Issue #487
North squad all-stars win football game, 57-35
The three best football players in Vermont this season - Fair Haven quarterback Cam Coloutti, Rutland running back Dakota Peters, and St. Johnsbury quarterback Jake Cady - put their stamp on this year's edition of the North-South All-Star Football Game played at Castleton University's Dave Wolk Stadium on Nov. 17.
Cady completed 26 of his 36 passes for 442 yards and five touchdowns and ran for two more TDs as the North rolled to a 56-35 win.
Project Feed the Thousands launches campaign for food and funds
Fund hopes to raise $80,000 and food donations for 200,000 meals
Project Feed the Thousands has begun its 25th annual campaign against hunger in the community. The regional food drive, which runs through the end of the year, seeks to raise $80,000 in cash and collect enough nonperishable food items to make 200,000 meals. According to a news release, numerous...
Crisis Fuel Assistance now available for income-qualifying Vermonters
Well before the official start of winter, Vermont has seen lower-than-average temperatures and an unseasonably early snowstorm, raising the prospect of another cold, harsh winter. With higher fuel prices this year, hundreds of area households will likely find it difficult or impossible to keep the heat on. In fact,
More
Castleton signs collaborative agreement with Greenfield Community College
Castleton University recently announced a new collaborative agreement with Greenfield Community College for degree completion. According to a news release, the university says this agreement “ensures that a Castleton education remains both accessible and affordable for students who otherwise might not have continued their educational pursuits.” The collaborative agreement with Greenfield Community College allows graduates to seamlessly enroll at Castleton. Graduates of GCC are eligible for the Maple Award and can attend Castleton at the Vermont in-state tuition rate. Greenfield...
ATP will hold auditions for 2019 Ten Minute Play Festival
The Actors Theatre Playhouse plans a series of open auditions for its 2019 Ten Minute Play Festival. Auditions will take place at the Green Street School Library, 164 Green St,, Brattleboro, on Saturday, Dec. 1, at 10 a.m., and Thursday, Dec. 6, at 7 p.m. Festival dates are Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, June 6-22, 2019. Since the inception of the festival 12 years ago, the goal has been to provide an opportunity for new playwrights to have their work recognized...
A huge national problem merits a huge national solution
I have been thinking back on major federal government programs. The most obvious major programs are wars. The Revolutionary War was, of course, fought by state militias (see the Second Amendment). The Department of War was formed in 1789. The 1812 war brought about the Navy and the exploits of General Andrew Jackson - then the list of wars goes on. Major programs during the Lincoln administration were the Homestead Act, the agricultural colleges and extension services, teacher training schools,
BAJC to ‘shine a light for social justice’ for Chanukah
In solidarity with the challenges that all marginalized people in our country face today, the Brattleboro Area Jewish Community (BAJC) will be shining a light for social justice on each of the eight nights of Chanukah (Dec. 2-9) at eight downtown Brattleboro venues. According to a news release from the congregation, the seeds for this idea “emerged from a deep desire to be a visible force for tolerance and peace.” Chanukah's ancient story is one of a small band of...
Special Gilfeather dinner menu to raise funds for Wardsboro library
For one night only, on Tuesday, Dec. 4, the Four Columns Artisan Restaurant and the Friends of the Wardsboro Library invite everyone to celebrate the season of the Gilfeather turnip, Vermont's state vegetable. The dinner is, in part, a benefit for the Friends of the Wardsboro Library, recent hosts of the Gilfeather Turnip Festival. It will feature a special menu created by Chef Erin Bevan. The funds raised will support the cost of lighting, heating, maintaining, and insuring the 1840s...
Galbraith to give analysis of U.S.-Iran situation
Ambassador Peter W. Galbraith will address the Windham World Affairs Council (WWAC) on developments in the Middle East in “The U.S. versus Iran: Will a proxy fight in Syria, Iraq and Yemen lead to War?” According to a news release, the talk, set for Friday, Nov. 30 at 7:30 p.m., marks the fifth year in a row that Galbraith has offered his knowledge and insider's expertise on this region to the community. Galbraith is working on a mediation project related...
Around the Towns
Rotary Club kicks off Christmas Tree fundraiser BRATTLEBORO - The Rotary Club Christmas Tree Fundraiser has begun. Since 1965, the Brattleboro Rotary Club has sold Christmas trees as a fundraiser for local student scholarships. Vermont-grown trees of all shapes and sizes will be sold daily in front of Brattleboro Bowl on Putney Road until all 400 trees are gone. The Brattleboro Rotary Club, founded in 1950, is an active community-service club of 75-plus members who engage in community and human-service...
BMC presents Glen Velez and Handance
The Brattleboro Music Center's Season Guest Concerts continue Sunday, Dec. 9, with Glen Velez and Handance, featuring special guests, vocalist Loire Cotler; percussionist, composer, and arranger Shane Shanahan; and the contemporary acoustic ensemble Dunham Shoe Factory. Velez, a four-time Grammy winner, “is considered the founding father of the modern frame drum movement and regarded as a legendary figure among musicians and audiences worldwide,” according to the biography on his website. “Velez brought a new genre of drumming to the contemporary...
Cameo Baroque will mark winter’s beginning
Main Streets Arts ushers in the holiday season with a benefit concert by Cameo Baroque on Saturday, Dec. 1, at 7:30 p.m. With a theme of “Wintertide,” the four-piece group will offer music by English, Italian, and German composers such as William Boyce, Antonio Caldara, Georg Philipp Telemann, George Frideric Handel, and Tomaso Albinoni. Members of the New Hampshire–based quartet performing on period instruments are Beth Hilgartner, recorder and voice; Leslie Stroud, traverso (Baroque flute); Ernie Drown, harpsichord; and Laurie...
NEYT invites community to share family stories of arrival to U.S.
New England Youth Theatre (NEYT) invites the community to share their family immigration stories as a part of their production of Rags, which opens on Thursday, Dec. 6. “Everyone has a story,” NEYT Executive Director Hallie Flower said in a news release. “We want to open up our theater as a place for people to share how their ancestors came to this country.” As part of the celebration of the immigrant experience with Rags, the youth theater's holiday musical, NEYT...
Milestones
Obituaries • Barbara Jean Halpin Cain, 72, of Guilford. Died Nov. 17, 2018 at her home, following a courageous battle with pancreatic cancer. She was born in Barton on July 28, 1946, the oldest of 11 children of Kenneth and Pauline (Blais) LaBounty. She was raised and educated in Barton, attending St. Paul's Parochial School. She was a graduate of Sacred Heart High School in Newport, Class of 1964. She went on to graduate from Lyndon State College, where she...
Learn to weatherize with free workshop
Are you ready for winter? Efficiency Vermont, in partnership with the Windham & Windsor Housing Trust (WWHT, homemattershere.org), will present a pair of free do-it-yourself weatherization workshops. They will be offered in Brattleboro on Thursday, Nov. 29, from 6 to 7:30 p.m., in the WWHT community room, 68 Birge St., and Dec. 6 in Newfane at Moore Free Library, 23 West St., from 6 to 7:30 p.m. These informal workshops will offer “some practical, hands-on guidance on how you can...
CCV/BMH joint program leads to environmental services hires at hospital
Community College of Vermont (CCV) and Brattleboro Memorial Hospital (BMH) will provide a direct pathway to hospital jobs in environmental services. At a recent graduation ceremony at BMH, nine participants in the new Environmental Services Training Program received certificates. Eight have been offered employment at the hospital. The program, developed in response to a critical need for qualified staff, is the result of a collaboration led by CCV and BMH which also includes the Vermont Department of Labor, the Vermont...
World AIDS Day observed with ceremony in Brattleboro
The AIDS Project of Southern Vermont is inviting the public to a World AIDS Day observation on Friday, Nov. 30 at noon at Centre Congregational Church on Main Street. The commemoration of those affected by the virus and those working to combat it will feature a sidewalk candlelight vigil, followed by Dora Urujeni, who will speak about working in Rwanda. Music will be provided by The Harmony Lot, a local a cappella group. According to a news release, the Brattleboro-based...
UMass Percussion Ensemble performs at museum
The Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) presents the UMass Percussion Ensemble in concert on Saturday, Dec. 1 at 7 p.m. The program features five works for a variety of percussion instruments: Steve Reich's “Music for Pieces of Wood,” Alejandro Viñao's “Book of Grooves,” Jennifer Higdon's “Splendid Wood” for marimba sextet, and percussion quartets by Andy Akiho and Aurél Holló. The UMass Percussion Ensemble consists of 14 undergraduate and three graduate percussion students at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst,
Can Brattleboro plan ahead for big purchases?
For the past few years, Town Manager Peter B. Elwell has worked to steer the Selectboard away from putting out proverbial fiscal fires and toward preventing emergencies in the first place. Small municipalities too often replace important town vehicles and infrastructure only after they've failed or have come close to it, or fixing buildings only after they've begun to crumble. This budget season, Elwell and his staff continue that effort with their short-term goals - recommendations for the fiscal year...
Too many projects, not enough money
The town's infrastructure needs a lot of help - and a lot of money. That's what Town Manager Peter B. Elwell told the Selectboard at the Nov. 20 board meeting. As Elwell, his staff, and the board have worked on the fiscal year 2020 budget over the past few weeks, both good news and bad news have emerged. Some revenues are up, like the money the town receives from the Meals and Rooms Tax. And Elwell has a plan to...
Quartet will bring Gypsy jazz to Bellows Falls
The acoustic jazz ensemble Rhythm Future Quartet has a straightforward agenda: to keep the spirit of Gypsy jazz alive and expanding in today's musical universe. The foursome will be doing just that in their Stone Church Arts' performance in the Chapel at Immanuel Episcopal Church, 20 Church St., on Saturday, Dec. 1 at 7:30 p.m. According to a news release, the group, named for a Django Reinhardt tune, will offer up “a newly minted sound, influenced by the classic Hot...
Holiday support program, ceremony offered to bereaved families
Atamaniuk Funeral Home is sponsoring its Holiday Support Program and Service of Remembrance on Tuesday, Dec. 4 for bereaved families and friends. The annual event will again be held at Carl M. Dessaint VFW Post 1034, 40 Black Mountain Rd., at 7 p.m. “Celebrating the holidays without a loved one can be one of the most strenuous events for a grieving family,” the funeral home writes in a news release. “Often, celebrations and special family traditions are difficult for the...
Inclement weather pattern continues with storms Saturday and Tuesday
Good day to you, hearty southern Vermonters! You've got to be hearty to deal with this weather pattern, that's for sure. After an elevation snowstorm that brought more than 15 inches to Mount Snow in western Windham County and light accumulations even in Brattleboro earlier this week, we have more inclement conditions on the way. Snow showers Wednesday will lead to a break in the action Thursday and Friday before some light rain and snow is possible Friday night. Then...
Ignoring hate speech in defense of free speech is missing the point
During the past weeks and months, “free speech” has continued to be a topic in the national conversation - most recently, locally, around panhandling. The issue of hate speech has also been a local issue, thanks to an incident this past summer, in which threatening words toward Jewish people were graffitied on a sidewalk in town. Defending free speech via inaction or ignoring hate speech under the guise of defending free speech misses the point. Research shows the United States...
As climate change prods, tugs, and gnaws, what’s a parent to do?
This past Halloween, I had a terrific concept for a ghoulish costume. However, before I took it a step further, I decided to pass the idea by my wife. “Do you think that will really help?” she asked. That's after I revealed that I wanted to dress up as the latest Intergovernmental Panel Climate Change (IPCC) report about the terrifying state of our planet. I had concocted a plan to spook the heck out of parents with it. Perhaps it...
Tribute to a legend of swing
The Vermont Jazz Center will present its annual Big Band Gala Performance on Friday, Dec. 7 at 8 p.m. The VJC Big Band, under the leadership of musical director Rob Freeberg, is a community orchestra of professional musicians who come together to raise money for Jazz Center scholarships. This year's gala, its 16th, will feature the music made famous by the legendary clarinetist and bandleader Artie Shaw. The VJC will supplement its 16-piece big band with four affiliates of the...
They couldn’t have arrived at a better time
They came from north, south, east and west. They were military veterans, Muslims, Native Americans, LGBT women, and women of color. Progressive and powerful, they flowed like a river into a sparkling blue sea, flipping the House of Representatives, defeating long-term incumbents who thought their seats were safe, overturning state houses, taking their places on court benches. Now they will assume leadership positions on several powerful House committees. It seems fair to say their impact on governance in this country...
Mohammed Daoudi named December’s featured artist at Crowell Gallery
Artist Mohammed Daoudi presents “Aches, Pains and Happiness on Paper” at the Crowell Gallery at the Moore Free Library, 23 West St., through the month of December. An opening reception will be held on Saturday, Dec. 1, from 4 to 6 p.m. Daoudi was born in 1958 and grew up in Tangier, Morocco. After graduating from high school, he attended Skidmore College and Columbia University. In 1985, he moved to Seattle, where he decided to make art the main focus...
Yale historian David Blight will speak about life of abolitionist Frederick Douglass
Yale historian and acclaimed author David Blight will examine the life of abolitionist Frederick Douglass in a lecture at Brooks Memorial Library on Dec. 5 at 7 p.m. His talk, “Writing the Life of Frederick Douglass,“ is part of the Vermont Humanities Council's First Wednesdays lecture series. Author of a new biography of Frederick Douglass, Blight will tell the story of the escaped slave who became one of the leading abolitionists, orators, and writers of his era. Blight is professor...
Ellery Witman receives scholarship celebrating her dedication to ballet
Company of Muses recently announced that Ellery Witman of Brattleboro has received the nonprofit scholarship organization's first Colleen McCloskey-Meyer Ballet Scholarship. Witman has been studying ballet at Brattleboro School of Dance (BSD) since 2012. She has spent countless hours training in class and performing onstage, first as a member of the school's Junior Dance Company and now as an apprentice to the Senior Dance Company, as well as a student demonstrator and student teacher. Over the past six years, Witman...
Brattleboro workers prepare for winter weather
As drivers throughout Windham County found themselves scrambling to schedule snow tire switch-outs in the lead-up to the storm on Nov. 15 and 16, staffers at the Department of Public Works (DPW) had their own problems. The sidewalk plow was out of commission. To prepare for the snow, “we had all of our equipment ready, including the sidewalk plow,” said DPW Director Steve Barrett, who added, “We even did a dry run.” But, as the snow continued falling on Nov.