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Eyes ofHistory - The North Star Monthly

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DANVILLE, VERMONT GOOD FOR THE WHOLE MONTH $1.50<br />

SEPTEMBER 2009<br />

Volume 22, Number 4<br />

BY NATHANIEL TRIPP<br />

profile<br />

Page<br />

5<br />

market<br />

Page<br />

24<br />

history<br />

September<br />

Song<br />

Page<br />

8<br />

For me, the September<br />

song is a sad song not<br />

because it signals the<br />

end of the summer season,<br />

but because it signals the beginning<br />

of school. Although<br />

it has been a very long time<br />

since I have darkened the<br />

doorway of a schoolhouse, I<br />

still feel a tinge of dread<br />

every time September rolls<br />

around.<br />

Otherwise, September is a really<br />

wonderful month. <strong>The</strong> fishing gets<br />

better, the lawns don’t need mowing<br />

as much, the fields and orchards<br />

and gardens are producing the<br />

fruits of our labor at last, and it is<br />

still warm enough to swim. <strong>The</strong>se<br />

are all also excellent reasons why<br />

just about the last thing I wanted<br />

to do as a kid was go back to<br />

school.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re was always so much to<br />

>> Page 33<br />

P.O. Box 319 w Danville,VT 05828-0319<br />

It was 1890 in a farmhouse on East Hill in Peacham<br />

when Mark Wheeler, a 51-year-old farmer sat at the<br />

kitchen table with a stack of blank school paper in<br />

front of him. He was a Civil War prisoner of war.<br />

Wheeler decided it was time to record all the images,<br />

people, places and events that were emblazoned in his<br />

memory.<br />

For 25 years, he had captured the attention of family, friends<br />

and fellow veterans by sharing his war experiences and time in<br />

Andersonville Prison. Wheeler was revered by his fellow members<br />

of the Barnet-Peacham Post of the Grand Army of the Republic.<br />

People gathered around the general store woodstove to<br />

hear Wheeler’s stories. Wheeler wanted to share his story not<br />

only with those around him, but with posterity. He did just that,<br />

leaving a memoir that exists today.<br />

Wheeler’s manuscript is one of the few surviving complete,<br />

firsthand accounts of a Vermont soldier’s imprisonment at Andersonville.<br />

Wheeler’s is a piece of history that is an important<br />

part of Vermont’s collective memory of the Civil War. It has<br />

survived 119 years and is now in the possession of the Peacham<br />

Historical Association.<br />

Though Wheeler epitomizes thousands of men who de-<br />

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fended our country during the Civil War, he didn’t end up as just<br />

a name on an Andersonville inmate list or listed on Civil War<br />

rosters or given a paragraph in town history of his service.<br />

Wheeler set himself apart by writing a personal eyewitness<br />

account. Though only having an elementary education and coming<br />

from a poor family, his manuscript is well written and captivating.<br />

His story comes alive as a down-to-earth, realistic,<br />

graphic adventure of cavalry raids, prison life, suffering, survival,<br />

unimaginable hardships and the horrors of war.<br />

Who was Mark Wheeler? Born in Marshfield, Vt. in 1839,<br />

Wheeler was from a family of nine children. Around 1850, his<br />

family moved to Peacham when Mark was a teenager. Wheeler<br />

was probably finished his schooling and helping his father. <strong>The</strong>y<br />

were poor and his father rented a house, working as a farmhand.<br />

In 1861, President Abraham Lincoln issued a call to arms<br />

when war was declared. Wheeler was 22 years old. Before he<br />

left to enlist Nov. 12, Wheeler married his sweetheart, the girl<br />

next door, Elizabeth “Lizzie” Clark on Nov. 8. Eleven days later,<br />

Wheeler was headed off to war.<br />

Wheeler served in the Vermont 1st Regt. Cavalry Co. D<br />

which was involved in 76 engagements including Gettsyburg,<br />

ANDY’S ROUGH LUMBER<br />

Boards, Dimension<br />

Lumber and Timbers<br />

Now buying Spruce & Fir logs<br />

Danville (802) 684-1075 (802) 745-8719<br />

NEED COMPUTER HELP?<br />

Hardware or Software<br />

wyBatap.com<br />

(802) 633-4395<br />

perstech@wybatap.com<br />

If I’m not helpful there is no charge.<br />

See Business Directory on Page 30.<br />

<strong>The</strong><br />

<strong>Eyes</strong><br />

of<br />

History<br />

Peacham soldier’s<br />

manuscript<br />

relays a<br />

agruesome<br />

account of life<br />

in the Civil War’s<br />

most infamous<br />

prison camp<br />

By Michelle Arnosky Sherburne<br />

>> Page 9<br />

Photo Courtesy of the Peacham Historical Association<br />

Farmers’<br />

Markets<br />

Danville Farmers' Market<br />

On the Green, US Route 2<br />

Wednesdays: 9 a.m. - 1 p.m.<br />

St. Johnsbury Farmers' Market<br />

On Pearl Street behind<br />

Anthony's Diner<br />

Saturdays: 9 a.m. - 1 p.m.


2 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

TableofContents<br />

4 opinion<br />

2 Fishing for chi<br />

by Justin Lavely<br />

4 Finding our way<br />

by Isobel P. Swartz<br />

5 profile<br />

5 Here’s the scoop<br />

by Justin Lavely<br />

Fishing for chi<br />

8 <strong>The</strong> Diary of Emily Bickford Kinerson<br />

by Lois (Field) White<br />

18<br />

While listening to Vermont<br />

Public Radio a few days back,<br />

I caught the tail end of a<br />

study, which found that adult professionals<br />

who take vacations live longer<br />

and have less stress. I’m not sure who<br />

spent the time, or the money, on this<br />

project but I fear both were wasted.<br />

I spent summer days with<br />

my grandfather learning<br />

how to pile both brush<br />

and firewood with<br />

meticulous precision.<br />

I think we all know that time away from<br />

our jobs is important for our mental health<br />

and those who live with us. <strong>The</strong> study may<br />

not have been a revelation, but it did get<br />

me thinking about a few things. I had just<br />

returned from a mini-vacation in Maine.<br />

While we were there, Ginni said,<br />

“Don’t you always feel like you’re on vacation?”<br />

<strong>The</strong>re is some truth to this. My last job<br />

was fast, stressful and very unfulfilling.<br />

My current job is the opposite. <strong>The</strong> people<br />

I deal with on a daily basis are some of the<br />

best and most interesting people around.<br />

Those I work with are dedicated and conscientious.<br />

Aside from all that, I think there is<br />

more to it. It’s not the long vacations that<br />

recharge our weekday batteries. It’s our activities<br />

and hobbies that help us while<br />

we’re still in the normal day-to-day grind.<br />

For me it’s fishing.<br />

18 in pictures<br />

17 Danville Fair<br />

by Jim Ashley<br />

Horse & Pony Pull<br />

by Jim Ashley<br />

From the Editor<br />

My fishing days began early, though I<br />

can’t remember how old I was. I know I<br />

was a long way from driving myself<br />

around so I spent summer days with my<br />

grandfather learning how to pile both brush<br />

and firewood with meticulous precision.<br />

Even before that, he would walk into the<br />

room where I was watching television and<br />

instruct me to “get in the truck, we’re<br />

going fishing.”<br />

When I got older and it was time for me<br />

to strike out on my own in a fishing sense,<br />

he bought my first rod and reel for $35 at<br />

the hardware store. My friends and I, still a<br />

long way from being able to drive ourselves,<br />

would hitch a ride with a friend’s<br />

mother during her lunch break. She would<br />

drop us off along Joe’s Brook or Water Andric<br />

then head back to work. We’d have<br />

five hours, until she left work, to reach the<br />

rendezvous point and no time was wasted.<br />

Well… maybe some time was wasted. We<br />

did that practically every afternoon.<br />

In high school, many other interests interfered<br />

with my time on the water. In college,<br />

I was lucky enough to fall in with a<br />

crowd of like-minded fisherman and we<br />

frequently threw my grandfathers 12’ aluminum<br />

boat and portable Evinrude motor<br />

in a truck and headed for parts unknown.<br />

Priorities and equipment have changed,<br />

but most of the members of our “Stand By<br />

Me” fishing group still cast the occasional<br />

line. I go whenever I get the opportunity.<br />

Surprisingly, it has little to do with<br />

catching a trophy or a meal. It has everything<br />

to do with a quiet environment and<br />

simple thoughts.<br />

However brief it may be, that’s a useful<br />

vacation.<br />

EDITORIAL OFFICES:<br />

P.O. Box 319 ~ 29 Hill Street<br />

Danville,VT 05828-0319<br />

(802) 684-1056<br />

PUBLISHERS/OWNERS: Justin Lavely<br />

Ginni Lavely<br />

EDITOR: Justin Lavely<br />

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR: Lyn Bixby<br />

ADVERTISING / Vicki Moore<br />

CIRCULATION: Angie Knost<br />

ART DIRECTOR/<br />

PRODUCTION: Tina Keach<br />

PROOFREADERS: Woody <strong>Star</strong>kweather<br />

Ginni Lavely<br />

Judy Lavely<br />

SUBSCRIPTIONS: Vanessa Bean<br />

OFFICE MASCOT: Lynsey Lavely<br />

ADVISORY BOARD: John Hall<br />

Sharon Lakey<br />

Sue Coppenrath<br />

Alan Boye<br />

Jane Brown<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong> <strong>Monthly</strong> is produced and published<br />

monthly by <strong>North</strong>star Publishing, LLC located at 29 Hill Street,<br />

Danville,VT. Subscription Rates are $16 per year. Printed in USA.<br />

Copyright 2008 by <strong>North</strong><strong>Star</strong> Publishing LLC.All rights reserved.<br />

No part of this publication may be reprinted or otherwise reproduced<br />

without expressed permission from <strong>North</strong><strong>Star</strong> Publishing<br />

LLC. Publisher is not responsible for errors resulting from typographical<br />

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paid at Danville,VT.<br />

ContributingWriters<br />

Isobel Swartz<br />

Lorna Quimby<br />

Van Parker<br />

Nathaniel Tripp<br />

Rachel Siegel<br />

Lynn Bonfield<br />

Jeff Gold<br />

e-mail: info@northstarmonthly.com<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com<br />

Write<br />

to<br />

Us<br />

Ellen Gold<br />

Vanna Guldenschuh<br />

Woody <strong>Star</strong>kweather<br />

Peter Dannenberg<br />

Van Parker<br />

Jim Ashley<br />

Lois (Field) White<br />

Please Let Us Know<br />

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<strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong>.<br />

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LETTERS: Write to <strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong>, and let us<br />

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ARTICLES: We don’t have a big staff of writers.<br />

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DEADLINE: 15th of the month prior to publication.<br />

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<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong><br />

“WHERE LIBERTY DWELLS THERE IS MY COUNTRY”<br />

1807-1889<br />

Est. by Ebenezer Eaton<br />

Danville, Vermont<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com AUGUST 2009 3<br />

Fairbanks Scales wins prestigious award in Paris while relations between<br />

Texas and Mexico worsen over asylum for horse thiefs<br />

THE NORTH STAR<br />

September 6, 1878<br />

Valuable Discovery – A St.<br />

Louis inventor, Mr. C.W. Johnson,<br />

thinks he has discovered a method<br />

for arresting decay in animal and<br />

vegetable matter. His invention is<br />

founded on the germ theory of<br />

decay propounded by Pasteur and<br />

expounded by Tyndall, Lister and<br />

other scientists. He believes the air<br />

to be filled with infusoria, or microscopic<br />

animals, and that decay in animal<br />

and vegetable matter is caused<br />

by these creatures. He believes that<br />

consumption is caused the same<br />

way. Impure air carries infusoria into<br />

the lungs, and though they may be<br />

expelled by respiration, the visits are<br />

so frequent that the lungs soon fall<br />

prey to them. His invention protects<br />

animal and vegetable matter from<br />

their encroachments either by a<br />

coating the air cannot penetrate or<br />

by keeping the matter in a purified<br />

atmosphere. He claims to have discovered<br />

several liquids and gases in<br />

which the microscopic animals cannot<br />

live and also a method for puri-<br />

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fying air. He proposes to introduce<br />

his discovery to the world by shipping<br />

a car load of fresh beef to St.<br />

Louis as soon as he can raise money<br />

enough to perfect his apparatus. He<br />

is also trying the experiment on an<br />

unidentified body in the morgue.<br />

September 13, 1878<br />

Relations with Mexico – For a<br />

long time it has been the opinion of<br />

those best informed that the irritating<br />

collisions that are constantly occurring<br />

between our government<br />

and that of Mexico along the southern<br />

Texas border will eventually lead<br />

to war. When the Diaz government<br />

was recognized by the United States,<br />

it was with the understanding that<br />

the latter reserve the right to make<br />

military incursions across the border<br />

after cattle thieves. In accordance<br />

with this, and in obedience to orders<br />

received from Washington,<br />

Col. MacKenzie has twice crossed<br />

the Rio Grande in search of plunderers,<br />

who rob American settlers,<br />

and then escape into the wilderness<br />

and escape molestation so far as the<br />

Mexican authorities are concerned.<br />

This, of course, cannot be endured<br />

by the Texans without appeals to<br />

their government and the result has<br />

been the raids mentioned.<br />

Tragedy in Hardwick – Mrs.<br />

T.B. Boynton of Hardwick, was accidentally<br />

shot by a man in the employ<br />

of her husband while Mr.<br />

Boynton and daughter were at the<br />

state fair in St. Albans. <strong>The</strong> hired<br />

man went into the house to get the<br />

rifle to shoot a hen hawk, but in taking<br />

it out from where it stood, was<br />

discharged, the contents striking<br />

Mrs. G. H. Ashley, Weston MA<br />

Mr. & Mrs. D.C. Ashley, Syracuse NY<br />

Ann Baker, South Meriden CT<br />

Bruce Berryman, Granby Valley VT<br />

Francis & Gracia Berwick, Barnet VT<br />

Joyce A. Bessette, Ashford CT<br />

Jean S. Boardman, Peacham VT<br />

Mr. & Mrs. Duncan Bond, Frenchboro ME<br />

Naomi Bossom, Lyndonville VT<br />

Mrs. Edmund A. Brown, Peacham VT<br />

Margaret Brown, West Danville VT<br />

Gary Bunnell, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Lee & John Casagrande, Barnet VT<br />

Frederick Chase, Jr., Waukegan IL<br />

M. Olive Cheney, Peacham VT<br />

Adrienne Rich Conrad, Santa Cruz CA<br />

Ronald L. Coolbeth, Springfield MA<br />

Irene Cross, Colchester VT<br />

Shirley Cummings, Sharon VT<br />

Constance L. Dimock, Trumbull CT<br />

Lenwood & Joan Drown, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Andrew Dussault, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Peter Emmons, Danville VT<br />

Martha & Stephen Gagliardi, Oakland ME<br />

Karen Gallas, Peacham VT<br />

Allan D. Gilmour, Birmingham MI<br />

Mr. & Mrs. Charlie L. Goss, Peacham VT<br />

Mrs. Boynton in the head, killing<br />

her instantly.<br />

Survey of Vermont – Gov. Fairbanks<br />

has secured the extension of<br />

the geodetic triangulation of the<br />

U.S. Coast Survey, over the state of<br />

Vermont, and C.P. Watterson, the<br />

superintendent at Washington, has<br />

appointed Prof. Volney G. Barbour,<br />

of the Vermont University, to conduct<br />

the proposed survey. It will be<br />

remembered that Prof. Quimby of<br />

Dartmouth College has been conducting<br />

a similar survey for the state<br />

of New Hampshire for several years<br />

past.<br />

West Concord – A.B. Colby, of<br />

<strong>North</strong> Concord, started off horseback<br />

with a scythe on his shoulder<br />

to grind it. In crossing a stream, the<br />

horse stumbled, all went into the<br />

water together and Colby came out<br />

minus a little finger and with two<br />

other fingers badly damaged. His<br />

vest and pocket book disappeared at<br />

the time and they have not been<br />

found.<br />

September 20, 1878<br />

Fairbanks Award – <strong>The</strong> cable<br />

announces the prizes won at Paris in<br />

15 classes of the American section.<br />

E&T Fairbanks & Co. received in<br />

the class 15 the highest and only<br />

award to any scale manufacturer.<br />

Corner Stone – Last Monday afternoon,<br />

public exercises were had<br />

in the laying of the corner stone in<br />

the new Congregational Church in<br />

St. Johnsbury. <strong>The</strong> program included<br />

singing, reading scriptures,<br />

prayer, and a brief historical address<br />

by the pastor. Articles were deposited<br />

in a lead box in the stone fol-<br />

New <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong> Subscribers and Renewals<br />

Robert H. Goss, Jericho VT<br />

Hazel H. Greaves, Hardwick VT<br />

Charles M. Hafner, New London NH<br />

Gail Hare, Danville VT<br />

Sybil S. Hazen, Lyndonville VT<br />

Peggy & Fritz Henry, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Mrs. Margo Hoogeboom, Monument CO<br />

John & Pat Horvatich, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Bruce Hoyt, Rockville MD<br />

Deborah & Jim Hunt, Danville VT<br />

Matthew Jacovelli, West Danville VT<br />

Lauren Jarvi, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Jack & Sharon Jurentkuff, Vienna VA<br />

Susan & Tim Kok, Virginia Beach VA<br />

Sarita Lanpher, Lancaster NH<br />

Elaine Malm, Danville VT<br />

Gerald & Janita Livingston, Bountiful UT<br />

Maxine Long, Livonia NY<br />

Blaine & Joan Lowell, Derby VT<br />

Tom & Bev Lynch, Brattleboro VT<br />

Ida Manning, Morrisville VT<br />

John H. Matsinger, Danville VT<br />

Jeanette Mayo, St. Johnsbury VT<br />

Chuck & Andrea McCosco, West Danville VT<br />

Kelley S. McGill, Lyndonville VT<br />

Robert G. McGill, Harriet AR<br />

Duncan & Jeanne McLaren, Barnet VT<br />

lowed by an address form President<br />

Bartlett from Dartmouth College. A<br />

large audience was in attendance.<br />

Fire at McIndoe Falls – <strong>The</strong><br />

blacksmith, carriage and paint shop<br />

of Eugene Sears has been totally<br />

consumed by fire. <strong>The</strong> cause of the<br />

fire is unknown. <strong>The</strong> loss is partially<br />

covered by insurance in the Vermont<br />

Mutual. <strong>The</strong> hotel and Weeks<br />

barn also caught on fire and for a<br />

time, it seemed like they would also<br />

burn. With the well-directed efforts<br />

of the people present, the fire was<br />

kept under control and Mr. Sears is<br />

the only sufferer.<br />

September 27, 1878<br />

Narrow Escape – <strong>The</strong> last Lyndon<br />

Union says, on Monday last<br />

George Petette the horse tamer at<br />

Lyndon Center, narrowly escaped a<br />

very serious accident. As he was riding<br />

past Henry Chase’s in a skeleton<br />

wagon, his horse commenced to<br />

kick and got his back leg over the<br />

crossbar. Petette fell off the back and<br />

somehow got his foot lodged in the<br />

wagon frame and was dragged<br />

halfway from the bridge to the dirt<br />

bank, but his boot heel ripped off<br />

and he rolled over in the dirt while<br />

the horse ran to the bank and was<br />

caught. All damage to property and<br />

the Petette was avoided.<br />

Country Fair – <strong>The</strong> Caledonia<br />

County Fair last week was in every<br />

regard a success. In the first place,<br />

there were three days of warm, beautiful<br />

weather, and the crowds could<br />

enjoy themselves without fear of interruption<br />

by rain. In the next place,<br />

there was a very creditable show in<br />

all departments; and although the<br />

Please! Send a gift subscription to: Yes! Send me <strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong> <strong>Monthly</strong>:<br />

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YOUR NAME<br />

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contemplated balloon ascension was<br />

a failure and perhaps a disappointment<br />

to many, yet that was not the<br />

fault of the managers. It was certainly<br />

an unexpected, if not an<br />

avoidable accident. As a while, it was<br />

the best fair that has ever been held<br />

on the grounds. In another place,<br />

we publish the premiums on cattle,<br />

horses, and other prominent articles,<br />

omitting quite a number of the<br />

small and fancy articles, for want of<br />

room.<br />

What Becomes of Wealth – A<br />

boot and shoe dealer has hanging in<br />

his shop a pair of boots worth seven<br />

dollars. <strong>The</strong>y constitute a part of his<br />

wealth, and a portion of their world.<br />

A man buys them and begins to<br />

wear them; by friction against the<br />

pavement little particles of the<br />

leather are rubbed off, and this separated<br />

from the rest of the sole.<br />

Every particle thus removed takes<br />

out a portion of the value of the<br />

boots, and when the boots are entirely<br />

worn out, the seven dollars of<br />

wealth which they formed is consumed.<br />

<strong>The</strong> wheat, corn, etc., which<br />

was raised by our farmers last summer<br />

is being eaten up. No particle<br />

matter is destroyed by this process,<br />

but the value which was in the grain<br />

is destroyed. As, while men are wearing<br />

out clothing and eating up food,<br />

they are generally busily employed<br />

producing wealth of some kind. <strong>The</strong><br />

wealth of the world is not easily diminished<br />

by the consumption, but<br />

it is changed. This applies, however,<br />

only to personal property. Town lots<br />

and farmland retain their value<br />

while personal property is subject to<br />

perpetual destruction and renewal.<br />

Where can I find<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong><br />

<strong>Monthly</strong><br />

Barnet Village Store<br />

Barnie's Market (Concord)<br />

Box Car & Caboose (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Go Go Gas (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Buffalo Mountain COOP (Hardwick)<br />

Cabot Village Store<br />

Center Tower (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Coles Market (Lyndonville)<br />

Convenient One (St. Johnsbury)<br />

D&L Beverage (Greensboro)<br />

Danville Inn<br />

Diamond Hill (Danville)<br />

East Burke Market<br />

East Calais General Store<br />

Green Mt Books (Lyndonville)<br />

Hastings Store (Danville)<br />

Horizons Deli (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Joe's Pond Country Store (Danville)<br />

Lyndon Freighthouse<br />

Lyndon Mobil Mart<br />

Marty's First Stop (Danville)<br />

Natural Provisions (St. Johnsbury)<br />

NVRH (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Paul's Whistle Stop (McIndoe Falls)<br />

Petty Co Junction (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Rite Aid (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Riverbend Country Store<br />

(N. Montpelier)<br />

South Walden Store (Walden)<br />

St J Mobil (St. Johnsbury)<br />

Tim's Convenience Store (Plainfield)<br />

TJ's Lunch Counter (Wells River)<br />

West Barnet Quick Stop<br />

Wheelock General Store<br />

<strong>The</strong> White Market<br />

Galaxy Book Store (Hardwick)<br />

Woodbury Village Store<br />

Willey’s Store<br />

Contact us about selling<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong> <strong>Monthly</strong><br />

in your store:<br />

(802) 684-1056<br />

info@northstarmonthly.com


4 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

REID & BALIVET<br />

ATTORNEYS AT LAW<br />

ERNEST TOBIAS BALIVET<br />

JUDITH A. SALAMANDRA CORSO<br />

DANVILLE GREEN � DANVILLE, VT � (802) 684-3666<br />

<strong>The</strong> Carpet Connection<br />

Your full-service carpet and flooring store.<br />

We are experts when it comes to carpet, vinyl,<br />

ceramic tile, hardwood, laminates and area rugs.<br />

199 Depot Street (802) 626-9026<br />

Lyndonville, Vermont (800) 822-9026<br />

Mayo’s<br />

Paint Dept.<br />

Labor Day Sale<br />

33% Off<br />

STOREWIDE<br />

Monday, September 7<br />

OPEN<br />

7 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri.<br />

8 a.m.-Noon Sat.<br />

now offering<br />

802 Railroad Street<br />

St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

(802) 748-8826<br />

Quality Meats & Fresh Produce<br />

Thick, Juicy Steaks & Ground Beef (Fresh Cut on Site)<br />

Locally Grown Vegetables<br />

Fresh Sandwiches, Burgers, McKenzie Hot Dogs<br />

“Extensive Wine Selection”<br />

Propane - Camping & Picnic Supplies<br />

Hollyberry’s Famous Bakery Products (Fresh Daily)<br />

Ultimate Selection of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream<br />

Movies • ATM • TMA’s • VAST Maps<br />

461 Route 114 / East Burke / Vermont 05832<br />

802.626.5010<br />

Finding our way<br />

BY ISOBEL P. SWARTZ<br />

Finding Our Way<br />

“<strong>The</strong>y shut the road through the woods<br />

Seventy years ago.<br />

Weather and rain have undone it again<br />

And now you would never know<br />

<strong>The</strong>re was once a road through the woods…”<br />

I have always liked the poem, “<strong>The</strong> Way<br />

Through the Woods”, by Rudyard Kipling. It is<br />

so evocative of the old country roads of Vermont<br />

that are now “thrown up”. I enjoy looking at<br />

maps, especially those that show Roman roads or<br />

ancient tracks and settlements, but my husband<br />

will tell anyone who asks that I have a crazy way<br />

of following a highway map. He may be right,<br />

but, unlike him, I am not hesitant to ask for di-<br />

rections. I recently received vindication of my<br />

ridiculed behavior and I shall get to that shortly.<br />

When I first came to this country I spent a<br />

week in New York City. <strong>The</strong> grid system of<br />

streets and avenues made it easier to find my way<br />

around there than in any other city I had lived in<br />

or visited. European cities are not like that. <strong>The</strong>y<br />

have evolved over hundreds of years from their<br />

simple beginnings as small settlements connected<br />

by meandering cow-paths or pack-pony tracks,<br />

used by peddlers taking their wares from village<br />

to village.<br />

In England, there still remain the vestiges of a<br />

system of direction finding that I call the Saints<br />

and Sinners method: the primary landmarks for<br />

way-finding are churches and pubs! Within a town<br />

or city, many roads and streets are still named for<br />

the businesses that were originally there: Smithy<br />

Lane, Mill Street, Market Walk, Butchers’ Row,<br />

and even the more ancient Castlegate, or the Barbican.<br />

This is truly living history, a rich and powerful<br />

connection to the roots of a community. I<br />

was sad to lose that connection to the past, when<br />

the 911 system caused many Vermont towns to<br />

change some of their historic street names for the<br />

sake of “efficiency”.<br />

In the European countryside, villages are so<br />

close to each other that the roads are often named<br />

for the next village. <strong>The</strong> major roads are numbered,<br />

but many older folks refer to them by the<br />

name of the next town or city. <strong>The</strong> modern motorways,<br />

numbered like those anywhere, are a<br />

rapid, direct but often sterile way to reach a destination<br />

quickly.<br />

Imagine my distress when I arrived in the U.S.<br />

to find that travel directions are based on the<br />

points of the compass! Of course I was aware of<br />

this scientific principle but I had never depended<br />

on it for finding my way. On the other hand my<br />

husband has a very strong sense of compass direction.<br />

When he went to buy a new car he was<br />

offered a choice of models with or without GPS,<br />

the difference in price — a mere $1,500. Our<br />

daughter, who was car hunting with him, laughed<br />

at the salesperson, “You are wasting your time<br />

with that option,” she said. “You’re looking at a<br />

man who has a personal GPS in his head!” I think<br />

this is a genetic trait because one of our grandsons<br />

has the same ability, though his father does<br />

not.<br />

When I look at a map I have to orient it in the<br />

direction I am going in order to make left and<br />

right turns correctly, because I am also one of<br />

those people who cannot quickly tell left from<br />

right! It takes time to orient myself.<br />

Now I know why, and I shall NOT suffer indignity<br />

anymore! Colin Ellard has saved me! He<br />

is a Canadian experimental psychologist, and in<br />

Ellard also states that this difference may account<br />

for why many men do not like to ask for directions<br />

– they find it difficult to follow a route described by<br />

‘turn-by-turn’ directions rather than compass<br />

orientation.<br />

his book, You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our<br />

Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall, he explains<br />

some of the differences in way-finding between<br />

men and women. He also explains why<br />

many men do not like to ask for directions!<br />

According to Ellard’s research, he has found<br />

that men are much more likely to navigate using<br />

compass directions whereas women navigate by<br />

noticing features along the way. <strong>The</strong>se include:<br />

buildings, especially those with unusual design or<br />

colors; store fronts, especially those with unique<br />

signs; natural features such as trees, unusual<br />

patches of vegetation, gardens; geographical features<br />

or particular vistas along the route. I know<br />

that this is true for me. As a young child, playing<br />

in the fields and woods near my home, I could<br />

have described in detail special features of the<br />

paths I walked: where there would be mud after a<br />

rainstorm; where certain flowers grew; where to<br />

find blackberries in the summer. I found myself<br />

walking those same paths, noting the old familiar<br />

landmarks, when I recently went back to my childhood<br />

home.<br />

Ellard also states that this difference may account<br />

for why many men do not like to ask for directions<br />

– they find it difficult to follow a route<br />

described by ‘turn-by-turn’ directions rather than<br />

compass orientation. I like to believe that these<br />

differences are related to the hunter and gatherer<br />

lives of our ancestors in which women depended<br />

on their intimate relationship with the environment<br />

to find the fruits, seeds, nuts and greens to<br />

feed their families. <strong>The</strong> men needed a wider orientation<br />

to find the game animals for meat, clothing<br />

and shelter. We think we are so modern, but<br />

buried deep in our brains are some parts of our<br />

ancient past and I like that!<br />

One further point of interest - - in Canada the<br />

main title of Ellards’s book is Where Am I? Apparently<br />

Canadians don’t mind admitting they are<br />

lost and are not embarrassed to ask for directions<br />

…and I like that too!<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom’s<br />

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We rent Mt bikes, kayaks and canoes!<br />

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OPEN 7 DAYS<br />

A WEEK


Here’s the scoop<br />

»This icy business is on fire and the Wilsons are<br />

just trying to keep up<br />

BY JUSTIN LAVELY<br />

Years ago, there was a television<br />

commercial that presented a<br />

group of new entrepreneurs<br />

tracking sales on a computer screen.<br />

When the very simple counter clicked<br />

over to one, they started celebrating and<br />

congratulating. When it started to flip<br />

faster than they could read, they looked<br />

shocked. One member turned to the<br />

other and said, “We need to expand.”<br />

<strong>The</strong> owners of Slick’s Ice Cream are in a similar<br />

situation. <strong>The</strong> wholesale side of their business,<br />

which opened three years ago, is growing, but their<br />

In the late 60s and 70s, my mother could take<br />

the whole family out for ice cream and spend<br />

less than &10. Times are tough now, so my plan<br />

was to give people a good product at a fair price.<br />

new retail stand on Route 302 in Woodsville is<br />

soaring. In some cases, sales have increased tenfold<br />

since the stand opened last July in a former<br />

antique shop. On summer nights, the traffic along<br />

the route forms a bottleneck thanks to lines of<br />

parked cars on both sides of the road. <strong>The</strong> atmosphere<br />

is friendly and the ice cream is top<br />

notch.<br />

<strong>The</strong> primary owner, Michael Wilson, a tall middle-aged<br />

man, talks to us in his ice cream stand at<br />

9 am on a Friday. He explains that later on, he will<br />

be joined in the stand by his wife and three sons as<br />

the family tries to keep up with the hundreds who<br />

will stop for a taste. As he’s talking, at least one car<br />

pulls into the parking lot and is saddened by the<br />

“closed” sign on the front of the building.<br />

“If they had come to the window, I would have<br />

gotten them something,” Wilson says.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re is no secret ingredient to Slick’s recipe, at<br />

least not in terms of food. Michael believes people<br />

are simply attracted to local businesses making<br />

local products and phenomenal customer service.<br />

Slick’s products may have unique names like<br />

“<strong>Star</strong>ry Night,” “Bite this” and “Mounds,” or familiar<br />

names like “Grandma’s Apple Pie,” but<br />

stopping at the stand produces a very familiar and<br />

comfortable feeling.<br />

<strong>The</strong> names and flavors are a far cry from three<br />

years ago, when with the help of a friend, Wilson<br />

made his first batch of vanilla ice cream. It was<br />

nothing special, but a seed was planted. A small<br />

business loan from <strong>North</strong>ern Community Invest-<br />

ment Corporation in St. Johnsbury helped the endeavor<br />

sprout and Slick’s, named after the family’s<br />

pug, was on a path to notoriety. Slick’s now has<br />

more than 30 flavors to offer with prices from<br />

$1.50 to $3.50.<br />

“In the late 60s and 70s, my mother could take<br />

the whole family out for ice cream and spend less<br />

than $10,” Wilson says. “Times are tough now, so<br />

my plan was to give people a good product at a fair<br />

price.”<br />

Last summer, Wilson, who partners with his<br />

two brothers-in-law, said the family would get excited<br />

about a $100 day, and now the ice cream<br />

stand brings in more than $1,000 a day on the<br />

weekends. Wilson takes nothing for granted as he<br />

points to the first dollar ever earned by the business<br />

hanging on the wall.<br />

During the interview, Wilson stops to field a<br />

call from his wife. She tells him he needs to find<br />

time to come home and start making ice cream before<br />

the stand opens for the night. He shakes his<br />

head as he hangs up the phone as if to say, “Just<br />

another day.”<br />

Slick’s growing popularity has been very rewarding<br />

for Michael and his family.<br />

“It’s been all word of mouth,” according to<br />

Wilson who also emphasized his great location on<br />

a major state highway. People from Chicago are<br />

stopping by and telling Wilson they heard about<br />

his place from a friend.<br />

Wilson emphasizes to his employees the im-<br />

>> Page 6<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 5<br />

Richard P. Barrett Insurance Agency<br />

309 Portland Street, Suite 102<br />

St. Johnsbury, Vermont 05819<br />

(802) 748-5224<br />

This month,<br />

join <strong>The</strong> Galaxy Bookshop in welcoming:<br />

Charles Sabukewicz<br />

Poetry.......................................Tuesday, Sept. 22, 7:00 p.m.<br />

Archer Mayor<br />

Vermont Author .....................Tuesday, Sept. 29, 7:00 p.m.<br />

Our Second Annual Read-a-Thon to benefit Hardwick Head <strong>Star</strong>t<br />

and Early Head <strong>Star</strong>t is scheduled for October 16-17! Stop in or<br />

call to sign up or to find out more.<br />

See our full calendar of events and shop online at<br />

www.galaxybookshop.com.<br />

7 Mill Street, Hardwick, VT / 802-472-5533


6 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Near the southern shore of Caspian Lake in Greensboro village<br />

Open 7-7...7 days a week, Phone: 802.533.2621, Toll free: 866.945.5397<br />

DISPLAY MODEL CLEARANCE SALE<br />

(ALL MODELS NEW)<br />

Here is the picture we would like on the add. We would like this to take up about<br />

½ of the add with the rest of the space filled up with the following information.<br />

Open 7:00 a-7:00p 7 days a week<br />

Near the southern shore of Caspian lake in Greensboro village<br />

Phone: 802-533-2621 Toll free- (866) 945-5397<br />

Fax: 802-533-2293<br />

David<br />

Lavely<br />

DAL BUILDERS<br />

26 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE<br />

Feel free to arrange this however you want. Thank you!<br />

<strong>The</strong><br />

WILLEY’S<br />

STORE<br />

Design-Build ► Residential & Commercial ► Construction Management ► Renovations ► Additions<br />

PO Box 362 Danville VT 05828 ► Phone/Fax: (802) 684-2116 ► dlavely@myfairpoint.net<br />

3262 U.S. Rte. 5, Derby,VT 05829 (802) 766-2714<br />

Mon.–Fri. 7 a.m. –5:30 p.m.; Sat. 7 a.m.–4 p.m. Located across from the Derby Post Officee<br />

TAX-FREE DAY — SAVE 6% AUGUST 22.<br />

SAVE 30% TAX CREDIT 2009 ON ALL UNITS.<br />

GAS STOVES: RETAIL SALE SAVE!<br />

Hampton Enamel Ivory Gas Stove 15KBTU H15 $1,892 $ 999 $ 893<br />

Hampton Charcoal Cast Gas Stove 35KBTU H35 $2,456 $1,456 $1,000<br />

Harman Fireluxe Cast Black Gas Stove $3,185 $2,185 $1,000<br />

Harman Clarity Direct Vent $2,399 $1,699 $ 700<br />

WOOD STOVES:<br />

Regency Steel Front Load Wood 55KBTU F11005 $1,789 $1,089 $ 700<br />

Regency Steel Front Load Wood 80KBTU F3100L $2,253 $1,253 $1,000<br />

Hampton Charcoal Cast Wood Stove H301 $2,242 $1,242 $1,000<br />

Hampton Charcoal Cast Wood Stove H201 $1,785 $1,100 $ 685<br />

Hampton Enamel Brown w/Side Shelves H305 $3,050 $2,150 $ 900<br />

PELLET STOVES:<br />

Harman XXV Black Cast 50KBTU $3,599 $2,995 $ 604<br />

Vista Flame Black 40KBTU $2,499 $1,750 $ 749<br />

Craft fair<br />

From apples to wood carvings<br />

and everything in between<br />

>> Page 5<br />

BY PEGGY PEARL<br />

<strong>The</strong> Festival of Traditional<br />

Crafts has<br />

been a tradition of<br />

its own for well over thirty<br />

years. <strong>The</strong> Friday and Saturday<br />

of the next to last<br />

full weekend of September<br />

have seen the grounds<br />

of the Fairbanks Museum<br />

and the <strong>North</strong> Church<br />

covered with tents. Visitors<br />

observing the “white<br />

city” might speculate that<br />

the church might be having<br />

a revival meeting and<br />

the Museum a carnival - or<br />

visa versa!<br />

<strong>The</strong> longevity of this event is<br />

a tribute to dedicated volunteers<br />

from all walks of life. Volunteers<br />

are the life’s breath of non profits<br />

and the Museum is truly<br />

blessed. <strong>The</strong>y load up their vehicles<br />

from East Burke to demonstrate<br />

how to make and use dyes<br />

from natural materials; the use of<br />

natural materials to attract the<br />

“big” one when fly fishing; the<br />

use of the spinning wheel and<br />

the use of the gasoline engine to<br />

provide the power for making<br />

butter, washing clothes or sawing<br />

wood. <strong>The</strong>y descend on us from<br />

Danville to show us how to use<br />

hand tools in woodworking and<br />

provide a look at the clothing<br />

portance of smiling and treating<br />

customers properly. <strong>The</strong>re are<br />

days when Wilson will walk<br />

around and speak with his customers.<br />

He often asks them for<br />

feedback and flavor requests.<br />

<strong>The</strong> customers seem to appreciate<br />

that attention and sometimes<br />

they even return the favor, such<br />

as a Grantham, N.H., man’s letter<br />

in New Hampshire Magazine<br />

that raved about Slick’s.<br />

“That was nice to see,” Wilson<br />

says. “It’s all about them.<br />

Without them, none of this is<br />

possible.”<br />

While the former substitute<br />

teacher is no stranger to entrepreneurship,<br />

neither of his other<br />

businesses, a music shop in<br />

Woodsville and a traveling gig<br />

pressure washing cars at local<br />

car dealerships, have reached<br />

this level of success.<br />

In fact, the success has Wilson<br />

and his family a bit nervous.<br />

“We’ve had a terrible summer<br />

weather-wise. What’s going<br />

to happen next year if we get a<br />

really hot summer?”<br />

As for employees, the business<br />

relies heavily on Wilson’s<br />

three sons, Adam, Jordan and<br />

Samuel. When they go back to<br />

school in the fall, Wilson may be<br />

scrambling to fill their shoes.<br />

“<strong>The</strong>y’re so important to<br />

running the ice cream stand, I<br />

don’t know what I’m going to<br />

do when they leave,” says Wilson.<br />

<strong>The</strong> family has broken down<br />

worn and the chores preformed<br />

in 1800’s everyday life. Visitors<br />

can learn the drum beats of the<br />

Civil War soldier and the firing of<br />

the musket. Wagon rides are offered<br />

and different varieties of<br />

apples are displayed. Craftsmen<br />

shows how to hand hew a timber,<br />

how to make an eight foot<br />

pump log and the use of herbs<br />

by early settlers.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Barnet area volunteers<br />

offer up the arts of blacksmithing,<br />

candle dipping, broom<br />

making and the spine tingling<br />

thoughts as an 18th century surgeon<br />

shows his instruments.<br />

Sheep graze on the Museum<br />

lawn amidst maple sugaring and<br />

butter making. Early American<br />

Decorating brings volunteers<br />

from Barnet, Burlington and<br />

Cambridge – this trio offers stenciling,<br />

painting on tins and reverse<br />

painting on glass, etc.<br />

Groton volunteers offer boat<br />

building and the multi tasking of<br />

the spring pole lathe – both your<br />

hand and foot are engaged! Further<br />

to the north – from Derby<br />

and Barton - come our basket<br />

maker and pottery ladies. Lyndonville<br />

and Lyndon area volunteers<br />

include a rug hooker and<br />

toys and games folks. <strong>The</strong><br />

“What’s it?” ladies who can<br />

stump you with their odd and<br />

unusual tools and gadgets. Con-<br />

responsibilities to maximize efficiency.<br />

Wilson, and his brother<br />

in law John West are the only<br />

two people that make the ice<br />

cream. <strong>The</strong> product is made a<br />

few miles from the stand at Wilson’s<br />

house in a converted carriage<br />

barn with an attached<br />

walk-in freezer.<br />

“We feel it’s important to<br />

maintain the consistency of the<br />

product,” John says.<br />

Wilson’s wife and three boys,<br />

along with other hired help, man<br />

the ice cream stand on a regular<br />

basis. In addition to making all<br />

the ice cream (sometimes Slick’s<br />

goes through 360 gallons a<br />

week), Wilson also handles distribution<br />

to retail stores, such as<br />

the West Barnet Quick Stop,<br />

Barnet General Store, Aldrich<br />

General Store in <strong>North</strong> Haverhill,<br />

Newbury Village Store and<br />

the Littleton Co-op. Hundreds<br />

of pints are loaded into generator-powered<br />

chest freezers in<br />

the back of a truck and driven<br />

to their destinations.<br />

“If things keep going like<br />

they have, we’re definitely going<br />

to have to get a real truck,” he<br />

says.<br />

Between, making the product,<br />

selling the product and<br />

transporting the product, Wilson<br />

puts in upwards of 100<br />

hours a week, but you won’t<br />

hear him complaining. “You do<br />

what you have to,” he says. “I’m<br />

not looking to get rich at this,<br />

just make a good living and support<br />

my family.” �


cord keeps us clean with soap<br />

making and Waterford tells us stories.<br />

From the other side of the<br />

state, Burlington brings us “green<br />

woodworking” showing us how to<br />

create a wooden yoke, firewood<br />

carrier, etc. Barre sends dowsers<br />

and their instruments for finding<br />

underground water – we don’t<br />

need any from above!<br />

St. Johnsbury also offers up<br />

many talents from its foresters, including<br />

a split rail fence demonstration,<br />

bee keeping and shingle<br />

making. Other St. J. talents include<br />

the weather sage, the weaver, the<br />

sheep shear paper cutter and the<br />

chair maker. You can watch the<br />

making of cane and rush seats for<br />

chairs and see the 18th century<br />

English long boat and its mate!<br />

Ryegate offers expertise on a<br />

model sawmill. Only from Victory<br />

do we have a traveling drag saw.<br />

We gather in volunteers from<br />

Hardwick and Fairlee for apple<br />

head dolls and braiding rugs. <strong>The</strong><br />

longest ride goes to a couple from<br />

Connecticut who hauls their very<br />

old press to the festival to make<br />

apple cider.<br />

For two days, the volunteers<br />

teach and demonstrate while receiving<br />

food and shelter. <strong>The</strong> public<br />

day is Saturday (Sept.19) which<br />

grew out of the Friday event that<br />

was offered to school children that<br />

participate in the Museum’s Education<br />

program.<br />

A history program started back<br />

in the seventies by yours truly, was<br />

more of a show and tell lesson.<br />

<strong>The</strong> lesson could only take you so<br />

far when you had an empty bee<br />

hive; a piece of a pump log with a<br />

hole in it; a picture of a barn loom<br />

and a broad axe that only made<br />

their eyes pop out with its size.<br />

<strong>The</strong> one day demonstration event<br />

started in the seventies with about<br />

a dozen crafts and has grown to<br />

over forty. <strong>The</strong> Friday event now<br />

has around 700 students attending<br />

with 25 minute demonstrations<br />

and a series of bells indicating the<br />

changing of classes. <strong>The</strong> students<br />

are on the grounds from 9:30 a.m.<br />

to 2 p.m. As you might well imagine<br />

the logistics could easily become<br />

a nightmare if not for a very<br />

capable staff and yet another set<br />

of volunteers. Probably the most<br />

hair pulling task was the schedule<br />

which meant keeping every<br />

demonstrator with only one class<br />

at a time. <strong>The</strong> students come from<br />

as far north as Newark and East<br />

Haven with Lyndonville, Sutton,<br />

Millers Run and Burke between.<br />

From the south we have Blue<br />

Mountain, Barnet with the east<br />

and west represented by Guildhall,<br />

Lunenburg, Gilman, Concord and<br />

Waterford; joined by Danville,<br />

Walden, Peacham and Craftsbury.<br />

St. Johnsbury has the Town School<br />

participation as well as good Shepherd.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re are schools like Lancaster<br />

and Plainfield, New<br />

Hampshire that take advantage of<br />

the day too.<br />

<strong>The</strong> volunteers certainly get a<br />

workout and are the happiest<br />

when they have a crowd around<br />

them. If you have put off attending<br />

Craft Day, this might be the<br />

year to attend for like the Bob<br />

Dylan song – “the times, they are a<br />

changing.” It is an event that is fit<br />

for both young and old; some will<br />

reminisce while others learn something<br />

new. It is an interesting mix<br />

with some demonstrators from<br />

year one still participating while nette Combs, organist at the Uni-<br />

other demonstrators have passed versalist Church in Barre. This will<br />

their knowledge to the next gener- take place at 7:30 p.m. on Sept. 18<br />

ation.<br />

at the <strong>North</strong> Church. Marking the<br />

A special feature on the 19th at 400th anniversary of the explo-<br />

1 p.m. will be the Professional ration of Samuel de Champlain,<br />

Lumberjack Demonstration put the concert will feature music from<br />

on by Leo Lessard and crew. Sanderson's This the Age Wooden of Exploration Bowls and Lyn-<br />

features ax-throwing, crosscut Perfect nette for that will provide Special us Gift with music<br />

Each Bowl is Hand-turned<br />

sawing and possibly springboard- that Europeans were listening to in<br />

from Native Vermont Hardwood<br />

style chopping. This event takes www.vtbowls.com<br />

the 1600’s. Lynnette was named<br />

place on the south lawn of Sam the & Artist Weeza of the Sanderson<br />

Year by the Vermont<br />

<strong>North</strong> Church. This is a 2902 “must VT Route Chapter 114 of East the Burke, American Vermont Guild of<br />

802-626-9622<br />

see” as old and new technology Visitors go Organists. Always <strong>Star</strong>t Welcome the Festival week-<br />

head to head.<br />

end off on a musical note on Fri-<br />

We are also pleased to anday and then return on Saturday<br />

nounce that another family event for other sounds of the 1800 set-<br />

will be an organ concert by Lyntlement. Sanderson's<br />

Wooden Bowls<br />

Sanderson’s Wooden Bowls<br />

Perfect for that Special Gift<br />

Each Bowl is Hand-turned<br />

from Native Vermont Hardwood<br />

www.vtbowls.com<br />

Perfect for that Special Sam Gift & Weeza Sanderson<br />

Each Bowl 2902 is VT Hand-turned RT 114 East Burke, VT, (802) 626-9622<br />

from Native Vermont Hardwood Visitors Always Welcome<br />

www.vtbowls.com<br />

Sam & Weeza Sanderson<br />

2902 VT Route 114 East Burke, Vermont<br />

802-626-9622<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 7<br />

Do you have a chronic health condition that is affecting your life?<br />

Visitors Always Welcome<br />

Any adult with one or more chronic conditions<br />

can participate. A friend or care giver is welcome<br />

to attend with you. 10 Participant Minimum<br />

Please check the session you’d like to attend.<br />

Tuesdays, Sept 1–Oct 6<br />

9:30 a.m. to noon, NVRH Business Ctr 127<br />

Thursdays, Sept 17–Oct 22<br />

5:30 to 8:00 p.m, NVRH Business Ctr 127<br />

Mondays, Nov 2–Dec 7<br />

9:30 a.m. to noon,<br />

NVRH Business Ctr 224<br />

Would you like to change your life for the better?<br />

You will learn:<br />

• how to deal with frustration, pain, fatigue, and isolation<br />

• exercise techniques for maintaining and improving strength,<br />

fl exibility, and endurance; use of medications<br />

• how to communicate with health professionals, family, and friends<br />

• nutrition and healthy lifestyles… and more!<br />

And you will receive:<br />

• A 300-page booklet and relaxation audio tape.<br />

A FREE PROGRAM FOR PEOPLE WITH CHRONIC CONDITIONS<br />

NAME<br />

ADDRESS<br />

PHONE<br />

TO ENROLL CALL 802 748-7590 OR MAIL THIS TO:<br />

LAURAL RUGGLES NVRH, PO BOX 905, ST. JOHNSBURY, VT 05819<br />

Traditional Vermont Handcrafts<br />

OPEN:<br />

Tues.-Sat. 9:30-6<br />

Sunday 9:30-1<br />

Closed on Mondays<br />

Intersection of Rt. 2 & 15<br />

West Danville, Vermont<br />

www.joespondcrafts.com<br />

(802) 684-3648<br />

A FREE PROGRAM FOR PEOPLE<br />

WITH CHRONIC CONDITIONS


8 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

<strong>The</strong> diary of Emily Bickford Kinerson<br />

Recording the history of a well-known Peacham family<br />

BY LOIS FIELD WHITE<br />

Emily Bickford Kinerson,<br />

of Peacham,<br />

kept diaries, which<br />

she called memorandums,<br />

for a nine-year period from<br />

January 1, 1891, through December<br />

31, 1899. <strong>The</strong> 10year<br />

diary is an interesting<br />

and informative glimpse into<br />

life in Peacham Corner, Vermont,<br />

in the 1890’s and is a<br />

good resource for historians<br />

and genealogists. Her diaries<br />

were discovered by chance in<br />

an old desk that had been<br />

tucked away for many years<br />

in a Peacham home.<br />

In addition to her diary, Emily<br />

also kept a record of payments to<br />

several engravers (carvers) and profits<br />

from sales of the Kinerson butter<br />

molds and prints. James<br />

Richardson Kinerson, her husband;<br />

Flora and Mary Bickford, her nieces;<br />

Lucy Bailey Kinerson, her daughterin-law<br />

(wife of her son Russell); a<br />

Mrs. Etta Darling; a Mrs. Dr.<br />

Thomas, and John Varnum, a<br />

neighbor, engraved the butter prints.<br />

James Kinerson later sold his business<br />

to John Varnum.<br />

James and Emily were in their<br />

late 60s and living on the farm about<br />

one mile north of Peacham Corner<br />

as the diaries began. <strong>The</strong> farmhouse<br />

is shown in the book “Historic<br />

Homes of Peacham” on page 206.<br />

<strong>The</strong> “Little Kinerson House” is attached<br />

to the farmhouse in that picture,<br />

taken in 1897.<br />

Emily is seated in the buggy,<br />

with James standing alongside.<br />

Grandchildren Ray, Ellen and Minnie<br />

are standing in front, with Lucy<br />

holding the hand of little Philip at<br />

the far right. Granddaughter May is<br />

seen at the far left; next to her is<br />

Flora Bickford, then Carrie Bickford<br />

Varnum, Emily’s sister. <strong>The</strong> elderly<br />

lady in front might be James’ sister<br />

Ellen Kinerson Ferguson.<br />

James and Emily purchased a<br />

house in Peacham Corner from the<br />

Mary S. Underwood Estate on June<br />

3, 1892, and soon moved there.<br />

That house sits on the corner of the<br />

road going towards East Peacham,<br />

across from the Peacham Library,<br />

and is pictured in “Historic Homes<br />

of Peacham” on Page 46.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Kinersons rented rooms in<br />

their farmhouse and the Corner<br />

house to students at Peacham Academy<br />

and other folks, a common<br />

practice in that era.<br />

Emily fell out of bed on July 6,<br />

1895, when she was 74, and was<br />

lame for the rest of her life. It is said<br />

that she got around by pushing a<br />

straight chair. Several months after<br />

her accident she was walking across<br />

the road to the store with help. It is<br />

likely she broke a bone or bones.<br />

She never consulted a doctor.<br />

Emily duly recorded her families’<br />

illnesses, accidents, and the<br />

childhood diseases and other epidemics<br />

raging around town. Her<br />

daughter-in-law Ella (son Charley’s<br />

wife) had frequent bouts of asthma.<br />

Emily often wrote “I have been up<br />

home,” meaning her earlier years on<br />

Cow Hill and Penny Street. She described<br />

the weather, church doings,<br />

and the activities of her sons and<br />

their families. Her two Peacham<br />

sons sugared and planted in spring,<br />

hayed and went berrying in summer,<br />

harvested, worked in the<br />

woods, got up woodpiles and<br />

butchered in fall, and broke out<br />

Amish Made<br />

Furniture • Quilts • Nonperishable Food Items<br />

Toys • Candles • Blankets & More<br />

Special Order Catalogs Available<br />

(rolled) the Peacham roads in winter.<br />

Emily often wrote, “Breaking<br />

roads is the order of the day”. <strong>The</strong><br />

boys worked on their farms and on<br />

town roads in between times. Her<br />

oldest son Jerome, a traveling salesman,<br />

and his wife Jennie occasionally<br />

wrote home. Emily and James’<br />

grandchildren (four born during<br />

that decade) visited often, especially<br />

May the oldest.<br />

Notable events during that<br />

decade were the Spanish-American<br />

War; the Columbian Exposition (the<br />

Chicago World’s Fair); the election<br />

of William McKinley as President<br />

of the United States; the erection of<br />

and blowing down of the Observatory;<br />

the centennial celebration of<br />

the founding of the Caledonia<br />

County Grammar School (Peacham<br />

Academy); the installation of a telephone<br />

in John Christian Frederick<br />

Richter’s Store, and visits from<br />

Emily’s sister Carrie and her husband<br />

Harvey Varnum from Marshalltown,<br />

Iowa.<br />

James and Emily’s home farm,<br />

called “the farm” in the diaries, had<br />

been conveyed to their son Russell.<br />

<strong>The</strong>ir son Charles purchased a farm<br />

on East Hill from Charles and Kate<br />

Hutchinson in January, 1898, shown<br />

stop by and see katie at the corner of route 2 and Hill Street in Danville VT• 802.684.9900<br />

open: tuesday - saturday 10 a.m. - 6 p.m.<br />

in “Historic Homes of Peacham”<br />

on Page 154. Prior to that Charles,<br />

Ella and their children, Charles Raymond<br />

(Ray) and Minnie Florence,<br />

lived in the “Little Kinerson House”<br />

pictured in “Historic Homes of<br />

Peacham” on Page 208.<br />

Emily’s last diary ended on December<br />

31, 1899. She became 80<br />

years old on February 16, 1901, and<br />

received many congratulatory letters<br />

from her Western siblings and their<br />

children. Emily and James lived on<br />

in the Corner house for a while;<br />

then in declining health they agreed<br />

to deed that property to Augusta<br />

Hunt for $1,100. <strong>The</strong>y went to live<br />

at the homes of Russell and Charles.<br />

James died September 23, 1902, of<br />

prostatic disease at age 78; Emily<br />

died November 27,1903, of bronchitis<br />

at age 82.<br />

Sons Russell and Charles were<br />

appointed executors of James and<br />

Emily’s “joint will”. One expense<br />

shown was a “crape (mourning)<br />

bonnette” (sic) for $4.75 and gloves<br />

for 25 cents for Emily, for James’ funeral.<br />

Russell and Charles held an<br />

auction, sold the Corner house to<br />

Augusta Hunt, paid the debts, settled<br />

the estate and divided the remaining<br />

assets among themselves<br />

and their brother Jerome.<br />

<strong>The</strong> oldest son Jerome continued<br />

traveling around the country,<br />

occasionally visiting his brothers<br />

and their families. He had no children.<br />

He died in Colonie, New<br />

York, in 1937 of myocardosis at age<br />

87. No further information is<br />

known of his wife Jennie.<br />

Sons Russell and Charles continued<br />

farming, raised their children,<br />

became upstanding citizens, town<br />

officials, and were elected to the<br />

Vermont Legislature. <strong>The</strong>y lived to<br />

see over 20 grandchildren, and there<br />

are now many descendents. Russell<br />

died in Peacham in 1926 of chronic<br />

myocardosis at age 69. His wife<br />

Lucy died in 1930 of cancer at age<br />

69. Charles (Charley) died in Woodstock,<br />

Vermont, in 1944 of pneumonia<br />

at age 84. His wife Ella died<br />

in Peacham of measles and pneumonia<br />

in 1913 at age 51. Charles’<br />

second wife, Jane Rebecca Warner,<br />

died in Boston, Massachusetts in<br />

1944 at age 65.<br />

Lois Field White will discuss the contents<br />

of the diaries, numerous family letters<br />

from Emily’s siblings who went West,<br />

account books and other documents at the<br />

Peacham Library at a date to be determined.<br />

<strong>The</strong> public is invited.<br />

Visit us<br />

at the<br />

corner<br />

of<br />

route 2<br />

and<br />

Hill St.<br />

in<br />

Danville<br />

VT<br />

tuesday<br />

thru<br />

saturday<br />

10 a.m.<br />

to<br />

6 p.m.<br />

802<br />

684.9900


Wheeler Manuscript<br />

>> Page 1<br />

Overland campaign, Cold Harbor, Spotsylvania,<br />

and the Wilson-Kautz Raid. He was captured<br />

June 29, 1864 during the Wilson Raid. He was a<br />

prisoner of war from June to November 1864.<br />

Wheeler begins his story in late June 1864 on<br />

the Wilson-Kautz Raid, eight days prior to his<br />

capture. <strong>The</strong> Union raid, ordered by Union Gen.<br />

Ulysses Grant, destroyed the South Side and<br />

Richmond-Danville railroads in Virginia which<br />

were major supply lines to Petersburg, Va. <strong>The</strong><br />

Wilson-Kautz Raid, consisted of 5,000 Union<br />

cavalry soldiers, was successful and lasted from<br />

June 22 to June 28, covering 500 miles, destroying<br />

60 miles of railroad tracks, numerous stations,<br />

locomotives, and artillery. After much<br />

success, the raid was halted when the Confederates<br />

ambushed and cornered Wilson’s troops at<br />

Stoney Creek, Va.<br />

“I can not describe the feailing when we<br />

found that we had got to surender to the rebels<br />

they came on to us like a lot wild Indians they<br />

wanted to butcher us.”<br />

His tale continues with his five months as a<br />

prisoner of war and describes the four prisons<br />

he was in: Salisbury Prison in <strong>North</strong> Carolina,<br />

Richland District Jail in Columbia, S.C., Florence<br />

Stockade in South Carolina, and worst of all,<br />

Andersonville Prison in Georgia.<br />

Wheeler described the conditions Union soldiers<br />

were forced to endure. <strong>The</strong>y were herded<br />

like cattle into train cars then into stockade prisons<br />

and left to the elements. <strong>The</strong>y were fed small<br />

rations of food that farmers wouldn’t feed pigs,<br />

given rancid water that made them sick, and suffered<br />

in the brutal heat of the day and freezing<br />

in the night temperatures. Prisons had no buildings<br />

or shelters so most prisoners dug large<br />

holes in the earth as their only shelter at Salisbury<br />

and Andersonville.<br />

“Imagine this picture if you can and then<br />

people it with sick ragged and sarving men who<br />

could be seen some of them slowly tottering<br />

and dragging across the pen only waiting to die<br />

thair only hope of liberty.”<br />

<strong>The</strong> worst he experienced was five months at<br />

Andersonville Prison in Andersonville, Ga., beginning<br />

July 6, 1864. Andersonville was known<br />

as “Hell on Earth,” the largest Confederate<br />

prison camp. It was opened in February, 1864,<br />

and was a 26.5-acre area with no shelters or<br />

buildings for prisoners, surrounded by a 15-foot<br />

high stockade fence built in a valley. Within six<br />

months, when Wheeler was there, the population<br />

peaked at over 32,000 prisoners, averaging<br />

1,100 prisoners per acre. Approximately 49,500<br />

Union soldiers were held in Andersonville and<br />

13,000 died from diseases, poor sanitation, malnutrition<br />

and exposure to the elements.<br />

For 25 years, he had captured the attention of<br />

family, friends and fellow veterans by sharing his<br />

war experiences and time in Andersonville<br />

Prison.<br />

Just as his unit entered Andersonville, the<br />

prison was in the midst of the famous Raiders<br />

episode. <strong>The</strong> Raiders was a large gang of 400+<br />

who preyed on new prisoners, stealing, terrorizing<br />

and killing them. Tensions escalated and a<br />

majority of prisoners appealed to the prison authorities<br />

for autonomy to deal with the Raiders.<br />

Six ring leaders were caught and an official trial<br />

was held by Andersonville prisoners with judge,<br />

lawyers, and jury. On July 11, 1864, Wheeler was<br />

an eyewitness to the hanging of the ring leaders.<br />

Andersonville, like so many Rebel prisons,<br />

was a cesspool with horrid water supplies, barely<br />

clothed men living in their own filth, suffering<br />

the summer heat with no tents, lean-tos, or<br />

buildings. Rations were sparse and consisted of<br />

a small daily portion of corn bread, then as time<br />

went on, rations were one pint of corn cob meal<br />

a day. Once a week they would get a serving of<br />

beans, infested with bugs. Wheeler went into<br />

minute detail about cooking the beans and bugs<br />

and how the soldiers were grateful to eat bugs<br />

because it was the only meat they got while<br />

there.<br />

Due to the poor diet and terrible water supply,<br />

Wheeler suffered from chronic diarrhea and<br />

scurvy the entire time he was in prison. Men<br />

were reduced to “living skeletons” and many<br />

died of starvation. Wheeler came close to dying<br />

himself but he held onto the hope of returning<br />

to his family.<br />

“By the last of July we had 33 thousand men<br />

in the prison was so croaded thar was not hardley<br />

room to ley down in goin back and forth<br />

>> Page 10<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 9<br />

Vermont’s <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom<br />

Annual Fall<br />

Foliage Festival<br />

September 27 through October 3<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom Fall Foliage Festival brings a piece of “Old Vermont”<br />

to life for visitors with local crafts, hymn sings, band concerts,<br />

church suppers, historical tours and the most beautiful fall colors you have<br />

ever seen! Seven unique festivals are held over seven consecutive days,<br />

now over 50 years running. <strong>The</strong> communities of St. Johnsbury, Walden,<br />

Cabot, Plainfield, Peacham, Barnet, and Groton invite you to come celebrate<br />

rural Vermont in all of its splendor.<br />

ST. JOHNSBURY - SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 27<br />

Come spend a glorious fall Sunday on St. Johnsbury’s Victorian Main Street.<br />

Visit Information Booth to pick up schedule on day of event. Arts & Crafts<br />

fair/Cookie Walk, 10 a.m.-3 p.m. and Farmer’s Market, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Historic<br />

walking tour at 10 a.m., historic cemetery walk at 11:30 a.m., town band concert<br />

at 1 p.m., planetarium show at 1:30 p.m. and parade at 2 p.m. Pancake/Ham<br />

Brunch, from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m., at St. Johnsbury House, featuring Maple Grove<br />

Farms of Vermont maple syrup ($3 for pancakes/$6.50 for all). Varieties of food<br />

served during the day. Tours possible of Fairbanks Museum & Planetarium (nation’s<br />

oldest science education museum) and St. Johnsbury Athenaeum & Art<br />

Gallery, a National Historic Landmark. Bus tours welcome; call to RSVP. Contact<br />

<strong>North</strong>east Kingdom Chamber, 51 Depot Square-Ste. 3, St. Johnsbury, VT<br />

05819. 800-639-6379, 802-748-3678. www.nekchamber.com, nekinfo@nekchamber.com<br />

WALDEN - MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 28<br />

Join us for Walden’s Day in the Country. <strong>The</strong> day’s festivities will begin at 11:00<br />

a.m. Arts and crafts demonstrations. Scenic tours. Country music. Hymn sing.<br />

Soup and chili luncheon with Vermont apple cider and homemade cookies<br />

available at 11:30 a.m., $5. Ham supper with choice of homemade apple or<br />

pumpkin pie for dessert at 5 and 6 p.m., $9. For supper reservations, call 802-<br />

533-7122. For information, contact Jane Muraro (Iron Horse Morgan Farm), 687<br />

Orton Road, East Hardwick, VT 05836. 802-533-9802.<br />

CABOT - TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29<br />

Welcome Coffee Hour begins at 8:45 a.m in the Cabot School Gym. Make a day<br />

touring old school houses, craft shops, the public library, Cabot Creamery and<br />

Historical Building. Crafts available in the gym from 8:30 a.m.-3 p.m. Three sittings<br />

for Beef Stew Luncheon at Cabot Church: 11:30 a.m., 12:30 & 1:15 p.m. In<br />

afternoon, enjoy a hayride to a sugarhouse. A hike to Nichols Ledge begins at 2<br />

p.m. Turkey Dinner at 5 and 6:30 p.m. at Cabot School Gym. <strong>The</strong> day ends with<br />

a musical program by local players at church, 7:15 p.m. For reservations: Beef<br />

Stew Luncheon (adults $5, children $2.50, Rose Bothfeld at 802-563-2715);<br />

Turkey Dinner (adults $10, children $5, Jane Brown at 802-563-2381); and Craft<br />

Tables (Vickie Bean at 802-563-2368). Beef stew luncheon, turkey dinner and<br />

tour tickets can be purchased at same time. For details, contact Fall Foliage<br />

Chairman Blanche Lamore, 1097 West Hill Pond Road, Marshfield, VT 05658.<br />

802-563-2457.<br />

PLAINFIELD - WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30<br />

A full day of activities begins with Coffee Hour at 9 a.m. and registration at<br />

Grace United Methodist Church. Foliage tours available at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.:<br />

Rock of Ages Granite Quarry, glass blowers, Grandview Winery and scenic<br />

spots, including hike to Owls Head and two nature trails, with lunch at the summit<br />

shelter. Other activities include touring the beautiful flower gardens at Goddard<br />

College, presentations by three local farmers on helping the community,<br />

as well as crafts and baked goods for sale. Cafeteria style luncheon from 11:30<br />

a.m. to 1 p.m., $5. Entertainment in the afternoon. Barbecued Chicken-Mostaccioli<br />

and Baked Bean Supper at 5 and 6 p.m., $10. For reservations, contact<br />

Joanne Martin, 802-454-7301, or Joyce Fowler, 802-454-8306.<br />

PEACHAM - THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1<br />

Registration at 9 a.m. and arts & crafts sale, 9 a.m.-3 p.m, at the Peacham Town<br />

Hall. Tickets for lunch, ghost walk and dinner can be picked up at town hall. Exhibits<br />

at the Blacksmith Shop and at the Historical House (homemade treats)<br />

and Peacham Library Book Sale, all 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Scenic bus tour at 10:15 a.m.,<br />

$2. Lunch at the Elementary School, 11 a.m.-1 p.m. Ghost Walk at 2 p.m., $4.<br />

Harp music in the Sanctuary, 4-6 p.m. Dinner at the church, 5 & 6:30 p.m.<br />

Spaghetti Supper, vegetarian and meat sauces, salad bar, garlic bread, homemade<br />

apple crisp and ice cream: $10 adults, $5 children, kids under 6 free. Tickets<br />

on sale the day of event. No dinner reservations needed. Coordinators,<br />

Marilyn Magnus, 2888 E. Peacham Rd., Barnet, VT 05821 (802-592-3320); Mary<br />

Williams, P.O. Box 192, Peacham, VT 05862 (802-592-3135); and Sharon Fuehrer,<br />

P.O. Box 15, Peacham, VT 05862 (802-592-3326).<br />

BARNET - FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2<br />

Come to the Barnet Center vestry at 8 a.m. to 12 noon for pancakes, Vermont<br />

maple syrup and sausage. Arts and crafts will be in the vestry all day. A bus<br />

tour will leave from the vestry at 10 a.m., visiting churches, the Goodwillie<br />

House, Ben Thresher’s Mill and traveling scenic back roads. Gifts are also at the<br />

McIndoes Church, with a soup and sandwich lunch served at noon. A European<br />

Coffee House runs from 1 to 4 p.m at the West Barnet Church. Enjoy a<br />

ham dinner at the Barnet Center vestry, starting at 4 p.m. and continuing until<br />

all are served ($10). For reservations, contact Robert Gibson, P.O. Box 131, Barnet,<br />

VT 05821 (802-633-2242); or Mrs. Pauline Urie, 1583 County Hill Rd., St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT 05819 (802-748-8246).<br />

GROTON - SATURDAY, OCTOBER 3<br />

Join us in Groton for our Festival Day. <strong>Star</strong>t with a Lumberjack Breakfast at the<br />

Methodist Church from 7-10 a.m. Visit our new Library, where there will be a<br />

book sale throughout the day. McClure’s Band will perform at the bandstand at<br />

11 a.m. Boy Scout Troop #702 will serve a light lunch on the Methodist Church<br />

lawn. Our Annual Parade starts at 1:30 p.m. Browse in the Peter Paul Historical<br />

House anytime during the day. Participate in the Old Fashioned Hymn Sing at<br />

the Baptist Church at 8 p.m. to close the day. Serving times for our Famous<br />

Chicken Pie Supper are 4:30, 5:30, 6:30 and 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available after<br />

July 1 at $10 for adults, $5 for children under 12. You must make reservations.<br />

Contact Peter Lyon, 848 West Shore Drive, Groton, VT 05046. 802-584-3020.<br />

(Take-out reservations are also available.)<br />

FOR MORE DETAILS OR LODGING LIST, CONTACT:<br />

<strong>North</strong>east Kingdom Chamber of Commerce<br />

51 Depot Square - Ste. 3, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

1-800-639-6379, 802-748-3678<br />

www.nekchamber.com, nekinfo@nekchamber.com<br />

(This complete calendar can also be found on chamber web site, under Visitor Information.)


10 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

>> Page 9<br />

through the camp we had to<br />

step over men lying on the<br />

ground and evry moning passing<br />

throgh the camp I would see<br />

men laying around on the grond<br />

dead and some dieing”.<br />

<strong>The</strong> reader gets a descriptive<br />

rundown of the daily struggle<br />

the prisoners faced to rid themselves<br />

of lice, maggots, and<br />

mosquitoes. He described a<br />

daily routine of ridding their<br />

clothes of lice. Wheeler wrote<br />

of men dying beside him during<br />

the night and the following<br />

morning, seeing them covered<br />

in a solid mass of lice.<br />

As in any war, prisoners<br />

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were deprived of decent, humane<br />

conditions, but they were<br />

abused psychologically as well.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Confederate soldiers, which<br />

Wheeler referred to as Rebels,<br />

used head games, lies, trickery,<br />

and coercion to beat down the<br />

prisoners’ morale and hopes.<br />

Wheeler described the punishments<br />

in minute detail from the<br />

stocks, buck and gag, cat-onine-tails,<br />

to hanging by the<br />

thumbs. Many tried to escape,<br />

and large forces of prisoners<br />

planned a huge tunnel escape<br />

and takeover only to be<br />

thwarted by a traitor.<br />

Despite the horrid stories<br />

Wheeler wrote, the reader gets a<br />

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Tuesday 10 am – 7 pm<br />

Wednesday 10 am – 4 pm<br />

Thursday 10 am – 4 pm<br />

Friday 10 am – 4 pm<br />

Saturday 10 am – 2 pm<br />

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strong sense of hope and desire<br />

to survive. Wheeler wrote with<br />

wit and stayed positive — not in<br />

a bitter or angry tone. Wheeler<br />

conveyed his Yankee stubbornness<br />

in not allowing the Rebels<br />

to kill his spirit and hope.<br />

Wheeler wrote: “I use to tell the<br />

rebels that they wood never<br />

have the priviagle of carring me<br />

out” [to be buried]}.<br />

In mid-October 1864,<br />

Wheeler was fortunate to leave<br />

Andersonville in a small group<br />

to be paroled. <strong>The</strong> parolees<br />

were loaded on a train and<br />

thought they were being exchanged<br />

only to be moved to<br />

Florence Stockade, S.C. It was a<br />

similar prison setup as Andersonville<br />

and just as terrible except<br />

medical treatment was<br />

available and a large shed built<br />

for sick prisoners where<br />

Wheeler sought shelter.<br />

On Nov. 30, 1864, Wheeler<br />

was paroled and handed over to<br />

Union troops. He was taken<br />

north to Annapolis, Md. and received<br />

medical treatment. He<br />

survived on doctor-prescribed<br />

doses of whiskey and brandy to<br />

build up strength because he<br />

couldn’t eat. After two weeks in<br />

Camp Parole hospital, Wheeler<br />

was released.<br />

Wheeler survived the journey<br />

and was reunited with his<br />

wife and family at the end of<br />

December 1864. He returned a<br />

“living skeleton,” weighing only<br />

90 pounds. Wheeler recuperated<br />

at the Sloan General Hospital in<br />

Montpelier until the end of the<br />

war.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Caledonian-Record in<br />

St. Johnsbury published articles<br />

referring to Wheeler’s imprisonment<br />

and on Dec. 30, 1864, an<br />

article titled “From Andersonville”<br />

reported Wheeler’s and<br />

another Vermont soldier’s return<br />

home. <strong>The</strong> article states:<br />

Wheeler “is a pitiable object and<br />

a living monument to the bar-<br />

barous cruelty of those men<br />

who call themselves the<br />

‘chivalry’ and ‘gentlemen’ of<br />

this country. We know now<br />

what ‘chivalry’ means: it is<br />

‘chivalry’ to starve a Union soldier<br />

by inches.”<br />

Wheeler returned to farming,<br />

eventually purchasing a hilltop<br />

farm on East Hill in<br />

Peacham. He married three<br />

times, being widowed by the<br />

first two, and had five children.<br />

For 40 years, Wheeler was active<br />

in the Methodist Episcopal<br />

Church in Peacham which was<br />

located where today’s Peacham<br />

town offices are. In later years,<br />

Wheeler moved to East<br />

Peacham Village.<br />

He was a charter member of<br />

the X.C. Stevens Grand Army<br />

of the Republic Post of Barnet<br />

and Peacham and served as<br />

chaplain. <strong>The</strong> GAR fought for<br />

pension legislation, established<br />

veterans’ retirement homes, and<br />

later evolved into the U.S. Department<br />

of Veterans’ Affairs.<br />

In the 1880s, he was a founding<br />

member of the Relief Corps, a<br />

women’s auxiliary to the GAR<br />

with the purpose of perpetuating<br />

the memory of the GAR.<br />

Tragedy struck in the year<br />

1882 when he lost his 17-yearold<br />

daughter, infant son, and his<br />

second wife all in that year. Two<br />

years later, he married for a<br />

third time.<br />

Wheeler spent the rest of his<br />

life years educating people<br />

about the realities of war and<br />

the immense sacrifice soldiers<br />

made for our country and freedom.<br />

On Decoration Day [our<br />

modern-day Memorial Day]<br />

Wheeler visited the local school<br />

and shared war experiences with<br />

schoolchildren. He had a mission<br />

he was dedicated to and he<br />

left his mark. Despite his weakened<br />

constitution, Wheeler lived<br />

a long life, dying in 1916.<br />

In the 1916 St. Johnsbury<br />

Republican, Wheeler’s obituary<br />

was published as well as a<br />

“Memorial to the late M.M.<br />

Wheeler” by his GAR Post that<br />

stated: “Comrade Wheeler was<br />

... ever seeking to [inculcate] in<br />

the hearts of both young and<br />

old the spirit of true patriotism<br />

and devotion to our beloved<br />

land; and possessing a character<br />

such as to know him was to respect<br />

and love him.” .... “we<br />

further express our own sense<br />

of loss and the loss to the community<br />

generally through the<br />

passing from among us of our<br />

brave, patriotic, faithful, lovable,<br />

and honored comrade and<br />

friend.”<br />

His 1890 memoir and the<br />

map he drew of Andersonville<br />

Prison was kept by Wheeler’s<br />

eldest son Elwin “Ellie”<br />

Wheeler. Elwin passed it on to<br />

Wheeler’s friend and fellow veteran,<br />

John (Millen) Farrow.<br />

Wheeler’s memoir was kept in<br />

the Farrow family, transferred<br />

from John to his daughter Mary<br />

Farrow Moore who in turn gave<br />

it to her son Francis Moore. At<br />

some point, John Farrow’s wife<br />

Emma or his daughter Mary<br />

Moore made a copy of<br />

Wheeler’s Andersonville map<br />

onto a 4-foot by 5-foot oilcloth<br />

mounted on cardboard.<br />

Wheeler’s memoir was read<br />

in Peacham classrooms<br />

throughout the years and at<br />

family gatherings. In the late<br />

1980s, the Moores donated the<br />

Wheeler memoir and large oilcloth<br />

map to the Peacham Historical<br />

Association for<br />

safekeeping.<br />

One hundred and forty-five<br />

years after Wheeler returned<br />

from the Civil War, people are<br />

still reading his story. Wheeler’s<br />

manuscript survived 119 years<br />

and has remained in the town he<br />

loved. His story continues to be<br />

passed on, just the way he<br />

would have wanted it. �


BY MICHELLE ARNOSKY SHERBURNE<br />

Peacham Historical<br />

Association will be<br />

unveiling their Civil<br />

War treasure, a manuscript<br />

written by a Peacham soldier<br />

119 years ago. Pvt.<br />

Mark M. Wheeler served in<br />

the Vermont 1st Regt. Cavalry<br />

Co. D from November,<br />

1861, to July, 1865. Wheeler<br />

was captured June 29, 1864,<br />

and spent five months in<br />

four different Confederate<br />

prisons, the worst of them<br />

being Andersonville.<br />

In 1890, Wheeler penned his<br />

memoir for posterity. He wrote a<br />

fully detailed account of his experiences<br />

from the Wilson-Kautz<br />

Raid in June, 1864, his prison time<br />

to his final release and reunion<br />

with family in December, 1864.<br />

In May, 2009, the Wheeler<br />

memoir, in the possession of the<br />

Peacham Historical Association<br />

(PHA), received a grant from the<br />

Vermont Humanities Council and<br />

the National Endowment for the<br />

Humanities (NEH) to have the<br />

original 119-year-old document<br />

conserved. <strong>The</strong> original Wheeler<br />

manuscript consists of 55 twosided,<br />

loose, handwritten pages,<br />

measuring 7½ inches in length and<br />

51/8 inches in width.<br />

PHA President Jutta Scott is<br />

pleased that this project has come<br />

to fruition. She said, “<strong>The</strong> original<br />

is amazingly in good shape. <strong>The</strong><br />

Peacham Historical Association<br />

received it in the 1980s but up until<br />

then, they used to pass it around,<br />

reading it page by page. In the<br />

classrooms, the kids handled it. No<br />

white gloves! And it survived despite<br />

all the handling.”<br />

<strong>The</strong> manuscript is written on<br />

acidic paper, which is less stable<br />

and durable than earlier alkaline<br />

paper. <strong>The</strong>y contracted experienced<br />

Vermont paper conservator<br />

M.J. Davis of WASHI in West<br />

Burke to properly conserve the<br />

document. Long-term preservation<br />

requires conservation treatment<br />

to stabilize the document<br />

through deacidification and encapsulation.<br />

Davis found the<br />

Wheeler document had suffered<br />

so much from contact and poor<br />

quality and storage conditions over<br />

the years. But she was able to preserve<br />

it properly.<br />

<strong>The</strong> second stage of the grant<br />

was having the document sent to<br />

the <strong>North</strong>east Document Conservation<br />

Center in Andover, Mass.,<br />

to be digitally scanned to create an<br />

electronic facsimile.<br />

PHA archivist, town historian<br />

and former town clerk Lorna<br />

Quimby worked with Sherburne<br />

to proof the transcription.<br />

Quimby said, “Wheeler was a<br />

good writer. You can see that in<br />

the construction of his account.”<br />

She enjoyed working through<br />

Wheeler’s document, finding it a<br />

challenge to figure out his words<br />

since spelling was not his forte.<br />

But Quimby noted evidence of<br />

Wheeler’s wit and sense of humor.<br />

But why now? What brought<br />

Wheeler’s document out of the<br />

vault?<br />

<strong>The</strong> original had been given to<br />

the PHA in the 1980s for safekeeping.<br />

Upon learning of the<br />

PHA’s latest addition, the late<br />

Peacham native Herman Alden<br />

Clark, of Groton, Vt., requested<br />

that the document be transcribed<br />

so people could read it. Herman’s<br />

grandfather, George Clark had<br />

married Mark Wheeler’s sister,<br />

Luthera Wheeler, so there was a<br />

family connection there.<br />

Quimby enlisted a Peacham<br />

college intern, Lisa Marceaux<br />

Moore, to transcribe it. <strong>The</strong><br />

Wheeler account was once again in<br />

circulation, but on a limited basis.<br />

It was used in local Peacham classrooms<br />

and it was read by a few.<br />

Soon the transcription got filed<br />

away in the historical society vault.<br />

For over 25 years, Wheeler’s<br />

story sat unread.<br />

In 2009, Michelle Arnosky<br />

Sherburne of Newbury, Vt., a<br />

freelance writer and granddaughter-in-law<br />

of Herman Clark, came<br />

across a photocopy of Wheeler’s<br />

account in family files. Upon reading<br />

Wheeler’s story, it was apparent<br />

that people needed to learn<br />

about Pvt. Mark Wheeler’s story<br />

and contribution to Vermont’s<br />

Civil War literature.<br />

Though it had been transcribed<br />

before, it had been heavily<br />

edited. Sherburne volunteered to<br />

transcribe it with stricter guidelines<br />

and that got the Peacham gears<br />

moving.<br />

With the approaching 150th<br />

anniversary of the Civil War in<br />

2011, the PHA had a renewed mission<br />

to preserve Wheeler’s manuscript.<br />

Sherburne said, “Wheeler’s<br />

manuscript is an incredible piece<br />

of literary history that details a<br />

perspective of the Civil War that is<br />

unique, from a farmer’s viewpoint<br />

as a soldier and prisoner. It is descriptive,<br />

captivating, alarming and<br />

personal all at the same time.”<br />

Sherburne commented that<br />

Wheeler writes in common man’s<br />

language, portraying the events<br />

and horrible conditions that Union<br />

soldiers suffered. Writing in retrospect,<br />

Wheeler had time to analyze<br />

what prisoners had to endure,<br />

what sacrifices they gave and the<br />

precious commodity that freedom<br />

is in this country. “Learning about<br />

this person, I found that he was<br />

dedicated to patriotism and educa-<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 11<br />

Grant will help historians preserve manuscript<br />

Prizes<br />

To Benefit Ben’s Mill Trust<br />

www.bensmill.com<br />

6th Annual Rubber Ducky Derby<br />

Saturday, October 3 at 11 a.m.<br />

at Ben Thresher’s Mill in Barnet, VT<br />

$5 Put Your Money on a Duck to Swim for You $5<br />

You may pre-buy duck numbers at $5 each, by filling out this form<br />

and mailing to:<br />

Ben’s Mill Trust LTD, PO Box 50, Barnet VT 05821<br />

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tion despite all he lived through,<br />

which is admirable.”<br />

Sherburne is working with<br />

PHA members Scott, Quimby,<br />

Lynn Bonfield and Diane Senturia<br />

to get Wheeler’s story online in late<br />

2009 on the PHA website,<br />

www.peachamhistorical.org. Marking<br />

the 145th anniversary of<br />

Wheeler’s return home from the<br />

war, his story will go global.<br />

On Sept. 17, 2009, Mark<br />

Wheeler’s experiences will once<br />

again take center stage in Peacham.<br />

<strong>The</strong> conserved original Mark<br />

Wheeler manuscript will be unveiled<br />

at a Vermont Humanities<br />

Council event* hosted by the<br />

Peacham Historical Association at<br />

7 pm at the Peacham Congrega-<br />

WHEELER<br />

True Value<br />

Building Materials<br />

29 Church Street<br />

Lyndonville, VT 05851<br />

(802) 626-5102<br />

or 626-5040<br />

tional Church.<br />

<strong>The</strong> original document and the<br />

4 by 5-foot oilcloth version of<br />

Wheeler’s Andersonville map will<br />

be displayed for the first time in<br />

years. <strong>The</strong> event will feature guest<br />

speaker and Vermont Civil War expert<br />

Howard Coffin, paper conservator<br />

M.J. Davis and Michelle<br />

Sherburne. <strong>The</strong> event is free, open<br />

to the public and accessible to people<br />

with disabilities.<br />

*Under grant from the National<br />

Endowment for the Humanities<br />

(NEH). Any views, findings, conclusions<br />

or recommendations expressed in<br />

this program do not necessarily represent<br />

those of the NEH or the Vermont Humanities<br />

Council.<br />

David Toll, M.D.<br />

Pediatrics<br />

1394 Main Street<br />

St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

(802) 748-2348<br />

Wheeler Sports<br />

Team Sports Products<br />

Images Of Vermont<br />

Silkscreening and Embroidery<br />

246 Church Street<br />

Lyndonville, VT 05851<br />

(802) 626-8235<br />

Fax: (802) 626-6180<br />

Email: wheel56@together.net<br />

Lyndon Institute<br />

Athletic Events ~ Fall 2009<br />

VARSITY FOOTBALL<br />

09/05/09 at Rice 1:00<br />

09/12/09 (H) U-32 1:00<br />

09/19/09 at Oxbow 1:00<br />

09/25/09 at <strong>North</strong> Country 7:00<br />

10/03/09 (H) COLCHESTER 1:00<br />

10/09/09 at Middlebury 7:00<br />

10/17/09 (H) MILTON 1:00<br />

10/24/09 (H) MMU 1:00<br />

10/31/09 (H) ST. JOHNSBURY 1:00<br />

JUNIOR VARSITY FOOTBALL<br />

09/08/09 (H) OXBOW 4:00<br />

09/14/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:00<br />

09/21/09 at <strong>North</strong> Country 6:00<br />

09/28/09 (H) SPAULDING 4:00<br />

10/05/09 at Essex 5:00<br />

10/12/09 (H) NORTH COUNTRY 4:00<br />

10/19/09 (H) ST. JOHNSBURY 4:00<br />

10/26/09 at Hartford 4:00<br />

FROSHMAN FOOTBALL<br />

09/09/09 (H) BRATTLEBORO 4:00<br />

09/16/09 (H) SPAULDING 4:00<br />

09/23/09 at Rice 4:00<br />

09/30/09 (H) ST. JOHNSBURY 4:00<br />

10/07/09 at BFA 5:00<br />

10/14/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:00<br />

10/21/09 (H) NORTH COUNTRY 4:00<br />

10/28/09 (H) HARTFORD 4:00<br />

CROSS COUNTRY<br />

09/02/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:00<br />

09/05/09 at Mt. Pisgah 10:00<br />

09/08/09 at Lamoille 4:00<br />

09/12/09 at Bald Mountain 10:00<br />

09/16/09 (H) KINGDOM TRAILS 4:00<br />

09/22/09 at Harwood 4:00<br />

09/26/09 at U-32 10:00<br />

09/29/09 at Lake Region 4:00<br />

10/03/09 at <strong>The</strong>tford Invite 10:00<br />

10/06/09 at U-32 4:00<br />

10/10/09 at Peoples Invite 10:00<br />

10/13/09 (H) KINGDOM TRAILS 4:00<br />

10/19/09 at Lake Region Relays 4:00<br />

10/24/09 at U-32 League Champ 10:00<br />

10/31/09 at <strong>The</strong>tford STATES 10:00<br />

GOOD LUCK VIKINGS<br />

Paul Wheeler, Athletic Director<br />

FIELD HOCKEY<br />

09/02/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:00<br />

09/05/09 at Mt. Pisgah 10:00<br />

09/08/09 at Lamoille 4:00<br />

09/12/09 at Bald Mountain 10:00<br />

09/16/09 (H) KINGDOM TRAILS 4:00<br />

09/22/09 at Harwood 4:00<br />

09/26/09 at U-32 10:00<br />

09/29/09 at Lake Region 4:00<br />

10/03/09 at <strong>The</strong>tford Invite 10:00<br />

10/06/09 at U-32 4:00<br />

10/10/09 at Peoples Invite 10:00<br />

10/13/09 (H) KINGDOM TRAILS 4:00<br />

10/19/09 at Lake Region Relays 4:00<br />

10/24/09 at U-32 League Champ 10:00<br />

10/31/09 at <strong>The</strong>tford STATES 10:00<br />

VARSITY & JV GIRLS SOCCER<br />

09/05/09 at Lake Region 11:00<br />

09/09/09 (H) OXBOW 4:30<br />

09/15/09 (H) ST. JOHNSBURY 4:30<br />

09/17/09 (H) RANDOLPH 4:30<br />

09/23/09 at U-32 4:30<br />

09/25/09 (H) <strong>North</strong> Country 4:30<br />

09/29/09 at Stowe 4:30<br />

10/03/09 (H) HARWOOD 11:00<br />

10/07/09 at Montpelier 4:00<br />

10/10/09 at Peoples 1:00<br />

10/13/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:00<br />

10/15/09 (H) NORTHFIELD 4:00<br />

10/21/09 at Spaulding 4:00<br />

10/23/09 (H) THETFORD 4:00<br />

VARSITY & JV BOYS SOCCER<br />

09/04/09 (H) LAKE REGION 4:30<br />

09/08/09 (H) LAMOILLE 4:30<br />

09/10/09 (H) OXBOW 4:30<br />

09/16/09 (H) NORTH COUNTRY 4:30<br />

09/18/09 at St. Johnsbury 4:30<br />

09/22/09 (H) MONTPELIER 4:30<br />

09/30/09 (H) RANDOLPH 4:30<br />

10/02/09 at U-32 4:00<br />

10/06/09 at <strong>North</strong>field 4:00<br />

10/10/09 at Peoples 4:00<br />

10/14/09 (H) STOWE 4:00<br />

10/16/09 at Spaulding 4:00<br />

10/20/09 (H) HARWOOD 4:00<br />

10/24/09 at <strong>The</strong>tford 11:00


12 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Af-fjord-ing Norway<br />

BY A.R. BOERA<br />

Accidental destinations<br />

are more the rule<br />

than the exception in<br />

military ‘Space Available’<br />

travel for retirees. <strong>The</strong>re is a<br />

lot of zigzagging as long as<br />

you have the time and the patience<br />

to travel like a nomad;<br />

the general rule is to keep<br />

moving - hopefully in the<br />

general direction of the<br />

places you’d like to cross off<br />

your “Bucket List.” A case in<br />

point is illustrated by one of<br />

my earlier travel articles. My<br />

plan was to re-visit Australia<br />

via Hawaii and Samoa. <strong>The</strong><br />

eventual trail took me to the<br />

intended target, but via detours<br />

to Japan, Singapore,<br />

Malaysia, Thailand, and Bali<br />

(including a couple of commercial<br />

links) with a stop on<br />

American Samoa on the way<br />

home. Another example followed<br />

a flight back from<br />

New Zealand. Instead of<br />

heading as directly as possible<br />

from the Charleston (SC) Air<br />

Force Base to the Plattsburgh<br />

(NY) AFB - where my car<br />

was in long-term parking -<br />

the “scenic route” took me to<br />

Panama and an opportunity<br />

to tour the Canal Zone.<br />

<strong>The</strong> subject of this travelogue<br />

will be another unintended destination<br />

back in 1993. <strong>The</strong> easy part was<br />

a hop to the Royal Air Force Base at<br />

Mildenhall, England – from Plattsburgh.<br />

(Coincidentally, Alex Trebek<br />

was at the recreation center on this<br />

British base auditioning for potential<br />

“Jeopardy contestants.) One day was<br />

profitably spent bussing to nearby<br />

Cambridge, and wandering – for<br />

seven hours – into and around hallways<br />

and courtyards of the various<br />

colleges of the University, touring<br />

the (world-renowned, but previously<br />

unknown to me) Fitzwilliam Museum,<br />

browsing through half a<br />

dozen antiquarian bookstores, beautifully<br />

decorated shops, a crafts fair<br />

and flea market, watching tourists<br />

being “punted” along the River<br />

Cam, “spectating” at a very formal<br />

wedding inside an ancient church,<br />

and stopping for a snack and a pint<br />

of lager at one of the historic town’s<br />

quaint pubs.<br />

Another day I took advantage of<br />

a shuttle to Heathrow Airport where<br />

I purchased a ticket for unlimited<br />

one-day use on London’s underground,<br />

trolleys or busses. I covered<br />

a lot of territory making the rounds<br />

of St. Paul’s Cathedral (its awe-inspiring<br />

basement crypts housing the<br />

remains of renowned British heroes<br />

– notably Horatio, Lord Nelson and<br />

the Duke of Wellington), the Tower<br />

of London (with its ravens and scintillating<br />

display of crown jewels), and<br />

the British Museum (enriched with<br />

the Rosetta Stone, the Elgin marbles<br />

from the Parthenon, and its priceless<br />

manuscripts among a myriad of<br />

treasures) all of which “must-see”<br />

landmarks I hadn’t yet covered on<br />

earlier visits or tours. Also enjoyed<br />

browsing again through bookstores<br />

along and near Charing Cross Road,<br />

as well as revisiting Westminster<br />

Abbey and checking my watch<br />

against Big Ben.<br />

While waiting for some way to<br />

get closer to Poland – to take a bus<br />

excursion from whatever base – an<br />

interesting flight opportunity appeared<br />

on the air terminal’s monitor<br />

Oslo. Sounded good to me! I hadn’t<br />

thought about Norway before since<br />

I wasn’t aware of any allied air base<br />

there. <strong>The</strong>re is none, but I learned<br />

that there is a NATO base near Oslo<br />

Gardemoën and I was soon manifested<br />

on a mission to Fornebu Airport.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re were just three<br />

passengers. On the train ride from<br />

the base, I teamed up with a retired<br />

Army major from Tacoma, WA, on<br />

his third visit to Norway. On previous<br />

trips he had traced his roots, visiting<br />

the home towns of both sets<br />

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of his grandparents and making the<br />

acquaintance of relatives along the<br />

way. We shared a room at a decent<br />

hotel downtown to help offset the<br />

incredibly high rates. We took a walk<br />

before dinner with Karl serving as<br />

my guide along the way, pointing out<br />

the National <strong>The</strong>ater, the University,<br />

and the Parliament Building, as<br />

well as the palace of King Harold,<br />

sitting atop a hill on Karl Johans<br />

Gate in a park open to the public.<br />

He told me that the royal family requires<br />

minimal security, enjoying an<br />

informal relationship with their<br />

subjects. When they go skiing, they<br />

take public transportation and commercial<br />

lodging. For our “dinner,” a<br />

tasty grilled cheese dish with delicious<br />

brew, the tab was a hefty 70<br />

kroner (about $10) each. Most stores<br />

were open late into the evening.<br />

Sidewalk artists, street-corner musicians<br />

and outdoor vendors<br />

abounded. I took with me the hilarious<br />

memory of a German shepherd<br />

dog’s reaction to a very realistic<br />

toy lizard cleverly manipulated by a<br />

vendor-puppeteer; the performance<br />

attracted quite a gathering. Already<br />

my legs ached and my feet were dogtired.<br />

A late night call to Julie before<br />

hitting the sack was a brief “Hilsen<br />

fra Øslo, Nørge!”<br />

First impressions: Friendly,<br />

handsome, healthy-looking people;<br />

clean city – minimal graffiti; lots of<br />

birds, mostly magpies; floral-lined<br />

parks…tulips, daffodils, lilacs, apple<br />

blossoms, forsythia, all coming into<br />

bloom as the country erupted with<br />

its late spring rebirth.<br />

<strong>The</strong> next day Karl learned that<br />

he would have a difficult time obtaining<br />

an auto rental because of his<br />

age (78). I volunteered that I’d be<br />

glad to be his chauffeur and share<br />

the costs if he wanted me to drive<br />

him around the country to visit relatives<br />

and friends, proposing to leave<br />

him at his destination(s), go to the<br />

nearest town for lodging, and pick<br />

him up a day or two later at each<br />

stop. He was most appreciative and<br />

agreeable to the offer. It never quite<br />

worked out that way. At every stop<br />

along the way west across the country<br />

to Bergen, it was invariably the<br />

hosts’ insistence that I join them for<br />

a meal or two, as well as overnight<br />

lodging in two instances, and I was<br />

made to feel equally welcome as a<br />

Tourists don’t know where they’ve been,<br />

travelers don’t know where they’re going.<br />

Paul <strong>The</strong>roux<br />

friend of Karl’s. At every stop, it always<br />

seemed to be snack time, and I<br />

enjoyed watching the animated discussions<br />

– in broken-English and<br />

broken-Norwegian – between Karl<br />

and his relatives, mainly close or distant<br />

cousins. <strong>The</strong> food on the farms<br />

was memorable, and I particularly<br />

appreciated those stops since it gave<br />

me the chance to wander off and<br />

tour the immaculate cattle barns and<br />

pens of the largest swine I’d ever<br />

seen, or watch the goats being<br />

milked. <strong>The</strong> whole family, including<br />

strapping sons and older relatives,<br />

would take time off from farm<br />

chores to gather with us for a lunch<br />

break – cheeses, wholesome homemade<br />

bread, grapes and the inevitable<br />

“kaka” and coffee. <strong>The</strong><br />

hearty farm breakfasts provided<br />

enough nourishment for a full day!<br />

Many of the younger folks spoke<br />

English fairly well, saving a lot of<br />

frantic referencing to Karl’s phrasebook;<br />

his grasp of Norwegian was<br />

about on a par with my mastery of<br />

Spanish.<br />

Along the way, we stopped at<br />

country churches and ancient graveyards,<br />

hundreds of waterfalls and<br />

cascading mountain streams; drove<br />

around and through mountains –<br />

there were dozens of tunnels cut<br />

into sheer rock, many of them two<br />

or more miles long. Our route took<br />

us on a winding drive along the<br />

fjords with towering “Rockies” on<br />

both sides and, at one point, the<br />

“highway” becomes a 25-mile ferry<br />

cruise on the sparkling (and frigid)<br />

blue waters of the fjord, between<br />

snow-capped mountains that met<br />

the shoreline precipitously. A thousand<br />

(or more) waterfalls cascaded<br />

spectacularly down from the snowy<br />

heights all along the way. Everyone<br />

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upper decks enjoying the view. Despite<br />

the breeze over the waters, we<br />

were dressed for it, and the midday<br />

sun made it quite comfortable outside.<br />

When we finally arrived in<br />

Bergen on the fourth day, we parked<br />

along the wharf and browsed<br />

through the flower, fish and crafts<br />

marketplace in the center of the city,<br />

then took a funicular ride to the<br />

1,050-foot high overlook atop Mt.<br />

Floyen, gaining a fantastic<br />

panoramic view – from the restaurant<br />

terrace – of the surrounding<br />

harbor, fjords, mountains…and the<br />

<strong>North</strong> Sea. After descending, we did<br />

some more window-shopping<br />

downtown which was interrupted by<br />

an entertaining Trade Fair parade<br />

through that part of the city, each<br />

business or organization represented<br />

by either a float, band, or costumed<br />

group advertising their products or<br />

services. Apparently, it was an annual<br />

event enjoyed equally by participants<br />

and their appreciative audience of<br />

townspeople and tourists.<br />

We retraced our journey eastward;<br />

there aren’t any optional<br />

routes, just side spurs, and even this<br />

one is closed during several winter<br />

months due to snow and ice. We<br />

made just a couple of stops to visit<br />

other friends of Karl’s along the way<br />

back; we couldn’t extend the auto<br />

rental since the company’s inventory<br />

was small and the vehicle was promised<br />

to another party.<br />

Back in Oslo, we toured the 75acre<br />

Frogner Park which is the<br />

showcase for the fascinating outdoor<br />

sculptures of Gustav Vigeland -hundreds<br />

of granite and bronze<br />

nude statues depicting the cycle of<br />

life. It was Sunday, so the park was<br />

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crowded with families, picnickers,<br />

sunbathers, lovers, and many tourists<br />

like us. Because of the weekly flight<br />

schedule from Fornebu, we never<br />

had time to take in the (Edvard)<br />

Munch Museum or go out to the<br />

several maritime museums on the<br />

Bygdøy Peninsula; would have liked<br />

to see explorer/anthropologist Thor<br />

Heyerdahl’s famous raft and reed<br />

boat, “Kon Tiki,” about which I’d<br />

read so long ago. Our parting dinner<br />

at one of Oslo’s outdoor cafes<br />

ended with a toast to Norway --<br />

”Mangettusentäkk!” (Many thousand<br />

thanks!) -- for its hospitality and<br />

the uniformly superb weather<br />

vouchsafed for us this past week.<br />

Other interesting Norwegian<br />

words…all self-explanatory:<br />

Resepsjon<br />

Velkommen<br />

Konferansenter<br />

Sykkielparkering<br />

Tobakk<br />

Bibliotek<br />

Frukt<br />

Parfymeri<br />

Täkk = ‘Thank you’<br />

Karl and I parted company at<br />

the Fornebu Air Base with a heartfelt<br />

“Farvel” as he left to take advantage<br />

of an unscheduled<br />

diplomatic flight to Stuttgart, Germany,<br />

in the hope that it would be<br />

more advantageous for him to connect<br />

with a flight to Dover. (We kept<br />

up a correspondence for seven more<br />

years until a son advised that he had<br />

passed away.) My (virtually private)<br />

C-141 “<strong>Star</strong>lifter” took off with its<br />

single passenger and reached<br />

Mildenhall without incident. Since I<br />

was alone, I was invited to sit in the<br />

jump seat of the cockpit for the entire<br />

flight as a guest of the captain<br />

who was giving another pilot a check<br />

ride. Aside from being a unique experience,<br />

it helped pass the flight<br />

time quickly. From Mildenhall I had<br />

just an overnight wait for a hop over<br />

the Atlantic back to Plattsburgh. Not<br />

all ‘Space Available’ travel is this<br />

serendipitous, but I’ve generally been<br />

among those who’ve been able to<br />

“keep on moving.”<br />

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Forest Resources: What do mean by “sustainable?” Steve Long, executive director, Center for �orthern<br />

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Trends in Vermont Bird Populations: Are we helping or hurting? Rosalind Renfrew, conservation biologist,<br />

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Aliens Disturbing the Balance. David Houston, ecologist and tree pathologist (ret.), U.S. Forest Service.<br />

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Wildlife Restoration and Recovery: Should wolves return to Vermont? Walter Medwid, executive director,<br />

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Wildlife Management Success in Vermont: Lessons from the Common Loon. Ray and Evelyn<br />

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Riding across America<br />

BY WOODY STARKWEATHER<br />

Afew years ago my<br />

wife and I took a trip<br />

across the country<br />

by train. We did it for a lark,<br />

but it turned out to be a<br />

much larger bird.<br />

Our reason for traveling was<br />

that we were giving a few papers<br />

and attending some committee<br />

meetings at a conference in San<br />

Francisco. Living in Philadelphia at<br />

the time, we found out that the trip<br />

would take four and a half days if<br />

we went via Washington, D.C. We<br />

were both busy people, and four<br />

and a half days seemed like an extravagant<br />

expenditure of time for a<br />

frivolity. Spending the same<br />

amount of time again for the pleasure<br />

of the return trip was out of<br />

the question, so, we chose a plan<br />

that enabled us to make our return<br />

trip by air. This turned out to be a<br />

very wise decision, although it was<br />

based on faulty reasoning.<br />

<strong>The</strong> entire round trip cost only<br />

slightly more than if we had done it<br />

all by air, so it seemed to us, as we<br />

set out cheerily from Philadelphia,<br />

that we were going to have quite a<br />

lot of fun for not much money.<br />

We would be meeting interesting<br />

people over white tablecloths in a<br />

dining car that served fine meals.<br />

We would be able to watch the<br />

passing grandeur of America. In<br />

between these pleasures, we had a<br />

good supply of books to read and<br />

a couple of New York Times<br />

crossword puzzles, just in case we<br />

got bored. Maybe we would work<br />

a little too.<br />

We had to get ourselves to<br />

Washington, D.C. first, and being<br />

purists, we did this by train too. We<br />

lived not more than a half mile<br />

from the Philadelphia station, so<br />

we rolled our carefully packed suitcases<br />

along the sidewalks, pleased<br />

at our independence from automobiles.<br />

<strong>The</strong> train came and left on<br />

time, and we showed the conductor<br />

the first page of our thick<br />

booklet of tickets. We even<br />

bragged a little to one or two fellow<br />

travelers that we were going to<br />

travel across our great country by<br />

train, and we were too caught up in<br />

our own adventurous excitement<br />

to take note of the skepticism that<br />

rolled like ocean swells across their<br />

faces.<br />

We arrived at D.C.’s Union Station<br />

on time, but the departing<br />

train to Chicago would be about an<br />

hour late. This was actually an<br />

omen, but if it had been the entrails<br />

of a sheep we could not have misread<br />

it more. We had plenty of<br />

time, we thought, so we had coffee<br />

and waited.<br />

Time passed quickly and our<br />

train was called. We boarded with<br />

undiminished enthusiasm and were<br />

further pleased to find a special<br />

compartment where luggage could<br />

be stored, located cleverly close to<br />

the entrance to the car but also not<br />

far from our compartment. Our<br />

compartment was, of course,<br />

small, but we had it all to ourselves,<br />

and in this there was a kind of coziness,<br />

a feeling I recalled when, as<br />

a boy, I crawled into a pup tent to<br />

spend a night “camping” on the<br />

beach in Connecticut. We had paid<br />

the extra amount to have the convenience<br />

of a toilet and shower in<br />

our compartment, and there it was,<br />

startlingly tiny but functional. <strong>The</strong><br />

most surprising thing about it was<br />

that the toilet and shower were in<br />

fact the same appliance. To<br />

shower, you lowered the toilet seat,<br />

and sat on it if you wanted to. To<br />

use the toilet, you just had to make<br />

sure that the shower wasn’t on and<br />

that the seat was dry. <strong>The</strong>re was no<br />

shelf to put razor and toothbrush<br />

on, but that was OK because they<br />

would have gotten wet in the<br />

shower anyway. I believe my wife’s<br />

reaction to the shower was an enigmatic<br />

“Oh my.”<br />

<strong>The</strong> toilet/shower was not<br />

enough to dampen our enthusiasm.<br />

Dampening did occur, however,<br />

a half hour after we pulled out<br />

of the station when all the lights<br />

went out and the train abruptly<br />

stopped. At this point in the journey<br />

we had clearly not reached the<br />

grandeur of America, for the scene<br />

outside our window was dominated<br />

in the foreground by a large,<br />

rusted steel beam from which a<br />

wire hung loopily. <strong>The</strong>se objects<br />

were arranged against a background<br />

of soot-colored, ancient<br />

concrete buildings with a repeating<br />

pattern of greasy lightless windows<br />

through which nothing could be<br />

seen. We examined this still life for<br />

about a half an hour – it was too<br />

dark to read. No one ever told us<br />

what the problem was, but we<br />

asked the porter, an elderly and<br />

most accommodating gentleman,<br />

and he explained that the train had<br />

lost power. I refrained from saying<br />

“Well, duh!” He went on to say<br />

that it would take a while to find the<br />

break, and it did. My sense was that<br />

a plug had fallen out of a socket<br />

somewhere, and they were looking<br />

over the whole train to see where<br />

the two-pronged thing was hanging<br />

down bouncing on the ties. I<br />

never knew that the electrical circuitry<br />

on a train was like that on a<br />

string of Christmas tree lights.<br />

One break in the circuit and the<br />

whole string goes dark. Eventually,<br />

the lights came on, and we heard<br />

muffled cheers from the other<br />

compartments. <strong>The</strong> train started<br />

up again. We were by this time<br />

about two hours late, but we<br />

thought we’ll just spend a little less<br />

time in Chicago.<br />

Dinner was served at different<br />

times for different sections of the<br />

train. We understood this. We<br />

knew there was only one dining car<br />

and, we imagined, one staff of<br />

well-trained waiters with serving<br />

towels draped over one arm, and<br />

one chef with his tall white hat, so<br />

we would have to wait our turn.<br />

Our turn came at 7:00, when our<br />

section was called to dinner and we<br />

made our way to the dining care.<br />

Soon, a plump, middle-aged<br />

woman trundled a cart down the<br />

aisle of the dining car, asked us<br />

curtly if we wanted spaghetti or a<br />

hamburger, and deposited four<br />

plastic food trays on our table before<br />

she moved down the aisle to<br />

the next set of tables. I revised my<br />

imagination. <strong>The</strong> tall white hat was<br />

gone, as were the serving towels.<br />

<strong>The</strong> “staff” was just the one lady.<br />

Something to drink came later,<br />

after we were finished. I have a lit-<br />

tle trouble swallowing and like to<br />

have something liquid to sip on<br />

while I am eating. It saves me from<br />

really serious choking. On a plane,<br />

one of the flight attendants will always<br />

take a few minutes to accommodate<br />

my desire, but it wasn’t<br />

possible on the train, where you<br />

would expect there would be more<br />

time. So I had to eat my hamburger<br />

very slowly, which was not<br />

difficult. It was awful, and slowly<br />

was OK. Not at all would have<br />

been better. I brought a little bottle<br />

of water with me to future<br />

meals.<br />

Our dinner companions were<br />

an elderly couple from Belgium,<br />

who had never traveled on an<br />

American train before. I think it is<br />

reasonable to describe their reaction<br />

to the dinner service as “appalled<br />

amazement.” We tried to<br />

talk to them about their life in Europe,<br />

but they were so shocked at<br />

the poverty of service and the quality<br />

of the food that they had little<br />

energy left for conversation. Belgium<br />

has one of the world’s finest<br />

cuisines, and the trains of Europe<br />

have been providing first-rate service<br />

for years, so their reaction was<br />

not out of line. I wondered,<br />

though, why someone in Belgium<br />

hadn’t warned them. <strong>The</strong>y may<br />

have good food, but their travel<br />

agents don’t know everything.<br />

We were scheduled to reach<br />

Chicago by noon of the following<br />

day, but of course we had spent an<br />

hour looking for the plug, on top<br />

of the late departure. On an airplane,<br />

the pilot apparently has ways<br />

of making up time that has been<br />

lost in delays. I can’t imagine how<br />

they do this; maybe they just crank<br />

her up another couple hundred<br />

miles an hour, or take some<br />

unimaginable aerial shortcut. Certainly,<br />

there are no shortcuts in the<br />

rail system, but somehow I expected<br />

that in the morning we<br />

would wake up and discover that<br />

we were back on schedule. Unfortunately,<br />

it didn’t happen. We had a<br />

reasonably undisturbed night’s<br />

sleep, followed by a horrible breakfast,<br />

and rolled into Chicago late by<br />

exactly the two hours.<br />

We had now about two and<br />

half hours to spend in Chicago, a<br />

luxury of time off the train we<br />

would not see again, and we decided<br />

to find a good restaurant and<br />

enjoy a really fine lunch. By this<br />

time we knew we were not going<br />

to find anything but high-school<br />

cafeteria food on the train.<br />

We walked just a few blocks<br />

and found what we wanted. That,<br />

in a nutshell, is the advantage of<br />

train travel. When you get off an<br />

airplane, you are in an airport, and<br />

they are all pretty much the same.<br />

You can exhaust your interest in an<br />

airport in a half hour. But when<br />

you step off a train, you are probably<br />

in the middle of a city, where<br />

anything can happen, and with the<br />

right connections and a little planning,<br />

you can spend some time<br />

there. We found an elegant sidewalk<br />

café and sat leisurely watching<br />

the city walk by us. <strong>The</strong> food was<br />

fine.<br />

As we re-entered the train station,<br />

we were immensely surprised<br />

to run into someone we knew, a<br />

young Taiwanese man who had


Page 15<br />

lived with us the previous year, then<br />

moved to Chicago.<br />

“That man looks like…”<br />

“It is! It’s Jim Wang!”<br />

We then had a brief conversation<br />

with Jim, and hurried off to our<br />

train with not much time to spare.<br />

We didn’t know it at the time, but<br />

running into Jim Wang in Chicago<br />

would turn out to be the highlight<br />

of our train trip. Had we known,<br />

we would have talked to him a little<br />

longer. Even a few seconds would<br />

have made a difference.<br />

<strong>The</strong> train was delayed leaving<br />

Chicago, and we sat in our compartment<br />

reading and occasionally<br />

saying things like “Hm, hm, Jim<br />

Wang! Imagine!”<br />

After an hour or so we started<br />

rolling out of Chicago, and we<br />

watched the passing scene: warehouses,<br />

poor neighborhoods, old<br />

factories, some of them abandoned.<br />

Trains don’t go through the nice<br />

parts of town. An apartment next<br />

to the train tracks is a place to live if<br />

you can’t afford anything better. We<br />

soon found out that whenever we<br />

came to any good-sized towns, we<br />

could count on a good look at the<br />

ugliest part of it.<br />

Out in the countryside, however,<br />

it is a different story. At many<br />

times during our trip we could look<br />

out our widow and see nothing but<br />

corn in every direction available to<br />

us. Sometimes it was wheat, but<br />

mostly corn. Because there is so<br />

much of it, the train traveler is able<br />

to really savor the experience of<br />

looking at a cornfield. Occasionally,<br />

some small scene breaks up the<br />

beauty of the field – a car waiting to<br />

cross the train tracks perhaps, and it<br />

would be interesting to look at it, see<br />

if it’s a man or woman driving, or<br />

try to figure out the model of the<br />

car, some little amusement like that,<br />

but usually the scene flashes by too<br />

quickly. Your head swivels to follow<br />

it, but the enjoyment is over in a<br />

moment, and you’re back to the<br />

corn. We read more.<br />

In a later part of the trip we<br />

were pleased to see the corn give<br />

way to salt flats. <strong>The</strong>se are very<br />

much like cornfields in their size and<br />

overall interest, but they are white<br />

and they do not move in the wind.<br />

We had been doing the corn for<br />

a good long while and had eaten<br />

several meals, waxing nostalgic<br />

about mystery meat, jello pudding,<br />

and other memories of high school<br />

cafeteria food, when the train came<br />

to a halt again. No one told us what<br />

had happened, so we had to ask our<br />

porter again. He explained to us<br />

that there had been severe thunderstorms<br />

ahead, even a tornado, and<br />

we had to wait until it was safe to<br />

proceed. <strong>The</strong>re may have been<br />

flooding on the tracks.<br />

It made sense. We didn’t want<br />

to go charging into a dangerous situation.<br />

But I wondered if they hadn’t<br />

exaggerated a little. If it were a<br />

square-rigged sailing vessel on the<br />

Atlantic in the 18th Century, I could<br />

see it. You would need to wait for<br />

favorable conditions before proceeding.<br />

But a train is such a big,<br />

heavy, metallic thing it ought to be<br />

impervious to the vagaries of<br />

weather, but apparently not. We<br />

read some more.<br />

We wandered up and down the<br />

train, which was easy to do when it<br />

wasn’t moving, smiling at people.<br />

We had been seated with some of<br />

them in the high school cafeteria,<br />

and they smiled back. I should add<br />

here that we didn’t actually meet any<br />

interesting people on the train.<br />

Some of them were afraid of flying;<br />

others were trying not to spend too<br />

much money. Most were traveling<br />

shorter distances than we were. We<br />

didn’t see the Belgian couple again.<br />

We didn’t meet anyone else who was<br />

doing it for the fun of it.<br />

After exploring the train several<br />

times, we went back to our compartment<br />

and read some more from<br />

our books. I think we did the crossword<br />

puzzles at this time too. It was<br />

easier to fill in the squares when the<br />

train wasn’t moving. After a while,<br />

maybe an hour or more, the winds<br />

were favorable and the train started<br />

again.<br />

That evening, there was going to<br />

be a big event. A movie would be<br />

shown in the lounge car. My wife<br />

and I like movies and go often, so<br />

we were looking forward to seeing<br />

this one, even though it was one we<br />

had seen before. We got there early<br />

to make sure we had a good seat.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re were larger windows than in<br />

our compartment and while it was<br />

still light, we could enjoy the passing<br />

corn. Show time came and<br />

went, but there was no movie. After<br />

a while we flagged down a passing<br />

train employee who told us that<br />

someone had forgotten the movie<br />

– it was still in Chicago.<br />

About 15 minutes before we<br />

were due to arrive in the next town,<br />

where a new crew was waiting for<br />

us, the train came to a stop. This<br />

time, the delay was very long –<br />

about two hours – and during this<br />

time we saw outside the window the<br />

back lot of a place called the “American<br />

Earth Compaction Machinery<br />

Co.” It was Sunday, so all the earth<br />

compactor people were at home,<br />

but most of the machines they sold,<br />

some of them very large and impressive,<br />

were right there in front of<br />

us, to be examined at our leisure.<br />

And we did. We came to know a little<br />

bit about earth compaction dur-<br />

ing that time, something you can’t<br />

usually study in a place like Philadelphia<br />

for all its museums, theaters,<br />

concerts by a world-famous orchestra,<br />

or its many fine restaurants and<br />

quality movie houses, or its highclass<br />

shopping, its history of involvement<br />

in the birth of America,<br />

or its extensive waterfront where<br />

something is always going on, or its<br />

many universities, institutes, and colleges.<br />

Nope. In Philadelphia there’s<br />

just nothing about earth compaction.<br />

We could have used a<br />

brochure, though. We had to guess<br />

sometimes about just what kind of<br />

job a certain machine could do. A<br />

brochure definitely would have<br />

helped.<br />

After about an hour and a half,<br />

some of us were beginning to contemplate<br />

mutiny, if that’s the right<br />

word for when the passengers on a<br />

train charge into the locomotive<br />

and take control, but we restrained<br />

ourselves. We again flagged down<br />

a passing employee and asked<br />

what was going on. What had<br />

happened is that, because of the<br />

earlier delays, when we were wait-<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 15<br />

ing for favorable winds, the crew<br />

had accumulated eleven hours of<br />

operating time. Of course they<br />

weren’t actually “operating” during<br />

that time. Probably, in fact, they<br />

were snoozing in comfy cots. Federal<br />

regulations, which the unionized<br />

workers had to abide by<br />

according to their contract, disallowed<br />

them from driving, or apparently<br />

even occupying, the train<br />

for more than that amount of<br />

time. So when they hit eleven<br />

hours at the wheel, they stopped,<br />

15 minutes outside of the next<br />

... we were going to travel across our great country by train, and we were<br />

too caught up in our own adventurous excitement to take note of the<br />

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stop. It didn’t matter that for more<br />

than an hour they were not doing<br />

anything. A new crew had to be<br />

driven by car out to the train. This<br />

explanation sounded unreasonable<br />

to us. We had no problem believing<br />

the part about the Federal regulations<br />

and the absolute<br />

impossibility of extending it by 15<br />

minutes to accommodate the<br />

comfort of several hundred passengers.<br />

Sure. That sounded like<br />

the government work rules and<br />

the unions we knew. What was<br />

hard to figure was the fact that we<br />

were only 15 minutes from the station<br />

by train, yet it took two hours<br />

to get the crew to us by taxi. It just<br />

didn’t add up. We had the impression<br />

that no one could possibly<br />

have anticipated this star-crossed<br />

eventuality, that the new crew was<br />

scattered all over the countryside.<br />

If the train hadn’t run out of time,<br />

they would have been waiting on<br />

the platform, waiving to their colleagues<br />

as they rolled in, but because<br />

the train was off by 15<br />

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scramble to get them all together<br />

and into a taxi. I could imagine<br />

them piling out of the taxi like a<br />

bunch of circus clowns, out there<br />

in the cornfield, laughing and<br />

shaking their heads, “Boy, you really<br />

had us going with that one.<br />

Imagine using up the eleven hours.<br />

Who’d a thunk it! Well, here we<br />

are. Let’s get going.”<br />

With the new crew in place,<br />

the train moved the remaining 15<br />

minutes into the station. Things<br />

seemed back to normal. But as we<br />

progressed there were more delays,<br />

not as long, but quite a few, and<br />

each one of them added on to the<br />

previous ones, so that in the end<br />

we were over eight hours late to<br />

our destination. I will say that the<br />

Rockies were beautiful, but later<br />

when we passed through the<br />

beautiful Sierra Nevada Mountains,<br />

which I had been looking<br />

forward to, it was night so we<br />

couldn’t see anything. After that,<br />

then the train turned south and<br />

made a long leg down through<br />

California, which took another day.<br />

We read some more. <strong>The</strong>re may<br />

have been something to see out<br />

the window, but we were too tired<br />

and disgusted by this time to even<br />

bother trying to look.<br />

We had been scheduled to arrive<br />

in San Francisco at about five<br />

in the afternoon. <strong>The</strong>re was no<br />

more food on the train, which was<br />

actually a good thing. We finally<br />

arrived at 2:00 AM, and there was<br />

some kind of delay with the luggage,<br />

so it was almost 3:30 AM<br />

when we got to our hotel, checked<br />

in, and we were able to get a few<br />

hours of sleep before the first<br />

paper, one of mine, which had to<br />

be presented at 8:30 that morning.<br />

My wife was lucky. Her paper was<br />

a couple of days later, and she was<br />

well rested by that time.<br />

We had read eight books between<br />

us and seen the grandeur of<br />

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16 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

FollowtheMoney<br />

BROW�’S<br />

MARKET<br />

AS WE SOW<br />

BY RACHEL SIEGEL<br />

Before there was an<br />

eight-hour day, there<br />

was Labor Day. First<br />

organized as a day to honor<br />

“the working citizens” in<br />

1882, Labor Day quickly<br />

caught on, and was a recognized<br />

federal holiday by<br />

1894, thirty-one years after<br />

the formal end of slavery in<br />

America. <strong>The</strong> eight-hour<br />

day, although hard won in a<br />

few union contracts, was not<br />

recognized by law until the<br />

Fair Labor Standards Act of<br />

1938, over forty years later.<br />

What happened in those<br />

seventy-five years between<br />

the end of slavery and the<br />

eight-hour day were a redefinition<br />

of labor, and a reimagination<br />

of working life.<br />

For millennia, most people<br />

were farmers, peasants, serfs, or<br />

slaves who did what needed to be<br />

done, scheduled by the seasons.<br />

<strong>The</strong> discipline was simple: sow and<br />

reap wherever and whenever possible<br />

to maximize harvest yields.<br />

Food preservation was relatively<br />

primitive, so most food was relatively<br />

perishable, so work—creating<br />

and preserving food—simply<br />

had to happen all the time.<br />

People worked to live, and lived<br />

as long as they could work. <strong>The</strong> relationship<br />

between employer and<br />

employee was simple. Either a person<br />

worked his own land or someone<br />

else’s. Legally or practically,<br />

labor belonged to whoever owned<br />

the land.<br />

Time became a measure of<br />

labor when labor focused on producing<br />

goods other than food.<br />

Things that could be stored could<br />

be produced—or not—anytime.<br />

Time is a frustrating measure of<br />

productivity. It can lead to the<br />

skewed incentive of waiting out the<br />

clock or just putting in the hours,<br />

but it is a way, however imperfect,<br />

of giving us a measure for un-measurable<br />

efforts.<br />

<strong>The</strong> technological breakthroughs<br />

of industrialization were<br />

in harnessing energy that could replace<br />

human energy: mechanical<br />

engines to power machines that<br />

could mimic human labor. But<br />

even as we invented leisure for the<br />

masses, the revelation of scale<br />

economies suggested maximum<br />

use or round the clock production.<br />

With a market-based economy<br />

came a labor market. Labor had always<br />

been a commodity, but now<br />

each worker could trade it for himself.<br />

Very quickly the mobile and<br />

competitive labor market tipped in<br />

the factory owner’s favor. <strong>The</strong> response<br />

was labor organizing,<br />

unions, strikes, scabs, violence, revolution<br />

in some places, and finally,<br />

legal recognition of standards for<br />

workplace conditions and behavior.<br />

This was all an attempt to come<br />

to some new understanding of the<br />

roles of employer and employee,<br />

of bourgeoisie and proletariat,<br />

based on the hope of freedom<br />

from labor. Our solution was to<br />

frame those roles by measuring<br />

them in time, a way of establishing<br />

a unit that can be priced for trade.<br />

<strong>The</strong> working life was framed as<br />

well: retirement was manufactured<br />

and then mass produced, as were<br />

the mutual funds and investment<br />

markets that seemed to effortlessly<br />

multiply savings.<br />

<strong>The</strong> more an economy focuses<br />

on producing ideas or services<br />

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rather than goods the harder it is to<br />

measure output, let alone effort.<br />

Our modern economy can often<br />

be relieved of the common, centralized<br />

workplace. After all, minds<br />

can work anywhere as long as they<br />

can communicate: laborers become<br />

mobile devices, practitioners<br />

of “distance working.” Networks<br />

are replacing hierarchies as organizational<br />

designs.<br />

As hierarchies flatten and markets<br />

grow longer tails, the working<br />

relationships that we have struggled<br />

to define are melting. Hourly<br />

wages are disappearing and salaries<br />

are not far behind, as are any benefits.<br />

In their place is the billable<br />

hour of the independent contractor,<br />

the worker—but not employee—who<br />

pays the taxes, health<br />

care premiums, and retirement<br />

contributions that employers used<br />

to pay.<br />

Ideas are perishable—only<br />

good until the next one comes<br />

along—and investments are too.<br />

Once again workers must labor<br />

continuously, scheduled not by the<br />

time clock but by the work itself, so<br />

as to maximize their yields. <strong>The</strong><br />

freelancer must always hustle for<br />

jobs, and always turn around whatever<br />

comes in. As farmers used to<br />

say, make hay while the sun shines.<br />

Whether working in the fields,<br />

in the factories, or in cyberspace,<br />

the discipline is still simple. Labor<br />

belongs to whoever owns the farm,<br />

the factory, or the way to create<br />

value. For a while there, about a<br />

century more or less, the idea that<br />

our inventions could relieve our<br />

toils and perhaps our souls was seductive<br />

enough to inspire struggle<br />

and sacrifice and to defy that apparent<br />

truth.<br />

So here’s to Labor Day: one<br />

eight-hour day set aside to honor<br />

the dream of owning our own<br />

time. Enjoy the parade and the barbecue.<br />

Next morning, it’ll be back<br />

to work.<br />

Rachel S. Siegel, CFA, consults on<br />

investment portfolio performance and<br />

strategy, and on accounting dilemmas. She<br />

is a professor in the business administration<br />

department at Lyndon State College.<br />

“Follow the Money” has been a regular<br />

feature in the <strong>North</strong>star since 2001.<br />

Off to the races<br />

<strong>The</strong> Kingdom puts its own spin<br />

on the television show<br />

<strong>The</strong> Great <strong>North</strong>east<br />

Kingdom Great<br />

Race landed in<br />

Danville at about this time<br />

last year. On a cool September<br />

Saturday, three Danville<br />

area businesses hosted<br />

“challenges” for participants<br />

.<br />

<strong>The</strong> NK Great Race is based<br />

on the hit TV series, “<strong>The</strong> Amazing<br />

Race” and pits teams of four<br />

against each other in a daylong<br />

event with “challenges” that are<br />

both mentally and physically demanding.<br />

This is an annual event<br />

sponsored by <strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong>east<br />

Kingdom Skating Club. <strong>The</strong> 2009<br />

NK Great Race is scheduled for<br />

Saturday, Sept. 19.<br />

Last year’s race started at the<br />

Burke school with team members<br />

completing a mentally challenging<br />

sudoko puzzle. <strong>The</strong> teams were<br />

then directed to Band Stand Park<br />

in Lyndonville where teams had to<br />

recruit the help of someone passing<br />

by the park to climb into a<br />

wheelbarrow while team members<br />

raced around the park pushing.<br />

Next, teams filled gallon jugs with<br />

water from the park fountain. <strong>The</strong><br />

catch being the jugs and the fountain<br />

were several yards apart and<br />

only a sponge could be used to<br />

transport water relay style from the<br />

fountain to the jug. Next, contestants<br />

jogged to the Lyndonville Fire<br />

Department where they put out a<br />

mock fire. From there teams built<br />

a fence at <strong>The</strong> Caledonia County<br />

Fairgrounds before driving to<br />

Danville for three more challeneges.<br />

<strong>The</strong> first stop was the Vermont<br />

Corn Maze in Danville. Some<br />

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teams with skilled maze travelers<br />

made it through in roughly 40<br />

minutes, while others took up to<br />

three hours to complete the challenge.<br />

After the corn maze, teams<br />

were directed to InJun Joe’s Court<br />

where they hopped into paddle<br />

boats and paddled their way across<br />

Joes Pond to the public beach and<br />

back again. <strong>The</strong>n it was off to<br />

Sugar Ridge Campground where<br />

everyone’s scouting skills were put<br />

to the test as teams struggled to<br />

build a camp fire using only a<br />

handful of hay and a flint.<br />

<strong>The</strong> 2009 NK Great Race will<br />

start at the Burke Town School in<br />

West Burke. Cash and other prizes<br />

will be given to the first, second<br />

and third place teams. Each team<br />

consists of four participants, all of<br />

which must be over 18 years of<br />

age, and in good physical health.<br />

One member of each team needs<br />

a valid driver’s license. <strong>The</strong> entry<br />

fee for each team of four members<br />

is $100. Team registration<br />

forms are to be received by Sept.<br />

11. Late registrations will be accepted<br />

after that date but will be<br />

subject to an additional $50 late fee<br />

per team. No registrations will be<br />

accepted after Sept. 16. Forms can<br />

be downloaded at www.neksc.org<br />

or may be picked up at Currier’s<br />

Market in Glover and the Village<br />

Sports Shop in Lyndonville. For<br />

more information, or to request a<br />

form by mail contact Krystal Ingalls<br />

at (802) 525-4576 or Sonia<br />

Peters at (802) 328-3886.<br />

This event is sponsored by<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom Skating<br />

Club. <strong>The</strong> NKSC consists of<br />

skaters ranging in age from four to<br />

fifty and is based at <strong>The</strong> Fenton<br />

Chester Arena in Lyndonville.<br />

198 Route 2<br />

W. Danville, VT<br />

P.O. Box 196<br />

802-684-3411<br />

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www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 17<br />

TWO GREAT LOCATIONSS:<br />

Caledonia Farmers Market<br />

Pearl St., St. Johnsbury<br />

Saturday, September 26, 9 a.m. - 1 p.m.<br />

Live animals & demonstrations on display<br />

.<br />

Catamount Arts<br />

Eastern Avenue, St. Johnsbury<br />

Sunday, September 27, 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.


18 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Old Fashioned<br />

Horse Power<br />

Photographed by Jim Ashley<br />

<strong>The</strong> Danville Fair Horse and Pony Pull set a new<br />

record of teams participating this year in several<br />

classes, thanks to active sponsors and community<br />

support.<br />

“We had twice as many teams in the 3,300 pound class tha+n we<br />

did last year and more teams in the Free For All Horses class than<br />

I’ve ever seen” said Dave Hare, the Horse and Pony Pull Chair for the<br />

Danville Chamber of Commerce. Raymond Thayer of <strong>North</strong> Haverhill<br />

NH was the announcer and Dave Welch operated his “cherry<br />

picker” to add new weight each time the teams progressed to a new<br />

level.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Danville Fair Horse and Pony pull featured a 1,800-pound<br />

Pony Class sponsored by Gilmour Ford and a Free For All Pony Class<br />

sponsored by Crosstown Motors on Friday evening Aug. 7. Nineteen<br />

teams from as far away as Sanbornville, N.H. competed in the pony<br />

classes with trophies for first through third place and ribbons and<br />

cash prizes going through 6th place. In the 1,800-pound class, the<br />

Craig Foss team from Sanbornville, N.H., won first place pulling 6,500<br />

pounds. <strong>The</strong> Pony Free For All was won by the Phil Morse team of<br />

Arlington, Vt., pulling 9,500 pounds. Only two inches separated 1st<br />

and 2nd place in the Free For All which was won by the Gould and<br />

Royce team of Townsend, Vt.<br />

Saturday’s pull featured two classes of horses; a 3,300-pound class<br />

sponsored by Maple Hill Horse Farm and a Free For All Sponsored<br />

by Marty’s First Stop. First place in the 3,300 pound class went to the<br />

Stone and Ingerson team from Jefferson, N.H., who pulled 10,500<br />

pounds and the Daniels and Whitaker team from Irasburg, Vt., took<br />

First Place in the Free For All Class pulling 11,000.<br />

New this year was an expanded Teamster Award given in memory<br />

of George Surridge, Jr. consisting of a special trophy and a cash<br />

prize sponsored by Littleton Chevrolet in each class over the two<br />

days.”All the teamsters put in a lot of work during the season and its<br />

nice to see them recognized this way. This year, younger teamsters<br />

pulled and one of them, Dustin Thayer of Piermont, N.H., won the<br />

award in the 3,300-pound class.<br />

I’m sure this is a trophy that he will treasure for many years” Hare<br />

said. “A lot of people work hard to make the Danville Fair Horse and<br />

Pony Pull happens each year and to see so many teams participate is<br />

a real tribute to each of them and our sponsors.” For more photos<br />

please go to www.northstarmonthly.com.<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 19<br />

»Results:<br />

Pony Pull<br />

1,800 lb Class<br />

1st Craig Foss<br />

Sanbornville, NH<br />

2nd Dupony & Sons<br />

Lancaster, NH<br />

3rd Gould & Royce<br />

Townsend, VT<br />

4th John Lahaye<br />

Etna, NH<br />

Pony Pull<br />

Free for all<br />

1st Phil Morse<br />

Arlington, VT<br />

2nd Gould & Royce<br />

Townshend, VT<br />

3rd Craig Foss<br />

Sanbornville, NH<br />

4th Gould & Royce<br />

Townshend, VT<br />

Horse Pull<br />

3,300 lb Class<br />

1st Stone & Ingerson<br />

Jeffersonville, NH<br />

2nd Wade & Savage<br />

Erroll, NH<br />

3rd Johnson & Perkins<br />

Putney, VT<br />

4th Johnson & Perkins<br />

Putney, VT<br />

Horse Pull<br />

Free for all<br />

1st Daniels & Whitaker<br />

Irasburg, VT<br />

2nd Jeff Simpson<br />

Barton, VT<br />

3rd Art Connolly<br />

Brownington, VT<br />

4th Johnson & Perkins<br />

Putney, VT<br />

»Thank You:<br />

»A Special Thanks to Dave<br />

Hare, who coordinated the<br />

horse and pony pull on behalf<br />

of the Danville Chamber of<br />

Commerce.


20 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Berries and wildflowers<br />

Walden Hill Journal with Jeff & Ellen Gold<br />

Sept. 2, 2008<br />

More clear weather to welcome<br />

in September. Our thermometer<br />

showed a high of 83°<br />

today but low humidity kept the<br />

day comfortable. I dug more potatoes<br />

today. <strong>The</strong> white Onaways<br />

have matured before the red variety.<br />

It’s a good yield so far with<br />

some large spuds. Without deer<br />

eating the plants or beetles devouring<br />

the leaves, we have a very<br />

acceptable harvest. Lots of rain<br />

seemed to encourage this year’s<br />

crop as well. We did a third and<br />

probably final basil harvest for<br />

pesto. <strong>The</strong>re’s still one small container<br />

left from ’07 and plenty<br />

from ’08 to enjoy throughout the<br />

winter. Fresh pesto is a tasty treat<br />

but we’ll enjoy the frozen servings<br />

too. <strong>The</strong> sun took temporary<br />

shelter behind the clouds before<br />

setting. I took advantage of the<br />

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coolness of early evening to mow<br />

a bit of the yard. Mosquitoes<br />

weren’t as much of a problem as<br />

long as I kept on the move.<br />

Sept. 10, 2008<br />

Yesterday was a total washout<br />

with residual hurricane winds and<br />

rain gushing through. Remaining<br />

clouds are trying to make way for<br />

the morning sun. It’s a chilly 48°<br />

with temperatures predicted to<br />

drop into the 30’s and even high<br />

20’s. Our first frost warning of<br />

the season is in effect for tonight.<br />

I’ll bring the potted plants in for<br />

sure and see what in the garden<br />

might need harvesting. I’ll probably<br />

throw a sheet over the dahlias<br />

as well.<br />

Sept. 11, 2008<br />

Perfect weather for a day out<br />

at the Tunbridge Worlds Fair.<br />

Fortified with a blueberry pancake<br />

breakfast at the Danville Inn,<br />

we headed down the Peacham<br />

Road in the rising mist. A lone<br />

loon was floating on Ewell Pond,<br />

soaking in the morning sun. We<br />

headed west in Groton, hooked<br />

up with 110 south through<br />

Chelsea and finally to Tunbridge.<br />

Our friends from Great Britain<br />

were in search of giant pumpkins<br />

and were not disappointed in the<br />

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displays at the Fair. I was delighted<br />

by the fanciful animals<br />

and people created out of various<br />

gourds and vegetables by<br />

children of all ages. A display of<br />

contra dancing put on by 70 and<br />

80 year olds in full top hat, tails<br />

and old time long dresses and<br />

bonnets was surprisingly lively.<br />

One man even wore his oxygen<br />

tank while dancing. It was good<br />

advertisement on how to keep<br />

fit late in life. We continued our<br />

tour on to Strafford, <strong>The</strong>tford,<br />

Lake Fairlee and finally Bradford<br />

for dinner at the Perfect Pear.<br />

Sept. 19, 2008<br />

We picked a perfect 3-day<br />

window for a Maine mini-vacation<br />

on the coast. Our home<br />

base was Ogunquit: “beautiful<br />

gem by the sea”. We arrived<br />

there after a scenic drive across<br />

the Kancamagus highway, enjoying<br />

the early color, broad vistas<br />

and intimate waterfalls. In<br />

Ogunquit we walked the Marginal<br />

Way along the coast; oneway<br />

in the late afternoon with<br />

the tide receding and the return<br />

walk the next morning with a<br />

boisterous rising tide. We enjoyed<br />

strolling along Perkins’<br />

Cove and visiting the Ogunquit<br />

Museum of American Art,<br />

beautifully positioned on a rocky<br />

ledge above the ocean. Our big<br />

discovery there was a magnificent<br />

Maine watercolorist, Robert<br />

Eric Moore. Side trips from our<br />

home base brought us south<br />

along scenic Shore Road to<br />

Cape Nedick and its famous<br />

Nubble Lighthouse. Heading<br />

north, we visited the Rachel Carson<br />

National Wildlife Refuge for<br />

a self-guided walk along the salt<br />

marsh. From there we headed to<br />

the Gray Gull for a delicious and<br />

memorable seafood meal overlooking<br />

the cove. Seals came in<br />

with the outgoing tide to find a<br />

single exposed rock for the<br />

night. A beautifully silhouetted<br />

great blue heron, waited by the<br />

receding waves for his dinner to<br />

arrive. We returned home via<br />

Lake Winnepisauke and a stop<br />

at <strong>The</strong> Basin in Franconia<br />

Notch. It was a very full 3 days<br />

with varied natural areas to explore<br />

and enjoy.<br />

Sept. 20, 2008<br />

We definitely had a frost<br />

while we were away. Thursday<br />

night, Sept. 18th was evidently<br />

the guilty date. Basil and husk<br />

cherries got zapped and some<br />

of the dahlias succumbed as<br />

well. <strong>The</strong>re wasn’t much zucchini<br />

left anyway. I had picked<br />

some before we left and made<br />

zucchini drop cookies, half of<br />

which remain in the freezer. Fortunately<br />

we had brought in the<br />

pots of tuberous begonias and<br />

geraniums just in case. We can<br />

start thinking about bringing in<br />

the wood while the weather<br />

holds. It feels like it’s time to<br />

blacken the stove and be ready<br />

for that first slow burn.<br />

Sept. 23, 2008<br />

Fall officially arrived at 11:44<br />

A.M. yesterday. Vivid color<br />

gradually spreading through the<br />

valley and cooler temperatures<br />

concur with the calendar. Frost<br />

again this morning is winding<br />

down the gardens while bright<br />

sunshine has helped warm the<br />

days. It was absolutely perfectly<br />

clear for a Riverglen outing<br />

through the Dixville Notch with<br />

a stop at the Balsams clubhouse<br />

for a wide vista of the mountains<br />

and valley below. Color is<br />

quite a bit further along up<br />

north and made for spectacular<br />

views. Coming back along the<br />

wide Androscoggin River beautifully<br />

completed a long but<br />

wonderful Fall outing. It’s a bit<br />

of a trek especially from Vermont,<br />

but well worth further exploration<br />

in the future.<br />

Sept. 25, 2008<br />

More sunshine but very hazy<br />

today. Rains are predicted to<br />

move in tonight and stay for the<br />

whole weekend. We took advantage<br />

of clear weather and dry<br />

wood to bring our generous 1<br />

1/2 cords into the garage. We<br />

have a good supply left yet from<br />

last year to burn first. I took a<br />

quick walk through the woods<br />

yesterday. <strong>The</strong> beaver pond is<br />

slowly beginning to fill and it<br />

looks like fresh sprouting twigs<br />

capping the lodge. I’m not sure<br />

if that’s new cuttings or just leftovers<br />

from before the dam<br />

broke. <strong>The</strong> logging road is clear<br />

now all the way down to Kittredge<br />

Road. What was a meandering<br />

stream is now a gouged<br />

out, debris strewn ravine ending<br />

in a large delta by the road. I still<br />

haven’t ventured up to the old<br />

beaver dam above the active one<br />

that gave way but I suspect I’ll<br />

find that dam breached as well.<br />

Sept. 29, 2008<br />

We finally learned the answer<br />

to “why did the chicken cross<br />

the road?”. Our neighbor’s freerange<br />

hens came a-calling and<br />

nipped off all of my beautiful<br />

tuberous begonia flowers. I<br />

think they were looking for insects<br />

and were just too forceful<br />

for those delicate blossoms. <strong>The</strong><br />

remaining dahlias fortunately<br />

fared somewhat better. So the<br />

answer is: “to graze or freerange<br />

on gardens on the other<br />

side”! Or maybe they were visiting<br />

April the cat, who sat majestically<br />

and ineffectively on guard<br />

in the window.<br />

Sept. 30, 2008<br />

A very wet ending to the<br />

month that saw an extended period<br />

of sunshine and frost before<br />

the rains set in. Color is<br />

peaking in Danville, being hurried<br />

along by colder weather<br />

then reined in (or should I say<br />

“rained in”) a bit by warmer<br />

moister days. Mark Breen attributes<br />

the vivid reds we’re seeing<br />

to the early sunny spell but the<br />

progression of color is marked<br />

by the diminishing hours of daylight.<br />

<strong>The</strong> sun is down by 6:00<br />

and dark sets in by 7:00. Today’s<br />

reluctant sun made a brief appearance<br />

around 4:30 so we<br />

took a quick stroll up Gore<br />

Road for the gorgeous<br />

panoramic color in the hills. <strong>The</strong><br />

valley remained hazy in the<br />

humid air but the vibrant trees<br />

glowed in the setting sun. A soft<br />

pink light spread gently across<br />

the east as the sun dropped<br />

below the hills.<br />

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22 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Fall marks the oven’s return<br />

No Small Potatoes with Vanna Guldenschuh<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom’s<br />

beautiful autumn season begins in<br />

a couple of weeks and along with<br />

it comes crisper air, cooler temperatures<br />

and fall fruits. We can<br />

start to think about using our<br />

ovens again to bake goodies from<br />

the bounty surrounding us. Look<br />

around – local apples abound and<br />

concord grapes (my favorite) start<br />

presenting themselves at the supermarkets.<br />

And, there are those<br />

green tomatoes on the vine waiting<br />

for you to deal with them. Let’s<br />

make dessert!<br />

<strong>The</strong> following recipes are custom<br />

made for the fall season and<br />

utilize foods you can only get this<br />

time of year – so take advantage<br />

of September to make a different<br />

sweet treat.<br />

Concord Grape Pie<br />

I only make this pie once a year<br />

when fresh Concord grapes are in<br />

season. I know that these grapes<br />

are not usually grown locally, but<br />

the supermarkets have them for<br />

about a month at this time of year<br />

Karen Paquette<br />

Lancaster<br />

(603) 788-4973<br />

Dave Cowens<br />

St. Johnsbury<br />

(802) 751-4218<br />

Casey Rowell<br />

Newport<br />

(802) 334-6529<br />

Julie Kenyon<br />

Littleton<br />

(603) 444-1738<br />

COMMUNITY MORTGAGE LENDERS<br />

Answering Your Questions:<br />

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Lyndonville<br />

(802) 626-9211<br />

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and you will love this different pie.<br />

It is an amazing color – you have<br />

never really seen purple until you<br />

make this pie. A true autumn treat<br />

and worth the effort of preparing<br />

the grapes.<br />

[see recipe]<br />

Wash the grapes and separate<br />

the skins from the pulp by popping<br />

the center of the grape out<br />

into one bowl and putting the<br />

skins into another bowl. Over low<br />

heat cook the grape pulp (that<br />

contains the seeds) for about 10<br />

minutes. Press this pulp through a<br />

strainer to remove the seeds. Add<br />

the strained pulp to the skins.<br />

Combine sugar, salt, cinnamon<br />

and tapioca and add to the grape<br />

mix. Let stand while you roll out<br />

the crust and line a 9 inch pan with<br />

the bottom crust. Fill with the<br />

grape mixture. This pie looks a little<br />

skimpy when you add the grape<br />

mix but it is very rich and does not<br />

need to be filled to overflowing.<br />

Put the top crust on and crimp the<br />

edges. Slash a few holes on top.<br />

Aside -If I have extra pie crust<br />

I like to make a stem of grapes for<br />

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the top of the pie. Cut small circles<br />

and overlap them on the top<br />

of the pie in the shape of a stem<br />

of grapes. Cut out a little stem for<br />

the top and a long thin piece of<br />

crust to turn into a curled tendril<br />

like grapes in the wild.<br />

Brush with egg wash, sprinkle<br />

with a little sugar and bake in a<br />

preheated 400 degree oven for 40<br />

minutes or until the crust is<br />

golden.<br />

Serve with vanilla ice cream on<br />

the side.<br />

Green Tomato Pie<br />

It looks like September may<br />

yield a large number of green<br />

tomatoes – at least in my garden<br />

that is the case. Here is a different<br />

way to use them.<br />

[see recipe]<br />

Mix the sugar, tapioca, cinnamon,<br />

nutmeg, salt and lemon zest<br />

in a bowl and set aside. Line a 9<br />

inch pie plate with the bottom<br />

crust. Sprinkle a little of the sugar<br />

mix in the bottom and layer<br />

tomato slices on top. Overlap the<br />

»Green Tomato PIe<br />

Pie crust for a 2 crust pie<br />

6 thinly sliced green tomatoes<br />

(you may need extra to fill<br />

the pie)<br />

1 cup sugar<br />

3 tablespoons quick cooking<br />

tapioca<br />

1 teaspoon cinnamon<br />

Pinch of nutmeg<br />

Pinch of salt<br />

Zest of one lemon<br />

Juice of one lemon<br />

4 tablespoons butter<br />

½ cup raisins or dried cranberries<br />

(optional)<br />

1 slightly beaten egg white<br />

and extra sugar for the glaze<br />

tomatoes so there is a good layer.<br />

Put some of the cranberries and<br />

raisins over each tomato layer if<br />

you are using them. Sprinkle more<br />

of the sugar mix on top and keep<br />

layering like this until the pie crust<br />

is full. Pour the lemon juice over<br />

all and dot with the butter. Put the<br />

top crust on and press the crust<br />

edges together. Slash a couple of<br />

holes in the top with a knife and<br />

brush the top with the egg white<br />

and sprinkle with sugar. Bake in a<br />

hot oven - 400 degrees – for about<br />

30 minutes and then turn the oven<br />

to 350 degrees and bake for an-<br />

»Concord Grape Pie<br />

4 cups stemmed real Concord<br />

grapes<br />

3 tablespoons tapioca (the<br />

small cooking tapioca)<br />

1 cup sugar<br />

1/8 teaspoon salt<br />

1/8 teaspoon cinnamon<br />

pastry for a two crust pie<br />

»Apple Cake<br />

2 ½ cups sugar<br />

1 ¼ cup vegetable oil<br />

3 eggs<br />

3 cups flour<br />

2 teaspoons cinnamon<br />

pinch clove<br />

1 ½ teaspoon baking soda<br />

1 teaspoon sa1t<br />

1 ½ cups chopped walnuts<br />

3 ½ cups chunky pieces of<br />

apple<br />

¼ cup apple brandy or<br />

regular brandy<br />

other 20 to 30 minutes or until<br />

golden brown and bubbling.<br />

Apple Cake<br />

An old fashioned recipe that<br />

smells great while it’s baking and<br />

tastes even better. This cake ages<br />

well and is full of chunky apples<br />

enhanced with a decadent glaze.<br />

[see recipe]<br />

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Page 22<br />

Beat the sugar and vegetable<br />

oil together (an electric mixer is<br />

recommended) until it is thick<br />

mass. Add the eggs one at a time<br />

beating well after each one.<br />

Sift or whisk together the flour,<br />

cinnamon, cloves, baking soda and<br />

salt. Add to oil and egg mix and<br />

combine well. You can do this in<br />

the electric mixer – just don’t over<br />

beat it.<br />

Add the brandy if you need a<br />

little liquid in the mix.<br />

Stir in the apples and walnuts.<br />

Pour the batter into a bundt<br />

pan that has been greased and<br />

floured.<br />

Bake in a preheated 325 degree<br />

oven for about 1 hour and 15 minutes.<br />

This is a cake that takes a long<br />

time to cook and is a little unpredictable<br />

because some apples vary<br />

in moisture. Check it with a toothpick.<br />

When it comes out clean it<br />

can be taken out. I have had this<br />

cake take almost 1 ½ hours to<br />

cook.<br />

While the cake is still in the<br />

bundt pan pour about ¼ of the<br />

glaze on the bottom of the cake.<br />

Let set for a few minutes and then<br />

unmold onto a platter and pour<br />

the rest of the glaze over the cake.<br />

Glaze:<br />

While the cake is cooking make<br />

the glaze<br />

1 stick butter<br />

½ cup sugar<br />

¼ cup maple syrup<br />

¼ cup cider<br />

<strong>The</strong> most important piece of<br />

advice I can give on cooking with<br />

apples is to know your apple and<br />

make sure it is flavorful A nice<br />

local apple either picked or purchased<br />

will outshine many of the<br />

supermarket apples that are good<br />

to eat raw, but don’t have the flavor<br />

to withstand the cooking stage. So<br />

go pick some yourself or buy from<br />

a local orchard. �<br />

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Up on the Farm Early<br />

UPHOLSTRY BY LORNA QUIMBY<br />

Dick and I recently<br />

repaired the chair I<br />

sat in after my hip<br />

replacement. I’d grasp the<br />

arms to help me stand on<br />

my feet so I could use my<br />

walker. <strong>The</strong> arms were finished<br />

wood and were glued<br />

to a support that was<br />

screwed to the seat. With a<br />

hardwood frame, the chair<br />

was well made—at least better<br />

made than most chairs<br />

you buy now—and the<br />

wooden parts were pegged.<br />

Over the years the glue had<br />

dried so the arms lifted off<br />

the peg. To make a long<br />

story short, last winter we<br />

noticed the chair was wobbly.<br />

We didn’t want it to collapse<br />

under anyone’s weight,<br />

and even I was cautious<br />

when I sat in it.<br />

<strong>The</strong> chair was one of a pair I’d<br />

reupholstered. I took tacks out of<br />

the fabric in the sections we needed<br />

to work on. Dick put glue on the<br />

pegs and clamped the arm pieces<br />

together. He replaced loose nails<br />

with screws, then I tacked the fabric<br />

back in place and the chair was<br />

ready for use.<br />

While I worked away, hammering<br />

in tacks and stitching fabric<br />

down, dealing with bifocals and an<br />

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artificial hip, I thought back to the<br />

time I learned to do this chore.<br />

Back then, after spending my<br />

days with Kathy, our little girl, I was<br />

ready for an evening with adults.<br />

Dick stayed home while I joined a<br />

class in upholstering put on by the<br />

Home Dem group. Ethel Case,<br />

who did her own upholstering, had<br />

arranged for the class. We met upstairs<br />

over the library building,<br />

which later burned. I still have the<br />

booklet (“Sears easy Plan for Reupholstering<br />

at home”—note that<br />

“easy”) put out by Sears Roebuck<br />

and Company.<br />

In the crowded room, we<br />

stripped the old upholstery from<br />

our chairs. What a dusty depressing<br />

mess that step revealed! We<br />

stretched webbing, sewed on and<br />

tied springs, banged fingers already<br />

sore from handling rough twine.<br />

Slowly our work took shape. <strong>The</strong><br />

results varied widely, but most of us<br />

took home something we could sit<br />

on until we could afford something<br />

better. I think the one clear lesson<br />

we learned was that upholsterers<br />

earn every dollar they charge.<br />

While our girls lived at home, I<br />

did upholstery for others as well as<br />

making slip covers and doing dressmaking.<br />

I liked doing upholstery<br />

better than making slip covers. In<br />

upholstering, when you get your<br />

fabric in place, you tack it down and<br />

it stays there. With slip covers, you<br />

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»Paper HEart/TBA (9/25 - 10/1)<br />

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»SAT.5: Cabaret Music Series - Stephen Herreid, 8 p.m.<br />

»SAT.12: Singer/Songwriter Showcase, 8 p.m.<br />

»SUN.13: Jazz on a Sunday Afternoont, 4 p.m.<br />

»SAT.26: Belly Dance Circus - Cabaret, 8 p.m.<br />

»SUN.27: Jazz on a Sunday Afternoon, 4 p.m.<br />

»TUES.29: Martha Graham Dance Company, 7 p.m.<br />

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www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 23<br />

fit your fabric, take off the pinnedtogether<br />

pieces, sew them together<br />

and hope the finished product fits.<br />

Louis Lamoureaux had the<br />

most interesting and challenging<br />

chair I ever redid. It was an antique<br />

tufted rocker he’d bought. It was in<br />

several pieces that I had to put in<br />

their proper places. I worked out<br />

what went where, glued the frame<br />

together, put in the springs and so<br />

on and finally tacked on the outer<br />

cover and inserted the buttons that<br />

did the “tufting”. When I delivered<br />

the final product, with its tufted<br />

back, wings and comfortable seat,<br />

Louis was delighted. I felt it was<br />

worth all the mess I’d made on our<br />

breezeway while working on his<br />

chair.<br />

By that time I no longer went<br />

to Sears and Roebuck for advice.<br />

<strong>The</strong>re was an upholsterer in St.<br />

Johnsbury on Caledonia Street. To<br />

visit his shop and watch him and<br />

his workers was an education in itself.<br />

Like my grandfather, he’d<br />

come down from Canada. He had<br />

stories about his training in a company<br />

that made furniture, where<br />

he’d learned his craft from the<br />

ground up. Any problem I faced, he<br />

had solved years before and knew<br />

the best solution. He was generous<br />

in his advice to one whom some<br />

would have thought a competitor<br />

and not given the time of day.<br />

Home Dem groups went the<br />

way of many other self-improvement<br />

programs. Women no longer<br />

have time or interest in such mundane<br />

subjects as upholstery or<br />

sewing. Most work for money outside<br />

the home. <strong>The</strong>y use some of<br />

their wages for baby-sitters and go<br />

out with their husbands, instead of<br />

leaving him with the babies while<br />

they indulge in upholstery lessons.<br />

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DANVILLE SCHOOL<br />

2009 Schedule<br />

Athletic Director: Merlyn Courser CAA<br />

Boys High School Soccer<br />

September<br />

3 Thursday Danville @ Rivendell 4:30<br />

10 Thursday Cabot @ Danville 4:30<br />

16 Wednesday Danville @ Twinfield 4:30<br />

18 Friday Danville @ Richford 4:30<br />

22 Tuesday Lake Region @ Danville 4:30<br />

26 Saturday Danville @ Hazen 2:00<br />

26 Saturday Danville @ Winooski 4:30<br />

30 Wednesday Oxbow @ Danville 4:30<br />

October<br />

2 Friday BFA Fairfax @ Danville 4:00<br />

6 Tuesday Danville @ Enosburg 4:00<br />

8 Thursday Winooski @ Danville B/G 4:00<br />

14 Wednesday Hazen @ Danville 4:00<br />

16 Friday Danville @ Oxbow 4:00<br />

20 Tuesday Richford @ Danville 4:00<br />

Girls High School Soccer<br />

September<br />

3 Thursday Danville @ Rivendell 4:30<br />

5 Saturday Twinfield @ Danville 11:0<br />

11 Friday Oxbow @ Danville 4:30<br />

15 Tuesday Hazen @ Danville 4:30<br />

19 Saturday Danville @ Lake Region 11:00<br />

23 Wednesday BFA Fairfax @ Danville 4:30<br />

26 Saturday Danville @ Winooski 12:30<br />

29 Tuesday Richford @ Danville 4:30<br />

October<br />

7 Wednesday Danville @ Oxbow 4:00<br />

9 Friday Danville @ Hazen 4:00<br />

13 Friday Danville @ Lake Region 4:00<br />

15 Thursday Danville @ BFA Fairfax 4:00<br />

21 Thursday Winooski @ Danville 4:00<br />

23 Thursday Danville @ Richford 4:00<br />

Boys & Girls Middle School Soccer<br />

September<br />

12 Friday Barnet @ Danville 4:30 Coed<br />

15 Tuesday Oxbow @ Danville 4:00 G/B<br />

17 Wednesday Danville @ Craftsbury 4:30 G/B<br />

22 Monday Danville @ Hazen 4:30 G/B<br />

26 Monday Twinfield @ Danville 4:30 G/B<br />

29 Monday Danville @ Concord 4:30 Coed<br />

October<br />

2 Thursday Danville @ Twinfield 4:30 G/B<br />

6 Monday Craftsbury @ Danville 4:30 Coed<br />

9 Thursday Concord @ Danville 4:30 Coed<br />

15 Wednesday Danville @ Barnet 4:30 Coed<br />

20 Monday Hazen @ Danville 4:00 G/B<br />

High & Middle School Field Hockey<br />

September<br />

9 Tuesday Danville @ Stowe 4:00 (M.S.)<br />

24 Wednesday Danville @ STJA 4:00 (JV)October<br />

6 Monday Danville @ Stowe 4:00 (M.S.)<br />

13 Monday Danville @ LI 4:00 (Varsity)


24 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Market Musings<br />

Festive fall markets by Jane Woodhouse<br />

Writing in August, as<br />

weather turns hot for the<br />

next five days, I am reminded<br />

that fall really is not so far<br />

away. <strong>The</strong>re is a tree on the Bayley<br />

Hazen Road, heading north out<br />

of Peacham that is showing its<br />

colors. It is an assertive reminder<br />

that cooler weather is soon to<br />

come. Summer lasted one week<br />

this year.<br />

Changes at the farmers market follow<br />

a tradition of seasons and offer new discoveries<br />

or a change of focus moving into<br />

the fall season. <strong>The</strong>re is an urgency and directness<br />

in shoppers as they come to savor<br />

the last month or so of market. Produce<br />

stands are full of fall crops. But fall is<br />

when another vendor shines. It seems to<br />

be the season that celebrates the artisans<br />

in our community. Fall travelers stop to<br />

find local fare to take home. Local shoppers<br />

come to find a treasure before the<br />

markets end in October. Many area events<br />

celebrate traditional crafts. But the market<br />

celebrates local handwork every week.<br />

Julianne Mackey is a talented rug<br />

hooker ready to share her work and her<br />

knowledge with market customers. She<br />

Dr. Richard Leven<br />

Dr. Stephen Feltus<br />

Dr. Rebecca Hogan<br />

Dr. Andrew Ishak<br />

displays her own designs to sell finished or<br />

as kits. Her wool is often hand-dyed and<br />

reflects a depth of color that is interesting<br />

and original. Additionally, Julianne, with<br />

her sister Martha, brings baked goods and<br />

preserves. Diane Donovan has been a regular<br />

at markets in the area for many years<br />

where she brings paintings and hand<br />

painted and dyed scarves inspired by color<br />

and pattern.<br />

Jean Elizabeth brings wonderful handmade<br />

soap and herbal personal care products<br />

to the St. Johnsbury market. She has<br />

been crafting her products for over 15<br />

years. Customers provide great testimonials<br />

to the success of her skin care products<br />

in dealing with a variety of problems.<br />

Jean Elizabeth is very generous in her advice<br />

to customers and is quick to point to<br />

a product. She seems to readily enjoy the<br />

challenge of a new skin issue and will work<br />

on products to answer the demand. Three<br />

Sisters Soap, bring their soap and herbal<br />

care products and teas to the Danville<br />

Farmers’ Market. Alycia, Rosalyn and<br />

Heather Moore are 3 young women who<br />

have created a niche when summer jobs<br />

are hard to come by. Alycia and Rosalyn<br />

have been featured musicians at the market<br />

as well, providing traditional fiddle<br />

Kids Eyeware<br />

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On Sept. 26, the St. Johnsbury Farmers<br />

Market will host a Family and Fiber Arts<br />

Day at the market as a prelude to the annual<br />

Foliage Day celebration on Sunday,<br />

Sept. 27. Funding for this special event is<br />

provided by a grant from NOFA-VT. Several<br />

special attractions are planned for the<br />

market. In celebration of local fiber we<br />

will have some animals on hand that are<br />

prized for their warm and lustrous fleeces<br />

and yarns. Brigid’s Farm in Peacham raises<br />

goats, specializing in natural colored angoras,<br />

who produce soft mohair fiber. Visitors<br />

to the market will see white, pale gray<br />

and black angora kids. Tannery Farm<br />

Cashmeres in Danville is home to cashmere<br />

goats that produce fiber in several<br />

natural colors. It is one of the finest of<br />

fine in terms of animal grown fibers.<br />

Boreas Farm in Newark will have cashmere<br />

spinning fibers and yarns at the market<br />

to sell.<br />

Too Little Farm, a staple of produce at<br />

the market, raises a flock of sheep in West<br />

Barnet. Always available at the market are<br />

colorful worsted weight yarns, handknit<br />

hats and sheep skins. Visitors will find additional<br />

vendors with handspinning fibers,<br />

yarns and finished products at the Family<br />

DADS 4 BY<br />

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Everything From<br />

Propane<br />

Cylinders<br />

Ratchet Straps<br />

and Fiber Arts Day market.<br />

Leo Rogers, a weekly vendor in St.<br />

Johnsbury, will provide musical entertainment.<br />

Leo carves beautiful kitchen tools,<br />

flutes, and ocarinas. His hands are never<br />

idle at the market as he works on a new<br />

tool or plays music. Early on Saturday<br />

mornings, Celtic tunes can be heard in his<br />

area of the market. He will share his music<br />

and his wooden instruments with us on<br />

September 26.<br />

Miriam Briggs from Wool Away will be<br />

at the market for some knitting instruction<br />

and support. Brigid’s Farm will bring spinning<br />

wheels to demonstrate and give some<br />

short lessons. Bring a chair and learn<br />

something new. Or bring a knitting project<br />

or spinning wheel to join us for a<br />

morning of spinning and knitting. Dana<br />

Karuza-Tulp will have children’s activities,<br />

including needle felting. Children may also<br />

join us for some knitting and spinning activity.<br />

As the weather cools our hands look<br />

for those projects that keep us warm. We<br />

focus on work that prepares for the coming<br />

winter and satisfies our sense of touch<br />

and sight in a way that food satisfies our<br />

sense of taste.<br />

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Wild turkeys & blueberries<br />

BY VAN PARKER<br />

One day in early August,<br />

I strolled out<br />

to the blueberry<br />

bushes in back of our<br />

house and discovered that<br />

all the ripe and even semiripe<br />

blueberries were gone.<br />

It was puzzling.<br />

Sometimes robins are the culprits,<br />

but this year we hadn’t seen a<br />

single robin hopping around the<br />

lawn. A few minutes later it all became<br />

clear. Looking out the back<br />

door I noticed a number of unusually<br />

large birds gathered around the<br />

bushes. <strong>The</strong>y turned out to be<br />

mostly half grown turkeys with perhaps<br />

one or two of their elders.<br />

This called for some kind of adjustment<br />

to save the remaining<br />

berries. It came in the form of some<br />

old Gardener’s Supply netting. Last<br />

year we had hardly used it at all.<br />

This year it has proved to save<br />

the day or rather the remaining blueberries.<br />

This minor incident reminded<br />

me of how just plain living calls for<br />

adjusting. It’s an adjustment to move<br />

to a new place and to leave an old,<br />

familiar one. When the last of your<br />

offspring goes off to college it calls<br />

for some adjusting. What will it be<br />

like with only the two of you or the<br />

one of you? Marriage is an adjustment,<br />

divorce a bigger one. For an<br />

elderly person, giving up their license<br />

calls for some major adjusting.<br />

I can’t imagine what it would be<br />

like to live without my wife of over<br />

50 years.<br />

Realistically, though, I know<br />

that, barring some accident that<br />

takes us both, one of us will go before<br />

the other.<br />

Watching other people adjust<br />

can be instructive. I’m thinking especially<br />

of my old college friend,<br />

Bill.<br />

A physicist, Bill has lived with a<br />

severe form of macular degeneration<br />

for many years. He is now considered<br />

to be legally blind. For<br />

several year’s his wife, Grace, had to<br />

do all the driving.<br />

Later their “daughter of choice”<br />

took over. More than a year ago,<br />

Grace suffered a major stroke. Her<br />

mind is as sharp as ever but she is<br />

paralyzed on one side. She now lives<br />

in a facility in the same California<br />

city, which they have called home<br />

for most of their married life.<br />

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Bill hasn’t missed a day going to<br />

see Grace.<br />

He also manages to walk to a<br />

nearby shopping area to get groceries<br />

and other needed items. He<br />

must be a familiar figure in the<br />

neighborhood. A person whose interests<br />

are wide ranging, Bill tells me<br />

he has memorized almost thirty of<br />

Robert Frost’s poems. He could<br />

surely give an hour and a half program<br />

reciting them all.<br />

Bill, who has always been a convivial<br />

man, called a few days ago.<br />

Among other things he told us that<br />

he had cut down on his drinking. He<br />

testified to feeling much better. He<br />

sounded younger and it was obvious<br />

that his sense of humor has<br />

never deserted him.<br />

Just before the Danville Fair one<br />

of Bill’s son, Malcolm and Malcolm’s<br />

family spent a few days at<br />

their property on Ewell Pond. Malcolm,<br />

who now lives in Geneva,<br />

Switzerland, had organized a party<br />

in July to honor his dad’s 79th birthday.<br />

People gathered out there in<br />

Santa Rosa. <strong>The</strong>y were colleagues<br />

from work, friends Bill and Grace<br />

had made during their time together<br />

in California, others who had<br />

known Bill from earlier times.<br />

Bill’s friends were in part celebrating<br />

a milestone in the life of an<br />

accomplished friend. Bill has a doctorate<br />

in physics and can explain<br />

Einstein’s <strong>The</strong>ory of Relativity as<br />

well as anyone I know. He can also<br />

talk about music and current affairs<br />

and a number of other subjects.<br />

Music was the catalyst that brought<br />

Bill and Grace together. Bill has<br />

given up playing the piano, but he<br />

still listens to the classics and, manages<br />

to get to concerts, whenever<br />

possible with Grace. <strong>The</strong>re is much<br />

in Bill’s life to celebrate.<br />

But I suspect those who gathered<br />

in Santa Rosa were celebrating<br />

more than accomplishments. <strong>The</strong>y<br />

were celebrating a friend who has<br />

adjusted creatively to whatever challenges<br />

life or circumstances have<br />

thrown at him. And he has done so,<br />

not to make a pun on his wife’s<br />

name, with real grace. His friends<br />

celebrated for his sake, but equally, I<br />

suspect, for their own.<br />

By the way, the blueberry<br />

bushes have reasserted themselves.<br />

<strong>The</strong> blueberries, though not as numerous<br />

as last years’ crop, are as<br />

large and tasty as I can remember.<br />

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www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 25<br />

Outdoor Adentures<br />

Stuck in the rocks by Tony Smith<br />

In Vermont, we’ve all<br />

been stuck in the snow,<br />

mud, ice, etc., but on a<br />

recent trip to the <strong>North</strong>-Atlantic<br />

Provinces of Canada, I<br />

witnessed a new kind of<br />

stuck. A kind of stuck that<br />

not only had expensive implications,<br />

but potential dire<br />

consequences as well.<br />

While in New Brunswick vacationing,<br />

my fiancée and I were admiring<br />

the views of the Bay of<br />

Fundy. <strong>The</strong> Bay of Fundy is located<br />

on the south shore of New<br />

Brunswick and has the highest tides<br />

in the world. We were heading to<br />

Cape Enraged, a spot recommended<br />

by the locals, when we<br />

stopped at a “beach.” This wasn’t<br />

your ordinary beach. Instead of<br />

sand, the entire beach was loose,<br />

smooth, flat rock. <strong>The</strong> rocks were<br />

your perfect skipping stones about<br />

the size of a sand dollar.<br />

It was about two hours before<br />

dark when we noticed three women<br />

yelling and screaming at one another<br />

while pushing a pristine looking<br />

four-wheel drive SUV that was<br />

stuck on the beach. <strong>The</strong>y would get<br />

it unstuck only to drive on the cobble<br />

another 50 feet and get stuck<br />

again. I thought about pulling them<br />

out with my truck, but I didn’t think<br />

I would be able to get off the beach<br />

myself. <strong>The</strong> beach had a steep slope<br />

to the water, composed entirely of<br />

loose rock. It was starting to get<br />

dark and the mosquitoes were<br />

awful. This was this last thing I<br />

needed to deal with while on vacation.<br />

I told my fiancée, “we should<br />

get out of here before we get enlisted<br />

into pushing.”<br />

Just before we got into our<br />

truck, a car stopped and a jolly fellow<br />

got out and asked, “where we<br />

were going?” I told him that we<br />

were getting out of here because we<br />

wanted no part of in this. He said,<br />

“I would really appreciate your help<br />

because the tide is coming in and we<br />

need to get this vehicle out of here<br />

before it ends up under water.”<br />

Being an ignorant Vermonter, the<br />

tide coming in never even occurred<br />

to me. If it had, I never would have<br />

started to leave in the first place. We<br />

were now officially enlisted.<br />

<strong>The</strong> first order of business was<br />

to get them unstuck, which proved<br />

harder than you can imagine. When<br />

we got over to the vehicle, the tires<br />

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<strong>The</strong> picture shows the<br />

cobble beach and tracks<br />

that are now under<br />

water from where their<br />

vehicle was stuck.<br />

in snow, but in rock? So we started<br />

digging the vehicle out much like we<br />

would have if it were in snow. <strong>The</strong><br />

difference in pulling rocks out from<br />

under the engine is opposed to<br />

snow was they were smoking HOT.<br />

We even got second-degree burn<br />

blisters on our arms from reaching<br />

under the vehicle bare-armed.<br />

After an hour or so of digging,<br />

we thought we had cleared away<br />

enough rocks to start pushing. By<br />

this time, the water was only 30 feet<br />

or so away from the vehicle compared<br />

to the 100 feet or so it was an<br />

hour ago. We started the first of<br />

several attempts at pushing only to<br />

keep getting stuck in the loose rock.<br />

After several tries we gave up and<br />

had to call a tractor. <strong>The</strong> only good<br />

news for those women at that moment<br />

was their tracks where we<br />

originally started pushing were now<br />

under water. We figured the tractor<br />

had about a half an hour to get<br />

there before the water would get up<br />

to where their vehicle was now. We<br />

left before the tractor got there, but<br />

saw the three women the next day.<br />

<strong>The</strong>y said the tractor pulled them<br />

out ok, but that it did cost them<br />

some money.<br />

I figured it was better than the<br />

alternative.<br />

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26 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

A road test to remember<br />

One teenagers struggle to get her drivers license<br />

BY PETER DANNENBERG<br />

Deborah, our granddaughter,<br />

needed<br />

to take her road<br />

test. She asked her Nana to<br />

help. Bonnie drives a<br />

Dodge Neon. To make it<br />

look racy, its back is higher<br />

than its front. Deborah<br />

tried to use the Neon, but<br />

the jacked-up trunk screens<br />

the ground from view in<br />

the mirror. She was more at<br />

ease in my old Ford Escort.<br />

<strong>The</strong>y drove on rural roads and<br />

city streets. Deborah practiced<br />

until Bonnie pronounced her<br />

ready. <strong>The</strong>n Deborah scheduled<br />

her road test.<br />

On the big day, Bonnie picked<br />

up Deborah a little early, so they<br />

could get in a warm-up before the<br />

mid-morning road test. First, they<br />

made sure Deborah had her sheaf<br />

of forms and Bonnie had the registration<br />

and proof of insurance.<br />

In Montpelier, they practiced for<br />

St. Johnsbury Academy<br />

Fall 2009 Sports Schedule<br />

Athletic Director: Tom Conte - CAA<br />

Headmaster: Tom Lovett<br />

Boys Soccer<br />

Varsity and Junior Varsity<br />

9/8 Essex (NL) 4:30<br />

9/11 <strong>North</strong> Country (NL) 4:30/7<br />

9/16 Burlington (NL) 4:30<br />

9/18 Lyndon 4:30<br />

9/22 Randolph 4:30<br />

9/24 U-32 4:30<br />

9/26 South Burlington (NL) 11:00<br />

9/30 <strong>North</strong>field 4:30<br />

10/3 Stowe 10:00<br />

10/6 Peoples 4:00<br />

10/8 Harwood 4:00<br />

10/14 Spaulding 4:00<br />

10/16 Montpelier 4:00<br />

10/20 <strong>The</strong>tford 4:00<br />

Coaches: Richard McCarthy<br />

JV - Adam Kennedy<br />

Cross Country<br />

9/2 NF, Ran, LR, OX, LI, Dan 4:00<br />

9/5 Harwood Inv. 10:00<br />

9/8 Lamoille 4:00<br />

9/12 Essex Invite 9:30<br />

9/16 Lyndon 4:00<br />

9/19 BHS Invite 9:30<br />

9/22 Harwood 4:00<br />

9/26 U-32 Invite 11:00<br />

@ Manchester<br />

9/30 NF,Ran,Haz,Stowe,<strong>The</strong>t,Dan 3:30<br />

10/3 <strong>The</strong>tford Inv. 10:00<br />

10/6 U-32 4:00<br />

10/10 Peoples Inv. 10:00<br />

10/14 <strong>North</strong> Country 4:00<br />

10/19 Relays 4:00<br />

@ Lake Region<br />

10/24 NVAC Champ. 11:00<br />

@ U-32<br />

10/31 State Champs 10:00<br />

@ <strong>The</strong>tford<br />

Coaches: Chip Langmaid, Tara Hemond<br />

and Richard Boisseau<br />

Girls Field Hockey<br />

Varsity and Junior Varsity<br />

All JV Games Follow Varsity Games<br />

9/3 <strong>North</strong> Country (NL) 4:00<br />

TBA Bellows Falls (NL)<br />

9/9 Lyndon (NL) 4:00<br />

9/15 U-32 4:00<br />

9/17 Lyndon 4:00<br />

9/19 Hartford 11:00<br />

9/23 <strong>North</strong> Country 4:00<br />

9/26 Stowe 2:00<br />

9/29 Spaulding 4:00<br />

10/1 Montpelier 4:00<br />

10/3 Milton 10:00<br />

10/7 Missisquoi 4:00<br />

10/13 Harwood 4:00<br />

10/15 Rice 4:00<br />

Coach: Fran Cone, JV - Paula Bystrzycki<br />

30 minutes, including “Vermont<br />

turnarounds,” parallel parking,<br />

starting and stopping on hills and<br />

using the parking brake. I rarely<br />

use my parking brake. It’s stiff, but<br />

the Escort passed inspection a<br />

week earlier.<br />

At DMV, the road tester was<br />

on a break. A thorough clerk<br />

checked each line of Deborah’s<br />

papers. She saw that Deborah’s<br />

mom hadn’t signed her driving<br />

log.<br />

Bonnie said, “I’m her grandmother;<br />

I was with her in the car<br />

when she drove. Her mother<br />

signed the DMV permission<br />

form. Can I sign the log?”<br />

“No, we’ll test her, but she<br />

can’t get her license until a parent<br />

signs the log.”<br />

Because Deborah is under 18,<br />

she had to prove she passed drivers’<br />

education too. She gave the<br />

clerk the yellow sheet of paper<br />

that certified she passed the<br />

course two years earlier. <strong>The</strong> clerk<br />

wanted a wallet-sized card instead.<br />

It wasn’t in the bundle of forms.<br />

Girls Soccer<br />

Varsity and Junior Varsity<br />

9/5 <strong>North</strong> Country (NL) 10:00<br />

9/11 Spaulding (NL) 4:30<br />

9/15 Lyndon (NL) 4:30<br />

9/18 Spaulding 4:30<br />

9/23 <strong>The</strong>tford 4:30<br />

9/25 U-32 4:00<br />

9/29 <strong>North</strong>field 4:30<br />

10/2 Peoples 4:00<br />

10/7 Harwood 4:00<br />

10/9 <strong>North</strong> Country 4:00/7<br />

10/13 Lyndon 4:00<br />

10/15 Montpelier 4:00<br />

10/21 Stowe 4:00<br />

10/23 Randolph 4:00<br />

Coaches: Tracy Verge, Frank Leafe<br />

JV - Greg Roberts<br />

Football<br />

Varsity<br />

9/5 Mt. Saint Joseph 1:00<br />

9/12 Rutland 1:00<br />

9/19 Spaulding 1:00<br />

9/25 South Burlington 7:00<br />

10/3 Hartford 1:00<br />

10/9 BFA 7:00<br />

10/16 Essex 7:00<br />

10/24 Burlington 1:00<br />

10/31 Lyndon 1:00<br />

Coaches: Shawn Murphy, Craig Racenet<br />

& Hank Van Orman<br />

Junior Varsity<br />

9/8 BFA 4:00<br />

9/14 Lyndon 4:00<br />

9/22 Spaulding 4:00<br />

9/28 <strong>North</strong> Country 6:00<br />

10/5 Hartford 4:00<br />

10/12 U-32 4:00<br />

10/19 Lyndon 4:00<br />

10/26 <strong>North</strong> Country 4:00<br />

Coaches: Mike Bugbee, Frank Trebilcock<br />

Froshman<br />

9/9 Spaulding 4:00<br />

9/16 Rice 4:00<br />

9/23 Bellows Falls 4:00<br />

9/30 Lyndon 4:00<br />

10/7 Spaulding 4:00<br />

10/14 Lyndon 4:00<br />

10/21 Essex 4:00<br />

10/28 <strong>North</strong> Country 6:00<br />

Coaches: James Bentley & Joe Tomaselli<br />

Deborah asked what was on the<br />

card. “<strong>The</strong> same information, but<br />

it’s smaller.”<br />

“Can you take the sheet instead?”<br />

Deborah asked.<br />

“No, you have to bring in the<br />

card or get another signed by your<br />

teacher.” <strong>The</strong> teacher retired a year<br />

ago, but Deborah promised to<br />

track him down and ask him to<br />

sign another wallet-sized yellow<br />

card.<br />

<strong>The</strong> tester asked Deborah to<br />

wait alone in the Escort while she<br />

tested a waiting boy. <strong>The</strong> paperwork<br />

mess made Deborah anxious;<br />

she played the radio and<br />

crossed her fingers for luck. Her<br />

spirits rose when the returning<br />

boy signaled his success with<br />

thumbs up.<br />

In the DMV parking lot, the<br />

tester asked Deborah to apply the<br />

parking brake, put the car in reverse<br />

and step on the gas. <strong>The</strong> car<br />

moved back a few inches.<br />

“Try again. Pull harder on the<br />

brake.” Deborah tried easing off<br />

the gas, but the tester would have<br />

none of that. After three strikes,<br />

she said they could not start the<br />

test until the brake held; Deborah<br />

must reschedule.<br />

Dejected, Deborah waited in<br />

line. <strong>The</strong>re was a cancellation at 2<br />

pm; if Deborah could make it, she<br />

WESTERN AVENUE STATION<br />

“your friendly full service station”<br />

should call. Otherwise, she must<br />

wait at least two weeks. Deborah<br />

had just three hours and the<br />

garage in Cabot was thirty minutes<br />

away, one-way.<br />

On the way, Deborah stopped<br />

at her house and found the little,<br />

yellow, wallet-sized card in a folder<br />

with other papers. Her mom was<br />

at work, so Deborah couldn’t get<br />

the driving log signed.<br />

Bonnie explained the brake<br />

dilemma to Mike, the garage<br />

owner. Mike said, “That’s not<br />

good.” He promised to adjust the<br />

parking brake within an hour. <strong>The</strong><br />

garage is nearby, so Bonnie and<br />

Deborah walked home and ate<br />

lunch.<br />

Mike called. He said the brake<br />

worked fine for him. “Come over<br />

and we’ll adjust it for Deborah.”<br />

After adjustments, Deborah still<br />

could not pull the lever hard<br />

enough to keep the Escort from<br />

creeping back while she pressed<br />

the gas pedal.<br />

Back home, Deborah tried the<br />

parking brake on the Neon. It<br />

worked. Switching cars vexed<br />

Bonnie, who spent six hours detailing<br />

my Escort, after one of<br />

Deborah’s friends said she lost<br />

points when an empty coffee cup<br />

rolled on her car’s floor.<br />

Deborah called DMV to<br />

reschedule her test at 2. It was 1<br />

pm She called DMV 14 times and<br />

got 14 busy signals. <strong>The</strong>y had to<br />

leave or risk missing the only open<br />

slot.<br />

Deborah drove back to Montpelier,<br />

worried about the unfamil-<br />

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iar Neon with its tail in the air,<br />

praying no one else took the 2 pm<br />

opening, afraid something else<br />

would go wrong. <strong>The</strong>y arrived at<br />

1:45; 2 pm was still available. This<br />

time, the tester would be the<br />

meticulous clerk who examined<br />

her paperwork in the morning.<br />

Deborah restarted the test.<br />

This parking brake worked. Nervous,<br />

she turned left instead of<br />

right and had to turn around. She<br />

parallel parked between cars on<br />

crowded State Street. It was imperfect,<br />

but adequate. And she remembered<br />

to apply the parking<br />

brake.<br />

A Vermont turnaround lost a<br />

couple of points, but was good<br />

enough. Failing to come to a full<br />

stop at a T intersection with no<br />

stop sign cost four points. At a<br />

traffic light, she waited for five<br />

cars before an oncoming truck<br />

driver waved her through—ten<br />

points off for not insisting the<br />

truck driver go first. Now a limp<br />

noodle, Deborah was thrilled to<br />

hear, “Well you made it. Bring in<br />

your mom’s signature on your<br />

driving log tomorrow and you can<br />

pay for your license.”<br />

<strong>The</strong> next day, Deborah went<br />

back with her signed log. <strong>The</strong><br />

clerk needed more information<br />

from the testing office, but they<br />

were at lunch. Deborah waited 20<br />

minutes, paid for her two-year license<br />

and drove home, triumphant.<br />

In a perfect world, the story<br />

would end here, but in bureaucracies,<br />

no one lives happily ever<br />

after. <strong>The</strong> first letter from the<br />

Commissioner of Motor Vehicles<br />

came a week later. It said DMV<br />

made a mistake on the expiration<br />

date of the driver’s license. <strong>The</strong><br />

letter held a new one-year license.<br />

It warned her to return her twoyear<br />

license in the enclosed envelope<br />

or DMV would suspend her<br />

“priviledge (sic) to operate.”<br />

Deborah mailed it back. <strong>The</strong><br />

second letter came a week later. It<br />

said, “In reviewing your driving<br />

record, we find that you are not<br />

under suspensions, therefore we<br />

are returning your license, as we<br />

are not sure why it was returned<br />

to this office.” <strong>The</strong> two-year license<br />

went back again, this time<br />

with a copy of the first letter.<br />

Another week passed before<br />

the third letter arrived. It said, “A<br />

review of your registration/license<br />

has revealed an error in fees<br />

and/or documentation. In order<br />

to maintain a valid registration/license<br />

on file, the required items<br />

must be returned with this letter<br />

within thirty days. FEES – Incorrect<br />

fees were received. Please<br />

submit the amount as specified<br />

below: Please submit a check in<br />

the amount of $2.00.”<br />

“BEFORE YOU RESUB-<br />

MIT YOUR APPLICATION –<br />

Please follow the directions below:<br />

Failure to do so will result in a suspension<br />

of your license. Please return<br />

a copy of this letter and all<br />

required documentation with your<br />

APPLICATION and FEE, IF<br />

APPLICABLE. Please DO NOT<br />

MAIL CASH.”<br />

Deborah sent in a check for<br />

two bucks. She peers in her mailbox<br />

daily for more letters from<br />

her new pen pal, the Commissioner<br />

of the Vermont Department<br />

of Motor Vehicles.


Connecting with healing in the old world<br />

BY BETS PARKER ALBRIGHT<br />

<strong>The</strong> path that we, Peter<br />

and Bets, took on the<br />

way to a broader understanding<br />

of healing is a<br />

story too long and involved<br />

to recount fully in this space.<br />

But there is one set of circumstances<br />

we like to remember<br />

because it was so<br />

important in the early formation<br />

of our ideas about<br />

healing, as opposed to “treating”<br />

people with well-defined<br />

sicknesses.<br />

In the late 1970s, we began<br />

using our vacation time to travel<br />

around the British Isles, which is<br />

where most of our ancestors came<br />

from. We were quite interested in<br />

adopting for ourselves what was<br />

then only vaguely defined as “a<br />

healthy lifestyle.” Also, being from<br />

Danville, we were practitioners of<br />

dowsing, which is really about getting<br />

in touch with energies around<br />

us that can’t be seen. It is of some<br />

interest how these strands came together<br />

for us.<br />

This path we found ourselves<br />

on seemed to lead us on, one step<br />

at a time. It was like reading a good<br />

book – we couldn’t wait to turn the<br />

next page! In our reading about<br />

dowsing, we read about some fascinating<br />

observations people had<br />

made in Britain. <strong>The</strong>re was Albert<br />

Watkins, who wrote in the early 20th<br />

century about a curious alignment<br />

of sites in England, which led others<br />

to make observations about<br />

“earth energies.”<br />

At a dowsing convention in<br />

Danville, we met a wonderful couple,<br />

Edward and Lydia Jastram from<br />

Massachusetts, whom we felt to be<br />

quite “tuned in” to both earth and<br />

human energies. <strong>The</strong>y both served<br />

as lecturers at dowsing meetings. In<br />

a surprisingly short time, we became<br />

warm friends. On one weekend at<br />

their home, we made a sudden decision<br />

to travel together to a large international<br />

meeting at Findhorn, a<br />

New Age community in northern<br />

Scotland.<br />

This decision changed our lives.<br />

At that meeting, more of a retreat<br />

really, lasting more than a week, we<br />

met other people who were to point<br />

us to the next steps in our process.<br />

<strong>The</strong> path led to other gatherings on<br />

subsequent trips. One was a meeting<br />

of the British Society of<br />

Dowsers, and the main speaker was<br />

Maj. Bruce MacManaway, who told<br />

of a certain experience he had had<br />

leading a company of men in World<br />

War II. He was a very compassionate<br />

person, and he found that if he<br />

held his hand over the bandaged<br />

wound of one of his men, it gave<br />

the man significant relief from his<br />

pain and distress. After he had repeated<br />

this on a number of occasions,<br />

he was forced to conclude<br />

that he had some sort of gift. He<br />

didn’t understand it, but he was<br />

bound to pursue it.<br />

Bruce left the army and after an<br />

interval bought a homestead in<br />

Scotland that he and his wife converted<br />

into a healing center, called<br />

Westbank. He developed his own<br />

way of approaching people who<br />

had health problems, using his<br />

hands for deep back massage and<br />

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“laying on of hands.” His wife Tricia<br />

taught yoga and they both had<br />

weekly meditation groups. <strong>The</strong>ir<br />

three sons observed all this and all<br />

wound up in health-related fields of<br />

work.<br />

Peter and I were so impressed<br />

with Bruce’s story and his demeanor<br />

that we invited him to address the<br />

American Society of Dowsers in<br />

Danville the next year. He and Tricia<br />

both came over and stayed with<br />

us, and we became fast friends. We<br />

got on so well, in fact, that they invited<br />

us to travel to Westbank the<br />

next year to work and study their<br />

techniques of healing. We readily<br />

agreed, and that’s what happened. It<br />

seemed quite a departure for us, but<br />

one we were ready for.<br />

We fit in well at Westbank,<br />

where Peter, as a medical doctor,<br />

could share in the growing number<br />

of people who came looking for<br />

new approaches to health and<br />

wholeness.<br />

Bets found a niche for herself<br />

in several ways. She had learned a<br />

discipline called Reflexology from<br />

a friend, Barbara D’Arcy Thompson,<br />

from our time at the Findhorn<br />

community. It is a form of<br />

foot massage that connects with all<br />

parts of the body, with very beneficial<br />

results. Bets also answered<br />

many of the letters that came in,<br />

inquiring about Bruce’s work and<br />

teaching program. Tricia didn’t<br />

enjoy writing letters and Bets<br />

surely did. It was fun to meet later<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 27<br />

with some of those who had written<br />

in, along with the tea and conversation<br />

that accompanied their<br />

sessions.<br />

We found that many who<br />

came in with health problems had<br />

terrible diets. Bets worked out<br />

weekly rotations of healthy foods<br />

with heavy emphasis on fruits and<br />

veggies and suggested attractive<br />

and easy ways for them to prepare<br />

meals for their families.<br />

Many of our new friends invited<br />

us to visit their homes. One<br />

such home was a castle that was included<br />

in the annual visit by Elizabeth<br />

of Glamis (the famous<br />

“Queen Mum”), whose name appeared<br />

in the guest book, which<br />

we also signed!<br />

Our Scottish trips have dwindled<br />

as travel costs soar and as we<br />

become less vigorous about globetrotting,<br />

but we still keep in touch<br />

with our friends there.<br />

Alternative health and healing<br />

practices and better understanding<br />

of healthy diets are much more a<br />

part of life these days than they<br />

were back then. <strong>The</strong>re is still<br />

plenty of room for improvement,<br />

as witnessed by widespread problems<br />

with obesity and diabetes. We<br />

are glad we were part of the<br />

change in awareness of ways in<br />

which people can enjoy longer and<br />

better lives. And we will always be<br />

grateful to the many friends on<br />

both sides of “the pond” who<br />

helped us along the way.<br />

Are You Having Trouble Affording<br />

the Prescription Drugs You Need?<br />

Our Health Centers May Be Able to Help<br />

Our offices offer discounts on many of the most common prescription drugs. This discount<br />

is available to all our patients. In addition, for those with limited incomes, we apply an additional<br />

discount if you qualify for our sliding fee program. For more information, call for an<br />

appointment.<br />

Concord Health Center (802) 695-2512<br />

Sarah Berrian, MD (Pediatric, Adult and Obstetrical Care)<br />

Susan Taney, Nurse Practitioner (Adult Care)<br />

Jeniane L. Daniels, Physician Assistant-Certified<br />

Donna Ransmeier, Behavioral Health Counseling<br />

Danville Health Center (802) 684-2275<br />

Tim Tanner, MD (Pediatric and Adult Care)<br />

Sharon Fine, MD (Pediatric and Adult Care)<br />

Mariel Hess, Nurse Practitioner (Pediatric and Adult Care)<br />

Jeniane L. Daniels, Physician Assistant-certified<br />

Caledonia Internal Medicine (802) 748-5174<br />

Frank Meierdiercks, MD (Internal Medicine)<br />

Thomas Ziobrowski, MD (Internal Medicine)<br />

Claudia Lee, MD (Internal Medicine)<br />

Elaine Robinson, Nurse Practitioner<br />

Betsy Fowler, Behavioral Health Counseling<br />

St. Johnsbury Family Health Center (802) 748-5041<br />

Dana Kraus, MD (Family Medicine and Obstetrical Care)<br />

John Ajamie, MD (Family Medicine)<br />

Cathleen Besch, Nurse Practitioner<br />

Carey Brodzinski, Nurse Practitioner<br />

Diane E. Matthews, Nurse Practitioner (Adult Care)<br />

Betsy Fowler, Behavioral Health Counseling<br />

<strong>The</strong>se Health Centers are units of<br />

<strong>North</strong>ern Counties Health Care, Inc. - established in 1976<br />

to bring health services to those in need in the <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom.<br />

Corn maze<br />

one of the<br />

nation’s best<br />

<strong>The</strong> Great Vermont<br />

Corn Maze in <strong>North</strong><br />

Danville has been selected<br />

as one of the 10 Best<br />

Cornfield Maze Attractions<br />

in America by<br />

www.Americasbestonline.net.<br />

<strong>The</strong> maze creators<br />

Mike and Dayna<br />

Boudreau were honored<br />

to have been selected.<br />

When the Boudreau’s<br />

opened their attraction 11<br />

years ago, they had never<br />

heard of a corn maze. Now<br />

there are one or more corn<br />

mazes in every state. Most<br />

mazes are only open for a few<br />

weeks in the fall, but the Great<br />

Vermont Corn Maze is open<br />

from Aug. 1 through mid-October.<br />

And it offers visitors a<br />

challenging two-hour adventure,<br />

complete with bridges,<br />

Barnyard Golf, petting animals,<br />

100’ of underground<br />

tunnels, a Kid’s Village, Ultimate<br />

Laser Tag (by reservation)<br />

and New England’s most<br />

unique haunted event DEAD<br />

NORTH - Farmland of Terror.<br />

For more information visit<br />

www.vermontcornmaze.com or call<br />

(802) 748-1399.


28 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

What’s happening at town hall<br />

Barnet<br />

Town Clerk: Benjamin Heisholt<br />

Selectboard: Ted Faris, Gary Bunnell<br />

and Jeremy Roberts<br />

Aug. 10, 2009<br />

Dogs – <strong>The</strong> Board read correspondence<br />

from Denise and Robert Stuart<br />

regarding dogs in East Barnet,<br />

specifically an incident in early<br />

morning hours of<br />

Saturday, August 8, 2009. <strong>The</strong> Stuarts<br />

reported a loud and violent attack<br />

upon the siding and<br />

latticework of their porch by at<br />

least two dogs apparently in pursuit<br />

of a skunk. <strong>The</strong> Stuarts reported<br />

that these dogs are the property of<br />

Billy N oyes of East Barnet. <strong>The</strong> report<br />

also detailed the actions of<br />

First Constable Timothy Gibbs in<br />

response to the Stuarts’ call regarding<br />

this matter and expressed the<br />

Stuarts’ desire for the Board to take<br />

action regarding the dangerous behavior<br />

of these dogs. Gibbs submitted<br />

a report of his response to<br />

the incident including photographs<br />

of the damage to the Stuarts’ home.<br />

Gibbs noted that N oyes’ dogs have<br />

not been licensed with the Town<br />

since 2006. Gibbs also gave a verbal<br />

recommendation that the Board<br />

take the steps necessary to grant<br />

the Caledonia County Sheriff’s<br />

Department authority to take action<br />

regarding this matter, which the<br />

Board approved.<br />

Broadband Project – <strong>The</strong> Board<br />

read an email from Christina<br />

Fearon, along with forwarded information<br />

from the Vermont Council<br />

on Rural Development,<br />

regarding potential stimulus grant<br />

funds available for broadband internet<br />

services within the town.<br />

Library Director Sherry Tolle expressed<br />

the Library’s interest in involvement<br />

in obtaining these<br />

stimulus grant funds. After a brief<br />

discussion, a motion was made by<br />

Board member Jeremy Roberts<br />

that the Board defer this grant opportunity<br />

to Andrew Mosedale as a<br />

consultant to the Board on this<br />

matter. <strong>The</strong> motion was seconded<br />

by Bunnell and approved by voice<br />

vote.<br />

Danville<br />

Town Clerk: Virginia Morse<br />

Town Administrator: Merton<br />

Leonard<br />

Selectboard: Denise Briggs, Doug<br />

Pastula, Marvin Withers and<br />

Michael Walsh<br />

Aug. 6, 2009<br />

Zoning - <strong>The</strong> Planning Commission<br />

was present to review the<br />

overall changes that were made to<br />

the Town Zoning Bylaws, with the<br />

Board. <strong>The</strong>y assured the Board that<br />

the Zoning changes followed the<br />

recommendations made and approved<br />

in the town plan, notes<br />

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from the Zoning Administrator and<br />

the DRB, and from best practices<br />

from surrounding towns. <strong>The</strong> majority<br />

of the current changes were<br />

made in the Danville Village area.<br />

<strong>The</strong> existing buildings were measured<br />

for setbacks and other features<br />

and zoning changes were also<br />

made to allow any new buildings<br />

to blend in with similar features as<br />

well as similar lot sizes. <strong>The</strong> Planning<br />

Commission requested the<br />

Board to review the changes to the<br />

Bylaws, identify any questions<br />

they may have, and decide how<br />

they wish to proceed.<br />

ATV Trail - Gail Devereaux of the<br />

Wheelock Road was present with<br />

Robert Barany to question the<br />

Board about the new ATV trail that<br />

goes down the town road and by<br />

their respective properties. <strong>The</strong><br />

Board explained that the original<br />

ordinance has been in effect that allowed<br />

ATV's on unpaved roads<br />

since the 1980's. Only recently<br />

they connected sections of three<br />

paved roads to allow the ATV's to<br />

travel all the way through the town.<br />

<strong>The</strong>ir concern was before the roads<br />

were all connected, the traffic was<br />

only a few local riders. N ow there<br />

are more frequent and much larger<br />

groups that travel by, making a noticeable<br />

increase in noise, and with<br />

apparently no enforced curfew.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Board will write a letter to the<br />

ATV club expressing the local residents<br />

concerns and request some<br />

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enforcement.<br />

�orth Danville - Gerard Lamothe,<br />

the former Vice President of the<br />

N orth Danville Community Club,<br />

was present to discuss the N orth<br />

Danville School Building and the<br />

current situation there. <strong>The</strong> Community<br />

Club oversees the building,<br />

and problems are centered on unlocked<br />

doors, unauthorized users,<br />

and unsecured building. <strong>The</strong> Board<br />

had been in touch with Lamothe<br />

previously, and confirmed their desire<br />

that the building be secure,<br />

locked, and supervised. Lamothe<br />

expects new officers will be<br />

elected next month, and hopes it<br />

will include a representative from<br />

the Board, to replace Marion Sevigny.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Board will send a letter to<br />

the Community Club restating<br />

their concern and oversight of the<br />

building.<br />

Sewer Line – Town Administrator<br />

Merton Leonard also presented a<br />

quote from Stantec to engineer extending<br />

the sewer line to the top of<br />

Hill Street. <strong>The</strong> proposed extension<br />

would be for approximately 900<br />

feet and allow provisions for 12 additional<br />

connections. <strong>The</strong>y quoted<br />

$1,954 for this work and would<br />

propose to do it as an add-on to the<br />

water line replacement. As this<br />

project would require state approval,<br />

the state requires the work<br />

to be done by registered engineers.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Board approved the project.<br />

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Lyndon<br />

Town Clerk - Lisa Barrett<br />

Administrative Assistant Dan<br />

Hill<br />

Selectmen: Martha Feltus, Kevin<br />

Calkins and Kermit Fisher<br />

August 3, 2009<br />

Salt Contract for Winter –A motion<br />

was made by Martha Feltus,<br />

seconded by Kevin Calkins, to accept<br />

the contract for winter salt<br />

purchases from Cargill at $64.18<br />

per ton. Motion carried 2-0.<br />

Skatepark Discussion - As discussed<br />

at several previous meetings,<br />

the Town must own the land<br />

that the park rests on prior to application<br />

for the grant. <strong>The</strong> Board<br />

would like to meet with the Village<br />

Improvement Society (VIS) to discuss<br />

acquisition of the parcel of<br />

land in question. Feltus will invite<br />

the VIS to attend the Board’s Aug.<br />

17 meeting.<br />

2009 Tax Rates – Feltus motioned<br />

to set the 2009 tax rates as follows:<br />

General Fund: $.3328, Highway:<br />

$.3992 and Local Agreement<br />

$.0038. <strong>The</strong> Homestead Education<br />

rate for 2009 is $1.4542 and the<br />

N on-Residential Education rate is<br />

$1.6886. Motion carried 2-0.<br />

<strong>Star</strong>s and Stripes Review -<br />

Pauline Harris has expressed concerns<br />

about traffic being stopped<br />

during the <strong>Star</strong>s & Stripes parade.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Village Trustees and the Board<br />

September 2009 Menu<br />

Danville Senior<br />

Action Center<br />

Meals at Danville Methodist<br />

Church. All meals served with a<br />

beverage, homemade breads and<br />

desserts. Reservations are appreciated<br />

by calling (802) 684-3903<br />

before 9:30 a.m. on day of the<br />

meal. A donation of $4 for guests<br />

60+ (Others $5) is appreciated.<br />

Sept. 1 - Seafood salad on a<br />

roll with lettuce and tomato,<br />

New England clam chowder<br />

with oyster crackers, broccoli<br />

and carrots.<br />

Sept. 3 - Veggie lasagna, summer<br />

squash casserole and garlic<br />

bread.<br />

Sept. 8 - Shepard’s pie with<br />

whole wheat rolls, broccoli,<br />

carrots and apple crisp.<br />

Sept. 10 - Chicken a la king,<br />

egg noodles, whole wheat<br />

rolls, carrots and cranberry<br />

sauce.<br />

Sept. 15 - Seafood newburg,<br />

rice pilaf, broccoli, carrots and<br />

whole wheat rolls.<br />

Sept. 17 - BBQ chicken,<br />

roasted veggies, pasta salad,<br />

rolla and canteloupe.<br />

Sept. 22 - Tuna melt, cream<br />

of broccoli soup, cole slaw<br />

and baby carrots.<br />

Sept. 25 - Bacon, broccoli and<br />

chedder quiche, rice pilaf and<br />

spinach salad.<br />

Sept. 29 - Roast beef, mashed<br />

potatoes and gravy, cauliflower,<br />

carrots and whole<br />

wheat rolls.


will meet with organizers of the<br />

event to review the concerns<br />

raised.<br />

August 17, 2009<br />

Brown Farm Road - As discussed<br />

at the Board’s Aug. 3 meeting, Dan<br />

Hill gave a summary of the project,<br />

how it came to be, funding for it,<br />

and the cost of the project. <strong>The</strong><br />

project was approved and funded<br />

by the Better Back Roads program<br />

and was reviewed by Local Roads.<br />

Residents voiced concerns about<br />

the depth of the hole created for the<br />

culvert and the cement abutment.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Board would like to meet with<br />

the road foreman and the engineer<br />

who designed the project to discuss<br />

the safety concerns of the residents.<br />

Residents will be notified of the<br />

planned site visit.<br />

Request for Road Race - <strong>The</strong><br />

Board approved the request of the<br />

Good Shepherd Catholic School to<br />

hold a road race along Stevens<br />

Loop, Back Center Road, and York<br />

Street on October 31st with appropriate<br />

traffic control.<br />

Peacham<br />

Town Clerk: Bruce Lafferty<br />

Selectmen: Richard Browne, Tim<br />

McKay and Gary Swenson.<br />

July 22, 2009<br />

Tree Board – Julie Lang, chair of<br />

the Peacham Tree Board, presented<br />

copies of the current Tree Board<br />

Charter. Clarification of the role of<br />

the Tree Board, cemetery trees and<br />

budget and grant procedures were<br />

reviewed. <strong>The</strong> bidding process for<br />

tree maintenance and the status of<br />

September 2009 Menu<br />

West Barnet<br />

Senior Meal<br />

Site<br />

Meals served at West Barnet<br />

Church. All meals served with<br />

a beverage. Reservations not<br />

required. Suggested donation<br />

of $2.50 per meal is appreciated.<br />

Phone (802) 633-4068.<br />

Sept. 2 - Macaroni and cheese,<br />

sausage, pickled beets, stewed<br />

tomatoes, biscuit and apricots.<br />

Sept. 4 - Buffet<br />

Sept. 9 - Lasagna, tossed salad,<br />

italian bread and sliced pears.<br />

Sept. 11 - Liver, onions and<br />

bacon, mashed potatoes,<br />

mixed veggies, dark bread,<br />

vanilla pudding and mandarin<br />

oranges.<br />

Sept. 16 - Salisbury steak with<br />

gravy, mashed potatoes, broccoli<br />

with cheese cause, dark<br />

bread and chocolate pudding.<br />

Sept. 18 - Baked beans with<br />

ham, cole slaw, brown bread<br />

and chocolate pudding.<br />

Sept. 23 - Chop suey, tossed<br />

salad, green beans raisin bread<br />

and tropical fruit.<br />

Sept. 25 - Chicken and biscuit,<br />

mashed potatoes, peas and<br />

carrots, cranberry sauce and<br />

canteloupe.<br />

Sept. 30 - Corn chowder, egg<br />

salad sandwich, fruit salad and<br />

cake and ince cream.<br />

the Tree Board with relation to the<br />

Town Cemetery were discussed.<br />

Signs for placement at each end of<br />

the town indicating Peacham’s distinction<br />

as a Tree City USA are<br />

now available and will be reviewed<br />

by the Board.<br />

Zoning Issues - Browne moved on<br />

advice of town council that the<br />

Board not act on the zoning enforcement<br />

of the Stedman House in<br />

Green Bay Loop since the building<br />

permit application of April 11,<br />

2009 (#5-09) is deemed approved.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Board requested the town<br />

council contact the Stedman’s attorney<br />

to finalize the matter.<br />

Snowmobile Policy -Ross Page,<br />

representing the local snowmobile<br />

club, requested clarification and<br />

permission for the use of some<br />

Class 3 Town roads for snowmobile<br />

access to trails. <strong>The</strong> Board requested<br />

that Page compose a letter<br />

including a map of the roads and<br />

trails discussed, explaining all pertinent<br />

information for their review<br />

and present it to the Town Clerk.<br />

Trails - Information by the Trails<br />

Committee co-chairs, Jutta Scott<br />

and Dave Edwards, was presented<br />

to the Board via. <strong>The</strong> current trails<br />

grant was discussed, specifically<br />

the work being done by the N orthwoods<br />

Stewardship Center group.<br />

<strong>The</strong> committee requested approval<br />

of a small foot bridge over the outlet<br />

of Foster Pond on the legal trail<br />

running from Foster Pond to Green<br />

Bay Loop through the Gibson<br />

property. <strong>The</strong> Gibson’s concerns<br />

were discussed. Subjects such as:<br />

legal trail definitions, bridge dimensions,<br />

proper trail usage and<br />

the impact on the trails grant were<br />

discussed. <strong>The</strong> Board delayed their<br />

decision until further evidence is<br />

presented on this issue. <strong>The</strong> Trails<br />

Committee also presented a drawing<br />

of the proposed Trails Logo for<br />

the Town Trails and Pathways.<br />

<strong>The</strong> logo was designed and donated<br />

by Kate Monteith of<br />

Peacham, specifically for the<br />

Town’s use. <strong>The</strong> Board approved<br />

the logo and will send a letter to<br />

Ms. Monteith thanking her for her<br />

generous creative donation.<br />

St. Johnsbury<br />

Town Manager: Michael Welch<br />

Town Clerk: Sandy Grenier<br />

Selectboard: Bryon Quatrini, Gary<br />

Reis, Daniel Kimbell, Jim Rust,<br />

and Jean Hall Wheeler.<br />

July 20, 2009<br />

Fire – Chair Daniel Kimbell complimented<br />

all persons involved in<br />

the containment of the fire that<br />

damaged three building on Main<br />

Street on July 9. Daniel named 17<br />

surrounding fire departments that<br />

responded to assist, including as far<br />

away as N ewport, and Woodsville<br />

and Monroe, N .H. Kimbell expressed<br />

appreciation on behalf of<br />

the Town to all Firefighters, Police,<br />

Public Works personnel, and Red<br />

Cross volunteers, as well as all<br />

other volunteers who responded to<br />

the emergency.<br />

Reappraisal – Peter Whitney reported<br />

that the booklets of new<br />

property assessments had been<br />

mailed on July 20 from Winooski<br />

so property owners should expect<br />

to receive their notice of reappraisal<br />

within two or three days.<br />

Peter also indicated that the entire<br />

list of reappraisals has been listed<br />

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on the Town web site. Peter said<br />

that after making several spot<br />

checks throughout the list, everything<br />

seems to be in line and he<br />

planned to host at least two public<br />

forums to answer questions. Kimbell<br />

clarified that an increased assessment<br />

does not necessarily<br />

mean increased taxes, and in fact<br />

the tax rate will be adjusted to reflect<br />

the new assessments and the<br />

school rate from the state is an unknown<br />

factor. Jean Wheeler asked<br />

when the tax rate had to be set.<br />

Town Clerk Sandy Grenier said the<br />

latest the tax bills could be mailed<br />

was October 20 (30 days before the<br />

property taxes would be due), and<br />

the bills usually go out 60 days before<br />

the tax due date.<br />

Recording Fees – Grenier reported<br />

the fee for recording has increased<br />

to $10 from $8 effective<br />

July 1, 2009. Grenier said in the<br />

past the Board had authorized the<br />

Town Clerk to retain $1 of the $8<br />

fee in reserve for records restoration.<br />

She asked that the Board authorize<br />

the retention of an<br />

additional $1 from the new $10 fee<br />

to be put into the reserve for<br />

records restoration, the remainder<br />

being applied to the general fund.<br />

Jim Rust suggested that the full $2<br />

increase should be applied to<br />

records restoration, so that the people<br />

that use the vault for recording<br />

will be paying the fee to maintain<br />

the records. <strong>The</strong> Board authorized<br />

a split of the new $10 recording fee<br />

as $7 – general revenue, and $3 –<br />

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Correctional Facility – Town Manager<br />

Mike Welch reported that he<br />

has conferred with Dave Peebles<br />

and, since the State has put the<br />

closing of the facility on hold for<br />

the moment, Peebles indicated that<br />

if the facility is to be kept open, it<br />

would need to be operated more efficiently,<br />

which would mean probable<br />

expansion. Currently the<br />

facility constructed to hold 100 inmates<br />

is housing 150, so additional<br />

beds would probably require construction.<br />

N othing definitive was<br />

said, but Peebles indicated he<br />

would like some feedback from the<br />

Town. It was generally agreed that<br />

the Board would be open to the<br />

suggestion, but would hold off<br />

making a commitment until they<br />

had more specific information.<br />

Member Bryon Quatrini suggested<br />

re-convening the Corrections<br />

Committee to discuss this matter.<br />

Block Party - Kingdom Recovery<br />

requested holding their annual<br />

Summerfest as a true block party<br />

on Summer Street, which would<br />

cordon off Summer Street from<br />

Central Street to Church Street.<br />

<strong>The</strong> event is scheduled for 2 p.m.<br />

to 7:30 p.m. <strong>The</strong> Board authorized<br />

Welch to allow the Block Party,<br />

with the stipulation that the Police<br />

Department and area neighbors are<br />

agreeable, and as long as Main<br />

Street is open to through traffic.<br />

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Shipping<br />

Center<br />

Mon.-Thu. & Sat., 7 a.m.-5:30 p.m., Fri. ’til 6 p.m., Sun. 9 a.m.-1 p.m.<br />

Hardware Electrical P aint Plumbing Building Materials Lumber<br />

A fine craft cooperative featuring gifts<br />

from more than 100 Vermont artisans<br />

We Sell<br />

Propane<br />

BACKROOM GALLERY SHOWS:<br />

CLEAR VISIONS: featuring prize-winning Vermont artists;<br />

August 21st through September 29th.


Accounting & Tax Preperation<br />

BUSINESS DIRECTORY<br />

Business Identification at a Reasonable Price $85.00/ year Price Includes Free Subscription<br />

��Kenneth M. Biathrow, CPA<br />

Tax preparation services -Personal, business, estate. Accounting<br />

services, financial statements review and compilation.<br />

P.O. Box 528, 364 Railroad St., St. Johnsbury, VT<br />

05819. (802) 748-2200.<br />

��McCormick & Company P.C.<br />

Dwight E. Lakey, CPA; Robin C. Gauthier, CPA. 1360<br />

Main Street, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819-2285. (802) 748-<br />

4914. (800) 516-CPAS.<br />

��A.M. Peisch & Company LLC<br />

A five-office Vermont based accounting firm specializing<br />

in individual and business tax services, financial and retirement<br />

planning, accounting, auditing and estate planning.<br />

We provide technology services including network<br />

security, operational reviews and accounting support.<br />

1020 Memorial Drive, St. Johnsbury, VT. 05819. (802)<br />

748-5654.<br />

��H&R Block<br />

Tax, Mortgage and Financial Services. D. Neil Stafford,<br />

master tax advisor. 443 Railroad Street, Suite 1, St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-5319. 76 Main Street,<br />

PO Box 65, Littleton, NH 03561. And Lyndonville<br />

Branch (Jan.-Apr.) 101 Depot Street, Lyndonville VT<br />

05851. (802) 626-0884.<br />

��Lisa Burrington, EA, LLC<br />

“Enrolled to practice before the IRS.” Tax and accounting<br />

services for individuals and small businesses. Address:<br />

106 Hill Street Lyndonville, VT 05851 Phone:<br />

(802) 626-9140 Fax: (802) 626-9141 Email: lisaburrington@myfairpoint.net.<br />

��Magnus & Associates<br />

Tax planning and preparation, 459 Portland St., St. Johnsbury,<br />

Vt.. Contact Ed Magnus at (802) 748-5555 or<br />

sungam@myfairpoint.net.<br />

Antiques<br />

��Antiques & Emporium<br />

Antiques, glassware, furniture, clocks, paintings & prints,<br />

collectibles, jewelry, handmade rugs, and much more. Always<br />

buying. Open Daily: 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. Closed Tuesdays.<br />

182 South Wheelock Road, Lyndonville, VT 05851.<br />

(802) 626-3500.<br />

��Saranac Street Antiques<br />

We feature a very large selection of fine antique furniture.<br />

Also quality area dealers specializing in primitives,<br />

White Mountain art, tools, country pieces and exceptional<br />

glass and china. Consider us a “must see” on your<br />

antiquing list. Open Wed.-Sun. at 10 a.m. for your shopping<br />

convenience. Main Street, Littleton, NH 03561.<br />

(603) 444-4888.<br />

Appliance Repair<br />

��Lewis Appliance<br />

Factory Authorized Service and Repair for Maytag, JennAir,<br />

Asko, Bosch and Frigidaire. Wayne Lewis, Waterford,<br />

VT. (802) 748-6561.<br />

Attorneys<br />

��Law Office of Charles D. Hickey, PLC<br />

General Practice of Law. 69 Winter St., PO Box 127, St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT 05819-0127. (802) 748-3919.<br />

��Law Offices of Jay C. Abramson<br />

Estate Planning, Long-Term Care Planning, Wills, Trusts,<br />

Real Estate. Certified Elder Law Attorney. 1107 Main<br />

Street, Suite 101, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-<br />

6200.<br />

��Law Office of Deborah T. Bucknam & Associates<br />

Family Law, Business & Commercial, Property & Land<br />

Use, Wills, Estates & Trusts, Government, Personal Injury<br />

and Real Estate. 1097 Main St., PO Box 310, St. Johnsbury,<br />

VT 05819. (802) 748-5525.<br />

��Clarke D. Atwell, Esq.<br />

Small business, Zoning, Cottage Law, Residential and<br />

Commercial Real Estate, Property Law, Rights of Way,<br />

Estate Planning and Trusts, Probate Estate Administration,<br />

Elder Law, Guardianships, etc. 364 Railroad St., St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT. (802) 748-5338 or clarke@neklaw.net.<br />

Auctioneers<br />

��Eaton Auction Service<br />

Specializing in Antiques, Collectibles and Estate Sales.<br />

Personal and knowledgeable service. From one item to<br />

a whole household. Auctioneers: Chuck Eaton and<br />

Delsie Hoyt Phone: (802) 333-9717. Address: Fairlee, VT<br />

05045. www.eatonauctionservice.com<br />

��Jenkins Auction Service<br />

We handle antiques, bankruptcies, benefits, estates<br />

and equipment. Auctioneers are Blake Jenkins Jr. and<br />

Kirby Parker. Visit our Web site at www.jenkinsauctionservice.com,<br />

E-mail us at sold@jenkinsauctionservice.com<br />

or call (802) 748-9296.<br />

Autobody Repair<br />

��Five <strong>Star</strong> Autobody<br />

Certified collision repair center. Complete autobody repairs<br />

from glass to frame. George & Suzanne Mudge.<br />

Located off I-91, Exit 22, 604 Lapierre Drive, St. Johnsbury,<br />

VT 05819. (802) 748-5321.<br />

��JJ’s Autobody<br />

John Jefferson, Barnet, Vt. Expert collision and rust repair,<br />

discounts on all deductibles, complete glasswork,<br />

AC service and repair ASE and PPG certified, (802) 633-<br />

3902.<br />

Automobile Repair<br />

��Burke View Garage, Inc.<br />

Larry Lefaivre, Owner. Domestic & Import Repair; Brakes,<br />

Exhaust, Tune-Ups. State Inspection Station.We Do It All. Tire<br />

Sales also. M-F 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.. RT 114, Lyndonville, VT<br />

05851. (802) 626-3282.<br />

��Mark’s Automotive<br />

Foreign and domestic repairs. Cooper, Hankook and Remington<br />

tires. Brakes, exhaust, oil change, VT State inspection,<br />

computer wheel balancing and computer diagnostics. ASE<br />

certified. Mark Jefferson, West Barnet Road, Barnet Center,<br />

VT. (802) 633-3863.<br />

��Murray Transport<br />

Auto & light truck repair, oil changes, exhaust, brakes, tire<br />

sales, mounting and spin balancing. <strong>North</strong> Danville Rd.,<br />

Danville VT. (802) 684-9820.<br />

Automobile Sales<br />

��Mountain View Auto Sales & Service<br />

Good used cars & trucks for sale, trade-ins welcome. Complete<br />

service shop and body shop. Vermont Inspections. 24hour<br />

towing. 376 Broad Street, Lyndonville, VT (802)<br />

626-4276 or (802) 626-9251.<br />

Banks<br />

��Passumpsic Savings Bank<br />

Your Partner in Financial Success. 53 Route 2 West, Danville,<br />

VT 05828. (802) 684-8100. Other offices located in: Vermont:<br />

St. Johnsbury, Lyndonville, Island Pond, Newport, New<br />

Hampshire: Littleton, Lancaster, Groveton and Whitefield.<br />

Member FDIC. www.passumpsicbank.com<br />

Books<br />

��Lyders Fine Books<br />

Buying and selling 19th and 20th century first editions in fine<br />

condition. rlyders@fairpoint.net (802) 592-3086. Josette &<br />

Richard Lyders, P.O. Box 250, Peacham, VT 05862.<br />

��Secondhand Prose<br />

Purveyor of quality used books. Operated by Friends of the<br />

St. Johnsbury Athenaeum. Open: Tues., Thurs. and Sat. 10-2,<br />

Wed. 1-5 and Fri. 10-4, 1222 Main Street, St. Johnsbury, VT<br />

05819.<br />

Bricklayer<br />

��C.T. Cushman Masonry<br />

Chimneys, Fireplaces, Patios, Stonewalls, Slate & Flagstone<br />

Walkways, Steps, Chimney and Foundation Repairs, Brick &<br />

Stone Veneer. 35 Years Experience. Chimney Cleaning. (802)<br />

748-2221.<br />

��Plumb Line Masonry<br />

Brick, block and stone for fireplaces, chimneys, walls, steps,<br />

patioes, etc. Contact Steven Towsley at.(802) 748-6595,<br />

(802) 535-8709, plumblinemasonry@myfairpoint.net, or visit<br />

www.plumblinemasonry.com.<br />

Cabinetry<br />

��Calendar Brook Cabinetry<br />

Since 1979 – Custom Kitchen Cabinetry, Bathroom Vanities,<br />

Entertainment Centers, Tables, Doors, Architectural Millwork<br />

and Mouldings, Hardwoods and Hardwood Plywoods,<br />

Hardwood Flooring, Stone and Solid Surface and Laminate<br />

Tops. David Patoine, Master Craftsman. 4863 Memorial<br />

Drive, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-5658.<br />

Chimney Service<br />

��Clean Sweep Chimney Service<br />

Sweep & inspection of all types of chimneys, fireplaces, inserts,<br />

wood & pellet appliances and more. Stainless steel liners,<br />

flashing, repointing, water proofing, chimney top outs<br />

and caps. Most chimney problems can be avoided with regular<br />

preventative care. McClure’s Enterprises, LLC, PO Box<br />

318, Lyndonville, VT 05851, (802) 626-9700.<br />

Lodging<br />

��Harvey’s Lake Cabins and Campground<br />

May 15-Oct 15. Lakefront furnished cabins set in wooded<br />

private 53-site campground. Large private campsites with<br />

WES suitable for tents popups, RV’s. Group Area, Refurbished<br />

Recreation Hall, Reunions, Retreats and Receptions.<br />

Boats, Kayaks and Bicycle Rentals. 190 Campers Lane, West<br />

Barnet, VT 05821. (802) 633-2213.<br />

www.harveyslakecabins.com<br />

��Marshfield Inn & Motel<br />

Quiet country accommodations on 37 acres mid-way between<br />

Montpelier and St. Johnsbury. Enjoy our nature trail,<br />

full breakfast menu and Winooski river view. Close to<br />

Cabot Creamery, lots of maple farms and Groton State Forest.<br />

Ask about our pet-friendly rooms! Call (802) 426-3383<br />

for reservations. Visit www.marshfieldinn.com for more information.<br />

Computers<br />

��<strong>North</strong>east Computer Systems<br />

Home & Business Computer Systems. Networking, Hardware,<br />

Service, Support and Software. 37 Depot Street, PO<br />

Box 1059, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802) 626-1050. FAX<br />

(802) 626-5012. www.necomp.com<br />

��Parallax Management Services, Inc.<br />

MS Access & database design; Excel programming; MS Office<br />

training/ automation; Quantitative analysis graphic design for<br />

Illustrator graphic designers; Computer presentation and<br />

public speaking skills training. Data conversions, implementations,<br />

statistical analysis, forecasting and other individual<br />

and business services. Contact Dan Zucker, Danville, VT.<br />

www.parallaxman.com Email: zucker@parallaxman.com<br />

��wyBatap Personal Technology Assistant<br />

On your schedule in your home/business. (Days - Evenings -<br />

Weekends) Desktop and Laptop Computers - Setup, Networking,Wireless,<br />

QuickBooks,”How To,” AntiVirus, Spyware,<br />

Data Recovery and more… Bob Roos, Barnet VT. (802) 633-<br />

4395. PersTech@wybatap.com<br />

Construction<br />

��A.C. Trades<br />

Foundation and Sill Repair. Winter Selective Cut Logging (S.F.I.<br />

certified). Andy Cochran, PO Box 106, Peacham VT 05862.<br />

(802) 684-9890.<br />

��Armstrong Masonry<br />

Masonry Construction & Repair. Brick, Stone, Block. Fireplaces,<br />

Chimneys, Veneer, Patios, Walkways. Ken Armstrong.<br />

(802) 626-8495.<br />

��Bob’s Construction<br />

Foundations, Floors, Mobile Home slabs, Foundations under<br />

existing homes. 23 years experience. Price stays the same<br />

from beginning of the job to the end. ACI certified. Robert<br />

Barnes. (802) 626-8763.<br />

��Calkins Rock Products, Inc.<br />

Sale of Sand, Gravel and All Sizes of Ledge Products. Portable<br />

Crushing. Route 5, PO Box 82, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-5636.<br />

��Gil’s Construction<br />

Foundations & Floors. New Rapid Forms. Free Estimates.<br />

Gilman LaCourse. (802) 748-9476.<br />

��William Graves Builders<br />

Working throughout Caledonia County for 31 years, serving<br />

as a building and renovation contractor for residences, barns,<br />

businesses and public facilities. We also offer project management<br />

services. We appreciate your calls and interest. PO Box<br />

128, 329 Cloud Brook Road, Barnet, VT 05821. (802) 633-<br />

2579 FAX (802) 633-4631. gravesbuild@mtfairpoint.net<br />

��Kingdom Timber Frames of Vermont<br />

Post & Beam Frames from the <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom. Constructing<br />

new, recycled and hand-hewn timber frames. Barn<br />

Repair. Design, Build, Complete Projects. Owner: Darren<br />

White. 158 Evergreen Lane, Danville, VT 05828. (802) 684-<br />

2121. (800) 866-2124. kingdomtimberframes@yahoo.com or<br />

www.kingdomtimberframes.com.s<br />

��Laferriere Construction, Inc.<br />

New construction, remodeling, custom work, residential &<br />

commercial. Dennis Laferriere, 525 Wightman Rd, Danville,<br />

VT 05828. (802) 684-3606. FAX (802) 684-3628.<br />

��Ross C. Page Foundations<br />

Concrete foundations & slabs. Residential, Agricultural &<br />

Commercial. Ross C. Page, 368 Thaddeus Stevens Road,<br />

Peacham, VT 05862. (802) 592-3382. FAX (802) 592-3382.<br />

��Ruggles Roofing<br />

Sick of Shoveling Your Roof? Our 80,000 PSI steel offers superior<br />

strength to your home or business. With 19 attractive<br />

colors to choose from it will enhance your buildings while<br />

heavy snow slides off to the ground. Fully insured. (802) 467-<br />

1189.<br />

��Vermont Home Specialties, Inc.<br />

Custom energy efficiency homes, Fine Log & Timber Frame<br />

Homes, Standing Seam Roofs & Corbond Foam Insulation.<br />

Stop by our model log home located at 1513 US RT 2, West<br />

Danville, VT. Call (802) 684-1024.<br />

www.vthomespecialties.com<br />

��Michael K. Walsh & Son, Builders<br />

Custom new construction: Houses, decks, remodeling, renovations,<br />

restorations, additions, finish work, wallpapering.<br />

High quality workmanship for over 30 years. Solid reputation.<br />

349 Calkins Camp Rd., Danville, VT 05828. (802) 684-3977.<br />

��Rob Keach Builders<br />

Custom commercial & residential construction. No job too<br />

big or too small. 2300 Daniels Farm Rd., Waterford, VT<br />

05819. (802) 748-5341 or (802) 283-3627.<br />

��Fenoff & Hale Construction<br />

All your construction needs. Fully insured. Timber frames,<br />

new homes, drywall & free estimates, remodeling, additions,<br />

roofing, siding and decks. Small or large projects, including interior<br />

and exterior painting. Phone: (802) 684-9955 or Fax:<br />

(802) 684-3414.<br />

��DAL Builders<br />

David A. Lavely. Design-build and construction management<br />

experience for residential and commercial projects. 26 years<br />

of local experience in new construction and renovations. PO<br />

Box 362 Danville Vt 05828. Phone/Fax (802) 684-2116 or Email:<br />

dlavely@myfairpoint.net.<br />

��Randy’s Home Repair<br />

Sheetrocking, painting, roofing, decks, vinyl siding and trim,<br />

jacking and foundation repair, hardwood floor insulation and<br />

refinishing old floors. Fully insured, free estimates, affordable<br />

rates. Located at 355 Pleasant Street, St. Johsnbury, Vt., (802)<br />

748-6556.<br />

��Black Dog Builders<br />

We are quality builders. We employ innovative techniques<br />

in new construction and renovations. We build<br />

near zero energy buildings, perform home energy audits,<br />

and WE BUILD GREEN. Call (802) 748-9443 or visit<br />

blackdogbuildersvt.com.<br />

Dentists<br />

��Peter M. Ollman, D.M.D.<br />

Pediatric Dentistry - since 1977. 576 Railroad St., St. Johnsbury,<br />

VT. Offering: a warm, compassionate, fun environment<br />

for infants, children and teens; specialized early prevention for<br />

infants and toddlers; unique children’s restorative and preventive<br />

dentistry, using our special skills and materials. We offer<br />

white and rainbow fillings, athletic mouthguards, and accept<br />

most insurance and VT/NH Medicaid programs. (802) 748-<br />

8701<br />

��Stuart V. Corso, D.M.D.<br />

General and family dentistry. 31 Mountain View Drive,<br />

Danville, VT 05828. (802) 684-1133.<br />

��Hawkins Dental Group<br />

Hubert Hawkins, DDS. Complete Family Dentistry. New patients<br />

welcome. 1350 Main Street, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819.<br />

(802) 748-2325. (800) 870-4963.<br />

Dining<br />

��Brown’s Market Bistro<br />

On the Wells River along Rt. 302 in beautiful Groton<br />

Village and features live music with Jean Anderson and<br />

other local artists on Friday and Saturday nights. Catering<br />

parties and special events and open for dinner Tues.-<br />

Sat. 4:30 to 9 pm. BYOB. Reservations suggested, (802)<br />

584-4124.<br />

Dry Cleaning<br />

��Palmer Bros. Dry Cleaning.<br />

Shirt laundry, alterations, linen rentals for special occasions.<br />

Pick-up and delivery available at Hastings Store in<br />

West Danville. Open Man.,Tues. & Thurs. 7-5:30, Wed &<br />

Fri. 7-6, Sat. 8-12. Eastern Ave., St. Johnsbury, VT. (802)<br />

748-2308.<br />

Electrical Service<br />

��Matt Pettigrew Electric<br />

New homes (conventional frame, post & beam or log)<br />

renovations or service upgrade (aerial or underground).<br />

Heating system controls, generator installations and all<br />

other phases of electrical work in a professional manner.<br />

Licensed in VT & NH. Danville, VT. (802) 751-8201.<br />

��CG Electric<br />

Licensed in VT, NH, MA & ME. Commercial, industrial,<br />

residential, service & repair. Established 1995.<br />

Charlie Gilman, PO Box 195, Danville, VT 05828. cgelectric@msn.com<br />

(802) 684-9700.<br />

��Greaves Electrical Services<br />

Free estimates. Fully licensed and insured. Call Tim<br />

Greaves, owner, Office: (802) 563-2550 Cell: (802) 316-<br />

6961 or send an email to greaveselc@aol.com. P.O. Box<br />

124 Cabot, Vt. 05647<br />

Elecrical Sales & Service<br />

��Byrne Electronic Service Center<br />

New & Used Television, VCR and other consumer electronic<br />

sales. Factory authorized service center for several<br />

brands. Professional repair service on all TV’s, VCR’s,<br />

Stereos and pro audio equipment. 159 Eastern Ave., St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-2111.<br />

Excavation<br />

��Compact Excavation Services<br />

Including stumps, trenches, drainage, crushed stone<br />

driveways, york raking, small building demolition, small<br />

foundations, tree length brush removed, rock retaining<br />

walls built, excavator (with thumb) picks up most anything.<br />

Also trucking and trailer to 10,000 pounds and<br />

30’ long. Matt Pettigrew, Danville, VT. (802) 751-8201.<br />

��C&C Bunnell Excavating<br />

Site Work, Septic Systems, Bulldozing, Roads, Ponds and<br />

Trucking Sand, Topsoil, Gravel & Stone Deliveries. Calvin<br />

Bunnell, Joe’s Brook Rd., Barnet, VT 05821. (802) 633-<br />

3413.<br />

Farm Equipment<br />

��Paul’s Farm Service<br />

Paul D. Bergeron. Serving Agricultural Needs with Integrity<br />

Since 1976. Sales, service and parts for Same,<br />

Deutz Fahr and McCormick lines. 514 West Main Street<br />

(US RT 2) Concord, VT 05824. (802) 695-2500<br />

Fencing<br />

��All Types of Fencing<br />

Commercial, Agricultural and Residential. Chain Link,<br />

High Tensile, Barbed Wire, Woven Wire and Ornamental.<br />

Gordon Goss. (802) 633-2822. Cell (802) 777-0919.<br />

Fax (802) 633-3405. gossmaple@kingcon.com<br />

Flooring<br />

��<strong>The</strong> Carpet Connection, Inc.<br />

<strong>The</strong> flooring specialists. All types of floor covering and<br />

supplies. Largest selection in the State. Sales and installation.<br />

199 Depot Street, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-9026 or (800) 822-9026.<br />

��Country Floors<br />

Complete Flooring Sales & Installation. Carpeting, Vinyl,<br />

Hardwood, Ceramic Tile, Area Rugs. Stanley H. & Joanne<br />

C. Martin, Hollister Hill Road, Plainfield, VT 05667. (802)<br />

454-7301.<br />

Florists<br />

��All About Flowers<br />

All occasion florist featuring the freshest flowers and<br />

plants in town. A fine selection of silk flowers and customized<br />

food baskets. A unique variety of gift items.<br />

Wedding and funeral arrangements for all budgets. Wire<br />

service available. 10% senior discount not applicable<br />

with other discounts. 196 Eastern Avenue, St. Johnsbury,<br />

VT 05819. (802) 748-5656 or (800) 499-6565.<br />

��<strong>The</strong> Flower Basket<br />

Flowers, plants, gifts, balloons, Yankee Candles and other<br />

magical things. Local delivery service available. 156<br />

Daniels Road, Hardwick, VT 05843. Mon.-Fri. 8-5:30. Sat.<br />

9-3. (802) 472-3397. www.theflowerbasket.biz


Forestry<br />

��McMath Forestry<br />

Complete Ecological Forestland Management Services.<br />

David McMath, Forester, 4875 Noyestar Road, East Hardwick,<br />

VT 05836. (802) 533-2970. Toll Free: (866) 462-6284.<br />

www.mctree.com<br />

Furniture Restoration<br />

BUSINESS DIRECTORY<br />

Business Identification at a Reasonable Price $85.00/ year Price Includes Free Subscription<br />

��Chair Care and Klappert Furniture Restoration<br />

Authentic restoration of old finishes and techniques for antique<br />

& fine furniture. Specializing in chair repair & all seat<br />

replacement. 90 5th Avenue, St. Johnsbury, VT. 05819-2672.<br />

(802) 748-0077.<br />

Gardening<br />

��Fine Garden Design<br />

Landscape design and consulting services. Offering creative<br />

and fresh approaches to kitchen gardens,perennial gardens<br />

and complete landscape design. Inspiring gardeners and cultivating<br />

beautiful landscapes since 1995. Angie Knost, Certified<br />

Professional Horticulturist, Walden, VT (802) 563-2535<br />

Glass Sales & Service<br />

��Mayo’s Glass Service, Inc.<br />

Commercial, Residential, Auto, Vinyl, Fiberglass & Aluminum<br />

Windows, Awnings & Doors. Plate Glass, Mirrors, Insulated<br />

Glass. 744 Portland Street, St. Johnsbury, VT. (802) 748-8895.<br />

��Pippin Tree Arts Stained Glass<br />

Mary Ellen Hannington works mostly with the copper foil<br />

method. Small pieces to window-sized panels. Address: PO<br />

Box 466, Island Pond, VT 05846 Phone: (802) 723-6184,<br />

mary@pippintreearts.com, www.pippintreearts.com<br />

Hair Care<br />

��Country Styles Family Hair Care<br />

Janet L. Carson. Located at the K.P. Hall on the top of Hill<br />

Street, Danville, VT 05828. Follow the handicapped accessible<br />

ramp. Home service available to shut-ins. (802) 684-<br />

2152.<br />

Health & Fitness<br />

��Stepping Stone Spa & Garden Cafe<br />

Travel local for a getaway; massages, exfoliation, facials, footbaths,<br />

hotstone, sauna, wholesome lunches, dinner, beer,<br />

wine, & overnight accommodations. Make a elaborate weekend<br />

getaway.. Nothing is as beautiful as picturesque Darling<br />

Hill in Lyndonville, VT. 802-626-3104 www.steppingstonespa.com.<br />

��Club at Old Mill<br />

Indoor tennis court, 3 racquetball courts and fitness center<br />

with Nautilus machines, free weights and full range of cardiovascular<br />

equipment. Group exercise classes including Pilates<br />

and Spinning. Professional, certified staff to help meet your<br />

fitness goals. Since 1980. Open 7 days. 49 Perkins Street, St.<br />

Johnsbury, VT 05819. clubatoldmill.com (802) 748-5313.<br />

Health Care Providers<br />

��Danville Health Center<br />

General Health Services for all ages. Open M-F. Mariel Hess,<br />

N.P.; Tim Tanner, M.D.; and Sharon Fine, M.D.; Jeniane Daniels,<br />

PA-C; 26 Cedar Lane, Danville, VT 05828. (802) 684-2275.<br />

(800) 489-2275 (VT).<br />

��Lyndonville Family Chiropractic<br />

Contributing to the health of the community for over<br />

17 years. Offering a holistic approach to healthcare utilizing<br />

chiropractic, acupuncture, nutrition and massage<br />

therapy. Karson Clark, D.C.; Stacey Clark, D.C. 11 Hill<br />

Street, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802) 626-5866.<br />

��HealthSource Chiropractic<br />

Back & Neck Pain Eliminated, Quickly & Easily. Dr. Jeremy<br />

Ste. Marie, D.C. Dr. Marjorie Ste. Marie, D.C. 32 Hill Street<br />

Danville, VT 05828 (802) 684-9707 or www.healthsourcechiro.com.<br />

��Hardwick Chiropractic<br />

BioGeometric Integration is a gentle, effective chiropractic<br />

approach that allows your system to heal and to become increasingly<br />

adept at correcting itself. Dr. Grace Johnstone, Dr.<br />

Rick Eschholz and Dr. Teri Dodge. 54 School Circle, East<br />

Hardwick, VT. (802) 472-3033.<br />

www.hardwickchiropractic.com<br />

��Linda Sayers, Reiki Master<br />

Reiki is an ancient, hands-on healing art, which supports the<br />

body’s ability to heal itself. Reiki promotes deep relaxation<br />

and helps release physical and emotional blockages. Linda<br />

Sayers, Reiki Master Teacher and Lightwork Practitioner. 63<br />

Norway Road, Greensboro Bend, VT 05842. (802) 533-2378.<br />

��Dan Wyand, PT & Associates<br />

Rehabilitation of Sports Injuries, Orthopedics and Neuromuscular<br />

Disorders. Sherman Dr., P.O. Box 68, St. Johnsbury,VT<br />

05819. (802) 748-3722/1932. Lyndon,VT. (802)<br />

745-1106.<br />

��Thousand Hands Massage <strong>The</strong>rapy<br />

Laurajean “LJ” Stewart, Licensed Massage <strong>The</strong>rapist, 60 Monument<br />

Circle, PO Box 129, Barnet, VT 05821. Located at the<br />

Barnet Tradepost. (802) 633-2700.<br />

samuraihini@hotmail.com.<br />

Historic Preservation<br />

��S.A. Fishburn, Inc.<br />

Historic preservation and design featuring wooden sash<br />

restoration, historic plaster repair, architectural millwork and<br />

fine custom cabinetry. (802) 684-2524.<br />

safishburn@gmail.com or www.safishburn.net<br />

Insurance<br />

��Sawyer & Ritchie Agency<br />

Independent thinking, individually focused. We’ll put our<br />

years of experience to work to meet your personal and<br />

business insurance needs with a complete line of auto,<br />

home, life, disability and commercial coverage. 198<br />

Route 2 W, Danville, VT 05828, (802) 684-3411 or (800)<br />

734-2203.<br />

��Berwick Agency, Inc.<br />

Providing insurance for home, farm, automobile and<br />

business. Est. in 1955. Licensed in NH & VT. Jeff Berwick.<br />

Located at 185 Church Street, Peacham. Mail: PO Box<br />

272, Peacham, VT 05862. (802) 592-3234 or (802) 592-<br />

3956.<br />

Investments<br />

��Investment Watch<br />

Independent investment research, portfolio analysis and<br />

strategy. Rachel Siegel, CFA. (802) 633-3977.<br />

rsiegel@hughes.net<br />

Jewelry<br />

��Old Coins & Jewelry Shop<br />

Buying: Silver and Gold Coins, Mint Sets, Scrap Gold and<br />

Silver, Wheat Cents, Coin Collections, Diamond and<br />

Gold Jewelry. Selling: Collector Coins and Sport Cards<br />

and Supplies, New and Estate Jewelry, Body Jewelry,<br />

Magic and Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh Cards. 10 Eastern<br />

Avenue, St. Johnsbury, VT. (802) 748-9174.<br />

Lawn Care & Landscaping<br />

��LND Landscaping<br />

Excavating - Hauling - Brush hog - Tilling - Driveways -<br />

Lawnmowing - Walkways - Stonewalls - Steps - Fencing<br />

- Cleanup - Planting - Snow Plowing - Sanding and More.<br />

Tim or Dave, Barre and Wolcott. (802) 479-0029.<br />

��Joe’s Brook Land Services<br />

Lawn mowing, tree work, bush hogging, stump grinding,<br />

light trucking and excavating, land clearing, snowplowing,<br />

sanding and firewood for sale. Reasonable rates. Cont<br />

��Don’s Lawn Care & Snowplowing<br />

St. Johnsbury-Danville area. Reasonable rates and quality<br />

service. Danville, VT, (802) 748-2504.<br />

Lumber & Building Materials<br />

��Caledonia Lumber<br />

Cedar lumber, a safe, local, natural alternative to pressure<br />

treated. Rough or surfaced to your specifications.<br />

Custom sawing available for all your lumber and building<br />

material needs. Located at 754 Station Road in Sutton,<br />

(802)-535-8643.<br />

Maple Syrup<br />

��Sugar Ridge Farm<br />

Pure Maple Syrup & Maple Products. “Vermont Seal of<br />

Quality.” Available by mail. MC & Visa accepted. Free<br />

brochure. Stephen & Diane Jones, 566 Stannard Mt. Rd.,<br />

Danville, VT 05828. (800) 748-0892.<br />

��Rowell Sugarhouse<br />

Visit a real sugarhouse. Open year round. See our sugaring<br />

equipment. Maple products, gifts, country crafts, VT<br />

shirts, woodenware, baskets, honey, souvenirs and more.<br />

We will ship your order. MC/ Visa/DS. Rt. 15, Walden, VT<br />

05873. (802) 563-2756.<br />

��Gadapee Family Sugarhouse<br />

Pure VT Maple Syrup in a variety of containers from gallon<br />

to half pint jugs and specialty glass. Maple cream,<br />

candy, sugar, maple jelly and maple granola to order. We<br />

have the “Vermont Seal of Quality” and we ship. 718<br />

Calkins Camp Rd., Danville, VT 05828. (802) 684-3323.<br />

gadmaple@together.net<br />

��Broadview Farm Maple<br />

Pure VT Maple Syrup available in Grade A Fancy,<br />

Medium Amber, Dark Amber and Grade B. “Vermont<br />

Seal of Quality.” Maple Cream, Maple Candy and Maple<br />

Sugar are available. We ship via UPS or Parcel Post. Joe<br />

Newell, 442 York Street, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-8396. joe@newells.net<br />

��Cabot Hills Maple Certified Organic Syrup<br />

Vermont Fancy, Medium Amber, Dark Amber and Grade<br />

B syrup. Marcia Maynard and Family, Thistle Hill, PO<br />

Box 68, Cabot, VT 05647. syrup@cabothillsmaple.com<br />

(802) 426-3463. Visa/MC. To buy our syrup call, email,<br />

write or order online at www.cabothillsmaple.com<br />

��Goodrich’s Maple Farm<br />

Award-winning maple syrup and products, including sugaring<br />

equipment & supplies, containers, tanks, vacuum<br />

pumps and much more. Custom tubin installation and<br />

consultation. Call us at 802.426.3388, e-mail us at<br />

goodrichsmaple@yahoo.com or visit<br />

www.goodrichmaplefarm.com.<br />

Meat<br />

��Lewis Creek Jerseys Badger Brook Meats<br />

Vince Foy & Deb Yonker. Retailing Certified Organic<br />

Angus Beef and Lamb by the Cut in any Quantity. <strong>North</strong><br />

Danville, VT 05828. (802) 748-8461.<br />

��Duncan’s Beef<br />

Home grown grass & grain fed beef. Sold by the cut.<br />

Clark and Jennifer Duncan. (802) 633-3036 West Barnet,<br />

VT.<br />

��Second Chance Farm<br />

Retailing certified organic pork, beef, turkey, chicken and<br />

eggs. 100% natural lamb. 36 cuts to choose from. <strong>North</strong><br />

Danville, Vt. (802) 748-1975<br />

��Meadow View Farm<br />

100% All Natural Grass-Fed & more importantly<br />

Grass-Finished Belted Galloway Beef. Sold by ½ cow, ¼<br />

cow, or cut. <strong>Star</strong>ted herds also available. Farm tours<br />

starting May 1st ; Nothing is as beautiful as picturesque<br />

Darling Hill in Lyndonville, VT 802-626-3116<br />

www.meadow-view-farm.com<br />

Music Studio<br />

��Vermont Sky Digital Audio<br />

16-Track Professional Recording Studio for Singers,<br />

Songwriters, Students and Bands. Advertising Jingles;<br />

Creative Consulting and Guitar Classes. Barnet, VT<br />

05821. (802) 633-2523.<br />

Old Barns<br />

��<strong>The</strong> Barn People<br />

Since 1974 Vintage Vermont barns purchased, dismantled,<br />

restored & reassembled elsewhere. Great for<br />

homes, additions, Great Rooms, studios, backyard offices<br />

and oddly enough …barns. Ken Epworth, 2218 US<br />

RT 5 N, Windsor, VT 05089. (802) 674-5898. barnman@sover.net<br />

Opticians<br />

��Optical Expressions<br />

Your Family Eye-Care Center. Eye Exams, Contact<br />

Lenses and Consultation for Laser-Eye Surgery. Green<br />

Mountain Mall, St. Johnsbury Center, VT (802) 748-3536.<br />

Painting<br />

��Tom’s Painting<br />

Interior - Exterior - Clean, neat, dependable. quality<br />

work for over 25 years. Call Tom Perry at (802) 563-<br />

2576 for all your painting needs. Located at 693 Upper<br />

Harrington Road, West Danville, VT 05873.<br />

��Fenoff & Hale Painting<br />

A division of Fenoff & Hale Construction. Interior and<br />

exterior professional quality work. No job too large or<br />

too small. Fully Insured. Free estimates. 1085 Route 2<br />

East Danville VT 05828 Phone: (802) 684-9955 Fax:<br />

(802)684-3414.<br />

��A.D. Myers Painting & Drywall<br />

Interior-exterior. Commercial-residential. Paints, stains,<br />

clearcoats. Experience in finishing cherry, oak, maple, architectwall<br />

trim, banisters and hand rails. Formerly from<br />

the coast of Maine. Good knowledge of prep., materials<br />

and application. Cold Hill, Lyndonville, VT 05851, (802)<br />

626-3802.<br />

Plumbing & Heating<br />

��Greenwood’s Plumbing & Heating<br />

New Construction, repairs, water heaters, bathroom &<br />

kitchen remodeling. Energy efficient wood or oil-fired<br />

heating systems, radiant & solar heating-water treatment<br />

systems, Gould water pump installation. GPDA<br />

member, fully-insured, free estimates. Contact Tony<br />

Greenwood at tonygph@live.com, (802) 748-1370, 145<br />

Railroad Street St. Johnsbury, Vt.<br />

��Walden Heights Heating<br />

Providing full-service & installation of propane & oil<br />

fired units inclusing boilers, hot air systems, radiant<br />

heating, water heating & cooking. From your heating to<br />

cooking needs, give Lloyd Rowell a call at (802) 563-<br />

2233 or (802)-793-6092. Fully insured.<br />

Real Estate<br />

��Peter D. Watson Agency, Inc.<br />

Country, period and vacation homes; land and timber<br />

tracts, farms and businesses. Free market analysis.<br />

Greensboro: (802) 533-7077. Hardwick: (802) 472-3338.<br />

East Burke: (802) 626-4222. www.northernvtrealestate.com<br />

��Morrill & Guyer Associates<br />

791 Broad Street, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802) 626-<br />

9357. Fax (802) 626-6913. realestate@homeinthekingdom.com,<br />

www.homeinthekingdom.com<br />

��Century 21 Quatrini Real Estate<br />

Susan S. Quatrini, GRI, Broker-Owner. 1111 Main Street.<br />

St. Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-9543 or (802) 748-<br />

3873. c21qre@sover.net<br />

��David A. Lussier Real Estate<br />

Farms, Acreage, Homes and Investment Properties. 540<br />

Main Street, PO Box 872, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-9541 or (802) 626-8482. Lussier@kingcon.com,<br />

www.lussierrealestateagency.com<br />

��Begin Realty Associates<br />

10 VT Route 2, “On the Green.” in Danville. Specializing<br />

in residential property, vacation homes, land and farms.<br />

Realtors Ernie, Barb, Debbie and Armans, (802) 684-<br />

1127, www.beginrealty.com.<br />

��MontShire Title & Closing Company, LLC<br />

Your source for real estate and closing services in<br />

<strong>North</strong>ern Vermont and New Hampshire, 1097 Main<br />

Street, St. Johnsbury, VT 05819 Toll Free (888) 241-6549<br />

or (802) 748-1300 or www.montshiretitle.com.<br />

��Century 21 Farm & Forest Realty Inc.<br />

Nicholas Maclure, managing broker. Derby, VT Office:<br />

(802) 334-1200, Cell: (802) 673-8876, nick@farmandforest.com<br />

AND Annette Dalley, managing broker, East<br />

Burke, VT, Office: (802) 626-4222, Cell: (802) 467-3939,<br />

annette@farmandforest.com. Our goal is to help you<br />

find your “peace” of the Kingdom.<br />

www.farmandforest.com.<br />

Real Estate Appraisal<br />

��Reynolds Real Estate<br />

VT Certified Appraisers, Donald Morrill and Annie<br />

Guyer. 791 Broad Street, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-9357. reynolds@charterinternet.com<br />

Sewing and Vacuums<br />

��<strong>North</strong> Country Vac & Sew<br />

Home of Defender Vacuum, made locally. Wide choice<br />

of new vacuums, uprights, canisters and backpacks. Service,<br />

parts and supplies for most makes. Sewing machine<br />

dealer for domestic Necchi and commercial Artisan.<br />

Parts and expert service for most makes. Scissor and<br />

knife sharpening. 442 Portland St. (next to Sherwin-<br />

Williams Paint), St. Johnsbury, VT 05819. (802) 748-9190.<br />

Ski Equipment<br />

��Power Play Sports<br />

Ski and Snowboard Leasing starting at $99. New and<br />

Used Gear bought and sold. Hockey Gear, Ice Skates,<br />

XC Skis, Downhill Skis, Snowboards and Snowshoes.<br />

New and Used Bicycles. Ski tuning, Skate sharpening, Bicycle<br />

Repair. Downtown Morrisville. (802) 888-6557.<br />

Small Engine Repair<br />

��Harry’s Repair Shop<br />

Snowmobiles, Snowblowers, Motorcycles, Lawntractors,<br />

ATV’s and Rototillers. Harry Gammell, VT RT 15,<br />

Walden, VT 05873. (802) 563-2288.<br />

Tires<br />

��Berry Tire Co., Inc.<br />

New tire sales and automotive repair. Everett Berry,<br />

1545 Red Village Road, Lyndonville, VT 05851. (802)<br />

626-9326.<br />

��Goss Tire Company<br />

Specializing in brakes, front-end work, exhaust and<br />

NOKIA tires. RT 5 in St. Johnsbury and RT 5 and 100<br />

Jct. in Morrisville, VT. (802) 748-3171. (800) 427-3171.<br />

��Affordable Tire and Automotive Center<br />

Cooper, Nokian, Bridgestone, Firestone, Goodyear, General,<br />

Super Swamper and more. Offering computer diagnostics<br />

and all you automotive needs. Located across<br />

from Mayo’s Glass Service on Portland Street. Look for<br />

our sign! (802) 535-3391 or affordabletireandauto.com<br />

Veterinarians<br />

��Companion Animal Care<br />

Small animal medicine & surgery. Bob Hicks, DVM. 54<br />

Western Ave., St. Johnsbury, VT. (802) 748-2855.<br />

��<strong>North</strong>ern Equine Veterinary Services<br />

Steve B. Levine. Practice limited to horses. Saturday appointments<br />

available. (802) 684-9977. 254 RT 2, Danville,<br />

VT 05828. www.northernequine.com<br />

��Danville Animal Hospital<br />

Lisa D. Whitney, D.V.M. Small animal care. Office hours<br />

by appointment. 549 Route 2 East, Danville, VT, (802)<br />

684-2284.<br />

Volunteers<br />

��R.S.V.P.<br />

Do you have some free time? Do you want to help an<br />

organization in the <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom as a volunteer?<br />

For information call the Retired and Senior Volunteer<br />

Program and the Volunteer Center at (802) 626-5135<br />

or (802) 334-7047.<br />

Water Systems<br />

��H.A. Manosh Corporation<br />

Well Drilling & Hydrofracturing, Water Systems & Treatment,<br />

24-hour Plumbing, Video Well Inspections, Water<br />

Fountains. Morrisville, VT 05661. (802) 888-5722 or<br />

(800) 544-7666. www.manosh.com<br />

Web Design<br />

��TMiller Web Design<br />

Custom website design for individuals, small businesses<br />

and organizations. Personal service at reasonable rates.<br />

Terry Miller, Peacham, VT. (802) 592-3153.<br />

terry@tmillerwebdesign.com,<br />

www.tmillerwebdesign.com.<br />

Welding<br />

��Walbridge Welding<br />

Repairs and new fabrication of steel, stainless steel and<br />

aluminum. Located under Portland St. Bridge in St.<br />

Johnsbury or with portable equipment at your location.<br />

Dale Walbridge. W (802) 748-2901; H (802) 584-4088.<br />

Yarn<br />

��Wool Away<br />

<strong>The</strong> oldest, most complete yarn shop in the <strong>North</strong>east<br />

Kingdom of Vermont.. Come see Miriam Briggs at 443<br />

Railroad Street in St. Johnsbury. E-mail: miriam@woolaway.com,<br />

(802) 748-WOOL (9665), wool-away.com.<br />

New listings.


<strong>The</strong> <strong>North</strong> Danville Church (ABC)<br />

Worship and Sunday School<br />

9:30<br />

Fellowship Hour<br />

10:20 AM<br />

Pastor: <strong>The</strong> Rev. Bob Sargent<br />

Handicapped accessible!<br />

COMING SOON...<br />

Sleepers River<br />

Alternative<br />

Pellet & Wood Stoves<br />

LOCAL Foods & Products<br />

and Much More<br />

located in<br />

NORTH DANVILLE VILLAGE<br />

Farmers’ Markets<br />

Henry Griffin of South Peacham finds a new<br />

friend at the Danville Farmers’ Market. <strong>The</strong><br />

event is held on the Danville Green on Route<br />

2 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Wednesday and<br />

is family friendly. <strong>The</strong> best and freshest locally<br />

grown vegetables and small fruits are<br />

available at this market and also at the St.<br />

Johnsbury Farmers’ Market which is held<br />

Saturdays from 9 a.m. - 1 p.m. behind Anthony’s<br />

Diner. Bakers work all night to bring their wonderful<br />

breads, pies and specialty products to market. Visitors will find<br />

an excellent collection of cut flowers and plants, preserves, wool<br />

and wood products, crafts and maple products and lots more.<br />

(Photo courtesy of Lynda Farrow)<br />

Letters from the Past<br />

When writing was a necessity and an art<br />

By Lynn A. Bonfield<br />

Traveling to reunions with family<br />

members was especially popular in<br />

19th century Vermont. Jesse Clark<br />

(1859-1901) proposed such a journey in his<br />

letter to his sister, Florella (born 1860), then<br />

living in Lynn, Massachusetts. He suggested<br />

that they might take a trip west to<br />

visit relatives in winter when he would be<br />

freer from farm duties.<br />

In the letter, he described the delights of the coming<br />

autumn with blackberry picking and apples falling<br />

from trees. <strong>The</strong> change in weather also announced<br />

the start of school, and Jesse reported his father’s concern<br />

about the loss of labor if his son Charlie (born<br />

1866) attended classes. <strong>The</strong> Clarks farmed in Peacham<br />

Hollow on land originally owned by Jesse’s great<br />

grandfather, Edward Clark (1759-1840), who passed it<br />

on to his son, Russell Clark (1795-1867), and then it<br />

went to Jesse’s father, Ephraim W. Clark (1828-1900),<br />

who, with money earned from the California gold<br />

rush, paid off the farm mortgage and enlarged the<br />

family land holdings.<br />

Jesse wrote of his father’s continued support of<br />

temperance and religious activities. <strong>The</strong> letter ended<br />

with news of family and friends, town events, including<br />

the blowing up of the landmark rock on the road<br />

between the Corner and the Hollow, now called<br />

Peacham Village and East Peacham respectively. <strong>The</strong><br />

selectmen had ordered the destruction of the large<br />

rock in order to use the stones for a bridge on the flat<br />

piece. Those exact stones are visible today, supporting<br />

the much used road. Jesse’s opinion in 1881 that<br />

folks had no respect for landmarks resonates today.<br />

Milking called him, and Jesse closed his letter.<br />

So. Peacham Vt.<br />

Sept. 3rd 1881<br />

Dear Sister<br />

<strong>The</strong> letters arrived all right. What a nice time<br />

Grant and Aunt Lide must have had at Stonington<br />

[family reunion]. How many invitations do you suppose<br />

would have to be given if the Clark’s or Merrill’s<br />

[the Clark, Merrill, and Johnson families intermarried]<br />

should have such a gathering. How nice it would be<br />

if they could only meet where the first Merrill pitched<br />

his tent which would be in Haverhill Mass. <strong>The</strong> western<br />

cousins have come and gone & it seems to me as<br />

though no one could wish to find better cousins than<br />

they.<br />

Now I’m going too put a flea in your ear don’t you<br />

want too take a little trip out west this winter, it is pretty<br />

early perhaps too mention such a thing but I have<br />

been thinking of it all summer and now if you will go<br />

we will take a little journey by and by. Aunt Lib [Eliz-<br />

<strong>The</strong> Clark homestead<br />

was owned by four<br />

generations of Clarks.<br />

<strong>The</strong> present house was<br />

built in the 1880s and is<br />

now owned by Wendy<br />

and Bob Morgan.<br />

Photo credit: Peacham<br />

Historical Association.<br />

abeth Merrill Mears 1838-1908] in her letter writes as<br />

though she was expecting you here this fall. When<br />

you get ready to come home if you can let me know<br />

a few days before hand I will drive over after you if it<br />

is possible.<br />

Aunt Sarah [Sarah Johnson Abbott 1829-1900] &<br />

Mary & Winnie were down yesterday after blackberries<br />

they got nearly 12 quarts. <strong>The</strong> weather for the<br />

past week has been hot and smoky almost too suffocation<br />

thursday it was so smoky it made ones eyes<br />

smart. Fri. it rained and yesterday was cloudy all day<br />

but no rain. Went over too the other place and cut<br />

the india wheat. <strong>The</strong> old early tree had lots of apples<br />

on it this year We have got a good share of them but<br />

I gues some others have got a divide too<br />

You will remember the large black rock between<br />

the hollow and corner[,] well! the Selectmen are splitting<br />

it out for abatement for the bridge at the foot of<br />

the hill[.] It seems like sacrilege almost too remove it<br />

but you know it is proverbial that Yankees have no respect<br />

for old landmarks.<br />

Grandpa and Grandma [Leonard Johnson and his<br />

second wife] were down and spent the day Wed. Wes<br />

[Jesse’s brother Wesson, born 1869] went after them<br />

in the morning and pa took them home they seemed<br />

too enjoy it Grandma was as good as a kitten[.] Mr.<br />

and Mrs. [Charles] Bunker [Peacham Academy principal<br />

and his wife, Nellie, preceptress] came last night<br />

as school begins next tuesday. I hardly know whether<br />

Charlie [Jesse’s brother] will go or not but will have<br />

too find out pretty soon[.] I want him to go very much<br />

but there is so much to do Pa thinks he cannot spare<br />

him but it seems too me that if he is ever going to<br />

school now is the time.<br />

Lyme Hobarts barn was burned too the ground<br />

last monday between 10¼ and 1 oclock with 17 tons<br />

of hay lumber wagons 2 figs etc which is a severe loss<br />

too him. Wm. V. Mclachlin [1846-1905] is very sick.<br />

Pa has gone too south Walden today to hold a temperance<br />

meeting with Geo. Drew[.] Will go too South<br />

Hadley tuesday. Frank Strobridge a cousin from New<br />

Galilee Penn. has been here for a couple of weeks like<br />

him very much.<br />

Remember now and let us know when you get<br />

ready to come home. It is time to do the milking and<br />

me sheet is full so I must close love too you with lots<br />

of kisses (for you and one for Ebbie if she wants it)<br />

Jess<br />

Jennie Badger has a boy baby two weeks old<br />

<strong>The</strong> original of this letter is preserved at the<br />

Peacham Historical Association. Letters in this series<br />

are transcribed as written with no changes to spelling,<br />

punctuation, or capitalization. Brackets indicate information<br />

added by the editor.<br />

Correction: In the August issue of the <strong>North</strong> <strong>Star</strong> <strong>Monthly</strong>, the photo accopanying<br />

Lynn Bonfield’s “Letters From the Past” column was mistakenly<br />

identified as Jack Colby. <strong>The</strong> photo to the left is the correct photo of Mr.<br />

Colby from Richard Beck’s “A Proud Tradition, A Bright Future: A Sequential<br />

History of St. Johnsbury Academy.” Our apologies for the error.


Page 1<br />

do outdoors; playing army, building<br />

forts or dams, catching fish, climbing<br />

trees or cliffs. A B.B. gun was<br />

great entertainment but best of all<br />

was just plain “exploring.” Alone or<br />

with friends, there was always<br />

plenty of exploring to be done and<br />

there was hardly a field, wood,<br />

stream or abandoned building<br />

within a radius of several miles I<br />

didn’t know well. On a rainy day,<br />

there was still plenty to do; games<br />

to play with friends or even books<br />

to read, models to build. I don’t recall<br />

ever being bored, except when<br />

in school. It wasn’t until the dreadful<br />

teenage years, when girls, of all<br />

things, suddenly became objects of<br />

fascination, that school offered<br />

anything of interest at all.<br />

Needless to say, my academic<br />

career was not stellar. It got off to<br />

a bad start and actually got worse<br />

with girls. After bumping about at<br />

several colleges, things finally came<br />

to a lurching halt with nothing better<br />

to show for those years than a<br />

draft notice. I have absolutely no regrets<br />

whatsoever, and rather enjoyed<br />

the classes in the army, which<br />

were mostly held outdoors, and led<br />

to interesting places. Besides, the<br />

military has three sizes; small<br />

medium and large, as opposed to<br />

the “one size fits all” approach of<br />

public education fifty years ago<br />

which I fear has only gotten worse<br />

since.<br />

Thus it was that the approach<br />

of September filled me with a<br />

dread which was only heightened<br />

by the crystal clear blue skies, the<br />

cooling breeze, and the ripening of<br />

field and forest. If the weather was<br />

at all decent, I would walk to<br />

school. After crossing a few lots<br />

and avoiding the bad dogs, I would<br />

follow the tumble of a brook which<br />

ran from a broken down mill dam<br />

through a narrow cleft with mossy<br />

round boulders the size of automobiles,<br />

leaving civilization behind.<br />

<strong>The</strong>n the brook slowed and began<br />

to meander as we entered a broad<br />

STORAGE<br />

Short or Long Term<br />

(not heated)<br />

BOATS • AUTOS<br />

BIKES • TRACTORS<br />

THURSTON’S<br />

AUTO<br />

1320 Memorial Drive<br />

St. Johnsbury, VT<br />

802-748-6373<br />

and swampy valley. <strong>The</strong>re were<br />

dragonflies and damsel flies which<br />

sparkled like jewels, a dozen different<br />

colors, flirting with me as I followed<br />

a narrow path of dry ground<br />

to a brace of railroad tracks polished<br />

to a mirror finish by the passage<br />

of many trains.<br />

Those tracks, running so<br />

straight down the valley to a point<br />

where they disappeared into the rest<br />

of the world beyond, were my favorite<br />

path. I could follow them<br />

W 802.745.1165<br />

56 Church Street<br />

St. Johnsbury VT 05819<br />

www.pointsnorthrealestategroup.com<br />

info@pnreg.com<br />

Connie Sleath Sharon Moore Kelly Donaghy<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 33<br />

BEGIN REALTY ASSOCIATES BEGIN REALTY ASSOCIATES<br />

Waterfront home<br />

ML2738974 Year round waterfront home on the 3rd pond at Joe's Pond<br />

on a town maintained road. 6 rooms, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, large enclosed<br />

porch, boat house, deck, 50 feet of frontage -- all in topnotch condition<br />

and ready for you to enjoy this year. Recently reduced to<br />

Main Street<br />

Danville, VT 05828<br />

(802) 684-1127<br />

south, towards the village, or north,<br />

towards the school, through the<br />

great sparkling, fermenting chain<br />

of swamp and pools. I once<br />

counted over a hundred turtles from<br />

where I stood in one place, and discovered<br />

pickerels, could catch them<br />

with a line which I carried in my<br />

pocket and would attach to a handy<br />

pole. On the gentle slopes above me<br />

to the east, there were vast fields of<br />

silver rye and golden barley, with<br />

shimmering waves, like the sea,<br />

Bottle Redemption - Daily Lunch Specials - Lottery Tickets<br />

<strong>Star</strong>t your<br />

search here.<br />

Priced at $349,900<br />

Beautiful renovated Danville home<br />

ML2789773 N ewly renovated, expanded, and updated for exceptional<br />

living space. Must see to appreciate the new 2-car garage w/overhead<br />

storage, new Great Room w/cathedral ceilings, exposed beams, tile floor,<br />

and propane stove, new roof, new furnace, new "to die for" bath upstairs,<br />

3BRs, office, den, formal dining room w/built-in hutch, living room<br />

w/woodstove & brick hearth...the list goes on! You must see to appreciate<br />

this home complete w/3 stall barn, 3 acres, lovely landscaping, and<br />

backyard woods.<br />

$319,900<br />

N<br />

��MLS # N2787505<br />

Hillside Cape located<br />

one mile from<br />

St. Johnsbury Academy.<br />

Updated and<br />

well cared for home.<br />

Custom built birch<br />

kitchen with ceramic<br />

tile flr, birch hdwd<br />

flrs on 1st floor, 1st<br />

flr laundry & full<br />

bath. Two covered<br />

porches, walk out<br />

basement. 1 & 1/2<br />

car garage with overhead storage room and outside access. Nice<br />

Garden area. Seller is a VT licensed Real Estate Broker. Available<br />

Immediately.<br />

$162,900<br />

S<br />

passing through them with the<br />

breeze. To the west lay a dark forest<br />

of hemlock climbing up to stony<br />

heights. <strong>The</strong>re were huge flocks of<br />

birds gathered for migration, plus<br />

ducks, pheasants, and hawks.<br />

<strong>The</strong>n a train would come; ahead<br />

of me as a bright star at the disappearing<br />

point, or from behind, as<br />

warned by a signal change. It might<br />

be a fast passenger express or better<br />

yet a slow freight rocking towards<br />

destinations which would some day<br />

Danville United Methodist Church<br />

“<strong>The</strong> biggest little church on the Green”<br />

As we begin a new school year, let us remember<br />

these words of Jesus Christ:<br />

“This is my commandment that you you love<br />

one another, as I have loved you.” John 15:12<br />

Rev. Henry E. Cheney<br />

684-3389 office<br />

Good site for new or existing business<br />

ML2790053 Located in Danville and sited on 10.2 acres, this property<br />

offers a 62x88 horse arena as well as a separate 10 stall barn with small<br />

apartment area and attached 2-car garage. <strong>The</strong> lovely entryway includes<br />

a small pond and pasture area. Zoned "Low Density" but with a conditional<br />

use permit your options increase to have light industry, a restaurant,<br />

retail store, recreational facility, or other commercial use. Just off<br />

Rte 2 with privacy, brook, and possible housesite.<br />

309 Portland St., St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

(802) 748-2045<br />

Providing Professional and Courteous Service<br />

www.beginrealty.com<br />

Don’t forget about our<br />

Property Management Services!<br />

WANTED:<br />

LANDLORDS AND HOMEOWNERS<br />

Full services include:<br />

● Advertising<br />

● Lease Contracts<br />

● Tenant Checks;<br />

● Credit Checks<br />

● Personal and Employment References<br />

● Court Records and Eviction Searches<br />

Partial and Full Mangagement Available<br />

Pretty Peacham property<br />

ML2790060 You'll love the wildflower gardens at this property and in<br />

walking distance to pristine Ewell's Pond! This 3BR, 2-bath Gothic<br />

Cape offers softwood floors, brick hearth w/woodstove in the family<br />

room, large living room and a bright formal dining room. <strong>The</strong>re's a full<br />

basement, attached barn/2-car garage. Appliances, wooden swing set,<br />

and several cords of wood are included w/this home. Just outside the<br />

village, plenty of privacy, and choice of jr. high and high schools.<br />

BEGIN REALTY ASSOCIATES BEGIN REALTY ASSOCIATES<br />

be my own, too. If I really intended<br />

to go to school, I would then leave<br />

the tracks and climb again, first<br />

through a great forest of ancient<br />

oaks, where the acorns rained down<br />

steadily through the leaves and squirrels<br />

argued in a great symphony of<br />

harvest, to an abandoned orchard<br />

where there were always deer feasting<br />

on the dropped fruit, often drunken<br />

deer who took little notice of my approach,<br />

but sometimes I never quite<br />

made it to school at all. �<br />

Sunday Worship<br />

and Fellowship 9:30 a.m.<br />

Sunday School During Worship Service<br />

$235,000<br />

$219,000<br />

E


34 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

Ongoing<br />

Events<br />

Mondays: Story Time, St. Johnsbury<br />

Athenaeum Youth Library, 10:30 a.m.<br />

(802) 748-8291.<br />

Mondays: Story Time, Pope Library,<br />

Danville, 10 a.m. (802) 684-2256.<br />

Mondays: Just Parents meet with concerns<br />

for drugs and kids, Parent Child<br />

Center, St. Johnsbury, 7 p.m. (802) 748-<br />

6040.<br />

David A. Lussier David Lussier..............................(802) 626-8482<br />

Sherri Temple..............................(802) 626-9947<br />

Box 872, 854 Center St., Lyndonville, VT 05819 REAL ESTATE AGENCY<br />

FARMS/ACREAGE/HOMES/INVESTMENTS PROPERTIES<br />

lussier@kingcon.com / 802-626-9541 / fax 802-626-3716<br />

PEACHAM RANCH<br />

New to the market, this 3<br />

bedroom, 2 bath ranch-style<br />

home sits on 5 surveyed<br />

acres with a private pond<br />

and flower beds. <strong>The</strong> home<br />

is neat and tidy with an open<br />

floor plan. Attractive kitchen<br />

that features a window seat<br />

and island. Handy mudroom<br />

and laundry, 1 car garage,<br />

detached shed, generator<br />

and rear deck.<br />

BUILDING LOTS<br />

NEWARK: 1 +/- acre camp or building lot........................$16,900<br />

BURKE: 3 building lots: 1.185+/- acres ...........................$35,000<br />

$169,900 MLS# 2792797<br />

WATERFRONT CONDOS<br />

Here is your chance to own a waterfront<br />

property at an affordable<br />

price! Located on Joe's Pond, there<br />

are 11 units available - all with waterfront.<br />

Cottages range from one<br />

room with bath for $65,000 up to 3<br />

bedroom, 1 bath cottages complete<br />

with kitchen, dining area and living<br />

room for $170,000. Call for more<br />

details.<br />

$65,000 - $170,000<br />

QUATRINI Real Estate<br />

1111 Main St. � St. Johnsbury, VT 05819 � email: c21qre@sover.net<br />

website: quatrini.com � realtor.com<br />

(802) 748-9543<br />

#2792182<br />

Located in a low traffic cul de sac, this well built<br />

ranch home has it all. Hardwood floors, upstairs<br />

laundry, all wood cupboards, tiled bath.<br />

<strong>The</strong> yard is fenced, front & back. Many closets,<br />

a basement full of storage shelves, paneled<br />

garage, too. St Johnsbury Academy sending<br />

town.<br />

This won’t last long at $149,000<br />

1st Monday: <strong>North</strong> Danville Community<br />

Club, Meeting, 6 p.m. <strong>North</strong> Danville<br />

Community Center. (802) 748-9415.<br />

1st & 3rd Mondays: "Six O'clock<br />

Prompt," Writers' Support Group, 6 p.m.<br />

St. Johnsbury Athenaeum. (802) 633-<br />

2617.<br />

2nd Monday: Cancer Support Group,<br />

NVRH Conference Room A, 4 p.m.<br />

(802) 748-8116.<br />

Last Monday: Alzheimer's Support<br />

Group, Caledonia Home Health, Sherman<br />

Drive, St. Johnsbury. 7 p.m. (802)<br />

748-8116.<br />

Tuesdays: Baby & Toddler Story Hour,<br />

Cobleigh Library, Lyndonville. 10 a.m.<br />

(802) 626-5475.<br />

1.41+/- acres..................................$37,000<br />

2.396+/- acres...............................$49,900<br />

LYNDON: 2 building lots: 1.6+/- acres............................$38,000<br />

1.8+/- acres................................$43,500<br />

SUTTON: 10.1+/- camp lot, right of way to land...............$29,900<br />

#2775735<br />

Just at the edge of town, this ranch home has<br />

a fenced back yard, a tiled mud room, a lower<br />

level family room and hard wood floors. 3 Bedrooms,<br />

Full bath complete the picture. Reasonably<br />

priced as a starter. St Johnsbury<br />

Academy sending town.<br />

Just reduced to $129,900<br />

Tuesdays: Cribbage Tournaments, 6 p.m.<br />

Lake View Grange Hall, West Barnet.<br />

(802) 684-3386.<br />

Tuesdays: Argentine Tango, 4:30-5:30<br />

p.m. (beginners) 5:30-6:30 p.m. (intermediate)<br />

Teacher: Isabel Costa (603) 823-<br />

8163.<br />

2nd Tuesdays: Caledonia Right to Life<br />

will meet at St John's Catholic Church<br />

Parish Hall, 1375 Main St, St Johnsbury,<br />

VT at 7:30 pm. All are welcome.<br />

2nd & 4th Tuesday: Bereavement Support<br />

Group, Caledonia Home Health,<br />

Sherman Drive, St. Johnsbury. 5:30 p.m.<br />

(802) 748-8116.<br />

2nd & 4th Tuesday: Drop-in quilting at<br />

1 p.m. at the Cobleigh Public Library,<br />

(802) 626-5475.<br />

Wednesdays: Read 'n' Stuff, Cobleigh Library,<br />

Lyndonville. 3:30 p.m. (802) 626-<br />

5475.<br />

Wednesdays: Ordinary Magic. Meditation<br />

for Life, St. Johnsbury Shambhala<br />

Center, 17 Eastern Avenue, 6-7 p.m.<br />

Wednesdays: Danville Farmers Market,<br />

9 a.m. to noon, on the green.<br />

Wednesdays: Peacham Farmers Market<br />

at the Union Store, 3 p.m. to 7 p.m.<br />

Wednesdays: Bandstand Park Concerts<br />

in Lyndon, 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.<br />

3rd Wednesday: Cardiac Support<br />

Land Wanted<br />

Danville, Walden, Cabot<br />

Camp owner at Joe's Pond<br />

looking to purchase small<br />

"nearby" parcel of land to<br />

build architecturally designed<br />

garage or barn. Will pay<br />

survey costs.<br />

Call (281) 467-0395 or email<br />

2009@jtdglobal.com<br />

ML#2721475<br />

You’ll love eating meals on the enclosed porch with a bird’s eye view of<br />

Joes Pond. This 2 bedroom camp has received lots of attention in the<br />

past couple of years. It features a new eat-in kitchen, a spacious living<br />

room with woodstove, the enclosed porch, a library, ¾ bath, and 2 bedrooms<br />

with lake views. <strong>The</strong>re is a new drilled well, and you have a<br />

shared right of way to the water. <strong>The</strong> camp offers rare privacy for a cottage<br />

at the lake.<br />

$175,000<br />

#2768086<br />

Out in the country, on 19 acres, great views,<br />

room for the horse, the dog and the kids.<br />

Split level ranch home has a finished, walkout<br />

basement with extra bath and a big family<br />

room. New two car garage. Sun room and<br />

BBQ deck. Some woods, too.<br />

This is a good buy at $239,000<br />

Group, NVRH, 6:30 p.m. (802) 748-7401.<br />

Thursdays: Introduction to Computers,<br />

Cobleigh Library, Lyndonville. 10 a.m.<br />

(802) 626-5475.<br />

Thursdays: Danville Town Band Rehearsal,<br />

7 p.m. Danville School auditorium.<br />

(802) 684-1180.<br />

Thursdays: Live Music at Parker Pie in<br />

Glover. Check website,<br />

www.parkerpie.com for details or call<br />

(802) 525-3366.<br />

Thursdays: Open Mic Night at Indigenous<br />

Skate Shop on Railroad Street in St.<br />

Johnsbury.<br />

2nd Thursday: Film discussion following<br />

7 p.m. film at Catamount Arts, St. Johnsbury.<br />

(802) 748-8813.<br />

3rd Thursday: Caregivers Support<br />

Group, Riverside Life Enrichment Center,<br />

10 a.m. (802) 626-3900.<br />

Thursdays: Read and Weed Book Club,<br />

Cobleigh Library, Lyndonville. 3:30 p.m.<br />

(802) 626-5475.<br />

Fridays: Lyndon Farmers Market, 3 to 7<br />

p.m., Bandstand Park on Route 5.<br />

Fridays: Hardwick Farmers Market, 3<br />

p.m. to 6 p.m., between Greensboro<br />

Garage and Aubuchon’s.<br />

Saturday & Sunday: Planetarium Show<br />

1:30 p.m. Fairbanks Museum, St. Johnsbury.<br />

(802) 748-2372.<br />

75 MT. PLEASANT ST.<br />

ST. JOHNSBURY, VT 05819<br />

802-748-8169 � 802-748-8855<br />

223 MAIN ST.<br />

LYNDONVILLE, VT 05851<br />

802-626-8333 � 802-626-9342<br />

www.parkwayrealtyassociates.com<br />

RESIDENTIAL - LAND - RECREATIONAL PROPERTIES<br />

Call me at (802) 748-1145<br />

E-mail me at susan@aikencrest.com<br />

or visit www.aikencrest.com<br />

Hi friends, keep in mind Aikencrest<br />

can care for your property. As a rental,<br />

as a vacant property while you're<br />

away. If you have moved to another<br />

area and need property management,<br />

Aikencrest is available for your<br />

property's needs. We tailor our care<br />

to fit your purposes. Call us and we'll<br />

tell you all about it.<br />

Saturday & Sunday: Ben’s Mill Museum<br />

in Barnet through October. (802)<br />

748-8180.<br />

Saturdays: Bridge Club for all experience<br />

levels, Cobleigh Library, Lyndonville,<br />

12:30 p.m. (802) 626-5475.<br />

Saturdays: Caledonia County Farmers<br />

Market, St. Johnsbury, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., behind<br />

TD Banknorth on Pearl St.<br />

Saturdays: Craftsbury Common Farmers<br />

Market, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.<br />

1st Saturday: Men's Ecumenical Breakfast,<br />

Methodist Church, Danville, 7 a.m.<br />

(802) 684-3666.<br />

1st Saturday: Scrabble Club, St. Johnsbury<br />

Athenaeum, Noon - 4 p.m. (802)<br />

748-8291.<br />

1st & 2nd Saturdays: Dance in the<br />

Kingdom at the Good Shephard School -<br />

Latin & Ballroom dance: Lessons at 7 p.m.<br />

followed by open dance, 8 to 10 p.m.<br />

(802) 748-3044<br />

2nd Saturdays: West Barnet Grange<br />

community breakfasts from 8-10 a.m.<br />

3rd Saturday: Breast Cancer Support<br />

Group, Caledonia Home Health, Sherman<br />

Drive, St. Johnsbury, 10 a.m. (802) 748-<br />

8116.<br />

Sundays: Groton Growers Summer<br />

Market, Veterans Memorial Park, 9 a.m. to<br />

noon.<br />

northstarmonthly.com<br />

thousands of<br />

unique visitors<br />

per month<br />

50,000 hits!<br />

Dussault’s<br />

Heating<br />

Sales<br />

Service<br />

Installation<br />

�<strong>The</strong>rmo Pride Furnaces<br />

�Peerless Boilers<br />

Box 301<br />

St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

(802) 748-4945<br />

24 hour service


<strong>The</strong><br />

Creamery<br />

Restaurant<br />

Now accepting<br />

reservations/prepayments<br />

for the annual Chicken<br />

Pie Dinner to benefit the<br />

Pope Library during<br />

Autumn on the Green<br />

Celebrating<br />

32 Years of<br />

Fine Dining<br />

and Libations<br />

Pope Notes<br />

with Dee Palmer, Library Director<br />

Huge thanks to all who help make our Danville Fair<br />

Fundraisers very successful. Our book sale was the most<br />

profitable ever and we are so grateful to all our volunteers who<br />

sorted and sold all those books. We also thank everyone who<br />

helped out in our Pope Library Ice Cream Booth – the most<br />

popular dish this year was hot fudge sundaes! Especially on Friday<br />

night when we all had to bundle up. Tom Beattie was the<br />

lucky winner of the beautiful glass top table crafted by Joe Hallowell.<br />

All in all it was a perfect day from start to finish!<br />

It’s been a very busy summer here at the Pope. We are happy to announce<br />

that we have 3 brand new computers, one donated by one of<br />

our favorite long-time patrons.<br />

Our fall book discussion series is World War II: <strong>The</strong> Loss of the Age<br />

of Innocence which includes Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, Rumors of<br />

Peace by Ella Leffland and Night by Elie Wiesel. <strong>The</strong>se novels richly illustrate<br />

coming-of –age themes against the backdrop of WWII with<br />

three memorable protagonists – an Army bombardier, a girl on the American<br />

home front, and a teenage survivor of the Nazi genocide. Schedules<br />

and books are available at the library. This discussion series is<br />

sponsored by the Vermont Humanities Council. Please join us.<br />

Some of our latest book acquisitions are: Shanghai Girls: A Novel by<br />

See, Swimsuit by Patterson, A Reliable Wife by Goolrick, Finger Lickin’<br />

Fifteen by Evanovich, <strong>The</strong> Shadow of the Wind and Angel’s Game by<br />

Ruiz Gafon, Olive Kittredge: A Novel in Stories by Strout, Best Friends<br />

Forever by Weiner, Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir by Buckley, Crazy<br />

for the Storm: A Memoir of Survival by Ollestad and Flannery: A Life<br />

of Flannery O’Connor by Gooch. Come in and check them out!<br />

From the Children’s Room<br />

Our “Be Creative at Your Library” summer reading program was<br />

great! Both the kids and I had lots of fun – especially during Tom Joyce’s<br />

hilarious magic show! I’m already looking forward to next year. Story<br />

hour resumes on Monday, Sept. 14 at 10 a.m.. Please join us for books,<br />

activities, snacks and fun.<br />

CEDAR LUMBER<br />

•A safe, local, natural<br />

alternative to<br />

pressure<br />

treated<br />

•Custom<br />

sawing<br />

available<br />

•Rough or<br />

surfaced<br />

•Sawn to<br />

your<br />

specifications<br />

Caledonia Lumber<br />

754 Station Rd., Sutton VT<br />

802.535.8643<br />

Great<br />

Reads<br />

<strong>The</strong> Errand Boy by local author Don Bredes, releases<br />

on September 22. Book signing at the Athenaeum<br />

on September 21.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Lost Symbol by Dan Brown, releases on<br />

September 15. 20% OFF<br />

Events in<br />

theNEK<br />

MON.31:<br />

»Songs of Comfort and<br />

Hope, a hospice choir based<br />

in St. Johnsbury, will present<br />

“Songs of Comfort and<br />

Hope,” 7 p.m., at St. Andrews<br />

Episcopal Church. <strong>The</strong> concert<br />

will benefit the nonprofit<br />

HOPE, Inc. to provide<br />

support for the victims of the<br />

recent fire on Main Street.<br />

<strong>The</strong> concert is open to the<br />

public and a free will offering<br />

will be taken.<br />

»<strong>The</strong> View from Greensboro<br />

- an exhibit of watercolors by<br />

Deborah Holmes, Highland<br />

Lodge. A Portion of the proceeds<br />

to be donated to the<br />

Hardwick Area Foodshelf. Call<br />

(802) 533-2647 for more info,<br />

or visit highlandlodge.com<br />

SEPT.1:<br />

»Destination Discovery -<br />

Feet and Tracks at the Fairbanks<br />

Museum, 10 a.m. to<br />

noon, will introduce you to<br />

the countless adaptations that<br />

plants and animals of our natural<br />

communities develop to<br />

better survive in their environments.<br />

Call (802) 748-<br />

2372. <strong>The</strong> Fairbanks Museum,<br />

fairbanksmuseum.org.<br />

SEPT.2:<br />

»Destination Discovery -<br />

Bones at the Fairbanks Museum,<br />

10 a.m. to noon, will introduce<br />

you to the countless<br />

adaptations that plants and<br />

McClure’s Enterprises, LLC<br />

Coming in October to the Boxcar & Caboose: the<br />

Espresso Book Machine ... books at the press of a<br />

button, affordable, self-publishing.<br />

BOOKS � COFFEE � CONVERSATION<br />

Full Service Coffee & Espresso Bar<br />

Customer Wireless Available<br />

394 Railroad St., St. Johnsbury, VT • 802-748-3551<br />

Monday - Friday 7-7 • Saturday 9-7 • Sunday 9-5<br />

www.northstarmonthly.com SEPTEMBER 2009 35<br />

animals of our natural communities<br />

develop to better survive<br />

in their environments.<br />

Call (802) 748-2372 for more<br />

information.<br />

»Scrap Book Making Classes<br />

in Lyndonville, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.,<br />

Call (802) 626-9300 for more<br />

info. <strong>The</strong> Scrap Box, 818 Broad<br />

St. Lyndonville.<br />

THURS.3:<br />

»5K Cross-Country Races, 6<br />

p.m.,Hardwick Trails at Hazen<br />

Union School. Six week race<br />

series Thursday evenings.<br />

Come for one or all of the<br />

races. Low key, fun way to<br />

challenge yourself in the company<br />

of others doing the same.<br />

Wheel-measured 5k run entirely<br />

on beautiful wooded<br />

trails. Presented by <strong>North</strong>ern<br />

Vermont Ridge Runners running<br />

club.<br />

»Destination Discovery -<br />

Worms at the Fairbanks Museum,<br />

10 a.m. to noon, will introduce<br />

you to the countless<br />

adaptations that plants and animals<br />

of our natural communities<br />

develop to better survive<br />

in their environments. Call<br />

(802) 748-2372. <strong>The</strong> Fairbanks<br />

Museum, 1302 Main St. St.<br />

Johnsbury, www.fairbanksmuseum.org<br />

FRI.4:<br />

»Moonlit Paddle on the<br />

Clyde River, 6:30 p.m. to 8:30<br />

p.m. With its shallow, slow<br />

moving water and abundant<br />

wildlife, the Clyde River is an<br />

ideal location for paddling.<br />

Siskin staff will provide canoes,<br />

paddles, life jackets, and be your<br />

guide on two Moonlit Paddles.<br />

Call (802) 673-5638. Siskin<br />

198 Eastern Avenue St. Johnsbury, VT 05819<br />

(802) 748-4852 (800) 838-4327<br />

Hours: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday 9-4<br />

America’s Largest Hearing<br />

Instrument Manufacturer<br />

To learn more, visit<br />

www.starkey.com<br />

Ecological Adventures, Ten Mile<br />

Square Rd. East Charleston.<br />

SAT.5:<br />

»3rd Annual Burke Mountain<br />

Bike Race -Race from the<br />

Sherburne Base Lodge to the<br />

summit of Burke Mountain,<br />

3.7-mile Hill Climb in the<br />

Green mountains of the<br />

<strong>North</strong>east Kingdom. Race from<br />

the Sherburne Base Lodge to<br />

the summit of Burke Mountain!<br />

Compete in teams, alone, or as<br />

part of the <strong>North</strong>east Championship<br />

Bumps Tour. www.hillclimbseries.com.<br />

Call<br />

888-BURKEVT. Burke Mountain<br />

Ski Area, 223 Sherburne<br />

Lodge Rd. East Burke, VT. Web:<br />

www.burkemountainbikerace.c<br />

om<br />

»Scott Barnet performs at the<br />

Tamarack Grill, 8-10 p.m. Barnett<br />

is an acoustic solo artist<br />

hailing from Southern New<br />

Hampshire. Pairing a passionate,<br />

percussive style with vocals that<br />

grab you from the inside and<br />

don't let go, Barnett delivers a<br />

sound that will warm your soul<br />

and send a shiver down your<br />

spine. Call (802) 626-7300.<br />

Tamarack Grill, 223 Sherburne<br />

Lodge Road, East Burke.<br />

SUN.6:<br />

»<strong>The</strong> Maple Leaf Seven will<br />

provide Dixieland music for the<br />

worship service at the <strong>North</strong><br />

Danville Baptist Church at 9:30<br />

a.m.. <strong>The</strong> band, led by church<br />

musician, Phil Brown, has played<br />

in many of the local churches,<br />

with their appropriate Dixieland<br />

music being well received<br />

as the accompaniment to a<br />

church worship service.<br />

>> Page 36<br />

FAMILY &<br />

FIBER ARTS DAY<br />

September 26, 9 a.m. - 1p.m.<br />

St. Johnsbury Farmers Market<br />

Pearl Street, St. Johnsbury<br />

• Activities and demonstrations for<br />

all ages with a focus on Fiber Arts<br />

and fiber producing animals.<br />

• Live animals.<br />

• Learn to knit and knitting clinic.<br />

• Locally produced spinning fibers<br />

and yarns. Learn to spin.<br />

• Children’s Activities.<br />

MUSICAL ENTERTAINMENT<br />

from Leo Rogers performing Celtic<br />

and original music.<br />

Maker of fine flutes and ocarinas.<br />

Sandra Day, BC-HIS<br />

Free View<br />

of Your Ear<br />

Canal and<br />

Free HearingScreenings<br />

Sept. 8-9,<br />

14-16, 21-23<br />

Call for Your<br />

Appointment<br />

Sandra Day, BC-HIS<br />

Rebecca Armstrong<br />

Isabelle Armstrong


36 SEPTEMBER 2009 THE NORTH STAR MONTHLY<br />

>> Page 35<br />

»Peacham Library Reception,<br />

to honor Peacham’s<br />

Joseph L. Smongeski, for his<br />

work: A Life in the Art World,<br />

and Dean Bornstein, book designer,<br />

2 p.m. to 4 p.m.<br />

»Gryphon & Co., a Celtic ensemble,<br />

will be performing at<br />

St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in<br />

Lyndonville at 3 p.m. For more<br />

information call (802) 253-<br />

0955.<br />

»Destination Discovery - Animal<br />

Sounds at the Fairbanks<br />

Museum, 10 a.m. to noon, will<br />

introduce you to the countless<br />

adaptations that plants and animals<br />

of our natural communities<br />

develop to better survive<br />

in their environments. Call<br />

(802) 748-2372 for more info.<br />

<strong>The</strong> Fairbanks Museum, 1302<br />

Main St. St. Johnsbury.<br />

THURS.10:<br />

»Osher Lecture Series, Longterm<br />

climate cycles in Vermont<br />

- What’s different now? Catamount<br />

Arts at 1:30 p.m.<br />

»Indian Wars of New England,<br />

7 p.m., Woodbury town<br />

Hall, Michael Tougias offers a<br />

slide lecture on the conflicts<br />

between New England's Native<br />

Americans and Colonists.<br />

A Vermont Humanities Council<br />

event hosted by the Woodbury<br />

Historical Society<br />

SAT.12:<br />

»Danville Bulky Waste Day, 9<br />

a.m. to noon at the stump<br />

dump on <strong>North</strong> Danville Rd.<br />

»3rd Annual Burke Mountain<br />

Music Festival, 4 p.m. to 10<br />

p.m., produced in conjunction<br />

with Catamount Arts and<br />

sponsored by Magic 97.7, Kix<br />

105.5 & 106.3 <strong>The</strong> Notch, the<br />

3rd Annual Burke Mountain<br />

Music Festival will be staged<br />

directly behind the Sherburne<br />

Base Lodge, with amphitheater-style<br />

grass seating on the<br />

mountain’s lower slopes. Tickets<br />

for the festival are available<br />

for sale at Catamount Arts.<br />

Among the performers - Rustic<br />

Overtones, Duty Free,<br />

Eames Brothers.<br />

»Mike Fortier and the Burke<br />

Mountain Bandits perform<br />

at the Tamarack Grill, 8 p.m. to<br />

10 p.m., the Bandits band specializes<br />

in country classics and<br />

good ole Rockabilly style<br />

tunes. Dance to country and<br />

50s-60s Rockabilly hits like<br />

Folsom Prison Blues, Matchbox,<br />

Chantilly Lace, Move It<br />

On Over, Runaround Sue,<br />

Great Balls of Fire, and even<br />

rock classics such as Call Me<br />

the Breeze! Call (802) 626-<br />

7300 for more info.<br />

MON.14:<br />

»NEK Audubon, informational<br />

and planning meeting, 4:30 p.m.<br />

to 6 p.m at the Fairbanks Museum.<br />

Open to all. Call Laura<br />

at (802) 751-7671 for more information.<br />

THURS.17:<br />

»Chicken Pie Summer, servings<br />

at 5 p.m., 6 p.m. and 7<br />

p.m., Sheffield Town Hall to<br />

benefit Ladies Aid. Reservations<br />

advised. Call (802) 626-<br />

3174 between 5 and 8 p.m. for<br />

more info.<br />

»Osher Lecture Series, Forest<br />

Resources: What do we<br />

mean by sustainable? Catamount<br />

Arts at 1:30 p.m.<br />

»Peacham Historical Society,<br />

presentation of the Wheeler<br />

Manuscript, 7 p.m., Peacham<br />

Congregational Church.<br />

SAT.19:<br />

»Peacham Localvore Feast,<br />

sponsored by the friends of<br />

COME SEE OUR LINE OF MEN’S<br />

PENDLETON CLOTHING FOR FALL!<br />

RUSTIC Elegance for<br />

Body, Home, Lodge, Camp & Cabin<br />

Visit our<br />

Wine Safe<br />

• Delicious<br />

French Wine<br />

• Champagne<br />

Clothing for<br />

Men & Women<br />

• IBEX<br />

• ISIS<br />

• Pendleton<br />

• Outback<br />

• Vera Bradley<br />

• Hickory Furniture<br />

• Pendleton Blankets<br />

• Phillip Goodwin Prints<br />

• Original Artwork<br />

• Camp Decorations & Lamps<br />

• Antlers • Taxidermy • Mooseheads<br />

RAILROAD STREET / ST. JOHNSBURY, VT<br />

802 748-2423<br />

VISIT OUR WEBSITE<br />

the Peacham Library.<br />

»Michael Arnowitt and John<br />

LaRuche, 8 p.m., <strong>The</strong> Music<br />

Box in Craftsbury. Montpelier<br />

pianist Michael Arnowitt will<br />

perform with chromatic harmonica<br />

virtuoso, John LaRuche<br />

in a concert of improvisational<br />

jazz. More info at www.themusicboxvt.org<br />

or (802) 586-<br />

7533.<br />

»<strong>North</strong>east Kingdom Great<br />

Race, <strong>The</strong> Great Race is a day<br />

long competitive event with<br />

many challenges. Teams of four<br />

will compete by racing<br />

through the <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom<br />

completing activities and<br />

challenges that are both physically<br />

and mentally challenging.<br />

Call (802) 525-4576. or visit<br />

www.neksc.org for more info.<br />

»Fall Foliage Hike on Bald<br />

Mountain - Enjoy the Fall<br />

colors and learn the natural<br />

and cultural history of the<br />

Bald Mountain area, 9:30 a.m.<br />

to 10:30 a.m. Join <strong>North</strong>-<br />

Woods Staff on a guided hike<br />

up Bald Mountain’s Long Pond<br />

Trail. Enjoy the Fall colors and<br />

learn the natural and cultural<br />

history of the Bald Mountain<br />

area. Call (802) 723-6551 or<br />

visit northwoodscenter.org for<br />

more information.<br />

»Exhibit of works by Barnet<br />

book designer Margery<br />

Cantor, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. At<br />

the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum,<br />

St. Johnsbury. Visit www.stjathenaeum.org<br />

for more info.<br />

»Fairbanks Festival of Traditional<br />

Crafts - Try your hand<br />

at blacksmithing or rug braiding,<br />

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Try your<br />

hand at blacksmithing or rug<br />

braiding! This is your chance<br />

to talk with traditional artisans<br />

and experts who demonstrate<br />

rural life skills, such as barrel<br />

making, bee keeping, basket<br />

weaving, sheep shearing, chair<br />

caning, and much more! Call<br />

(802) 748-2372 or visit<br />

www.fairbanksmuseum.org for<br />

more info.<br />

»Hayrides at Willoughby Gap<br />

Farmstand - Come pick your<br />

own pumpkins, too, 11 a.m. to<br />

6 p.m., Bring the kids by for<br />

maple creamies, a hayride and<br />

more fun. Get some fresh produce<br />

and pick your own pumpkins.<br />

Try their homemade pies<br />

and breads, and their own beef<br />

cuts. Call (802) 467-3921 or<br />

visit www.willoughbygap.com<br />

for more information.<br />

SUN.20:<br />

»NEK Audubon. Pondicherry<br />

Autumn hike through the<br />

refuge where all the fall juveniles<br />

look alike. Trip starts at 7<br />

a.m. Meet in front of the Fairbanks<br />

Museum for car-pooling.<br />

Call Tom at (802) 626-9071<br />

for more information.<br />

THURS.24:<br />

»Osher Lecture Series, <strong>The</strong><br />

ecological importance of hidden<br />

worlds. Catamount Arts at<br />

1:30 p.m.<br />

SAT.26:<br />

»Annual Chicken Pie Supper,<br />

Newark Street School, 5 p.m.<br />

to 7 p.m. Reservations not required.<br />

All you can eat. Benefits<br />

the Newark Volunteer Fire<br />

Department. For infomration,<br />

call (802) 467-3788.<br />

»Burke Fall Foliage Festival -<br />

Join the fun at this annual popular<br />

<strong>North</strong>east Kingdom event<br />

which features crafts, food,<br />

games, demonstrations, and<br />

more. Sponsored by Burke<br />

Area Chamber of Commerce.<br />

Call (802) 626-4124 for more<br />

info.<br />

SAT.26:<br />

Diamonds<br />

Fine and<br />

Designer Jewelry<br />

Estate Jewelry<br />

Repair and<br />

Appraisals<br />

September<br />

Birthstone - Sapphire<br />

Fred Little,<br />

Jeweler<br />

Eileen Fisher<br />

Natural Fibers<br />

Handbags, Wallets, Briefcases<br />

SUMMER SALE IN PROGRESS<br />

40-50% OFF<br />

»Fall Foliage Lamplight<br />

Service and Hymn Sing,<br />

7:30 p.m., host Pastor Rev. Dr.<br />

Robert Potter, Peacham Congregational<br />

Church, and the<br />

Peacham Congregational<br />

Church Youth Orchestra.<br />

»HypZotiQue BellyDancE<br />

CirCus at the Catamount<br />

Arts Center, 8 p.m. to 9:30<br />

p.m., is the wayward delirious<br />

brainchild of Director Erin<br />

Narey and the <strong>North</strong>east<br />

Kingdom's ringmaster of mayhem,<br />

the King of Silly. Call<br />

(802) 748-2600 or visit<br />

www.catamountarts.org for<br />

more information.<br />

SAT.26:<br />

»Fall Foliage Festival - Local<br />

history, entertainment, photo<br />

ops, church suppers, crafts and<br />

tours in 7 <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom<br />

towns, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., a<br />

week-long event hosted by<br />

seven <strong>North</strong>east Kingdom<br />

towns. Call (802) 563-2380 or<br />

vist www.nekchamber.com for<br />

more information.<br />

FRI.2:<br />

»DEAD NORTH - a haunted<br />

night of terror at the Great<br />

Vermont Corn Maze, 7:30 p.m.<br />

to 9:30 p.m., Tickets on sale<br />

beginning July 1 - get them before<br />

it sells out. Great Vermont<br />

Corn Maze, 1404 Wheelock<br />

Road, <strong>North</strong> Danville. Call<br />

(802) 748-1399 or visit vermontcornmaze.com.<br />

�<br />

Glassware<br />

and Art Glass<br />

Original<br />

Paintings<br />

Antiques and<br />

Collectibles<br />

Porcelain and<br />

Pottery<br />

Vintage & New<br />

Modernist<br />

Furniture<br />

Lots of fun<br />

and great service

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