Save the dates! The new series rolls into its eleventh year in September. This fall, the talks will  focus on Colonial and Revolutionary Boston. From January 2014 through May, the theme will be Boston’s Changing Neighborhoods: History and Genealogy.

Programs are held two Wednesdays per month (except in December)  at 6pm in the Commonwealth Salon on the first floor of the Central Library in Copley Square.  Get details on each talk here.

September 11  The state archeologist, Victor Mastone, will give an illustrated talk on the Battle of Chelsea Creek, one of the lesser-known battles of the Revolutionary War.

September 25  Massachusetts State Archives staff will review the wealth of records at the Archives useful to researching colonial ancestors and the colonial era.

October 16  Nancy Rubin Stuart will speak on her new book, Defiant Brides, a dual biography of Peggy Arnold and Lucy Knox.

October 30  Maureen Taylor, aka the Photo Detective, will discuss her book and film project, The Last Muster, which uncovers photographs of Revolutionary War veterans who lived into the era of early photography.

November 6  Historian JL Bell will talk on Boston’s colonial newspapers and the men who published them. Bell contributed to Todd Andrilik’s Reporting the Revolutionary War and is the author of the very entertaining Boston 1775 blog.

November  20  Veteran genealogist Barbara Mathews will give tips on using colonial records in family history research.

December 4  Epidemiologist and genealogist Lori Lyn Price will discuss medicine and health in colonial New England. What types of health issues and diseases might your ancestor have experienced, and how might these conditions been treated?

Collections and programs related to the fall series on Colonial and Revolutionary Boston are:

BPL Collections of Distinction: Colonial and Revolutionary Boston

BPL Collections of Distinction: American Revolutionary War Maps

BPL Collections of Distinction: John Adams Library

BPL Collections of Distinction: Local and Family History

The Norman B. Leventhal Map Center  exhibit, Charting an Empire: The Atlantic Neptune  is on now and runs through November 4. The Map Center is located adjacent to the Commonwealth Salon, so check out the exhibit now or  when you visit for the September and October talks.

Check out a video series called The Science of Innovation, created by the US Patent and Trademark Office, the National Science Foundation, and NBC Learn.

The site currently has eleven videos exploring various processes of innovation in these areas:

• Smart Concrete
• Self-driving Cars
• Electronic Tattoos
• Fuel Cell Efficiency
• Biometrics
• Biofuels
• Anti-Counterfeiting Devices
• Synthetic Diamonds
• Bionic Limbs
• Innovation
• 3D Printing

Probably the most graphically stunning is A Handsome Atlas  from Brooklyn Brainery, with its colorful and imaginative visualizations of nineteenth century census data.

Rich Blocks, Poor Blocks  takes data from the US Census Bureau’s 2007 through 2011 American Community Survey to map  income data on income and rent. Data can be displayed by street address, zip code, census tract number, or city, and comparisons to state medians are also shown.

Bostonography was developed by two “cartography geeks”. It  includes maps on themes such as distances to liquor stores and Dunkin’ Donuts locations.  The site is also attempting to define some of Boston’s disputed neighborhood boundaries by crowdsourcing  “collective definitions of Boston’s neighborhoods by its residents and those who know the city well.”

Gapminder bills itself as  “a non-profit venture – a modern “museum” on the Internet – promoting sustainable global development and achievement of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals.”  Its data page contains visualizations on 513 socioeconomic indicators by country. The same data is also available to download to spreadsheets. The rest of the site is also worth checking out, particularly the Joy of Stats documentary.

For the first time, the public may access the data that made up 134 reports on Boston’s neighborhoods, planning districts, the 2010 Census, and the 2005-2009 American Community Survey.  

The 2010 Census includes information on population, sex, age, race, housing occupancy and household type; the American Community Survey features more detailed characteristics such as place of birth, employment status, and languages spoken at home.  For example, to find Brighton’s median household income, enter “Brighton median household income” into the search bar on the Boston Data Portal, then click “Brighton, neighborhood data: American Community Survey 2005-2009″.  After downloading the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, click the “Economic” tab;  Brighton’s “Median Household Income”  is listed first.

Students, researchers, and others seeking economic, demographic, and housing information about Boston’s neighborhoods now have data at their fingertips.

The release of the data is part of Mayor Menino’s strategy for open government and transparency.  The BRA Research Division will make the data for future reports available via the Boston Data Portal.