GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Cloudy to start, getting sunny. A cold front is coming through today towing a drier, cooler mass of air; it's possible that some parts of the region could see light showers, but if they show up they'll be "lackluster," the weather service insists. Highs today in the upper 70s, maybe around 80 in the valleys. Mostly clear tonight as high pressure starts building in to the west, lows around 60, winds today and tonight from the west.A great Great Blue. Usually, by the time you see a Great Blue Heron, it's already seen you and is on the wing outta there. So Lisa Grose's trail cam video is especially welcome, from a pond near a heron nesting site."The Upper Valley is where this story needs to be told.” That might not be obvious for a feature film about a woman with a heart defect training for a stage of the Tour de France. But Julia Coulter, the film's writer and director—and central character—is a 2010 Hanover High grad and grew up biking the region's many scenic roads. In a Daybreak story, Matt Golec reports on how the film came about and where it's headed: It's still raising funds, but filming starts in mid-August. The cast, Matt reports, includes Kyle Secor from Homicide: Life on the Street, Bridge & Tunnel's Brian Muller, and local great Gordon Clapp.Former LISTEN executive director sentenced to 21 months in prison for embezzlement. As John Lippman writes in the Valley News, Kyle Fisher's sentence—handed down in US District Court in Concord yesterday—was less than the 26 months prosecutors had sought, but more than the 12 months his lawyer asked for. Fisher was feeding a $4,000-a-month gambling addiction when he drained at least $239,000 out of the nonprofit's accounts. In court yesterday, he told spectators, "I was in a position of trust and I betrayed that trust... I will do everything to make it right."VTrans project to separate bike lanes from vehicle lanes on Route 5 in Hartford to "change traffic patterns considerably." Locals are concerned about the impact on the steep stretch of roadway between the middle and high schools and Route 14, which is down to one lane both directions. "When school starts it’s going to cause tremendous problems," a nearby business owner tells the VN's Patrick Adrian. The changes come in the wake of a new state law requiring a buffer between vehicles and cyclists; for most of the four miles from Wilder to the Hartland line, Route 5 will be one lane. Adrian explains.SPONSORED: The Hood Museum of Art traces foodways through art! The Hood's intriguing exhibit, From the Field: Tracing Foodways through Art, explores the idea of food as not only nourishment but an expression of our lived and shared experiences. It invites audiences to reflect on their attitudes, practices, and rituals around food, through Nov. 3. Join us for a Gallery Talk with the curators on Saturday, July 27, from 2-3:00 pm. The Hood Museum is always free and open to all. Plan your visit today! Sponsored by the Hood Museum of Art.Light, but not superficial. Happy, but not cheesy. Smart, but not a workout to read. That's sort of the sweet spot for one of the toughest kinds of requests booksellers get, writes the Norwich Bookstore's Emma Kaas in this week's Enthusiasms. And as it happens, she's got just the book! Rebecca K Reilly's debut novel, Greta and Valdin, centers around a pair of New Zealand siblings—half-Maori, half Russian Moldovan—but really, it's about the "messy, joyful" Vladisavljevic family and its members' complicated lives. Reilly "has a magical ability to transform life's many iniquities into relatable anecdotes," Emma writes.At VT Law & Grad School: A "soothing and enchanting show" of water in motion. Tunbridge artist Michael Sacca has been photographing the ocean since he was a kid hanging out—and surfing—around Gloucester, Mass. A new show of his photographs at VL&GS's Jefferson Gallery draws from photos made mostly over the past seven years, taken in Gloucester, on Cape Cod, and in Hawaii. "Despite the overabundance of water in Vermont these days," writes Dave Celone on his Upper Valley VT/NH Musings blog, it's "a relaxing interlude from a busy life." Includes a good sampling of the works on the wals.Knitting people together: What it actually takes. As DH's Center for Advancing Rural Health Equity says, in this region, "Friends, neighbors, and strangers all work together to create a better world." But it's not always clear what that means. Now, in a new five-part podcast series, former public health grad student Ella Harper-Schiehle—now at the VT Dept of Health—looks into the nuts and bolts: a joint bid by Sullivan County and Charlestown's J.S. Automotive to help people in need get their cars repaired; the Lebanon Opera House's initiative to expand programming for audiences that are sometimes overlooked; Newport NH's New Hampshire Grand Families; and more.Wumph! Whale slams into, upends boat off Portsmouth, NH. You may already have seen Tuesday's video of a humpback surfacing and then hitting the boat—but if not, there's a reason it's gone viral. Two passengers who were fishing were tossed in the water, but were rescued unhurt by a nearby boat. “There's nobody at the helm of the boat actively trying to see the whale or get closer to the whale," the Seacoast Science Center's Ashley Stokes tells NHPR's Kate Dario. "It was just wrong place, wrong time." The whale, Stokes says, was out feeding on "a large patch of fish."You can summon all the "moose mojo" you want, but they're getting harder to see in NH. That's because, NHPR's Rick Ganley notes, there are a lot fewer of them than there used to be: an estimated 7,000 of them a quarter-century ago, half that now. But he and his producer, Mary McIntyre, were determined to see one. So one evening recently, they got on a bus run by the Pemi Valley Moose Tour. “It used to be like fishing in a barrel. ‘There's a moose, there's a moose.’ Now it's a little tougher, but we're pretty stubborn," says guide Eric Pyra. Moose, on the other hand, have their own ideas about showing up.In the White Mountains' Lincoln Woods, three reports in a single day of a bear following hikers. They happened Monday, and the bear wasn't scared by hikers trying the chase it off with loud noises, reports Amanda Gokee in the Globe (sorry, paywall); in one case, it tried a bluff charge—a defensive move. State bear expert Andrew Timmins tells Gokee that photos and video suggest it's a juvenile, and "from what he’s seen, the bear isn’t exhibiting aggressive behavior... but is just begging for food," Gokee writes. A Fish & Game team will meet to decide what steps to take next.VT's average wage now stands at $62K a year—but in all but two counties, it's less. A new report from the Public Assets Institute, using data from the state labor department, notes that only workers in Chittenden and Washington counties (the latter is home to Montpelier) had an average wage last year higher than the statewide average. The two counties host 45 percent of the jobs in Vermont. Windsor County ranks third in the state for average wage, at $59,723, while Orange County is in the middle of the pack, at $52,481. VT Public's Howard Weiss-Tisman has the details.Despite desperate times, local news publishers find a way. The numbers are brutal. At the turn of this century, 1,446 people worked in Vermont journalism, write Colin Flanders and Kevin McCallum in Seven Days. Now? 358—at least, as of last year. Yet publications still plow ahead, and Flanders and McCallum profile four of them: the Addison Independent, where publisher Angelo Lynn has laid bare to readers what it costs: about $25,000 for a single print edition; VTDigger, which has consolidated staff and is actively fundraising; the Waterbury Roundabout, a three-person online news site just getting by; and the all-volunteer, mostly online Hardwick Gazette.Adventurous? Maybe. Bizarre? Definitely. Ben Kilner is giving a whole new meaning to surf and turf by crossing the width of Scotland on/in a hand-built "Peddle Paddle", a bicycle/canoe kluge that will transport him more than 150 miles. His goal is to raise money for charity, writes Andy Corbley on the Good News Network, and to inspire others to get outside and explore the world. Kilner’s nine-day adventure will start with a paddle along the Caledonian Canal (and through Nessie’s home waters) and, reversing course, end with a bike ride along the Great Glen Way.An out-of-this-world selfie. Astronaut Matthew Dominick, who's on board the International Space Station at the moment, is also a keen photographer. Last month, he figured out a way to capture a person peering out at the stars from the window of the Dragon space capsule just as the rising moon provided enough light to illuminate the capsule but not so much that it washed out the Milky Way beyond. In Peta Pixel, Matt Growcoot describes how he did it—along with the results.
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We may be the middle of nowhere to everyone else in VT and NH, but
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It gets going on Allen Street in Hanover, with music from jazz vocalist Grace Wallace, plus ice cream and books related to the season's themes at Still North. Then down to a season preview at Sawtooth Kitchen, and finally...
The free Hop summer concert features
Latin Grammy-winning bassist and composer Giraudo and his band, who use traditional tango as a starting point to edge over into jazz, chamber music, and more. Here they were at Lincoln Center early this year.At Feast and Field tonight, Espiral 7. The Colombian band, which comes out of a vibrant music and arts scene in the city of Cali, fuses pop-Latin, rock, salsa, jazz and more in a sound they call Neo-Caleño. They're on a US tour right now, and tonight's their only stop in New England. At the Fable Farm Fermentory in Barnard, gates at 5:30, music starts up at 6. Here's "Mi Corazón".
Alison Bechdel at the Briggs Opera House in WRJ at 7 pm. The cartoonist, author, Tony winner for Fun Home, MacArthur "Genius" Award winner, and creator of the Bechdel Test is the keynote speaker for WRJ Pride this year. Her talk at the Briggs is unticketed, first-come, first-served—so as the Main Street Museum puts it, "first come gets the seats!" Doors open at 6:30. That's going to be some line outside...
Summer Music Associates continues its concert series with the classical pianist—and Gershwin specialist—performing works by Beethoven, Haydn, Czerny, and Liszt. At the First Baptist Church.
Blues guitarist Benoit grew up in Houma, Louisiana and has been playing clubs since he was a teenager; Osborne grew up on an island off Sweden but eventually moved to New Orleans, played for a time with the North Mississippi All-Stars, and has his own thriving solo career. They're all over right now with their "I Hear Thunder" tour. Gates (and food trucks) at 6 pm, the Mike Zito Band at 7 pm, Benoit and Osborne at 8, no charge for the music.
: Retired US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer reading the
Declaration of Independence
in Plainfield on July 4 following the town's parade; the Parish Players' premiere production of Proxy, by retired physician Kenneth Burchard, about the mental illness Munchausen by Proxy; and the VT punk band
Dead Street Dreamers at the Main Street Museum last month.
And for today...
Two musical giants died recently. Bernice Johnson Reagon, daughter of a Baptist preacher, an original member of the Freedom Singers in 1962, a former director of the Black American Culture Program at the Smithsonian, and a founding member of Sweet Honey in the Rock, died at 81 on July 16. And John Mayall, pathbreaking British blues harmonica player, keyboardist, and guitar player, died Monday at 90. He influenced and helped launch the careers of a generation of musicians right behind him—the Rolling Stones, the founding members of Fleetwood Mac, Eric Clapton...
, and
, off Mayall's 1967 Bluesbreakers album (recorded in 1966; by the time it was released, Clapton had already left the band to form Cream).
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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