Daybreak Thursday, 4/2/26

Note: Sorry again for today’s delay. Because of this morning’s tech issue, this is a lite version of Daybreak. Back to normal (IT gremlins willing) tomorrow.

Chance of light rain, maybe a touch of snow first thing. With cold air hanging tough east of the Greens, we’re looking at a raw, cloudy day with highs in the mid or upper 30s, chance of rain showers all day, then a chance of freezing rain and possibly some icing overnight—it’s looking like temps will drop below freezing down to around mid-slope, while they stay just above it in the valleys. Overnight lows in the low 30s until they start a dramatic rise toward the 60s tomorrow, but more about that then.

Rings around the moon. As Artemis II heads that way, two lunar halos from the other night, one with a double ring, the other split by moon rays.

And a big “Whoops!” Yesterday morning, a reader writes, “we were at DHMC at the Heater Rd. location when this car surged forward, ran up on the tree and landed on top of this truck. We were one parking spot away and very glad the car did not roll over and come in contact with our car. An hour later, there were two tow truck drivers who seemed like they were trying to figure out how to pull the car off the truck safely.”

Time for Dear Daybreak! In this week’s collection of items from Daybreak readers, we start off with Susan Ellison’s soul-settling photo from a while back of sunset over Little Lake Sunapee, then move on to Skip Sturman’s ideas for what a crash course for newcomers on all things Upper Valley might look like; Linette Wermager’s poem on this in-between season; and Lori Fortini’s reflection on how driving in mud season offers a few lessons for life in general. If you’ve got a good Upper Valley anecdote or entertaining story or bit of local history, please use this form to pass it along or email me at [email protected].

“You’re driving forever in the dark and you seem to be nowhere, and then you go into a dance hall and it’s like a magical world.” That was longtime local dancer Sally Eshleman talking to Dartmouth senior Caitlin FitzMaurice about English Country Dance the night that FitzMaurice decided to give ECD a try. Though as she crunched through the snow and ice on her way into the Norwich Congregational Church, she realized that snow boots were “probably not the best dancing shoes.” Inside, she found veteran caller David Millstone, a group of seasoned dancers and one other newbie, and a revelation about dance and the connection it begets. The latest “Story in Sound.”

SPONSORED: Spanish language for healthcare careers from Dartmouth’s Rassias Center. Spanish for Healthcare Professionals encompasses Spanish language and grammar for a medical setting, using both general and healthcare-specific vocabulary so that medical professionals will gain skills and confidence needed for interactions with their patients and community. All adult Spanish learners are welcome to attend, with the understanding that the curriculum is focused on healthcare. This is an intensive language program that runs June 27 through July 5. Sponsored by the Rassias Center.

Hartford town manager to retire. John Haverstock told the town’s selectboard Tuesday evening that he’ll be stepping down in July or August, though his contract runs until October. He took the position in October of 2023. While he lives in Quechee, reports Liz Sauchelli in the Valley News, his partner—who’s already retired—lives in Addison, VT: “She’s been making it clear that she would like to join me in retirement,” he tells Sauchelli. “I think it’s healthy for when you get to a certain stage in your life to make a decision that’s best for one and one’s family and to enjoy life because we don’t get to live forever.”

Wells River family loses home to fire, welcomes new baby on same day. That’s the can’t-be-improved-upon VN headline atop Clare Shanahan’s story about George Houghton and Sarah Higgins, whose Route 302 home was destroyed in a Monday morning blaze—just as they were prepping to head to the hospital, where Higgins was due to be induced with their third child. Instead, she went into labor on the way there. Shanahan recounts the morning’s events—which actually began the night before, but accelerated when Higgins awoke to a room full of smoke. Now, with little Brooke safely delivered, they’re reckoning with what comes next. Friends have set up a GoFundMe.

SPONSORED: We the People Theatre presents The Spitfire Grill, an intimate musical about second chances, community, and finding where you belong. Something in this town is about to change. At the Eclipse Grange Theater, April 30–May 17. Get your tickets today! Sponsored by We the People Theatre.

Cabot Creamery and Smarties Candy Company create Seriously Smart Cheese, “the world’s first cheddar-forward candy tablet.” Well, no, but kudos to whichever marketing ace dreamed up the April Fool’s article that ran in several newspapers yesterday. “To create Seriously Smart Cheese,” it goes, “Cabot’s cheddar is carefully pulverized into a fine powder before being re-formed into signature Smarties-style discs. The result is a cheese experience that is dry, stimulating and pushes cheese to the boundaries. ‘At Cabot, we’ve always believed cheese should be everywhere, including the candy aisle,’” says the company’s Big Cheese.

Tinkering with weather models at 4 am can make a career—and the best snow-prediction app out there. In Bryan Allegretto’s case, it can also land your photograph on the bathroom fireplace in a Pixar executive’s multi-million-dollar home. Allegretto, a meteorologist who co-founded the snow-forecasting app OpenSnow, moved to Tahoe in 2006 and began making his own snow predictions because traditional forecasts are abysmal at predicting weather at specific mountain locations. Many modelling innovations, new colleagues, and devoted followers later, OpenSnow provides some of the most accurate forecasts for ski regions all over the world. Technology Review’s Rachel Levin tells the story.

The Thursday Crossword. Puzzle constructor Laura Braunstein’s “midi” is a bit longer and harder than her Tuesday minis, but perfect with breakfast. 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 the Hood Museum, "American Pop" and "Nurturing Nationhood". Dartmouth historian Annelise Orleck and exhibition curators will give a talk on how “people and symbols contribute to our understandings of the United States as a nation” and other questions raised by the Hood’s 2026 exhibitions. 12:30 pm.

Poet Jennifer Chang reads at Dartmouth. Chang’s most recent book, An Authentic Life, was a finalist for both the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry. Poetry editor of New England Review, she teaches at the University of Texas in Austin. 4:30 pm in Sanborn Library.

Dartmouth’s Rockefeller Center hosts a conversation on the US criminal justice system with Judge Beth W. Jantz. A 1999 Dartmouth grad, Jantz is a magistrate judge for the US District Court’s Northern District of Illinois. She’ll be talking about “her experience with the criminal justice system, reforms she has seen during her career on the bench, and potential reforms that will help shape the future of criminal justice and pathways beyond traditional prosecution.” 5 pm in Hinman Forum and livestreamed.

Hop Film screens Beyond Resolution. It’s a series of short experimental films by French-American filmmaker Sabine Gruffat that favor “ambiguity and resist resolution, drawing from a range of genres and layered techniques.” Gruffat will be on hand to talk about it all afterward. 7 pm, Loew Auditorium.

The Hop presents The TEAM and Reconstructing. The Hop-co-commissioned piece, directed by Zhailon Levingston and Rachel Chavkin (Hadestown), sold out the theater company’s run in New York. “As a flooded Tyvek-encased house becomes a plantation becomes a college campus mainstay, the show's tour-de-force cast embodies fictional characters, historical figures and their own racialized family histories to ask how, in the aftermath of slavery, we might move through history together.” 7:30 pm tonight and tomorrow in the Moore Theater.

The Boneheads at the Flying Goose Pub in New London. The Maine-based band, with their mix of originals and covers of folk, rock, blues, country, Cajun, and soul, is celebrating their 35th anniversary and the release of a new album, Still Kickin’. 7:30 pm, call 603) 526-6899 for reservations.

And anytime, JAM’s highlights for the week: Last month’s panel on education reform in Vermont, moderated by State Sen. Joe Major and featuring Ed Secy. Zoie Saunders, State Reps. Rebecca Holcombe and Esme Cole, State Sen. Seth Bongartz, and others; last weekend’s local No Kings Day demonstrations; and the one-year-on “grand opening” of Wilder’s KIS Thrift with a performance by local band the Caring Babies.

And for today...

“I’ve seen the future of New Orleans piano and it’s called River Eckert,” music critic and arts commentator Ted Gioia wrote in his newsletter the other day. “He’s not even old enough to get a driver’s license—you must be 17 in the state of Louisiana—but has already digested all the varied flavors of his hometown keyboard tradition.” Or as Gioia put it elsewhere, “They don’t teach any of that at Juilliard, not even after hours.” At 16, Eckert’s already a force in his hometown music scene; his debut album is coming out in a couple of weeks. Here’s a taste: Eckert and Trombone Shorty at the inauguration of New Orleans’ new mayor, Helena Moreno.

Whew. 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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