GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Well this should be fun. Mostly, today, we're looking at rain showers, strong wind gusts from the south, and temperatures getting to around 60—yesterday busted records for the date, we'll see about today. Given all that, there'll probably be rapid snowmelt, and though most rivers should escape anything dramatic, some may not; areas with poor drainage may also see ponding. But all of that will come to an end tonight, because right behind the system there's a potent cold front, and overnight we're going to drop sharply into the mid or upper teens—bringing everything to an end with a dusting of snow.A splash of color would be a good thing today, don't you think? And fortunately, the amaryllis bulbs that Barbara Woodard regrows indoors every year seem like just the ticket.71,799. That's the number of visitors that Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller, which is officially a National Historical Park, saw last year. It's a pittance compared to, say, the 3.3 million people who visited the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, also a historical park, but for Marsh-Billings, it means bragging rights: It's a record number. The park was one of 20 in the National Park Service system that set records in 2023, the agency has just announced. St. Gaudens, in case you're curious, hit its peak of 44,881 in 1989; last year, it clocked in at 30,537.Former LISTEN director pleads guilty to embezzlement. In federal court in Concord yesterday, Kyle Fisher pled to a single count of wire fraud amounting to $4,787—which, as John Lippman points out in the Valley News, is "less than 2 percent" of nearly $240,000 he is alleged to have taken. Fisher said he spent the money on gambling and for personal use. He is due to be sentenced in June and will be free on bail until then. He currently lives in North Carolina. In a statement yesterday, LISTEN's board thanked federal justice officials and said, "We’ll have more to share after the sentencing hearing.” (Note: Right at send time the VN website was having some issues; be patient if it still is.)SPONSORED: Get the best discount on a Crossroad Farm CSA through tomorrow, February 29th. Farm Shares are available through discounted, pre-purchased credit. Shares can be redeemed at the farm in Post Mills and at the Norwich farm stand. Shares don't expire and can be used to purchase everything Crossroad carries, including hanging baskets, vegetable starts, fresh fruits and vegetables, and a wide assortment of products from other local farms. Sponsored by Crossroad Farm.In Hanover, four candidates for three school board seats share their thoughts. Incumbents Deborah Bacon Nelson, a former Leb High School teacher, and Kelly McConnell, who teaches French at Dartmouth, are being joined in the contest by former school board member and Dartmouth prof Marcela Di Blasi and Hanover High grad and Etna resident Anastasia Rodzianko. Given the various controversial issues school board members in NH confront, from parental rights to Education Freedom Accounts, a group at Kendal asked them to lay out why they're running and where they stand. Their answers are at the burgundy link. VN article by Christina Dolan is here.Does it ever seem like you just can't find the right book? You start one, you put it down. You start another, you put it down. You skip sections to see if anything grabs you, you put it down. The Norman Williams Public Library's Liza Bernard's been in your boat recently, trying to find a mud-season read that'll keep her engaged. In this week's Enthusiasms, she talks about the process—and why, surprisingly, she's been enjoying "this odd exploration"—maybe, she writes, "because it mirrors the fits and starts of the coming of spring." Of course, it helps that she's finally three chapters into a forthcoming novel.SPONSORED: Tickets for VINS Owl Festival available Friday, March 15! Discover the enchanting world of owls at the VINS Nature Center's annual Owl Festival on Saturday, April 13. Immerse yourself in a day filled with all things owly! Meet live owls that range from Vermont’s forests to habitats all over the world and discover their life stories. Join in a craft inspired by owls, and play games to test your own owl skills. Learn all about the amazing world of owls and how you can help the ones in your backyard. Tickets available starting March 15. Sponsored by VINS.NH cannabis legalization bill was crafted with Sununu in mind—but you still wouldn't want to bet on its chances. That, of course, is because there's a long history of legalization bills passing the NH House only to die a quiet death in the Senate. The latest measure, which got an initial go-ahead from the House last week and would authorize 15 retail locations run by the state Liquor Commission, has momentum, writes Ethan DeWitt in NH Bulletin, in no small part because it was designed based on the governor's specifications.It wasn't just yesterday's temps that broke records. "Meteorological winter" won't actually end until midnight Thursday, but Rodney Chai, a meteorologist at the Weather Service in Burlington, tells VT Public's Lexi Krupp, "A hundred percent it's going to be the warmest winter" on record. Temps averaged 6 to 8 degrees above normal across northern New England in December and at least 10 degrees above normal the first half of February, Krupp reports. It's been awful for snow, Chai says. "The mountains, the higher elevations, are doing quite well, but really, below 2,000 feet, it's been terrible if people love snow."Oh, well then, we're good: In VT, average education property tax bill now expected to grow 19 percent, not 20 percent. As new budget information from school districts around the state has come in, reports Ethan Weinstein in VTDigger, some school districts are "shaving" spending; in all, the education fund will need to raise about $15 million less than earlier projections—but that's in an overall $230 million increase in school spending driven, Weinstein writes, by rising health care costs, construction needs, special ed, increased salaries, and the loss of federal pandemic aid.Up in Lyndon Center, VT, they're still wrestling with how to protect that covered bridge. Remember how there were all these plans to put a steel structure in front of the Millers Run Bridge to keep box trucks from taking it out on a regular basis? Well, WCAX's Hailey Morgan and Victoria Baldoni report that the plan's been put on the back burner, in part because of construction costs and in part because contractors have been scared off by the embankment. Right now, they're making do with a 2 x 4 with reflective tape.In Burlington, senior housing residents "implore" city council for help with security issues. You may remember Derek Brouwer's piece two weeks ago on the issues plaguing Decker Towers, a public housing high-rise for seniors and people with disabilities that's struggling with an influx of people using drugs or seeking shelter for the night. On Monday, Brouwer reports, the Burlington city council devoted 90 minutes to the problems, with councilors and Mayor Miro Weinberger pledging to help out. The city and the housing authority have been at odds over how to address security there, Brouwer writes,In VT, farmers and foresters take aim at Act 250. The state's landmark land use law, they argue, stands square in the way of their efforts to adapt to changing global markets and industry consolidation. And, reports Peter Hirschfeld for VT Public, farm experts say that evolving means "diversifying product lines, getting into agritourism, building out processing facilities to make value added products, and focusing on direct-to-consumer sales." But they've been bumping up against Act 250 oversight as they seek to expand their infrastructure. Hirschfeld explores the issues for farmers and sawmill owners.Let’s take this outside. The team over at Merriam-Webster has pulled together a list of bird names that could easily be mistaken for insults. Bustard, bufflehead, goatsucker… how about dickcissel, a pretty songbird with a pretty song that is the source of its name. Pity the ruddy duck, also called booby and dumb-bird. Some names mimic the sounds the bird makes, some have deep linguistic roots, like the twit-twat and the nope. If you’re called that one, say the folks at Merriam-Webster, say “‘Thank you, I am a European finch having in the male rosy-red underparts’ and then see who has the last laugh.” Here's part 1.And hey, while we're talking birds... You may have been one of the hundreds of thousands of people around the globe who took part in this year's Great Backyard Bird Count. And the cool thing about the count is that birders submit photos (more than 125,000 in all, this year). The count's organizers have just gone up with a page of selections (if you want to see them all, you can go here) that's filled with birds and birders from Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, Antarctica (45 birders there checked in with penguins, petrels, and terns), Europe, and North and South America. The Wednesday Vordle. If you're new to Daybreak, this is the Upper Valley version of Wordle, with a five-letter word chosen from an item in the previous day's Daybreak. A word game—but local!
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There's that Daybreak jigsaw puzzle, perfect for mud-season cabin fever. Plus, of course, fleece vests, hoodies, sweatshirts, even a throw blanket. And hats, mugs, and—once you work up a puzzle-piece sweat—tees. Check it all out at the link!
At 7 this evening, Hop Film screens another multiple Oscar nominee, The Zone of Interest. There are some films, Wendy Ide wrote in The Guardian earlier this month, "that strike like a lightning bolt on a first watch and stay with you, scarring themselves into your psyche and subtly but permanently shifting your movie-viewing paradigm on its axis." Jonathan Glazer's film, which takes off from a Martin Amis novel, is one: It follows the sometimes bucolic daily lives of a striving German family—who live just outside the walls of Auschwitz, where the father is commandant.
And this evening at 8, Valley Improv hits the stage at Sawtooth Kitchen in Hanover, with the troupe's six newest members taking the spotlight. "They spent the autumn and winter learning improv," write the old-timers. "Come see their first show with us!"
And let's just slip into today with...
Australian guitarist Tommy Emmanuel (though he's also a Kentucky Colonel, don't you know) and Virginia-based composer and finger-style guitarist (and kalimba player) Yasmin Williams.
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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Written and published by Rob Gurwitt Poetry editor: Michael Lipson Associate Editor: Jonea Gurwitt About Rob About Michael
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