Daybreak Friday, 1/23/26

Mix of sun and clouds, then a chance of snow. Though neither of those is really the headline for today. Early this afternoon, when the high is about 20, temps will start a steady drop, reaching the mid teens by late afternoon and, eventually, the minus single digits overnight. This is due to a serious invasion of Arctic air, and with strong wind gusts tonight as it arrives, the wind chills will be in the -20 range. Even after they die down, the weather folks say, “even relatively light winds will be enough to result in brutally cold wind chills.” It’ll remain extremely cold tomorrow, then we’re looking at potentially 7+ inches of snow on Sunday into Monday.

Foxes. Red then gray, from Erin Donahue. Ted Levin writes, “If your grandparents immigrated through Ellis Island at the turn of the 20th century (like mine), you know how difficult it is to trace your Old World ancestry. Now, try to unravel red fox bloodlines, thread by vulpine thread. Recent DNA studies suggest that red fox evolved in the Middle East 400,000 years ago and crossed into North America twice: 300,000 years ago and again 130,000 years ago. Colonists released British red foxes to hunt, further scrambling the genetics. Gray foxes, the sole survivors of the oldest lineage in the dog family, evolved in the New World 3.6 million years ago—a true native.”

Coyotes. Definitely plural, threading through the night woods. “I see these guys frequently,” Neil Goodwin writes from S. Royalton, “but never as many as five at once.”

Did you catch Dear Daybreak yesterday? If not, you missed Jim Block’s stunning photo of the northern lights Tuesday night, Jane Masters’ timely bubble recipe for frigid days, Randy Leavitt’s poem about heading out of town for vacation, and Harriet Dumas’ reflection on rocks, rock art, and kindness. And Dear Daybreak could definitely use some stories from around the region. Got one? Just go here!

Embezzled Tunbridge fire department funds apparently repaid. In The Herald, Darren Marcy lays out a timeline of how Jacqueline Higgins’ theft of some $200K from the volunteer department where she was part-time bookkeeper was discovered—beginning from when the department’s board hired auditors to look at the books last February. Asked repeatedly to turn over the financial records, Higgins finally did so in April—the same day, Marcy reports, “that a deposit in the amount of $196,764.31 was made into the TVFD’s savings account” from Higgins’ husband and herself. Higgins told investigators “credit card debt…coupled with serious issues with alcohol” were factors.

Live in Hartford? You can help shape this year’s voter guide. You may remember last year's ad hoc guide, with info about all the candidates. It’s returning ahead of town/school meeting in March, this time under the auspices of Hartford’s Town & School Meeting Committee, which wants input from Hartford residents to help create the guide's questions for candidates. What do you want selectboard and school board candidates to level with you about? Let the committee know by submitting your questions via the form at the burgundy link. It’ll be open until Jan. 31, and will collect answers anonymously (and won't collect email addresses).

After lawsuit, Bridgewater foundation head says claims “are entirely without merit.” As you probably remember from last week, former board members Charles Shackleton and Collen Doyle allege in a civil suit that they were improperly removed from the board “after they began to ask questions about its operation,” reports Mike Donoghue in the Standard. They also call into question the legitimacy of executive director Kristiana Birmingham in that post. “It is disappointing that this matter has resulted in litigation. However, we are committed to resolving this issue so that we can keep our full attention on our mission,” Birmingham tells Donoghue. More at the link.

Wells River man dies in Newbury VT rollover. Details are sparse in the VSP report on yesterday’s accident. Around 2:45 pm, troopers were called to Tenney Pond Road in Newbury for “a reported one vehicle rollover into a pond.” They found that Jeffrey Linsky, 69, had been driving north “when he overturned the vehicle into a body of water off the roadway. Linsky was found unresponsive and despite lifesaving efforts he was pronounced deceased. The investigation into this incident is ongoing.”

What can you find high in trees that might be 9 feet wide and 4 feet deep, can weigh a ton, and support the weight of a full-grown human being? Why, bald eagles’ nests, writes Northern Woodlands’ Jack Saul in this week’s “This Week in the Woods.” Initial construction can take an entire season to complete, he adds, to accompany a photo of a pair in Lyme that are refurbishing. And a cool, non-eagle fact: Woodpeckers’ nictitating membranes (semi-transparent eyelids) close to protect their eyes when their bills hit wood. Also out there: eastern bluebirds, which sometimes huddle together in tree cavities at night when it gets really cold.

Hiking Close to Home: Ottauquechee River Trail, Woodstock, VT. Looking for an easy, accessible walk? The Upper Valley Trails Alliance says the Ottauquechee River Trail is a flat stroll along the river with well-maintained paths perfect for families and anyone seeking a peaceful winter outing. A great escape right in Woodstock, close to home. Trail and parking info at the burgundy link.

With plunging temps and high wind warnings this weekend, NH’s Kevin Jordan is worried. Col. Jordan is chief of law enforcement for NH Fish & Game and the guy charged with leading rescue missions. In an interview with the Globe’s Amanda Gokee (sorry, paywall), he says that equipment for above treeline in those conditions is bulkier and costlier, and “we worry that people won’t do that, and they’ll get into trouble much faster in that extreme weather than they normally would.” He also talks about dangers to rescuers (“I always tell people, I’ve done all the 4,000-footers, but not one of them in the daylight”), charging people for those rescues (yep, those two drunk guys on Monadnock are getting billed), and more.

Daybreak’s Upper Valley News Quiz. Were you paying attention this week? Because we’ve got questions. Like, what else can you do at Enfield’s newest bar and restaurant? And what do a hardy group of pilots at Post Mills Airport like to do in winter? Meanwhile, you’ll find NHPR’s New Hampshire quiz here, and Seven Days’ Vermont quiz here.

VT leaders eye making public land available for housing development. In particular, they’re inventorying underused state land. Last fall, Gov. Phil Scott ordered agencies to catalog properties that could be sold or leased for housing, from the closed state prison in Windsor to vacant lots around the state, aiming to jump-start new construction amid stagnant progress. About 140 parcels have been identified so far, reports Seven Days’ Kevin McCallum, but no final decisions have been made. Burlington, Dorset, and other towns are also exploring similar public-land approaches. McCallum delves into the challenges and benefits.

“I'm like, ‘Oh, wow! You have your heater on all the time!’" In her latest episode for VT Public, producer Erica Heilman talks to Arwa Mint Meiloud and Habib Ould Meiloud, E. Calais teens whose father is Mauritanian and mother is white and a native Vermonter. Arwa tells her that “because we live paycheck to paycheck—we definitely have to stretch things out to the next paycheck—that I could not call us middle, middle class.” Both believe firmly that being biracial is less of an issue for them than class. “The overarching thing is always going to be class,” says Arwa. “I think class is a huge issue in America that people oftentimes overlook to talk about other topics.”

The final words of monks and poets. The website Secretorum offers a quiet glimpse into the very end of life. These translated final verses from Japanese Death Poems were written by zen monks and haiku poets and compiled into a book by Yoel Hoffman. Some go back centuries. From 1716: Farewell, sire—/like snow, from water come/to water gone. And this, from a 24-year-old in 1703: Over the fields of/last night’s snow—/plum fragrance. And from 1320: My six and seventy years are through./
I was not born, I am not dead./Clouds floating on the high wide skies/The moon curves through its million-mile course.

Eye of Sauron no more: a new look at the Helix Nebula. Also nicknamed the Eye of God (for reasons that will be obvious based on older photos), the nebula’s the subject of photos just released from the James Webb Space Telescope. In particular, it’s focused on what are called “cometary knots,” of which the image offers our best view to date. "Here, blistering winds of hot gas from the dying star are crashing into colder shells of dust and gas that were shed earlier in its life, sculpting the nebula's remarkable structure," the European Space Agency, one of the Webb’s partners, wrote in a press release.

Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak.

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HEADS UP

There are all sorts of good performances and events happening this weekend, and you’ll find them here.

And for today...

Let’s sit in with the enthusiastic crowd in Verona, Italy, where Australian singer Xavier Rudd joined Italian blues artist Zucchero Fornaciari on stage. “One of the things my mind was always blown by was the amount of incredible artists and music that exists in so many places in the world that so many people never even hear of,” Rudd writes. “Walking into this man’s world on this warm night in Italy this year was one of those moments. A true gentleman, fantastic song writer and absolute beast in his homeland.”

See you Monday for CofeeBreak.

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Written and published by Rob Gurwitt      Poetry editor: Michael Lipson    Associate Editors: Jonea Gurwitt, Sam Gurwitt

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