GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Sunny, a bit chilly. There's actually warmer air moving in off to the west, but cooler temps are going to hang tough here east of the Greens until tomorrow, with highs today around freezing at best, mostly lower. Otherwise, we should see sunny skies, winds from the west (until tonight, when they shift to come from the south). Low tonight in the mid 20s.Sunrise, sunset...
Day breaks over the river by Paradise Park in Windsor, by Jessica Kim;
And it ends over bare birches in Strafford, from Carol Orgain.
It'll be at least Tuesday and Wednesday, Dec. 19-20, and possibly Thursday as well, NHDOT says in a press release. That's so that workers can remove bridge steel from the southbound lane, part of an extensive rehab project. "A detour will be in place for the daytime traffic closures from 7:00 am to 7:00 pm," the agency says. "Detour signing will be in place to direct motorists around the closure."
To understand Act 250, Brave Little State dives into Woodstock's Peace Field Farm mess. In a wide-ranging look at the law designed to protect Vermont's "Vermontiness", VT Public's Sabine Poux goes way back to look at its origins (through the eyes of former Gov. Deane Davis) and how it works, and up to the minute to look at the ongoing efforts of farmer/restaurateur Matt Lombard and developer John Holland to create a farm-to-table restaurant on their Woodstock property. She talks to them, to former Natural Resources Board commissioner (and Post Mills farmer) Tim Taylor, and others for this indispensable explainer on the act and its consequences.Well, who knows? Maybe it's yours? Back in July, an employee at the Vermont Welcome Center on I-91 south of Brattleboro found a money clip in the parking lot with, the VT State Police say, "a large amount of cash." No one has claimed it, so the VSP is putting the word out. "If you believe the money clip and cash to be yours please contact the Vermont State Police Barracks in Royalton (802-234-9933). You will need to be able to provide proof of ownership of the engraved money clip."SPONSORED: Go deeper into the season! Immerse yourself in the traditional stories and songs of Nine Lessons & Carols this Sunday at 6 pm at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Hanover. Rejoice with the adult and children's choirs at this long-running tradition of St. Thomas (now in its 89th year!). Share the joy—and help us support Heating Helpers, a program of LISTEN Community Services. Sponsored by St. Thomas Episcopal Church."A calm explanation from a nurse can do more than a million wordy pamphlets." That was Dartmouth political scientist Brendan Nyhan in a talk last week to the college's international conference on vaccines. In his story about it, the Monitor's David Brooks writes that—despite widespread public belief in misinformation and "outright lies" about vaccines and other topics, he came away "a tiny bit more optimistic." Why? Nyhan highlighted now-general acceptance of the HPV vaccine, thanks to healthcare workers' years of advocacy. "It’s important to reach people through sources they trust," he said.“The level of fear and worry is there. We’re not naive. But we’ve gained strength by being together.” As Chanukah winds down, Upper Valley Jewish Community president Roberta Berner tells Valley News correspondent Christina Dolan that, with the Gaza war and the response in this country a constant backdrop, the simple act of coming together has particular resonance this year. The organization has taken no public stance on the conflict—“We provide solace and sanctuary for our members. We don’t want to exclude anybody," Berner says—focusing instead on providing the comfort of community.SPONSORED: Chapman's General—making the holidays merry! For over 125 years, Chapman’s General has served Fairlee, the “Town Under The Cliff." Today, it's a modern take on a Vermont country store with a curated selection of local art, art supplies, New England food products, and ethically sourced jewelry—and a favorite destination for holiday gift-buying with its robust toy selection, wines, greeting cards, hand-picked gift baskets, and vibrant community gathering-spot vibe. Come visit us for all of your holiday gift-buying needs! Sponsored by Chapman's General.NH AG files civil complaint against white nationalist group. The charges stem from a protest by members of the Nationalist Social Club-131 outside the Teatotaller Café in Concord back in June, when they took issue with a drag story hour going on inside. They shouted slurs, gave the Nazi salute, and are accused of making "intimidating gestures" at people inside. "Acts of hate designed to terrorize an individual or business into violating our State's antidiscrimination laws are simply wrong and will not be tolerated," AG John Formella says in a press release. His MA counterpart has filed a similar complaint, reports the AP's Holly Ramer.NH saw "marked" increase in homelessness from 2021 to 2022. Actually, reports Amanda Gokee in the Globe (paywall), a new report finds there were increases in two types of homelessness in the state: in chronic homelessness, in which an individual or head of family has a disabling condition and has been homeless for at least a year, and in unsheltered homelessness. In a 2019 count, there were 147 individuals facing the latter, according to the NH Coalition to End Homelessness. By 2022, that number had grown to 331. Chronic homelessness grew at nearly twice the national rate from 2020 to 2022.Christmas tree supply hits the news in both NH and VT. Though for different reasons.
In NH, reports the Globe's Amanda Gokee in the Morning Report newsletter (no paywall), the State Forest Nursery announced Monday that, thanks to this summer's heavy rains, conifer species like Fraser fir and Balsam fir are limited or not available at all this year. "That wouldn’t impact the supply of Christmas trees around the state this year, although it could have an impact in future years," Gokee writes. Overall, though some tree farmers lost trees due to the rains, others, who'd planted on well-drained soil, saw "exceptional" growth.
Meanwhile, Christmas tree supplies have been tight in Vermont, and it's partly thanks to the 2008 recession, reports Babette Stolk in VTDigger. As a spokesperson for the National Christmas Tree Association (you knew there was one, right?) explains, trees take at least a decade to reach the right size, and given tight wallets in 2008 there was an oversupply—so farmers cut back on planting. Demand for real trees and cut-your-own has also been rising. The result: Many farms in the state are now turning customers away.
Okay, it's kind of a bureaucratic definition, writes Frank Jacobs on
Atlas Obscura
, using 2015 data from the feds' Highway Performance Monitoring System to find, for each state, the state route with the lowest annual average daily traffic. For NH, that turns out to be Rt. 2 from Lancaster to the ME border; for VT, it's 103, between Rockingham and Clarendon. For the US as a whole? Route 11 in Alaska, where on an average day you'll see fewer than 200 drivers.
Over 60 percent of employees at the company's flagship plant in Waterbury, VT have signed cards seeking to join the United Food and Commercial Workers, reports
VTDigger
, and yesterday the company recognized the union. "We respect our employees’ decision," the company said in a statement provided by the union. Back in May, workers at the Ben & Jerry's scoop shop in Burlington opted to join a different union.
Québec-Vermont Abenaki feud puts VT environmental groups in a tough spot. Back in June, the chiefs of the Odanak and Wôlinak First Nations in Canada wrote 30 organizations in VT asking to "discuss our concerns that Vermont's conservation organizations are complicit with cultural appropriation and fraud." As Kevin McCallum writes in Seven Days, "That got the attention of the progressive organizations." They've had longstanding relations with the state-recognized Abenaki tribes whose legitimacy the Quebecois tribes are challenging. Now, McCallum reports, at least two groups have paused their work with VT tribes, while others are seeking to understand both perspectives."An opportunity for us to enter worlds that we may not be invited into otherwise." That's Keith Marks, who runs Next Stage Arts in Putney, talking about the performing arts and culture in general. Week after week, writes Hannah Feuer in Seven Days, venues in unexpected places "bring world-class artists to the kinds of towns where the cashier at the local convenience store knows every customer by name." Feuer talks to Marks, the Chandler's Chloe Powell, and the Highland Center for the Arts' Keisha Luce about what it takes to keep audiences enthralled in what Luce calls "such small corners of the world."“I was pretty confident that I Velcroed it where I was supposed to Velcro it, and then I came back, and it was gone.” Don’t you hate it when that happens? You’re gardening on the International Space Station, pluck a tomato from the vine, secure it to avoid zero-gravity floating, and … whoa! Where did it go?! For months, astronaut Frank Rubio has been taking the heat for the tomato’s disappearance, writes Jelisa Castrodale in Food & Wine, and denying rumors that he ate it (against NASA policy). At last, a new ISS crew member has found it, and Rubio, who came back to Earth in September, is off the hook.Meanwhile, on a planet far, far away... NASA is preparing to send folks to a place devoid of creature comforts, remotely edible pizza, and fresh air: Mars—no, wait. Houston. That’s where NASA has set up Mars Dune Alpha, a stand-in for the Red Planet, with 3D-printed walls—which they hope to do on Mars—living quarters, and a Martianesque “outdoor” space. The entire stage set, which YouTuber Sam Denby guides us through, is in an inflatable bubble. On June 25, four average folks started a 378-day residency. NASA’s tracking every detail, with the aim of learning a lot before they ship people to the real Mars. The Thursday Vordle. With a word from yesterday's Daybreak.
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Today at 12:30, Upper Valley Music Center in Lebanon offers up its next "A Little Lunch Music" session, featuring pianist, composer, and faculty member Will Ogmundson. He'll be performing a free concert of holiday music and original compositions.
Today and tomorrow, Sustainable Woodstock and Pentangle Arts are streaming First We Eat, Suzanne Crocker's 2020 film about living off the land—in Canada's Yukon Territory, close to Alaska and not far from the Arctic Circle. Crocker got the idea after a landslide blocked the only road into her town of 1,500 and she began thinking about what it took to bring food in. So she decided that for a year, she, her husband, and their three children would eat only food that had been hunted, fished, gathered, grown or raised in the area. No salt, no sugar, no tea or coffee. And she'd film it all...
And anytime, check out JAM's highlights for the week, including: novelist and high school principal Ken Cadow at the Norwich Bookstore, reading from and talking about Gather, his National Book Award finalist YA novel about a highly self-reliant teen growing up poor in rural Vermont; the Hartland Holiday Variety Show last year, with carols, readings, parts of Handel's Messiah, and a 16th-century hurdy gurdy work; and the Upper Valley Land Trust's Jason Berard talking about bobcats and the Clay Brook Trail in Lyme, which UVLT designed to minimize impacts to wildlife.
And for today:
We'll just give ourselves over to Blick Bassy, the Cameroon-raised, France-based singer-songwriter. With a new album out, he toured the US and Canada this summer, and right now is doing the same in Europe (if you happen to be in Annecy, France tonight, you can catch him). Bassy sings in his native language, Baasa:
See you tomorrow.
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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