Barry Arthur Cotton created the Boston 400 website/blog/podcast to promote the 400th Anniversary of the founding of Boston, Massachusetts, in 2030. He is an author and lives in Austin, Texas.

He is the 7th great-grandson of Rev. John Cotton, the Puritan Patriarch of New England. John Cotton was a Founding Father to America’s Founding Fathers and was pivotal in establishing America’s first public school and its first institution of higher learning, Harvard College.

Barry served on the Board of the Winthrop Society for 9 years, was its National chairperson & President for 5 years, and was elected President Emeritus in 2010. Concurrently, he served as a Trustee of the Partnership of the Historic Bostons for 14 years and has authored articles for the Winthrop Journal and the Mayflower Quarterly. Recently, Barry contributed several articles to BOSTON: The Small Town with a Big Story published in September 2019.

Barry’s personal website can be viewed at COTTON CHRONICLES.

WORKS-IN-PROGRESS

Barry does business as (DBA) Seanchí Leabhair (Storyteller Books) in the Irish language and will self-publish in eBook, paperback, and hardcover formats. Progress in writing has been overshadowed by the joy Barry experiences caring for his grandsons. It has, however, been possible for Barry to conduct research and design book covers with a baby on his shoulder. The actual writing, however, has been much more demanding, and to ‘get in the Zone’, Barry often wakes up early to write between 3AM and 7AM. Progress has been slow.

Currently, Barry is working on a book titled THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY COMPANY’S BOSTON MEN. From the sailing of the Mayflower in 1620 to the 1640 advent of the English Civil Wars, twenty-thousand individuals migrated from England to America in what is known as The Great Migration. Though less than one percent of these immigrants were from Boston, Lincolnshire, ten Boston, men helped found the Massachusetts Bay Company while four of their number led the company as Governor or Deputy Governor for fifty-one of the fifty-five years it existed.  This book tells their story and is planned for release in 2022.

At the same time, he is working on a biography of his 7th great-grandfather, the Rev. John Cotton, titled JOHN COTTON: An Intimate Investigation of His Life and Times, which was awarded First Place in the WRITERS’ LEAGUE OF TEXAS MANUSCRIPT CONTEST for nonfiction. This work is planned for release in 2023.

At present, Barry has over twelve works-in-progress…outlined…researched…and says,

“Were there but world enough and time, I might finish eight or nine!”