GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
More showers to start. That cold front's moving quickly, though, so it'll be exiting east pretty soon and it should become mostly sunny the rest of the day before a low-pressure system makes its way into the region tonight. "Cold" front is relative, by the way: We'll still be getting into the mid- or upper 70s today. Chance of rain toward daybreak, ahead of tomorrow's main event.Does anyone else think a Great Blue Heron chick looks kind of like Christopher Lloyd in Back to the Future? Etna photographer Jim Block's been traipsing around both NH and VT taking bird pics in recent weeks, In Springfield, he was photographing a Great Blue landing in its nest, thought he saw a head poking out, and got what turned out to be a little chick in profile. There's lots more in both of his most recent blog posts—maroon link goes to NH, and here's VT.Section of Northern Rail Trail to close for next few weeks. It's that first stretch of the trail, from where it starts across from CCBA to where it crosses Bank St. Ext., and it'll be closed until June 24 (though that may change) while contractors make drainage improvements and finish up paving work on Spencer Street itself. Thoughtfully, though, it will be open for Father's Day weekend.To policing woes in area towns, add Norwich. On Sunday, Norwich became the fourth area town looking for a new police chief, joining Hartford, Springfield, and Claremont. Simon Keeling, who'd been appointed chief in January, suddenly resigned last week, effective Sunday. He had expressed frustration with budgetary limits, according to posts on the town's listserv, but the Valley News's John Lippman reports that he gave no reason for his resignation to town officials. Keeling's move leaves the town with a single patrol officer. Town Manager Rod Francis goes into more detail in a Daybreak interview.Hanover police seek public's help after end-of-May attack on student. In a news release yesterday, the department said that the 20-year-old male student, a member of the Phi Delta Alpha frat, was assaulted sometime during the night of May 27-28 between the frat house on Webster Avenue and a trailhead down to the Connecticut. The student was hospitalized at DHMC with serious injuries, including a fractured jaw. They ask anyone with information to be in touch with Lt. Mike Schibuola at [email protected] or 603-640-3336.SPONSORED: Today Only: Your Gift to Willing Hands is Doubled. Help us secure $8,000 in matching funds during NH Gives, a one-day campaign celebrating the community of volunteers, partners and donors who make Willing Hands' work possible. Don't miss this opportunity to double your impact and join our community of nearly 1,000 supporters! Sponsored by Willing Hands.Fungi that live underground turn out to be surprisingly airborne. Dartmouth environmental scientist Bala Chaudhury's lab specializes in mycorrhizae, the symbiotic relationship between plant roots and fungi that's earned huge attention in recent years as a cornerstone of the soil microbiome. In Dartmouth News, Harini Barath delves into Chaudhury's research, which began by wondering how soil-dwelling fungi were winding up on green rooftops in Chicago and is now looking at 20 sites across the US. And, along the way, helping to define the plant and fungal traits that are part of the relationship."She immerses you in a foreign world and then guides you to the human elements..." There's a forthcoming book by Pakistani-British writer Kamila Shamsie that Still North Books' Allie Levy says is energizing her as a reader "in a way I have not experienced in quite some time." But since we can't read it yet, in this week's Enthusiasms Allie points to an earlier Shamsie work, Home Fire, "a gorgeously written, intensely heartbreaking, thought-provokingly subversive" rewriting of Antigone that showcases Shamsie's deft writing as she follows two Pakistani immigrant sisters in search of their radicalized brother.New England led the country in pandemic baby boomlet. And NH led New England. Births in 2021 increased over 2019 in just 13 states, writes Tim Henderson in Stateline, and all six New England states were among them—notable, he adds, in a region that has long had the country's lowest birth rates. The biggest jump overall? NH's 7 percent. And according to a Stateline analysis of data provided by the state, it was driven by women in their early 30s with a college degree. “New England is one of those places where you might leave but you always go back,” says a woman who helps new parents.NH lands $50 million federal grant to expand broadband access. It's one of the first four states to benefit from a $10 billion effort included in the American Rescue Plan to boost broadband across the country. "High-speed internet remains out of reach for tens of millions of Americans, many in rural areas," writes Allison Winter of States Newsroom (they're the larger organization behind New Hampshire Bulletin). The other states are Virginia, which got $220 million, Louisiana, with $177 million, and W. Virginia, with $136 million.NH AG won't prosecute anti-vax protesters who shut down Exec Council meeting. It seems like an entirely different era, doesn't it? You'll remember that back in September, people protesting federal vaccine funding forced the meeting to end before it began due to what Gov. Chris Sununu at the time called "unruly and very aggressive behavior." Yesterday, Atty General John Formella said the state "would not have been able to prove any potential criminal charges beyond a reasonable doubt," the AP reports, and declined to press criminal charges.VT Gov. Phil Scott signs housing bills in Randolph. The measures, writes Seven Days' Kevin McCallum, will use $45 million in federal funds to make home ownership more affordable for middle-income Vermonters and to fix up run-down rental properties. It was the first public bill-signing since the pandemic, McCallum reports, and was held "at the site of a former furniture factory in Randolph where nine new solar-powered homes and 12 new apartments will be possible partly because of the bills."Foreign interference, weakened trust in the elections process, learning "how to talk to each other again." Those were the greatest challenges for Vermont elections cited yesterday by the three Democratic candidates for secretary of state at the first state-level candidates' debate sponsored by a news organization this cycle. VTDigger hosted Bradford Rep. Sarah Copeland Hanzas, Deputy Secretary of State Chris Winters and Montpelier City Clerk John Odum for what turned out to be a "cordial" conversation, says Riley Robinson in a writeup of the debate.Phytoplankton decline in the Gulf of Maine raises new climate concerns. According to a NASA-funded study, these plantlike microalgae—a critical component in the North Atlantic’s food web—are 65% less productive today than they were just 20 years ago. The cause: warmer, saltier gulf waters. The threat to phytoplankton, which absorb carbon dioxide and make a good meal for small ocean organisms, spells trouble for fish and lobster populations and the region’s fishing economy. Though Maine’s Bigelow Laboratory is focused on monitoring phytoplankton levels, it’s unclear how much can be done.So how’s your reading comprehension in Native American Choctaw? It’s only the world’s third most “unusual” language, according to the World Atlas of Language Structures. Choctaw’s complex rules and comically long words—often with several prefixes and suffixes each—proved so inscrutable that Choctaw-speaking U.S. soldiers were deployed as “code-talkers” to evade eavesdropping Germans during WWI. But it’s a beautiful tongue, writes Atlas Obscura’s Alex Bellos, and an endangered one: Mississippi Choctaw are reviving its instruction in schools. See if you can pass AO’s Choctaw quiz.The Wednesday Vordle. And remember: You can sign up to get a daily Vordle email while Daybreak's not publishing June 10-20; you'll find the signup page right here. One key thing: Use the email address you already use for Daybreak or once the newsletter returns you'll be getting two of them.
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Leon Creek may be made of LA-based musicians, but it takes its name from a small river on the outskirts of San Antonio—a rest stop for travelers headed from Texas to southern California in the mid-1800s. Fitting for a band aiming to update Americana.
Which we'll do right now. 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 and writers who want you to 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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