Daybreak Thursday, 3/26/26

Mostly cloudy, chance of showers. We’ve got this warm front coming through, plus winds from the southwest (which could get kinda gusty this afternoon ahead of an arriving cold front), so we’re headed toward the upper 50s or even low 60s with a decent chance that even the snow in the mountains is going to melt. Then that cold front arrives, so tonight temps will be dropping through the 40s and into the low 30s by daybreak tomorrow.

Rings around the sun. Clearly there was a lot of atmospherics out there on Tuesday…

Time for Dear Daybreak! In this week’s collection, we start off with one of the earliest early-morning photos to run in the newsletter, Paul Goundrey’s stunning view of Mt. Cube on a February morning. Then it’s on to 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 on his 73rd birthday, a story that begins when she was in second grade and—there’s no other way to put this—obsessed with vomiting cats.

One super-clear ice cube business in a small town would be unusual. But two?Tangled in a feud? Dartmouth senior Maisie Pike first ran across the cubes when she stopped in for a drink in Stowe. “The way that it sounds in the glass and the way that it feels is different from cloudy cubes,” their maker, bartender Brian Crux, told her. Pike was intrigued—and even more so when she stopped for dinner at Plate, where Crux had once worked, and learned that Plate had its own clear cubes—and that behind all that was a story about a betrayed friendship and lingering hard feelings in a small ski town. It’s the newest “story in sound” from Sophie Crane’s podcast class.

A fire’s aftermath. On March 2 in Vershire, Hal Beebe, who has Alzheimer’s, turned on the stove in his apartment after his caregiver had left but before his wife returned from an overnight nursing shift. The stove hadn’t been used in years, and the resulting fire destroyed the five-unit building. In the Valley News, Marion Umpleby does what breaking-news reporters often don’t: She follows up, tracking not just what happened during the fire, but to the neighbors who helped Hal Beebe get out (one lost pretty much everything, including pets, the other managed to salvage medical equipment and is moving to Barre). Beebe’s wife is in a hotel. Includes GoFundMe links.

SPONSORED: Theresa Rebeck's SEMINAR at Shaker Bridge Theatre. A provocative comedy from Pulitzer Prize nominee Theresa Rebeck (most Broadway-produced female playwright). Four aspiring young novelists sign up for private writing classes with Leonard, an international literary figure. Under his recklessly brilliant and unorthodox instruction, some thrive, others flounder, alliances are made and broken, sex is used as a weapon, and hearts are unmoored. The wordplay is not the only thing that turns vicious as innocence collides with experience in this biting comedy. March 26 to April 12. Tickets at the burgundy link or here. Sponsored by Shaker Bridge Theatre.

Hilda Belcher: The followup. Back in September, the Meadow Meeting House in Corinth hosted a “box social” to commemorate the centennial of an exhibition in the building of the famed artist’s work. Belcher had grown up in Pittsford, VT, and last fall’s organizer, Amy Peberdy, connected with her great-nephew there. Now, in Image mag, Susan Apel writes about Belcher’s art and career—including her early success (1908: “Girl Painter Wins Prize from 692 Men Competitors”), famous “Checkered Dress” with a young Georgia O’Keeffe as subject, backhanded compliment when one of her paintings was stolen from the Philadelphia Academy of Art, and more.

Need a guide to all those Dartmouth buildings under construction? Heck, there are four of them along West Wheelock alone, plus one on Observatory Road, another coming sometime on the other side of West Wheelock, and an addition to the rugby clubhouse out at Garipay. But as Nancy Schoeffler writes in the Dartmouth Alumni Mag, “housing is front and center.” Russo Hall on W. Wheelock is due to open in September. Just downhill, three more are due to open in 2028, including Shonda Rhimes Hall (already being called “Shondaland” after her production company). In the article you’ll find this link to a handy map that lays it all out.

SPONSORED: Step into the moving story of Palm Sunday at St. Thomas. Witness a humble donkey lead children in a joyful procession, opening the solemn journey of Holy Week. Hear again the Passion narrative—the drama in which we see the messenger of love and forgiveness sentenced to death by the brutal imperial power of Rome. Sponsored by St. Thomas Episcopal Church.

With new solo practice, Woodstock doc hopes to “be able to stay in this town and continue to take care of the community here.” All this week, you may have seen those ads up top about Lorissa Siegel. Now, the VN’s Clare Shanahan gives the backstory. Tomorrow, Siegel winds up her 18-year run at DH’s Ottauquechee Health Center, and next week strikes out on her own, with a fraction of the patient load and none of the “pressure to complete appointments more quickly and to devote more time on complicated billing paperwork,” Shanahan writes. Siegel, she notes, is part of a trend of local physicians leaving large institutions and setting up small private practices.

The battle over Ben & Jerry’s. Co-founder Ben Cohen likes to say that it’s about keeping the company from becoming “another piece of frozen mush.” But as Chelsea Edgar writes in Seven Days, it’s about a lot more. Never less than an entertaining writer (Cohen’s “personal aesthetic is Dad Who Buys Everything at Costco…”), Edgar traces the dead serious issues at play: the efforts by corporate owner Magnum Ice Cream Company, a spin-off from global giant Unilever, to rein in Ben & Jerry’s outspoken advocacy of “the concept of leftist ice cream.” Edgar chronicles the issues and maneuvering, alongside a three-scoop cup of Ben & Jerry’s history.

Taking the long view. A handful of you will say, “Oh, I get it,” but the rest of us should just nod wisely and pretend… It started when Thomas Buckley-Houston, a software writer, was on Java and wondered how to view as many volcanoes at once as possible. In fact, where on Earth can you see the farthest? Calculating that involved eight years of effort, elevation data, trigonomic light, NASA’s Shuttle Radar Topography Mission, locally anchored tile-specific azimuthal equidistant projections, and 10¹⁵—or a million billion—calculations. And now you, too, can discover the longest sight line from any point on Earth by clicking here. (Hey, Kahnawake, I see you! says Mt. Mansfield.)

The Thursday Crossword. It’s puzzle constructor Laura Braunstein’s “midi”—a bit longer and harder than her Tuesday minis, but perfect with breakfast and with a few only-in-the-Upper-Valley clues. 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
At AVA Gallery, “A Colorful Evening with Author Adam Blue”. The local artist, educator, and author will read from his novel, And It All Makes Sense in the End—in which “six unlikely runaways climb a massive tree and discover a hidden realm where extinction reverses, the impossible thrives, and the soul remembers what the mind forgets”—as well as talk about the visual artists who inspired the work and answer questions. 5:30 pm in the main galleries.

The Rumney Sessions at Fable Farm in Barnard close out the season with All She Wrote. The string band trio of Annie McDougall, Dakota Rose, and Sammy Rose Blackmore met at Berklee College of Music and discovered that they shared a desire “to create music that is honest, tender, and resonant.” They call their blend of bluegrass, folk, and old-time music Earth Fairy Space Grass. Doors and food at 5:30 pm, music around 6.

Shaker Bridge Theatre opens its run of Seminar. As you saw above, in Pulitzer-nominee Theresa Rebeck’s play four aspiring writers have plunked down their hard-earned money to a novelist-turned-editor who’s fond of brutal honesty. As a reviewer once wrote, the result “is a remarkable feat: a rare comic drama that insightfully engages us in the world of writers and writing without actually subjecting us to the tedious and lonely writing process itself.” At the Briggs Opera House in WRJ with previews tonight at 7 pm, then Thursdays-Sundays through April 12.

At the Norwich Bookstore, Eve Jacobs-Carnahan and Global Craftivism since the Pussyhats. Jacobs-Carnahan is an artist, civics educator, and creator of Knit Democracy Together, which held knitting sessions throughout VT and NH to talk voting and civic engagement and, among other things, created a knitted sculpture of the NH Statehouse. She’ll be talking about her new book and craftivism and leading a crafting project (with materials provided). 7 pm.

The Faux Paws at Artistree. The bi-coastal trio of brothers Andrew and Noah Van Norstrand along with Chris Miller mix bluegrass, folk, jazz, and "glossy pop" influences into “a high-energy, soulful sound,” writes Artistree, that ranges from fast-moving fiddle tunes to saxophone solos to songs about unrequited love (though honest, how many of those could there be?). 7 pm.

Lucy Kaplansky at New London’s Flying Goose Pub. The veteran singer-songwriter (among other things, she was part of the folk supergroup Cry Cry Cry with Dar Williams and Richard Shindell) is out on a solo tour, mostly in New England. 7:30 pm, call (603) 526-6899 for reservations.

And anytime, a roundup of local events you might have missed from JAM. This week they’re highlighting: the latest Mudroom at AVA, where Julia Neily, Annabelle Cone, Lars Hasselblad Torres, Don Kollisch, Marv Klassen-Landis, and Judith Hertog told stories about “showing up”; three band and choral concerts with sturdents from Grantham, Plainfield, Lebanon Middle, Lebanon High, and Hartford High School; and the Hartford Conservation Commission’s recent “Mix and Mingle” at which 10 of the region’s environmental groups spoke about what they do and why.

And for today...

You can prep for tonight, when Lucy Kaplansky plays the Flying Goose.

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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