ePodunk pages: Westerly, RI and Stonington, CT.

Have we missed a well-known resident in your town? Submit it to us by sending an email to info@epodunk.com

-Emily