GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
A little advance notice. I'll be taking the second half of a summer break starting the week after next: Aug. 7-18, one week for real time off, the second for some long-delayed behind-the-scenes Daybreak refurbishing.This time, though, you won't be left high and dry. That's because for those two weeks, Daybreak Diversions—a short newsletter with a few vintage items of fun stuff (and some new ones thrown in for kicks), music, and, of course, the Vordle—will get sent out to anyone who signs up at 6 each weekday morning. If you'd like to get it, just hit the burgundy link. (Note: If you already get the weekend Vordle reminder, you're on the list automatically.)Aren't weather swings fun? Once the fog clear today, it'll be sunny, hot, and muggy, with temps near 90 and the humidity making it feel even hotter. Meanwhile, a cold front is making its way this direction, which will bring us rain and possible thunderstorms tomorrow. Lows tonight in the upper 60s.Now there's a bobcat with a sense of elegance! Caught by Tom Williamson's trail cam in Hartland.Norwich to lose police chief. Wade Cochran, who just took over the post last October, will be stepping down Aug. 8. "I have a different career opportunity and I’ve chosen to take that path," Cochran told Daybreak yesterday. He added, "The community has been outstanding and supportive, and it by no means has anything to do with the community." Cochran follows patrol officer Chelsea Maxim, who left on July 14 to take a job in Randolph; a third officer is on medical leave. At Wednesday's selectboard meeting, reports the VN's Patrick Adrian, interim manager Brennan Duffy said he and Cochran will develop a short-term staffing plan. The town posted the opening yesterday.Former Woodstock Union varsity snowboard coach sues over dismissal after transgender conversation with athletes. David J. Bloch filed a federal civil rights lawsuit last week, reports Mike Donoghue in the VT Standard, claiming he was unfairly dismissed in February, a day after he and two students on the snowboard team talked about transgender athletes, and in particular a transitioning Hartford High snowboarder. Bloch, who's being represented by the same national legal team that handled the case of a Randolph Union volleyball player disciplined for her comments about a transgender fellow team member, claims his due process rights were ignored. Donoghue digs into it all.Police seek public's help on missing Dartmouth grad. Daniel Brooks, who graduated from the college's Master of Arts in Liberal Studies program in May, hasn't been seen since the end of June. "His family has not heard from him in 2 weeks, and they are concerned for his welfare," the Hartford Police Dept. posted on FB yesterday. He drives a red 2014 Ford Fiesta with Indiana plate TLW197. Burgundy link goes to HPD post, with photo; here's the VN's wrapup.Staff from the state of VT, Dartmouth, locals, join all-hands effort to rescue waterlogged Strafford Historical Society collection. The artifacts, Tim Calabro writes in The Herald, spent a week and a half submerged in the flooded basement of the Justin Morrill Homestead. “When I saw it, I cried. It was horrible, just horrible,” Royalton's John Dumville, former head of VT's historical sites, tells Calabro. The society was lucky, though: Dartmouth conservators and Rachel Onuf, director of the VT Historical Records Program, mobilized to help. Calabro tells the story, with both losses and wins.In fact, preservationists have been active all over Vermont. "Basements, regrettably, tend to be where people stockpile records," state archivist and chief records officer Tanya Marshall tells Seven Days' Abigail Sylvor Greenberg. But as it happens, the state's Archives and Records Administration had plans in place for flooding, and the staff was ready to fan out and offer resources and advice—from helping get some documents freeze-dried or dehumidified to helping decide whether certain documents or books needed rescuing. As Rachel Onuf tells Greenberg, "This is going to happen again."Quechee Dam, Simon Pearce hydro plant repairs have "a long way to go." The dam—which generates power for Simon Pearce's glassblowing operations and is not aimed at flood control—appears to have sustained damage in the Ottauquechee's flooding July 10-11, writes Tom Ayres in the Standard. Similary, the hydro plant was filled with silt, mud, and flood waters and will require “several months of repair work at best,” Simon Pearce CEO Jay Benson says. A dam inspector last week “did not express a lot of concern," Benson tells Ayres. "But what we’ve said all along is that as the water continues to come down, what we see now may not be what we see later."
Oops. Calvin Coolidge may have been the only Vermont resident to serve as president, but he wasn't the only president from Vermont. Chester A. Arthur grew up in Fairfield, up near the border, then went off to college and built his life and career in NYC. Thanks for both the correction and the dive into history to Dennis Brown (who once sold a tractor to Coolidge's son—"the only person I’ve ever talked to who lived in the White House," he writes) and to Matt Dunne, who points out that Arthur was subject to a 19th-century form of birtherism by conspiracy theorists who bruited about that he'd actually been born in Canada.In wake of June ransomware attack, Leb middle and high school students will finally get their grades. The attack, which “found no evidence that it resulted in unauthorized access to or acquisition of personal information,” according to Supt. Amy Allen, led the district to take the schools' student information database—and its payroll system—offline, reports Nora Doyle-Burr in the VN. "It was challenging for all of us," Allen tells her.VT Law & Grad School lands $2.5 million gift from Sharon maple-sugaring family. Well, technically, the money comes from the Maverick Lloyd Foundation, whose name VLGS's School for the Environment will now bear. But the foundation is overseen by Arthur Berndt, owner of the nearly 575-acre Maverick Farm in Sharon, and his daughter Lorna Adley. "We have continuously bent Mother Nature to our will, and we’re experiencing the results. We urgently need to change course," Berndt says in VLGS's press release on the gift. Here's VTDigger's Max Scheinblum with more (and yes, Berndt's great-great-grandfather, was Texas surveyor Samuel Augustus Maverick).Hiking & Biking Close to Home: Ascutney Trails. This week, the Upper Valley Trails Alliance points to the nearly 50-mile Ascutney trail system, with its diverse terrain for beginner and experienced mountain bikers—including rock gardens and bridges as well as flowy, bermed downhills—as well as several pedestrian-only trails. The massive network can be reached from trailheads at Ascutney Outdoors Center and the W. Windsor Town Forest, with connections to Weathersfield Town Forest and Mt. Ascutney State Park. Check the Ascutney Trails website for route recommendations and trail conditions.Been paying attention to Daybreak? I know, it's only been a couple of days. And yet, the Upper Valley News Quiz has some questions for you. Like, which popular local peak is going to be heard to reach this summer? And what's the private company some Woodstock residents are thinking should be made public? And what appears to have killed the oldest known loon in VT? Those and other questions at the link.But wait! How closely were you following VT and NH?
Because Seven Days wants to know if you know which big-time band closely identified with VT will be putting on two shows for flood relief in August.
And NHPR's got a whole set of questions about doings around the Granite State—like, what Grafton landmark did two NH residents just buy, hoping to reopen?
Suspected tornado touches down near Keene. It was reported in Roxbury, NH by a weather service spotter yesterday afternoon just before 3, moving east at 30 mph and generating flying debris and hail, along with concern about flash flooding, reports David Brooks in the Monitor. This morning, the weather service will survey the area from Keene to Dublin—where high winds blew out windows and ripped shingles off the roof of the Dublin School—to make a final determination. The Keene Sentinel has a photo of a funnel-shaped cloud taken in Swanzey.After 20 years behind VT Public's Morning Edition mic, Mitch Wertlieb signs off this morning. It's "been the best job I’ve ever had," he tells VTDigger's Paul Heintz, but he'd begun to wear out—not just from the early mornings, but "the cumulative effect of daily exposure to very bad things": the pandemic, natural disasters, political upheaval. He'll still get those at VP's podcast, The Frequency, which he takes over this fall, but in more measured fashion. This morning from 7-9, though, it's a celebration, including Zach Nugent and Dead Set performing live Grateful Dead music beds.Okay, this is getting out of hand: Six windows from Beetlejuice house stolen. The house, part of the set for Beetlejuice 2, had actually been deconstructed and the windows donated to Northeast Slopes, the vintage Corinth ski area, which was storing them. They were taken sometime between Monday and yesterday, the VT State Police say in a news release. I'm trying to picture what someone's going to do with six windows, a lamppost with a pumpkin head on top, and a sculpture that looks like a backscratcher.It’s not just the spoons that are greasy. Begging for a fight, Amanda Tarlton researched “the absolute best diner in every state” for Readers Digest. Honors here go to Manchester's Red Arrow Diner and The Chelsea Royal in W. Brattleboro, which gets props for its “whimsical” décor and fresh ingredients. In the mood to travel? Honolulu’s Rainbow Drive-in serves loco moco (“a burger patty atop white rice with a fried egg and brown gravy”); in Iowa City, the Bluebird offers a Krakatoa omelet with bacon, jalapeños, pepper jack cheese, and cilantro-lime cream cheese; and Great Falls, Montana’s Roadhouse Diner tops burgers with “peanut butter, Serrano peppers, and yes, even Pop Rocks.”"Whale ballet." Robert Addie, a former commercial fisherman from Portsmouth, NH, was on a family fishing trip off Cape Cod on Monday with his three daughters, hoping to relax after returning from a humanitarian trip to Ukraine. He'd been trying without much luck to film the whales they'd been seeing all afternoon when suddenly three humpbacks breached in unison not far from the boat, followed by a calf. Not surprisingly, the video, at the burgundy link, has gone viral, and Addie's story has gone national.The Friday Vordle. This time with a word ripped straight from yesterday's Daybreak.
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From 5:30 to 8 this evening, you'll find jazz on the Lebanon Mall, as Billy Rosen, Fred Haas and a special guest, guitarist David Newsam set up shop between Salt Hill and Three Tomatoes. Same deal tomorrow, with Rosen, Haas, and vocalist Sabrina Brown. Very weather dependent.
Also at 5:30, AVA Gallery is hosting artist talks by Charlet Davenport and Sabrina B. Fadial. Both have exhibits currently on display: Davenport's "Drawing From Life" brings together work in lithographs, copper prints, woodcuts, and other print work, some from as long as six decades ago, with more recent work in a variety of media inspired by life drawing sessions; Fadial's "Material – Process – System – Knowledge" displays her bricolage work in materials as various as steel, pantyhose, baby oil, industrial detritus, Styrofoam, and pistachio shells.
This evening at 6, Pentangle Arts shifts its Music By the River summertime series to the Woodstock Village Green—where it will be for the rest of the summer while East End Park gets cleaned up. Tonight: Bombajazzeando, which melds Puerto Rican bomba dance and drumming with North American jazz. The band features dancer Brendalíz Cepeda (granddaughter of bomba great Don Rafael Cepeda), drummer Saúl “El Pulpo” Peñalosa, and composer and jazz-band leader Julian Gerstin. At the Woodstock Town Hall Theater if it rains.
Also at 6, the Main Street Museum in WRJ rolls together its weekly Friday Night Piano and its Pride celebration with Stevie Pomije on live piano, David Fairbanks Ford on player piano, and DJ Suave Sweat Stain emceeing.
And also at 6, Whaleback Mountain continues its regular Friday Night Family Nights (they last until Sept. 22) with food on the grill, beach volleyball, cornhole tournaments, disc golf, music, cold drinks, and laid-back good times outside.
As you know, the Hop's production of NOISE began its run last night at Northern Stage. At 6:15 this evening, ahead of tonight's show, creator César Alvarez and director Sarah Benson will be at Putnam's Vine/Yard in WRJ for a conversation about what went into making it all happen. Free, no tix needed.
This evening at 7, Liam Gundlach and Ripley Burns kick off their summer 2023 tour of "The Ripliam Menagerie" at Seven Stars Arts in Sharon. The two veteran circus performers have put together a whimsical collection of odd beasts, acrobatics, rarely seen feats of leg-juggling, and some of the most compelling diabolo artistry you'll find anywhere. They'll also be at the Thetford Hill Fair Sunday and then at various other venues in these parts until mid-August, when they take the show to Europe.
Also at 7, in the air-conditioned splendor of Dartmouth's Loew Auditorium, Hop Film screens Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, this year's film produced by Dartmouth grads (and commencement speakers) Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, as now-15-year-old Miles Morales (voiced by Shameik Moore) tries to balance school, adolescence, that whole superhero thing, and, you know, parents.
Tonight at 9, Sawtooth Kitchen brings in two bands, MINX and The L-Word, for "for a night of heavy beats, soaring vocals and a good old rock n' roll party."
Saturday
Tomorrow at noon (though keep an eye on the weather) it's the WRJ Pride Parade, which begins gathering at the Main Street Museum at 11.
And from 1 to 3:45 tomorrow, Upper Valley Music Center and the Lebanon Public Libraries will be hosting a pair of free gamelan workshops—the first for intermediate and advanced players, then, at 2:30, for beginners. They'll be led by Emeric Viani, a music educator from the greater Boston area with expertise in world music, choral music, and Balinese gamelan. Space is limited so you'll need to register in advance.
At 3 pm tomorrow, authors Eric Schaller and Matt Cheney hold a joint book launch party at Salt Hill Pub in Lebanon for their new collections of short stories. Schaller, a biology prof at Dartmouth, will be introducing Voice of the Stranger, which draws on folk and fairy tales—as well as his scientific background—as inspiration, with stories about an ancient djinn, a city of rats, a cyclops, Darwin and Huxley, and wolves in human form and otherwise. Cheney, director of interdisciplinary studies at Plymouth State, is just out with The Last Vanishing Man, which blends realism with ghost stories and weird tales to feature Warhol’s star Candy Darling, a man who kills fairies, an ex-pat living in Siberia, and characters searching for understanding in an increasingly disturbing world. Coincidentally, they say, each book's third story centers on Lake Winnipesaukee.
Also at 3 tomorrow, under a tent behind St. Barnabas Episcopal Church in Norwich, the Scottish Club of the Twin States is hosting an afternoon concert of Scottish music by harpist Rachel Clemente and piper Dan Houghton, both of them highly accomplished VT-based musicians.
Sunday
The Thetford Hill Fair returns to Thetford Hill on Sunday from 11:30 to 3:30 (postponed from its original date tomorrow due to the forecast). A stationary merry-go-round; tables-full of plants donated by local farms; rummage, book, and antiques/collectibles tables; a food tent, bake sale, and tea-and-cookie garden; and entertainment including Steve Hennig and Mike Wood on banjo and guitar, and Liam Gundlach and Ripley Burns' "Ripliam Menagerie" (see Friday for more on that).
If you're in the mood for a drive on what looks like a beautiful day, the Chandler is hosting the second of its summertime Bluegrass Brunches in Braintree, VT—a bit west of Randolph. Things actually get going at 10 with a morning mountain bike ride led by the Ridgeline Outdoor Collective, gates at the Braintree Hill Meetinghouse open at 11 for food at 11, and music—with an all-star lineup of Patty Casey & Colin McCaffrey and Doug Perkins, Patrick Ross & Jim Whitney—starts at noon.
If you haven't yet had a chance to see Vermont farmer and film director George Woodard's WWII feature film, The Farm Boy, here's your chance: His and producer Joan O'Neil's company, Hanging Mudflap Productions, is bringing the film to the Briggs Opera House in WRJ at 2 pm on Sunday. That link goes to Susan Apel's writeup about the screening in Artful. Here's Sally Pollak's story in Seven Days about the making of the film.
And on Sunday at 4 pm, the Center Meeting House in Newbury, NH hosts writer and historian Steve Taylor in a New Hampshire Humanities-sponsored talk, "Poor Houses & Town Farms: The Hard Row for Paupers." Taylor will talk about approaches to the poor in early New England, how they were treated in alms houses and poor farms and county institutions, and how reformers were eventually able to close them down.
And to take us into the weekend:
, a string band based in Half Moon Bay, CA, which is how they get to film a video in the otherworldly Enchanted Forest above Seal Cove Beach.
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, writers, and librarians who think you should 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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