Letter: Political Bias

To the Editor:

Do you only report about Democrat candidates or am I missing your reporting on Republican candidates some how? The Berkshire Eagle is a left-favoring periodical that I've learned to simply ignore because of their bias. Please clarify my dilemma sooner than later.

I appreciate your efforts & overall coverage but it appears a political bias is showing itself.

Chuck D. Wright
North Adams, Mass. 

Editor's note: iBerkshires covers all local candidates and state candidates who visit Berkshire County (and let us know they're coming!) We have been focusing on the upcoming primary, which has no local Republican races. We wrote about gubernatorial candidate Geoffry Diehl and two candidates who recently came to Pittsfield. 

Northern Berkshire United Way: Founding in the Depression Era

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff
05:45PM / Sunday, February 01, 2026

Northern Berkshire United Way is celebrated its 90th anniversary this year. Each month, will take a look back at the agency's milestones over the decades. This first part looks at its founding in the 1930s.

 

Northern Berkshire United Way has scrap books dating to its founding, recording the organization's business and the work of the agencies it has funded. 

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — It was in the depths of the Great Depression when a group of local leaders came together to collectively raise funds to support social service agencies. 

 

The idea wasn't new; community chests had been established by the hundreds across the country in the years following World War I. Even President Franklin Roosevelt had promoted the concept, calling on communities to pool their resources during the hard times. 

 

North Adams had been discussing a charity fund at least since Pittsfield had established one a decade earlier. 

 

It was late 1935 when the North Adams Chamber of Commerce finally moved forward, with some of the city's most notable businessmen leading the way. 

 

The North Adams Community Chest wouldn't be formally organized until January 1936. Over the next 90 years, it would raise millions of dollars to support families, public health, child care, social services as the Northern Berkshire United Way. 

 

Herbert B. Clark, inheriting the presidency of North Adams Hospital from his late father, would be the impetus to transform talk into action. One of his first actions was to inform the board of directors that the hospital would not run its annual appeal — and that it was all in with the new community chest.