Features
Sunday Seniors: How to Contact the DMV About Unsafe Driving Practices
By Liz Sauchelli
A few weeks ago in the Sunday Valley News, I wrote an article about driving screenings that take place at Kendal at Hanover. I was surprised by the reaction I received: It is clearly a topic that is on the minds of lots of senior citizens and their...
Miss Manners: Be Clear When Asking Friends to Dinner
Dear Miss Manners: What terminology is recommended to invite someone to join you for a meal at a restaurant at their own expense — i.e., not a hosted meal, but just a get-together? Gentle Reader: Aha! A dangerous problem. With the decline of dinner...
Osher Class Examines Depression-Era Foodways
By Nicola Smith
Imagine a crumbly pie crust that tastes a little salty and a little sweet, and has the soft, flaking quality of a phyllo. Is it made from flour, vegetable shortening and butter? Flour and lard? The texture and flavor is subtly different from the usual...
And Then They Fell in Love
By Nora Krug
San Mateo, Calif. — The literary pairing was inevitable.When Breath Becomes Air, Paul Kalanithi’s memoir of his final years as he faced lung cancer at age 37, was published posthumously, in 2016, to critical acclaim and commercial success. The Bright...
Book Review: Two Views of a Bygone Vermont
BY ALEX HANSON — VALLEY NEWS STAFF WRITERThe Last of the Hill Farms: Echoes of Vermont’s Past; photographs and text by Richard W. Brown; David R. Godine; 133 pages; $40Vanishing Vermonters: Loss of a Rural Culture, by Peter Miller; Silver Print Press;...
New Hampshire Author Pens New Book About the Struggles of a Former Mill Town
By Nicola Smith
Ten years ago, the Groveton, N.H. paper mill, which had been in existence since 1889, shut its doors for good, devastating the local economy and community.Groveton, in northern Coos County, is just one of many New England towns that, in the early- to...
Where to Visit Santa in the Upper Valley
The Christmas spirit is alive in the Upper Valley and everyone’s favorite elf is in town. Santa has already been spotted around the Upper Valley, but in case you missed him, here are some future scheduled appearances.Did we miss one? Let us know by...
Researchers Observe as Eastern Coyotes Become More Like Wolves
By Patrick Whittle
Portland, Maine — The future of the coyotes that roam forests, cities and suburbs from Newfoundland to Virginia could hinge on the animals becoming the “wolves” of the East Coast. And humans better get used to them.Coyotes have lived in the East since...
New Hampshire Native Gordon Clapp Was Born to Portray Frost
By David Corriveau
… I’d like to get away from earth awhile And then come back to it and begin over. May no fate willfully misunderstand me And half grant what I wish and snatch me away Not to return ... Robert Frost, — from Birches Growing up in North Conway, N.H., in...
The (Not So) Good (Smelling) Old Days
By Larry Coffin
The sanitary equipment of the house is an all-important matter, as there is no other feature of the home which will afford more comfort and be so conducive to perfect health as good plumbing. St. Johnsbury Caledonian, May 23, 1906From the...
Looking Back at Vietnam
By Nicola Smith
Two weeks after being hospitalized on an American base in Japan for a severe injury sustained in a firefight in South Vietnam, Mike Heaney wanted to make sure he would remember what had happened to him, and where, and how.So he drew two maps: blue ink...
Two Roads Diverged: Bypassed Bits of Appalachian Trail Remain Open for Hiking
By David Corriveau
While hiking the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine in 1948, Earl Shaffer followed a stretch of the old King’s Highway in North Pomfret, between a farmhouse and a barn, en route to the White River in West Hartford.Shaffer was the first person to...
Guitarist Val McCallum Comes Back to His Vermont Roots
By David Corriveau
When he’s vacationing in Woodstock, Val McCallum spends a lot of time padding around his house in bare feet.On Friday morning, a couple of weeks after finishing a European tour with Jackson Browne, for whom he has played lead guitar for 20 years,...
Hidden in Canaan: Debris From 1923 Fire Washes Into Indian River
By EmmaJean Holley
It had not rained in Canaan for days leading up to June 3, 1923. So, when a barn on School Street went up in flames that windy Saturday morning, it took only two hours for the fire to leap from building to building until it had consumed most of the...
Art Notes: Mask-Making Helps Participants See Themselves Better
By EmmaJean Holley
Musing on the slipperiness of identity, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke once wrote, “It never occurred to me before how many faces there are.” If each person has a good several faces, he reasoned, then there are many more faces in the world than there are...
Lost in White River Junction: Network of Walking Paths Connected Terraces
By EmmaJean Holley
At the corner of Hillcrest Terrace and Forest Hills Avenue in White River Junction, a shaded, wooded path winds down a leaf-covered slope. To the right of the path, a steep, forested bank rises up toward the houses above; to the left, another bank...
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...
