GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
It's a transition day. High pressure is moving in, but so are the weekend's heat and humidity, though today should be quite pleasant. There's a slight chance of showers this morning, but the clouds should drift off fairly quickly and the sun will be out for a good bit of the day. Temps into the low 80s, not much wind to speak of. Down to the upper 50s tonight.Black bear saunters through E. Thetford. And is caught on Erin Donahue's trail cam. Walks like us, writes naturalist Ted Levin, flat-footed and sometimes upright. Eats whatever it feels like, the ultimate omnivore (also like us). Diet includes berries and apples, nuts, grasses, roots, spawning fish, frogs, carrion, sleepy rodents, fawns, and front yard provisions: sunflower seeds, corn, squash, and compost. Comatose in winter. A symbol of almighty natural forces. What would the Abenaki make of this bear's white-blazed jaw?"Note to self: Never hug a pitch pine." It's time to catch up on two weeks' worth of Lost Woods! Auk wanders the woods and discovers the appeal of throwing rocks, Wally and Henry talk swamps... As he does every week here, Lebanon writer and illustrator DB Johnson chronicles the doings in Lost Woods—and on his blog he outlines the pleasures of drawing the impossible and sings the praises of Merlin, the Cornell Ornithology Lab's app that helps you identify birdsongs (and birds).Dartmouth shifts plans, moves proposed undergrad housing across Lyme Road. After re-thinking its plans to house students north of campus on Garipay Field, the college yesterday announced that it intends to build a new apartment-style complex for up to 400 undergrads or 300 graduate students on the west side of Lyme Road—essentially between the Co-op roundabout and Hanover's police/fire headquarters.
The move, says VP Josh Keniston in a Daybreak interview, is in response to fierce neighborhood opposition to its earlier plan—and is also aimed at fitting in with the college's long-term plans to develop an academic cluster on the old golf course. Noting continued neighborhood concerns about traffic and other issues, the college, he says, will "host a series of sessions to work with community to find solutions...we can co-develop a plan that will actually improve the options up there."
Still, as the Valley News's John Lippman notes, the proposal faces "significant hurdles" as the college seeks to convince Hanover officials "that a three-building, 128-unit housing complex north of downtown built on a former golf course is compatible with the surrounding neighborhood."
SPONSORED: Ready for 50 percent electricity bill spikes this summer? On top of $5 gasoline, utilities are on the verge of shocking rate increases driven by the skyrocketing price of natural gas. Moving to solar energy protects you from these crippling rate increases. Over the lifetime of "owning" your power production with a Solaflect Tracker, the average homeowner will save over $25,000 on electricity. Or you can keep "renting" power from your utility and watch them increase the rent whenever they like. Hit the maroon link above for five reasons to make the move to solar now. Sponsored by Solaflect Energy.Maine firm will manage ValleyNet's day-to-day services. ValleyNet, which is essentially the operational arm of ECFiber and LymeFiber, announced Tuesday that Great Works Internet, a Biddeford, Maine B Corp., will take over its employees and run the fiber companies' daily operations. "ValleyNet is just too small to continue doing this on our own," CFO Stan Williams tells Daybreak. "There are a lot of fixed costs to cover on the management and regulatory sides; this will be more efficient and give current employees a place to grow into." ValleyNet will continue to hold decision-making control, Williams says."This came as a shock to all of us": Global door-and-window manufacturer lays off Windsor County employees, will close N. Springfield facility. JELD-WEN, which is based in Charlotte, NC, has laid off 80 of its 192 employees in North Springfield and Ludlow and plans to consolidate its Vermont operations in Ludlow, reports VTDigger's Katherine Fiegenbaum. Another 10 layoffs are pending, she writes. A laid-off employee tells Fiegenbaum that work had died down recently after a pandemic rush, but that management “just kept telling us it was going to pick back up.”Former Belmain's department store in Randolph may see some life come September. The landmark downtown building, which has sat vacant since 2018, is slated to house three tenants, reports Dylan Kelley in the Herald: Third Branch Pottery, Windy Lane Bakery, and, near the front of the building, Sweet Scoops ice cream. Owners George and Kelly Gray are looking for tenants for two additional spaces. They'd been hoping to open in mid-summer, but contractors have been hampered by a shortage of materials. Soon enough, Gray says, “It won’t be the dark windows anymore. That’s for sure.”Does the Connecticut from above ever get old? Nah. Just in case you missed Middlebury-based photographer Caleb Kenna's breathtaking drone's-eye shots of the river in these parts when Daybreak first linked to his Dartmouth Alumni Mag spread early in May, Dartmouth News has just re-linked to them. It's good timing: With summer in full bloom, they're even more evocative.Hiking Close to Home: John's Glen Trails in Grantham This week's suggestion from the Upper Valley Trails Alliance highlights an easy 3.3-mile trail network at Eastman featuring a series of loops that can be created off the main John's Glen Trail #9. Lots of wildlife, glacial erratics, and wetlands. Access requires a free parking pass from Eastman (hit the "Directions" tab at the link). Once you've got your pass, return to the circle, turn right on Eastman Road, go 0.8 miles and bear right onto Road ’Round the Lake. In 0.3 miles turn right onto Clearwater Drive. Travel 0.9 miles to trailhead parking at the end.Been paying attention this week? The News Quiz has some questions for you. Like, what crashed in the Connecticut earlier this week? And what company are the owners of Harpoon Brewery acquiring? And what's the deal with smooth slender crabgrass? You'll find those and others at the maroon link.Turns out, the Knob-lipped Fairy Shrimp isn't the only fairy shrimp in VT vernal pools. After "a hectic season of surveying," writes Steve Faccio on the VT Center for Ecostudies blog, researchers now know that Vermont actually has two species of fairy shrimp: the long-known Knob-lipped and the Intricate Fairy Shrimp (also known as the Smooth-lipped Fairy Shrimp). "Both species are widespread across North America," Faccio writes, but in MA, which has known populations of the Intricate Fairy Shrimp, it's considered a "species of special concern" because of its rarity.New VT program gives primary care docs a hotline for children with mental health issues. The state has a shortage of child psychiatrists, reports NBC5's Krystin Rae, which in some cases has left people under 21 on waitlists for up to a year. Now, a $2.2 million grant has set up a hotline for pediatricians to call that will give them advice—and, in limited circumstances, the option for a child to be seen face-to-face—when they're dealing with young patients facing mild to moderate mental health issues. The hotline is open to any pediatric practice in the state.Now this is a cat that takes its job seriously. Though did no one think to give it a step-stool?The Friday Vordle. And remember, just go to the same link over the weekend if you want to check out Saturday's and Sunday's.Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it keep going by hitting the maroon button:
Bookstock gets under way in Woodstock this morning at 9 when Ben Franklin cuts the ribbon on the village green to open up its sprawling used-book sale (you'll also find vintage books across the road at the Norman Williams Public Library). Then, at 10, a very full slate of author events gets going: poets, mystery writers, ex-spies, journalists, activists, first-time writers, veteran writers, locals writers, writers from far away, Ayad Akhtar, Valerie Plame, Flynn Berry, Sarah Stewart Taylor, Archer Mayor, Jeff Sharlet, Mary Ruefle, Sydney Lea... Link takes you to the program for today, tomorrow, and Sunday. Guaranteed there'll be something you don't want to miss. Here's Gareth Henderson's writeup in the Woodstock-focused Omni Reporter.
Today at 5:30, the Hop brings in Chilean singer-songwriter Pascuala Ilabaca and her band, Fauna (which includes her drummer husband, Jaime Frez), for a free concert on the Dartmouth Green. Over six albums, Ilabaca has built on her understanding of the folkloric music of the Andes with influences from her time studying in Spain, India, Guatemala, and Mexico. No tix required.
This evening at 7, BarnArts kicks off two weekends of performances of Five Women Wearing the Same Dress. The play, by Alan Ball (the creator of Six Feet Under), takes place at a wedding in Knoxville, TN in the '90s, in a bedroom where five bridesmaids (hence the identical dresses) are hiding out from the reception, shifting from comedy to tragedy and back as they talk over sex, drugs, AIDS, sexual predation, religion, and other unvarnished topics. It's at the original site of Feast & Field, directly across Royalton Turnpike from the Fable Farm fermentory and orchard where F&F is held now.
Tomorrow starting at 10, it's two days of cheese, milk, ice cream, 4H-ers grooming their cows, cheese- and butter-making demos, music, and more at Billings Farm's Dairy Celebration Days.
And at 11 am and 1 pm tomorrow, the Hop's got Modern Times Theater (Rose Friedman and Justin Lander) and their puppetry in The Perils of Mr. Punch, "a melodrama of epically small proportions so funny that you'll forget to take out your phone for at least the first half hour." It's a free HopStop presentation for families, in the Hop Courtyard, no tix needed.
At 2 tomorrow afternoon, Valley Improv launches its first outdoor show of the season at 208 Passumpsic Ave. in Wilder (you can park by the Kilowatt Park boat ramp and walk up). No charge, but you'll need to RSVP.
Starting at 7 tomorrow evening and lasting hours, the Main Street Museum in WRJ is hosting a—and I quote—Dance Your A$$ Off party featuring three bands: Western Terrestrials, The Nickel & Dime Band, and Savannah Sly. 10 bucks to bop.
Also at 7 tomorrow, the Claremont Opera House celebrates 125 years of theater and music with an evening of, well, theater and music: character portrayals from Claremont's performing arts history, an adaptation of the first show performed on the COH stage, and musicians galore performing everything from the "Claremont Grand March" and ragtime to concertos to jazz to marching band classics.
At 7:30 tomorrow, the Hop brings in cellist, movement artist, and performer Seth Parker Woods and his multimedia performance, co-commissioned by the Hop, Difficult Grace. "Heightened by film, spoken texts, dance and visual art by Jacob Lawrence, Barbara Earl Thomas, Zoë McLean and Freida Abtan, Difficult Grace draws its inspiration from the Great Migration, archival research, immigration, and the poetry of Amiri Baraka and Dudley Randall," the Hop writes, plus dancer Roderick George and music from a variety of collaborators.
Also at 7:30 tomorrow, contra dancing returns to the Upper Valley at the E. Thetford Pavilion with the power duo of Pete Sutherland and Oliver Scanlon (two-thirds of Pete's Posse) providing the tunes and Nils Fredland doing the calling. They've got Covid protocols in place: You'll need to wear a mask and must show proof of vaccination at the door or in advance. You can save time by registering here. You'll find the pavilion on Pavillion Road in E. Thetford, just up from Cedar Circle. Here's a lovely little video about the pavilion, its history, and its contra dances from the Valley News, back in the days when it could do videos. (Thanks, PB!)
And on Sunday at 7:30 pm, Interplay Jazz & Arts celebrates the start of its 25th Year jazz camp with an all-star faculty performance at Kimball Union Academy's Flickinger Arts Center. As they write, "World-famous jazz musicians from all across the country gathered in one place for a rollicking, joyful concert"—including Fred Haas and Michael Zsoldos on sax, pianists John Proulx, Oscar Perez, and Armen Donelian, vocalists Natalia Bernal, Madeline Kole, and Dominique Eade, and others. Tix online or at the door.
And some music to end the week...
Pretty much the moment she released it, Dolly Parton's "Light of a Clear Blue Morning" became an anthem of hope following hard times. So it's no surprise that four friends in Hanover High's graduating class—two of whom are headed to the Berklee School of Music in voice and one to UCLA to study musical theater—decided to perform it at graduation this year, using the soulful
a cappella
version first recorded by the Wailin' Jennys.
Have a wonderful weekend. And stay cool! See you Monday for CoffeeBreak.
The Hiking Close to Home Archives. A list of hikes around the Upper Valley, some easy, some more difficult, compiled by the Upper Valley Trails Alliance. It grows every week.
The Enthusiasms Archives. A list of book recommendations by Daybreak's rotating crew of local booksellers and writers who want you to read. this. book. now!
Daybreak Where You Are: The Album. Photos of daybreak around the Upper Valley, Vermont, New Hampshire, and the US, sent in by readers.
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