GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Daybreak is brought to you this week with help from MDVIP. Primary care physician Dr. Lorissa Segal opens March 31 in Woodstock, offering advanced screenings and diagnostics that can help identify risk markers. Timely appointments. After-hours contact. Learn more here.
Colder, clouds clearing out. They should mostly be gone by mid or late morning, while a cold front moving through will keep temps in the low 30s and send them down into the teens overnight (tomorrow will be cold, too, but Sunday gets a bit warmer again). Winds from the northwest, getting gusty this afternoon, and remaining from the north through tomorrow.
Animal behavior you might not want to copy.
Well, for starters, there’s the squirrel chewing on an antler— “They've been chomping away for a couple of weeks,” writes Sue Showalter from New London. “It's a curiosity as I've not witnessed it before.”
And then there’s this mourning dove, taking a bath in the bit of water sitting atop a chunk of ice in Lyme Center, from Peggy Ackerson.
Did you catch Dear Daybreak yesterday? If not, you missed Paul Goundrey’s stunning view of Mt. Cube on a February morning, Stephen Bobin’s story of a conversation overheard in a supermarket checkout line, Perry Allison’s riff on why theater people fall in love with what they do, and Nicole Ford Burley’s fond reminiscence about Lyme children’s book author and illustrator John Stadler, who died last month, and his remarkable patience (and memory) for the quirks of a budding seven-year-old writer.
“Love, this is a knitting shop. Nothing exciting ever really happens here.” Corinne Fischer wouldn’t actually agree—she found Norwich Knits “bustling with all sorts of friendly and lively characters” when she visited. But that conversation with owner Cara Liu led the Dartmouth senior to explore where yarn actually comes from—with the 20 Shetland sheep on farmer (and pediatrician) Peter Wright’s Bosque Verde Farm, and with the Junction Fiber Mill’s Amanda Kievit. “The people in the Upper Valley aren’t ending up in sheep farming or mill work or knitting by accident,” Fischer says in the newest “Stories in Sound” podcast. “They are choosing … Together these farmers, spinners, and knitters carry on a deep Vermont tradition.”
Phone threat at Hanover High leads to lockdown, police sweep. The call came in at 2:21 pm yesterday, reports Eric Francis for Daybreak, drawing a quick response from the Hanover and Norwich police departments and the Grafton County Sheriff’s Department. They swept floor-by-floor through the school, releasing students as they went. “We use these false calls almost as practice exercise so if it ever does happen we are going to get it right,” Hanover Chief James Martin tells Eric. “We always do an ‘after action review’ to see where we can improve our process and we’ll look at things we did today and improve going forward for the next time.”
Smells of “complexly delicious” sauces… Savory stir-fry sauce… Produce being prepped and cut… A restaurant kitchen? Nope, the Gifford cafeteria. Jenn Lizotte, who started at the hospital as a breakfast cook, is now head chef, and under her direction, writes Isabel Dreher in The Herald, “Whole, healthy ingredients are staples of these meals, per their mantra of making food medicine.” The remake, under the direction of food service manager Martina Rutkovsky, includes drawing food pros who want balance in their lives, eliminating food waste, and creating food that patients, staff, and locals who’ve gotten wind of it will appreciate. Hours: 7 am-1 pm weekdays.
SPONSORED: One of Colombia’s greatest voices is performing FREE at Lebanon Opera House! Join us on Thursday, April 9 at 6:30 PM for a free evening with Nidia Góngora, LOH’s spring artist-in-residence. The Latin Grammy-nominated artist’s music blends ancestral rhythms with contemporary sounds, evoking the thunderous powers that inhabit the jungle and the sea. Registration is encouraged. Sponsored by Lebanon Opera House.
On the Northern Stage stage, a trio of acting greats. There’s Daphne Zuniga, who went to Woodstock Union HS but, of course, lives in LA with a long string on on-screen credits behind her; the consummate Canadian star Martha Burns, whose stint in Slings and Arrows won her two Gemini awards; and local Emmy-winner Gordon Clapp. Together, they’re the cast of The Children, Lucy Kirkwood’s play “about the interlocking lives of three scientists living in the aftermath of nuclear disaster,” as the VN’s Marion Umpleby writes. Umpleby talks to Zuniga and director Sarah Elizabeth Wansley about the play: “I feel used up in the most gratifying way,” says Zuniga.
And literally around the corner, a play that “will change people’s perception of artistry.” Theresa Rebeck’s razor-edged comedy Seminar officially opens tomorrow at Shaker Bridge Theatre in the Briggs. The VT Standard’s Emma Stanton sat down with director Kent Burnham and several actors to talk about the play—in which four aspiring writers work with a legend in the field, not always happily. Rebeck, says one, “allows the actor to excavate and navigate a single thought and let it bloom and wilt and then blossom again.” Says Burnham, “I hope everyone leaves with questions and heads to a bar down the street to talk about how they felt with each twist and turn.”
SPONSORED: Cedar Circle Farm & Education Center is hiring for 2026 and beyond! Our team is hardworking, fun, and rooted in a shared love of food, farming, and community—join us! We’re looking for great folks to join our Summer Camp staff, kitchen team, and farmstand/café crew this season, as well as a tractor operator to join our vegetable production crew. Benefits include paid leave, fresh produce, a 20% discount at our farmstand and café, and access to an employee assistance program. Learn more and apply on our job site. Sponsored by Cedar Circle Farm.
A twist on mud season: This year it’s the paved roads that are in the worst shape. At least, that’s what the VN’s Liz Sauchelli found in her survey of area towns’ public works departments. “It’s been really, really bad,” Enfield Public Works Director Jim Taylor tells her. “We always get some frost heaves, but for some season this year seems to have really, really taken a toll.” The same’s been true in Hanover and Thetford, though not in Hartford. NHDOT’s Jennifer Lane tells Sauchelli one cause may have been heavy rain early in the winter followed by a long freeze. “That combination allows water to soak into the ground and then freeze, expanding and pushing the pavement upward.”
Its breeding season for gray jays. Also known as Canada jays, writes Northern Woodlands’ Jack Saul in “This Week in the Woods,” the jays can overwinter in these parts because they scatter food everywhere: “Using a specialized saliva that acts as both adhesive and preservative, gray jays store food in thousands of locations beneath bark and moss throughout their territory. They’re also known for their “friendliness, inquisitiveness, and tameness”—and ability to steal food from humans. Also out there this fourth week of March: crumpled rag lichen and moss sporophytes.
Hiking Close to Home: the D&H Rail Trail southern section, Pawlet/Rupert VT. With mud season here, the UVTA says rail trails are perfect for spring—the D&H Rail Trail's Southern Section is a gentle, scenic 10.8-mile gravel path through southwestern Vermont that handles spring conditions well. It follows the former Delaware and Hudson Railroad with 17 wooden-decked bridges and stunning views. Easy walking, biking, or horseback riding on relatively flat terrain. You can learn more about mud season hiking etiquette here.
Daybreak’s Upper Valley News Quiz. Ha! And you thought I’d forget again. But the key question: Were you paying attention this week? Because we’ve got questions! Like, which program is VT State shutting down at its Randolph campus? And what happened at the District 3 Environmental Commission to the Woodstock Inn’s bid to tear down two old homes? Meanwhile, you’ll find NHPR’s New Hampshire quiz here, and Seven Days’ Vermont quiz here.
NH’s governor issues executive order directing energy department to create “nuclear roadmap” for the state. As NH Bulletin’s Molly Rains reports, Kelly Ayotte’s order directs the department “to identify a path toward implementing ‘advanced nuclear electric generation,’ which usually refers to emerging nuclear technologies such as small modular nuclear reactors.” NH is already a significant nuclear state, with more than half the energy generated within its borders coming from Seabrook Station. Ayotte argues that doubling down “would lower rates more effectively than increasing reliance on renewable energy sources,” Rains writes.
NH lawmakers send Ayotte bill limiting state’s public-school obligations. The GOP-crafted measure, reports NHPR’s Annmarie Timmins, would “limit the state’s obligation to the academic subjects currently required” and money for students learning English, receiving free or reduced price lunches, or special ed. “Local taxpayers would cover the rest, such as transportation, school administration, and nurses.” Pretty much everyone expects it to wind up in court if the governor signs it: the bill is “best construed as a polite invitation to the judicial branch to correct three decades of faulty school funding orders,” said one GOP senator yesterday.
Feds charge a leader of VT’s Migrant Justice with human smuggling. Jose Ignacio De La Cruz was arrested yesterday morning in Burlington on federal grand jury charges that include bringing migrants into the country illegally and obtaining fraudulent Vermont driver’s privilege cards, reports Seven Days’ Lucy Tompkins. Government prosecutors cited evidence from a search of De La Cruz’s cellphone, the cellphone of a person who was detained after entering the country, financial records, and historical cell site location data. Tompkins details the charges and history. De La Cruz pled not guilty yesterday, and was ordered held for another hearing next week.
Do humans share ideas about beauty with insects, birds, and mammals? That’s not an idle question: Charles Darwin noticed that some animals have “nearly the same taste for the beautiful as we have.” But now, animal behaviorist Logan James and his team have checked, using a wealth of animal sounds and a crew of human listeners to see whether the humans preferred the same sounds as frogs, sparrows, and other species. Writing in The Conversation, he says the answer is: Yep. With examples. One intriguing bit that needs more investigation: “Those who reported spending more time listening to music on a daily basis agreed with animals more.”
Oh, also, you could add red-crowned cranes. The East Asian birds are renowned for their mating dance, which humans find pretty irresistible, too.
Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak.
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On Saturday, it’s Mug Season at CraftStudies in WRJ: “a celebration of the humble mug and all things cozy”. Decorate a coaster, find mugs for sale, free hot stuff to drink. Proceeds go to CraftStudies’ Community Supported Craft Fund.
Plus, of course, Montshire After Dark, gamelan, Dirty Cello, the Thetford Hill Church music and dessert extravaganza, the Garifuna Collective, Haydn’s Seven Last Words of Christ… And a whole lot more this weekend. You’ll find it all here.
And for today...
Don’t forget Mercedes Escobar at Roots and Wings on Saturday. Here she is at Berklee College of Music a couple of years ago.
See you Monday for CoffeeBreak.
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