Daybreak Thursday, 9/11/25

Flurries, temps dropping to near zero. Nah, just joshin’. But it caught your eye, right? In truth, high pressure’s still in place, though a weak cold front will move through today. You wouldn’t know it from the forecast, though, apart from a few more clouds and gustier winds coming from the north (bringing some fire concern). Otherwise, it’s what we’ve been seeing: fog to start, then sun, highs in the mid or upper 70s, mid 40s overnight.

Vistas. From on high, and lower to the ground.

It’s time for Dear Daybreak! This week’s collection of short pieces from readers about Upper Valley life features a soul-settling view of Lake Fairlee at dusk by John K. Pietkiewicz, Rebecca Meyers’ story about a bid to counter garden-chomping deer that went outlandishly—and endearingly—awry; a new Danny Dover poem that I won’t spoil for you; and Jon Kaplan on the satisfying perfection of new, well-wrought stairs. And hey, Dear Daybreak needs submissions! If you’ve got something to share, why, please send it in!

Reminder: I-89 Exit 19 southbound off-ramp closed today. It’ll last from 6:30 am until about 5 pm as crews do final paving. As with last week, the detour will take you down to Exit 18, then back northbound.

Bus-car tangle snarls traffic on I-91 in Norwich. You figured this was bound to happen… If you’ve gotten on the highway southbound at Exit 13, you know there’s a construction zone that has southbound traffic on 91 down to one lane and cars entering the highway required to come to a full stop. Yesterday afternoon, a driver “failed to stop at the end of the on-ramp and yield for traffic that had the right of way in a construction zone,” say the VT State Police. Her Crosstrek sideswiped a bus headed south, causing extensive front-end damage. Neither driver was hurt, but the highway was shut for about an hour and vehicles detoured off at Norwich. WCAX has photos.

A tour of Northern Stage’s new housing—which other theater companies are eyeing enviously. Seven Days’ Amy Lilly recently got shown around by Northern Stage managing director Jason Smoller, who talked over the numbers—70 percent of each show’s cast and crew travels from elsewhere; board chair Jon Spector adds that with the region’s rents going up, owning its own housing “will cost us less in the long run, and we’ll have certainty.” The producing artistic director of Vermont Stage in Burlington calls a similar move her “daydream”: “Every theater in every place thinks about it,” she tells Lilly.

Finding terroir in Springfield, VT. Not for wine, but for beef. And not just any beef. As Compass Vermont writes (note: they don’t do bylines), Sheila Patinkin’s Vermont Wagyu in Springfield is the first in the nation to get a "Certified Authentic Wagyu" mark from the USDA—a program launched by the American Wagyu Association. Patinkin and others in the state argue that VT’s climate (four seasons are less stressful for cold-hardy Wagyu than continual warmth), high-quality forage, and clean air and water make it “a premier region for raising Wagyu in the United States.” Compass digs into the burgeoning Wagyu scene in the state.

SPONSORED: One Night. One Dance Floor. One Unforgettable Lip Sync Battle. It’s the Positive Tracks Sweat For Good Games on Saturday, Sept. 27, 6 –10 PM at Whaleback Mountain. Don't wait—the sold-out event of the year is BACK! Get ready for a night packed with live DJ beats, dancing, drinks, appetizers, and a legendary lip sync competition. Sign up to rock the mic (totally optional!)—or just come to laugh, cheer, and dance. All proceeds benefit Positive Tracks, an Upper Valley nonprofit helping young people change the world through the power of sport. Tix at the burgundy link or here. 21 and older only. Sponsored by Positive Tracks. 

In a tract of NH forest, a “territorial rap battle.” As Dartmouth grad student Miranda Zammarelli explains to NPR’s Ari Daniel, the two warblers they’re listening to are duking it out for territory. One’s going, “'Hey, this is my space, stay away,'“ Zammarelli says. “And the other bird's like, 'No, this is my space, stay away.'“ You may recall her research into songbird territories at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest from back in March. Daniel tells the whole story: the 57 years of territorial maps hand-drawn by biologist Dick Holmes and his students, Zammarelli’s digitization—"I think about all the hands these maps touched”—and what they tell us now.

SPONSORED: The Hood Museum is turning 40! Celebrate our 40th anniversary with a free community block party this Saturday, September 13, 1:00–4:00 pm. Join regional artist Katie Runde in creating a community chalk garden, collaborate on a large-scale mosaic, enjoy live music, refreshments, raffles, and pick up new and vintage museum swag! We hope to see you there! Sponsored by the Hood Museum. 

Market Basket board fires Arthur T. Demoulas ("Artie T.") as CEO. The popular New England grocery chain has been embroiled in a Demoulas family drama for years, and in May, the board—controlled by Arthur Demoulas’s sisters—put him and five other employees on leave, alleging that he was planning a work stoppage at the company. Tuesday night’s move echoes events 11 years ago, when Demoulas was also ousted as CEO; he was reinstated after massive protests by employees and customers. WMUR’s Jon Schoenheider and Alanna Flood report on events, with a timeline. "I'll probably go shopping somewhere else for the first time in my life,” says one customer.

NH’s northern border patrol program: 47 arrests in a year and a half. That’s after hundreds of police patrols and more than $1 million in spending on the state’s Northern Border Alliance, reports the Keene Sentinel’s Rick Green. Democrats have argued the money could be better used elsewhere; GOP Exec Council member Joe Kenney counters, “What happens is that the bad actors will find out reinforcements are patrolling and watching the northern border, and, therefore, they are going to head further west, or try to go further east.” In the first six months of this year, Green writes, there were 10 arrests, including for assault and driving without a license.

“This is the lull before the storm.” Small VT businesses try to survive the tariff war. That quote comes from Vermont Country Store CEO Jim Hall, talking to Seven Days’ Derek Brouwer about how the iconic retailer has managed tariffs so far: It stockpiled imports and is now “playing a game of chicken with its many national competitors,” Brouwer writes. He looks at three smaller businesses as well: Richmond water bottle maker Bivo, which is trying to shift its market to Europe; Richford shipper Pinnacle Parcels, which is worried it won’t survive; and a Jericho children’s clothing importer, whose owner “will be lucky if she earns a dime” this year.

With a long-handled garbage grabber, a fishing net, and a cooler, two VT game wardens handle a rogue timber rattler. To be sure, the rattlesnakes do live in Vermont—but not on Grand Isle. Which is where Kim McFerron happened on a nearly 4-foot rattler by her home, reports VT Public’s Howard Weiss-Tisman in a captivating story about what happened next: She meditated, “trying to just send peace to this snake” so it would stick around until the wardens showed up. Which they did: Matt Thiel and Asa Sargent “bobbed and weaved” for a half hour until they coaxed the snake into the net. Thiel took it to his office—“My wife wouldn’t let me keep it at our house,” he explains. It lived there until he found a new home for it as an educator in PA.

Building a castle just like they did in 1228. In the 13th century, it probably didn’t take craftsmen ten years to install a window, but today? Let’s just say there’s been a steep learning curve, writes Ben O’Donnell in Archaeology. In the heart of Burgundy, France, carpenters, painters, blacksmiths, basket weavers, historians, and archaeologists have been constructing Guédelon Castle using 13th century tools and methods. Windows (not glass—too expensive back then—so goatskin? canvas?), tiles, scaffolding, paint … “With our work, the castle can speak,” says site director Florian Renucci. And you don’t have to feel so bad about how long it’s taken to redo the kitchen.

Three minutes. Nothing but adrenaline. The Mountain Bike World Championships are being held in Switzerland, and in Champéry on Sunday, 21-year-old Canadian Jackson Goldstone won the men’s elite downhill race. He happened to have a GoPro on his helmet, and you can watch his winning run from his perspective. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself clenching pretty much every muscle you’ve got by about halfway through. To get a sense of how crazy the run is, this non-POV version helps.

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

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HEADS UP

Well hey, it’s here! The Tunbridge World’s Fair starts up at the fairgrounds this morning at 9 with the Oxen Open Log Skid, fiber-crafting demonstrations, and, of course, entire buildings full of farm animals, pickles and preserves and eye-popping vegetables, crafts, history, and much more. And thru Sunday there are the rides, the food, the midway, the food, the horse shows and sheep-shearing demonstrations and sheep dog trials and tractor pulls and live music and entertainment. And food. Homepage above, full schedule here.

Victor Tom on “How Rocket Science Made Its Way into Major League Baseball and the Strike Zone”. Tom was chief scientist at BAE Systems, and his online talk, thanks to the Lebanon Rotary, chronicles how (at a defense company) he used camera mapping technology first to help win the America's Cup in 1992 and then in 2000 helped Major League Baseball re-establish the correct strike zone, thereby changing the way home plate umpires call balls and strikes. 11:45 am at the link.

At Feast and Field in Barnard: Queer Dance Party with DJ Kellarella and DJ Cartier. Kellarella directs Health & Wellness programs at the Pride Center of Vermont and organizes Babe’s Queer Dance Party in Bethel. Cartier’s originally from New Orleans and spins rap, R&B, and pop—and creates comics. Doors and food at 5:30, dance at 6.

At the Norwich Bookstore, an evening of mystery with Bailey Seybolt and Flynn Berry. Seybolt, from the Burlington area, will be reading from and talking about her debut novel, Coram House, with Norwich thriller writer Berry. The story, based in part on the real-life St. Joseph’s Catholic Orphanage in Burlington, features a disgraced true crime writer digging into two murders decades apart connected to the orphanage. 7 pm.

The Mudroom at AVA. Tonight’s live storytelling event is focused on the theme of “Best Friends”. 7 pm.

Yep, I know “A Taste of Ireland” is at the Lebanon Opera House, but it’s only got a handful of obstructed view seats left. And hey, this is your chance to see world-class dancers from Lord of the Dance and Riverdance on their first foray into New England, with Gavin Shevlin (two-time world champion Irish dancer), Callum O’Neill (world champion, formerly of Riverdance), and fiddle player Megan McGinley.

And anytime, check out JAM’s highlights for the week: There’s producer Chico Eastridge’s profile of Hanover water reclamation Superintendent Kevin Maclean, who talks about “the passion and skills it takes to manage water resources”; Barbara Krinitz’s latest “The Magic’s In the Music” episode, featuring stories of tour life from the Twangtown Paramours, Hilde Ojibway, and Nick Charyk; Palestine in the Park in WRJ back in August, with Mohsen Mahdawi; and, as always, school boards, selectboards, and other civic events.

And for today...

Two Grammy-winning singer-songwriters join forces: former NFL All Pro Mike Reid, who’s now in the Songwriters’ Hall of Fame, and Joe Henry, with 16 solo albums under his belt as well as being a producer for Solomon Burke, Elvis Costello, Allen Toussaint, Julian Lage, and Bonnie Raitt. They’ve got a new duo album out. (Thanks, DL!)

See you tomorrow.

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Written and published by Rob Gurwitt      Poetry editor: Michael Lipson    Associate Editor: Jonea Gurwitt   About Rob                                                 About Michael

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