Features
Summer Guide: Swim in These Natural Wonders
John Lippman
The Upper Valley in summer is a paradise for fresh water swimmers. Fresh water — lots of it — flows everywhere: the Connecticut River, the White River, the Ompompanoosuc, the Ottauquechee, True’s Brook, Silver Lake, Canaan Street Lake, Storrs...
Woodstock Country School Shined Brightly, Briefly
By David Corriveau
Even if they wanted to, Bill Boardman and Laura Spittle doubt that they could forget the Woodstock Country School.“Every time I drive into downtown Woodstock, I drive by Greenhithe,” Boardman, a 1956 graduate of the progressive boarding school, said...
Middlebrook Restaurant Stays Dark for Summer as Owners Move On
By EmmaJean Holley
After three years at the helm of the seasonal, family-run Middlebrook Restaurant, so named for its location on a winding stretch of road in West Fairlee, owner Chris Aquino has decided to move on to other, more justice-oriented pursuits. The...
Poet Vievee Francis Poises Her Work Between Nature and Civilization
By EmmaJean Holley
Sometimes, when she needs to buckle down and write, Vievee Francis goes to the Tuckerbox Cafe in White River Junction and works as she watches the freight cars switch tracks across the street.“Their slow heaviness,” she said, over baklava, “stills...
Outside Story: Animals Have Fascinating Teeth
By Tim Traver
When my daughter was 4, she once asked, “Do mice get cavities?” We were coming back from the dentist, so teeth were on her mind and so were mice, since her pet mouse had recently escaped. Later in the day, she asked if ducks had teeth; such is the...
Hospitality Runs in the Family: Tuohy Siblings Bring to Life a Handful of Vibrant Pubs
By David Corriveau
After about a decade of working for other people in the hospitality industry, brothers Josh and Joe Tuohy started an on-and-off, transcontinental phone conversation in 2001 about returning to their roots as hosts of their own family pub.Finally one...
Raise Your Glass: Bread & Butter Wine Brand Changes Hands
By Warren Johnston
Bread & ButterChardonnay, 2015Napa, Calif., $14.99Bread & Butter Chardonnay is among the top-selling super premium wines in the country, and there’s a good reason for that — it’s a dry, white wine that is flavorful, well-crafted and sells for a...
Watergate Figure Keeps an Eye on Trump
By Dan Zak
Early last Thursday morning, Richard Nixon’s White House counsel woke from a dream about Donald Trump and nuclear war. This is somewhat typical.John W. Dean III starts most days wondering how the current president will exceed the narcissism and...
Will Vermont Inspections Put More Rust to Rest?
By Alex Hanson
A few years ago, I bought an old car.Even though I’ve bought a few old cars over the past several years and ought to have known better, the old car in this case had some rust. Actually, a lot of rust.But since I hadn’t paid much money for it, and...
The Weepies Have a Life That Kind of Imitates Their Name
By Chrissie Dickinson
Steve Tannen and Deb Talan couldn’t see the future when they almost accidentally formed the folk-pop duo the Weepies in the early 2000s. Since then, the road has been a rewarding and at times rough one. The singer-songwriters married and became...
Sifting Your Way To Better Compost
By Barbara Damrosch
Compost is “finished” when you can no longer recognize the ingredients that went into making it because they have thoroughly decomposed. It looks like dark, fertile soil, only fluffier, enriched and lightened by the work of bacteria and other soil...
The Quiet Nature of Richard and Mildred Loving Led to a Quiet Film
By Stephanie Merry
Like everything else in Loving, the movie’s climax doesn’t soar so much as whisper. A lawyer representing Richard and Mildred Loving in a 1967 Supreme Court case that would validate their marriage and overturn Virginia’s miscegenation laws asks...
A Flowering Plant That Blooms Like a Cloud of Pink Smoke
By Liz Krieg
Years ago, I first noticed a plant growing along the side of the road in New Mexico. In large drifts, Geum trifolum is a major contender for inspiring awe. They were in the later seasonal growth stage called “smoke” and the whole patch was all a mist...
Origins of the Creemee
By Steve Taylor
You’re from Vermont, you call it a creemee. New Hampshire, it’s just soft serve.So let’s just concentrate on this peculiar Green Mountain thing, first its murky origin and then on what’s come to be the real thing, the maple creemee, because here in...
Actress Meghan Ory Says She Tackles Projects She Believes In
By Luaine Lee
Beverly Hills, Calif. — For a person who pretends to be someone else for a living, actress Meghan Ory should be in deep trouble. She cannot tell a lie. “I’m the world’s worst liar,” she says. “It’s really weird, and it’s funny because I have...
Petite Shoppers Finding Fewer Options
By Suzette Parmley
Philadelphia — At 4-foot-9, Mindee Hewitt is a dynamo with a can-do personality. But finding clothes that fit her tiny frame often becomes deflating. It’s getting harder for Hewitt and other women 5-foot-4 and under, as department stores...
Summer Is For Swimming: A Guide to Upper Valley Swimming Holes
By John Lippman
The Upper Valley in summer is a paradise for fresh water swimmers. Fresh water — lots of it — flows everywhere: the Connecticut River, the White River, the Ompompanoosuc, the Ottauquechee, Trues Brook, Silver Lake, Canaan Street Lake, Storrs...
Watch the Sun Set Over the Valley
By Jared Pendak
Perhaps nothing connects us to the natural world better than sunsets. Whether the day behind us has been pleasant or painful, absorbing the brilliant hues of dusk is a most effective way to revitalize the mind and spirit, helping both to settle like...
Where to Pick Your Own Produce
The sights and smells of summer are perhaps most abundant in the farms that make their homes in the Upper Valley. Every year, fields filled with strawberries, raspberries, blueberries and other produce are open to visitors to play farmer and harvest...
Orford Tree Farm Cultivates Lupines
By David Corriveau
Orford — Almost as soon as the lupines begin painting a matrix of deep purple alongside the logging roads through his tree farm in early June, Tom Thomson can count on his phone to start ringing.“A lot of people in the last week have been calling,”...
