Daybreak Thursday, 2/12/26

Getting sunny, cooler. High pressure’s working in today, and though we’ll start the day with a mix of clouds and sky, it should be pretty sunny out there by late morning. Temps today will rise into the upper 20s, with gusty winds this afternoon from the northwest. Back to single digits tonight.

Snow prints. What’s left behind after a bird hits the snow is like the ghostly remains of a story that you know you’d have wanted to witness, but can only guess at.

It’s time for Dear Daybreak! This week’s collection of vignettes and poetry from readers starts off with Lori Harriman’s beautiful sun pillar over the fields of E. Thetford, then moves on to Susan Orkin’s little story about her dog, her passport—and the helpful folks at the post office; Yue Yang’s February haiku; and Christine Hoskin’s shout-out (with photo) to the Elden Murray photo exhibition/competition at the Howe Library for giving amateur photographers a public chance to put their best feet forward.

Cottage Hospital reports data breach. Last week, reports Alex Nuti-de Biasi in the Journal Opinion newsletter, the small Woodsville hospital notified over 2,100 customers in NH, VT, and elsewhere about a data breach that took place last fall and exposed names, Social Security numbers, drivers’ license numbers, and more. In all, 1,138 New Hampshire residents and 539 Vermonters were affected. CEO Holly McCormack tells Nuti-de Biasi that an investigation “determined that an unauthorized party took certain files from one of Cottage Hospital’s file servers,” and that the hospital is continuing its review and will notify all individuals whose data was involved.

Six arrests made public in Springfield, VT kidnapping, aggravated assault case. The arrests actually happened two weeks ago, reports Mike Donoghue in the Times Argus, after a Windsor-area woman was kidnapped in Claremont, taken to a home in Springfield, then tracked down by police and freed. Her captors had beaten and burned her because they believed she’d taken $8,000 in drugs from them. The Springfield police remained mum about the case, Donoghue wrote in the VT Daily Chronicle Sunday, prompting local concern about the lack of public information. Springfield’s chief says they were waiting to see if the feds want to lodge charges.

Sturm, Ruger, Newport NH’s largest employer, confirms job cuts. In an email to the Valley News, a company spokesman wrote that the CT-based firearms manufacturer is “adjusting our New Hampshire workforce to proactively address cost misalignments within our operations and balance production across our facilities.” The Newport plant produces some of Ruger’s pistol models, most of its revolvers, and some of its rifle models, the VN reports. Though the company provided no specific layoff numbers, they affect fewer than 90 of the facility’s employees. Companywide, Ruger employs 1,800, and it’s been facing financial challenges.

Norwich police chief owes tab to VT State House cafeteria from days as Capitol chief. WCAX’s Calvin Cutler reports that according to “multiple sources,” Matthew Romei “left behind an unpaid lunch tab of $1,600 at the Capitol Food Court when he stepped down in 2023.” Romei tells Cutler he’ll be paying it off—and adds that private debt issues shouldn’t be made public. In an email to Daybreak, Romei explains, “Debt collection is fairly heavily regulated and is supposed to be private. So if someone ‘tipped them off’ I would wonder about the why. I don’t see them posting stories about people who are behind on their power bill or house note…”

“That’s some good prose right there.” Peter Orner’s talking about Michael Herr’s classic Vietnam War book Dispatches in this week’s Enthusiasms, but he’s not just recommending it to us: He’s recommending it in an open letter to Pete Hegseth. He notes that John Le Carré, Robert Stone, and Hunter S. Thompson all considered it “the greatest non-fiction book about Vietnam”—but that’s not really the point, he writes: “It’s about what human beings are capable of doing to each other.” And, he adds, “that depravity can still shock is proof that we’re, some of us anyway, still human.”

At Northern Stage, The World Is Not Silent “immerses viewers in one family’s way of communicating—and needs six languages to do it.” But, Alex Brown quickly adds in her review in Seven Days, “you’ll understand them all, thanks to theatrical techniques and a great deal of comedy.” Don Nguyen’s three-person play centers around Vietnamese immigrant Dau, his son Don, and Linh, the granddaughter of a family friend from Saigon. It spans about a year of their lives in Nebraska—but “the characters are the focus, not the plot,” Brown writes. “Lives change in subtle ways or don’t change at all. The actors are the magic in this production.”

NH Exec Council confirms new state Supreme Court justice. The vote was 4-1 in favor of Daniel Will, with only Republican David Wheeler opposing him, reports Ethan DeWitt in NH Bulletin. At his confirmation hearing last week, Will told councilors he would “model former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in assessing the exact wording and intent of the New Hampshire Constitution and statutes when making decisions,” DeWitt writes. The lone Democrat on the council, Leb’s Karen Liot Hill, said she’d “heard from attorneys and colleagues who spoke not only of his exceptional intellect, but also of his humility.” Wheeler criticized Will for his brief as solicitor general supporting the 2020 Covid-19 emergency declaration.

Burke Mountain owners buy Smugglers’ Notch Resort. The “collaborative ownership transition” from current owner Bill Stritzler to a partnership with Bear Den Partners was announced yesterday. “We sought out Bear Den Partners as an equity partner because they share our belief that this resort is about families, employees, and community, not trends or shortcuts,” Stritzler said in a statement; his family will retain a stake in the resort. In VTDigger, Ethan Weinstein writes, “the Lamoille County resort, which sees some of the highest average annual snow totals in the East, has catered to locals, families and those seeking a more affordable opportunity to hit the slopes.”

And speaking of skiing: "There must be something in the water back home in Vermont.” That was downhiller Ryan Cochran-Siegle after he took silver for the second time in a row in the men’s Super G at the Olympics. After a disappointing run in the downhill Saturday due to food poisoning, he roared back yesterday with his gold-medal-winning mom Barbara in the stands. Maybe it was the inspiration from two Vermonters taking medals the day before, writes the AP’s Pat Graham. Or maybe it was the maple syrup-mix with his water during warmups and syrup on his pancakes at breakfast. “Maybe," Cochran-Siegle said, "that was the secret." Here’s the run.

Sheesh. Bill Koch won silver at the 1976 Innsbruck Olympics, not gold, as my fingers insisted on typing yesterday morning. So just to make up for that slip, at the burgundy link you’ll find video from that race.

There are no traffic jams in ant colonies. An individual ant is pretty dumb, but a group of ants? Oh so clever. In contrast, a group of comparatively intelligent humans is shockingly … unintelligent. In fact, says Joe Hanson on PBS’s Be Smart YouTube channel, the more humans who try to solve a problem together, the worse they do, because humans actually put in less effort when they’re in a group (looking at you, high-school project team). In contrast, the “swarm intelligence” of ants—and birds and fish—is greater than the sum of its parts, allowing them to solve problems, confuse predators, and travel more efficiently than if they were alone. 

The Thursday crossword. Today, it’s canny puzzle constructor Laura Braunstein’s “midi” (even though it’s labeled a “mini”—don’t ask). It’s slightly longer and harder than her Tuesday minis, but nothing that’ll eat up your morning. And if you’d like to catch up on past puzzles, you can do that here.

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

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HEADS UP
The Dartmouth Libraries host Rena Mosteirin and James Dobson for a talk about Perceptron. Poet and Left Bank Books owner Mosteirin and English and Creative Writing prof Dobson will discuss their book, “which blends poetry and a critical biographical reading of Frank Rosenblatt, inventor of a 1957 machine learning device, the Perceptron.” 4:30 pm in Berry 180A.

Dartmouth’s Rockefeller Center hosts “The Media, Journalism, and American Democracy”. It’s a panel of four behind-the-scenes journalism stars: Economist columnist and former NYT editorial page editor James Bennet; NYT Opinion senior producer Jillian Weinberger; New York Review of Books editor Emily Greenhouse; and Bulwark managing editor Sam Stein. Moderated by Dartmouth government prof Herschel Nachlis and The Dartmouth editor-in-chief Charlotte Hampton. 5 pm in the Loew Auditorium and via livestream.

The Norwich Historical Society on Norwich’s street names. “Have you ever wondered whether or not Turnpike Road was actually a turnpike? Or how Hopson Road got its name? And who was Brigham Hill named after? Norwich’s place names come from legends, actual people, and the land itself.” Via Zoom at 6:30 pm, as a fundraiser.

Buster Keaton’s The Cameraman at the Lebanon Opera House, with Bob Merrill on piano. The silent film master “at his creative peak,” LOH says, as he “plays a hapless newsreel cameraman desperate to impress both his new employer and his office crush as he zigzags around Manhattan hustling for a scoop.” With accompanist Merrill, no slouch himself. 7 pm, part of the Come As You Are Film Series, no charge.

At the Norwich Bookstore, Betsy Vereckey, Joni B. Cole, and Moving To My Dog's Hometown. Vereckey, a longtime journalist, quit her job and moved from NYC to Hanover after her marriage ended because it was where she’d adopted her dog. It’s a memoir about starting over, rebuilding a life, and finding a new home. And also about dogs. She’ll be in conversation with writer and writing teacher Joni Cole. 7 pm.

Bollywood Mystery Movie Singalong at the Hop. As they describe it, “Do you love epic stories, spontaneous singing and massive dance numbers? Or maybe you've always been curious about Bollywood musicals, but have never seen one. This surprise movie night promises fun, adventure, forbidden love, betrayal, vengeance … or probably at least three of those things!” Which movie? You’ll have to go. 7 pm in the Loew.

Vance Gilbert at the Flying Goose Pub in New London. “A folkie trapped in a vaudevillian body,” a reviewer once wrote. “With the voice of an angel, the wit of a devil, and the guitar playing of a god…,” wrote another. Over the decades he’s toured with Shawn Colvin, Arlo Guthrie, and George Carlin. 7:30 pm, (603) 526-6899 for reservations.

And for today...

Vance Gilbert is at the Flying Goose tonight. A couple of years ago he came out with this song, “Black Rochelle”—which he can explain just fine on his own in his lyrics. Talking about it afterward, he said, “It’s a true story. The cruelest kids are often the kids who have been treated most cruelly. One of the easiest and hardest songs ever to write. I am proud that I heard that melody so clearly in my head even as the words were cutting my chest wide open.”

See you tomorrow.

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

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