GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Reminder: Daybreak's off until Jan. 5. Definitely time to rest up for the year ahead.
But before that happens: You're the best! Over 15,000 of you now make room for Daybreak in your lives. Many of you pass it along to friends, which is how it grows. You send photos and ideas and kind words and corrections. You helped it to its best year ever with your contributions and sponsorships. You’ve responded enthusiastically to Dear Daybreak and Enthusiasms, the Monday jigsaw and the new crosswords, the new Giving Guide and the Daybreak-only news stories—reassuring me that Daybreak can keep evolving. Which it will in 2026; you can support that here. You're the coolest audience a newsletter could have. Thank you for a great year.
Partly sunny. We may still see some snow showers first thing, but yesterda’s system is headed east and skies will grow a bit clearer as the day goes on. There’ll be some winds from the northwest today, with gusts getting stronger around midday; temps will climb a bit but remain below freezing. Lows tonight in the mid teens as clouds build in again ahead of a possible brush with snow tomorrow morning. Oh, and in case you’re wondering about the roads this morning: Plows are out, but build in some time.
Out and about. Two very different scenes:
Up on the Fairlee cliffs, workers have been busy rigging the wire mesh that, ideally, will keep boulders from pitching onto I-91 below. From a distance, writes Lynne Fitzhugh, “It’s hard to capture the number of workers tethered to the cliffs like tiny spiders” … but in Friday’s rain, she did her best.
And in Meriden, a tufted titmouse stopped by outside Sheila Culbert’s window. “They’re a common winter bird,” she writes. “But very pretty.”
And arriving just in time… Remember yesterday’s item about Amtrak trains tooting out “Jingle Bells”? Well, an intrepid Eric Francis was on the WRJ platform yesterday morning when the southbound Vermonter came around the bend, jingling all the way.
A Lost Woods double-header. This week in Lebanon illustrator DB Johnson’s weekly comic strip, Henry delivers the news to Auk that scientists are trying to bring the dodo back from extinction—and Auk and Eddie mull the possibilities. And in next week’s strip, it’s a new year… and Auk wonders if maybe the next trip around the sun could take a bit longer. “They say years don’t actually repeat themselves, but sometimes they echo,” muses Eddie.
The Village at White River Junction gets its third set of owners. The upscale assisted living facility, with its prominent downtown spot, was founded by local developer Byron Hathorn and Northern Stage founder Brooke Ciardelli in 2019. They sold it to the Seattle-based investment firm Columbia Pacific Advisors two years later. And now, reports Marion Umpleby in the Valley News, it’s changed hands again, with two suburban-Boston firms—Benchmark Senior Living and real estate investors National Development—taking it over earlier this month. There are no current plans “to change the monthly cost or make changes to the Village’s site or services,” Umpleby writes.
In the world of student robotics, Thetford Academy is a big deal. In fact, reports Dylan Moody A’ness for UVM’s Community News Service, “In recent years, [it] has become a regional robotics powerhouse.” A’ness grew up in Thetford and went to TA, and he returned recently for the school’s Haunted Harvest VEX Robotics Tournament—to report on the tournament and Thetford’s robotics history: which was very much up-by-the-bootstraps, with physics teacher Marc Chabot paying for supplies out of his own pocket. Then parent volunteers showed up—”they wanted to spend their entire holiday break building robots,” says Chabot. Now? Multiple visits to the world championships.
SPONSORED: Spend Winter Vacation at the Montshire! For starters, the museum’s Science Studio programs are hands-on, drop-in, and for all ages. Make hot air balloons, get zapped with electricity, try out parachutes, circuits, and chain reactions. These are free with museum membership or admission. And get tickets now for New Year’s at Noon, where you can celebrate the excitement of a new year without staying up late, at a festive, hands-on event for families with kids aged 0-10. Finally, Dino Lights are up until January 10th. Come walk through the ages! Sponsored by the Montshire Museum of Science.
In a meh reading year, one book “that hasn’t gotten much praise and I’m now recommending almost daily.” That’s the Yankee Bookshop’s Kari Meutsch writing about The Everlasting, by Alix Harrow, in this week’s Enthusiasms. Harrow’s got a big reputation as a fantasy writer, and the book’s got plenty to keep those fans happy. But as Kari writes, Harrow’s aiming for even bigger game, “looking at the deeper themes of history and memory: who writes the stories that we are taught from, and who gets to decide the arc of the stories that greatly influence our views of ourselves and the world at large.” And, along the way, why we need to hear more sides to each story.
Springsteen at the Briggs. Okay, not the superstar himself. But on Sunday evening, five area musicians—Royalton singer Ali T; Western Terrestrials frontman Nick Charyk; Enfield native Brooks Hubbard; Bethel’s Krishna Guthrie; and Windsor singer-songwriter Jim Yeager—will take the stage to perform a series of songs from Bruce Springsteen’s having-a-moment 1982 album, Nebraska (show details below). In the VN, Alex Hanson talks to organizer and narrator/scene-setter Pat Halpin, and to Charyk—“When I was a teenager, it was the first Springsteen album that appealed to me”—and Ali T about the album itself and what they’ll be trying to do.
SPONSORED: 🧶 Open House Saturday at Junction Fiber Mill. Join us for an Open House at Junction Fiber Mill this Saturday, Dec. 27th, from 10am to 1pm! Take a tour and discover how we create our yarn, right here in White River Junction. This event is perfect for anyone interested in fiber, value-added agriculture, and large machinery. Knitters, crocheters, weavers, and wool felters: explore our selection of locally spun and hand-dyed yarn. Location: 101 Maple Street (Parking available behind 87 Maple Street) in WRJ. Sponsored by Junction Fiber Mill.
World Cup moguls moved to NH, aerials to Lake Placid. They’re crucial this go-round, what with the Olympics looming, and yesterday US Ski & Snowboard announced that, due to warm weather out west, events originally scheduled for Deer Valley Resort in Utah will instead move this way. The aerials world cup will be Jan. 11-12 in Lake Placid; moguls and dual moguls will be at NH’s Waterville Valley Resort Jan. 15-16.
Landmark College: "This is where you can really tap into your superpower and be who you are. No one's judging anyone." When the Putney college launched with 77 students four decades ago, reports WGBH’s Kirk Carapezza, “there was no blueprint to follow” because American higher education hadn’t focused on how to teach college kids with dyslexia or ADHD or other learning differences. Now, Landmark’s got over 400 students on the grounds of the former Windham College, which the feds wanted to turn into a prison; the Putney School Board, led at the time by future-Gov. Peter Shumlin, had other ideas. Carapezza tells the college’s story and talks to students there.
Deep Andromeda. The Andromeda Galaxy “is one of the most photographed targets in the night sky,” writes the Greenwich Observatory. But in awarding its Astronomy Photographer of the Year to a trio of astrophotographers from China, they explain, the three “have succeeded in presenting this familiar favourite in a striking new light.” The photo itself is beautiful, but the reason it’s here is because of its local tie: the filter set used to capture the image was made by Chroma Technology, a precision optical filter manufacturer in Bellows Falls. “Make sure to view this photo as large as you can to take in the beauty of our stars!” they write in their post about it. (Thanks, HHC!)
Just showing off? You’ve seen photos or even video of humpback whales breaching. What you might not have seen is the view from both above and below the water, which is what underwater photographer Alvaro Herrero López managed to get off French Polynesia in the middle of pod of whales—at a safe distance until, suddenly, he’s not.
Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak. And you should know that Wordbreak will keep going while Daybreak’s away, with a fresh word drawn from the region’s news. If you’re hankering for it, just use the burgundy link at the start of this paragraph each morning.
Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it stick around by hitting the maroon button:
HEADS UP
A few events you should know about while Daybreak’s away….
Sunday, Dec. 28
A Celebration of the Music of Nebraska. Ali T., Brooks Hubbard, Jim Yeager, Nick Charyk, and Krishna Guthrie perform the songs from the fabled Springsteen album, while organizer and Royalton Community Radio DJ Pat Halpin narrates between songs to set the scene—along with trailers from Terrence Malik’s Badlands, which inspired Springsteen, and Sean Penn’s Indian Runner, based on one of the songs on the album. “I’ve always loved the album and with the new movie about this time in Springsteen's life, I thought it would be timely,” Halpin explains. 7 pm at the Briggs Opera House in WRJ.
Wednesday, Dec. 31
New Years At Noon at the Montshire. “Celebrate the excitement of a new year, without staying up late, at this event full of festive hands-on activities for families with kids aged 0-10. Enjoy stories, balloon races, and dance party countdowns throughout the event,” they write. “Guests are invited to dress up, dress down, or creatively mix the two (think jammies and sparkles) as we ring in the New Year together!” 10 am to noon.
New London’s first First Night. Things get going at 10 am with storytelling at the Tracy Memorial Library and then build quickly from there, with free events for families including performances, music, and a free skate followed by a skating competition, and lots of music, dance, a square dance, and more if you’ve bought a New Year’s New London button. Details, times, and locations at the link.
A bit to the north, Catamount Arts’ First Night North in St. Johnsbury. There, things start up at 4 pm and wind up with a midnight dance party on Main Street, with a lot of music, dance, and more all around town. Schedule here, and list of artists here.
And even farther north, Highlight in Burlington. It’s the successor to the city’s old First Night celebration, and it’s chock-full, from three Circus Smirkus shows (first one’s at noon) to Dwight & Nicole to Sam Amidon to Soul Porpoise, a late-night dance party, and waterfront fireworks. Full list of events at the link.
Meanwhile, closer to home, there’s a dance party at The Filling Station in WRJ starting at 8 pm, with a break at 11:50 pm for a ball drop from the Coolidge clock tower, and in Fairlee, the Lake Morey Resort is hosting a New Year’s celebration with The Conniption Fits: 8 pm to 12:30 am.
Friday, Jan. 2
The Anonymous Coffeehouse ushers in the year with fiddler Patrick Ross, NJ singer-songwriter Lucy Isabel, and NH folk musicians Decatur Creek (Beth Eldridge, Doug Farrell, and Jack Henry). It all gets going at 7:30 pm at the First Congregational Church of Lebanon.
Saturday and Sunday, Jan. 3 & 4
Billings Farm’s Woodstock Film Series screens The Librarians. Kim A. Snyder’s documentary follows a group of librarians in Texas, Florida, Louisiana, and elsewhere as they face book bans, attacks from politicians and organized lobbies, and the censure of family members who disagree with their views. 3 pm both days.
And for today...
It’s kind of become a Daybreak tradition to put some version of Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn’s magical version of The Nutcracker in this spot. Last year we took a detour. But now it’s back—though not Ellington’s band. Instead, it’s the overture as performed by American roots superstars Darol Anger, Joe K. Walsh, Grant Gordy, and Aidan O’Donnell. So, let’s just step into the end of the year with those guys.
And now... If you're celebrating Christmas tomorrow or Kwanzaa starting Friday, or waiting to head into the night or onto the trails to mark New Year's, or just hanging out and appreciating family or friends or this place we all live, I hope your next little while is filled with warmth, peacefulness, community, good food, plenty of time outside, and a promising start to the new year.
And maybe some more snow?
See you for CoffeeBreak Monday, Jan. 5.
Written and published by Rob Gurwitt Poetry editor: Michael Lipson Associate Editor: Jonea Gurwitt About Rob About Michael
And if you think one or more of your friends would like Daybreak, too, please forward this newsletter and tell them to visit daybreak.news to sign up.
Thank you!
