The Windham County NAACP cordially invites the public to attend its third Annual Freedom Fund Dinner, featuring “A Celebration of Our Community with Song,” on Saturday, Aug. 13, at 5 p.m. outdoors at Retreat Farm.
The hour-long songfest preceding the dinner will be led by Dr. Samuel L. Waymon of Nyack, N.Y. Dr. Waymon is the brother of legendary singer/activist, Nina Simone, and was her organist, confidante, bandmate, and tour manager as they toured the world together.
Waymon is an award-winning composer, singer, pianist, arranger/producer, and actor and has shared the concert stage with Miles Davis, Odetta, Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela, Quincy Jones, Donny Hathaway, Phyllis Hyman, Max Roach, and many others in addition to his sister.
Dr. Waymon is a Civil Rights activist who marched in Philadelphia, Mississippi, and Alabama, and sang at the funeral of Martin Luther King, Jr. His composition, You've Got to Learn, can be heard in Spike Lee's film, Da Sweet Blood of Jesus, and he was co-producer of the recent documentary, The Amazing Nina Simone, directed by Jeff Lieberman.
Four short films by Maya Deren, the Ukrainian-born artist and writer whose work is largely credited with launching the avant-garde cinema movement in America, will be shown at Epsilon Spires on the evening of Saturday, July 9. A live soundtrack will be performed by musician Rob Schwimmer on the...
The Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department says it is receiving reports from across the state of black bears seeking food in yards, outbuildings, and livestock enclosures over the past two months, and that many of these situations can be prevented if people take steps to make their backyards bear-safe...
Free summer lunches return to Brooks LibraryBRATTLEBORO - Brooks Memorial Library is once again offering a grab-and-go lunch on weekdays from noon to 1 p.m., in the library's community room, through Aug. 5. Food is bagged and will contain both lunch and breakfast items. It is free is to anybody younger than 18 to either eat at the library or take it with you. Sign-ups are not required, but doing so will help ensure that the food you need will...
The candidates in the race for the U.S. House seat represent an surprising array of choices for Vermonters to sort through. If you think that the U.S. Congress is doing a fine job and should just keep on doing what it always has, then Molly Gray, who is somehow perceived as an interloping carpetbagger while simultaneously being a native daughter of Vermont, is the choice for you. She is the darling of the Democratic establishment and will be a loyal...
College news • Caya Greenspan-Layman of Wilmington graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in sociology and a minor in creative and professional writing from Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa. She was also named to the Dean's List for the spring 2022 semester. • Elizabeth Day of Brattleboro and Wyatt Keith of Vernon were both named to the spring 2022 Dean's List at American International College in Springfield, Mass. • Elijah Cooper of Brattleboro and Meagan Kelly of Westminster, both...
Registration is open for the Brattleboro Music Center's Hands on Harps Camp, scheduled for July 11–15. Participants will build their very own “clàsarch” (small harp) and learn to play it. The first day of the camp will be spent constructing harps, with all supplies provided, under the direction of master instrument maker Dennis Waring. Other sessions, with harper Rachel Clemente, will include instruction in how to play and maintain the harps. Participants will also explore the musical history of Scottish...
The Sundays On The Hill Concert Series committee says it is “so delighted to offer our twenty-fourth year of concert series after the COVID pandemic changed all of our lives in so many ways. We hope that we will be seeing many familiar faces this summer and look forward to meeting many new music supporters.” All of the concerts will be held in the Church on the Hill (Community Church) in Weston at 4 p.m. Starting this year's season on...
Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present Vermont-based singer/songwriters Ali McGuirk and Michael Roberts with their bands, as part of the 2022 Next Stage Bandwagon Summer Series, on Friday, July 8, at the Retreat Farm on Route 30. With a total of seven Boston Music Award nominations, Ali McGuirk is recognized as one of New England's most compelling artists. Blending classic soul power with a folk music lyricism, she “captivates audiences with her powerful, sultry voice, heartfelt songwriting, and...
Southeastern Vermont Community Action's (SEVCA) Board of Directors has named Kevin Brennan as the agency's new executive director. In a news release, the board said that Brennan's background in program development, financial management, and his Ph.D., focused on the social foundations of education, all will help the agency to improve programs as well as internal operations. “Kevin brings a terrific blend of experienced leadership, an understanding of our communities, and a deep commitment to SEVCA's mission,” said Tom Dougherty, SEVCA's...
Weston Theater Company announces the musical Marry Me a Little, playing July 6 through July 30 at Walker Farm. “Rife with whimsy and elegant reveries, this dialogue-free revue, conceived and developed by Craig Lucas and Norman René, shapes a story of longing in Manhattan,” organizers say. Tony Award winner and legendary composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim's “songs that got away” breathe life into the yearnings of two single dreamers who live in the same building, just one floor between them. Alone in...
On June 20, we Afghans celebrated World Refugee Day under incredible circumstances. I never thought I would know what it would feel like to spend my life in a land of exile. It hasn't even been a full year since the Taliban took over Afghanistan and made trouble for thousands of people. Since I immigrated, I have started to feel the nostalgia in my heart and body that immigrants and refugees must have experienced throughout history, whether they wanted to...
My recipe for a great July afternoon? Sitting in the shade of a maple tree on a warm and sunny day, with hot dogs and hamburgers sizzling on a nearby grill, watching a doubleheader between two good American Legion Baseball teams. Brattleboro Post 5 and Bellows Falls Post 37 played their traditional July 4 holiday doubleheader on July 2 at Tenney Field and they delivered a great day of baseball. Brattleboro came away with a sweep of the doubleheader, winning...
The Ethiopian Community Development Council is America's only resettlement agency that is community-based and refugee-led. We at ECDC believe that refugee resettlement works only when the entire community is involved and when refugees themselves are in the lead. A year ago, none of us could have imagined that the emergency evacuation of Kabul would have brought us together as a community to welcome 100 new refugees to southern Vermont. We can be extremely proud of everything that we have been...
The Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) is accepting applications for its 2023 Climate Change Artist Residency. “In response to the ongoing climate crisis, BMAC has created an artist residency program to support artists seeking time and resources to engage with the profound questions and challenges presented by climate change,” BMAC Director of Exhibitions Sarah Freeman said in a news release. “Through their work, artists can foster personal and emotional connection to the complex and often abstract issue of climate...
When the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated hybrid learning, F.M. Kuzmeskus, Inc., the school bus provider to the Windham Southeast Supervisory Union (WSESU), had to gather details about which students would be going to the school buildings. That resulted in a “ridership collection form” that will be used in the coming school year as well. “Operating within the guidelines provided by our state and federal agencies, we've established safety protocols that begin on the school bus and extend throughout the day,” says...
This town's municipal government takeover of emergency medical services, intended to save money, instead is racking up higher costs. At its July 5 meeting, the Selectboard voted to raise the salaries of local firefighters with EMS training by up to 10 percent - draining the last dollars of a projected surplus less than a week into the change. The board, following a recommendation from former Town Manager Yoshi Manale, had hoped to swap a $285,600 annual assessment from Rescue Inc.
The annual Ten Minute Play Festival at the Actors Theatre Playhouse runs for nine performances only, Thursday, Fridays, and Saturday evenings, July 14 through July 30, promptly at 7:30 p.m. Ten Minute Play Festivals have been described by patrons as “Popcorn for the Brain,” and the Actors Theatre Festival has proven over the years to be one of the Playhouse's most popular programs, according to a news release. The scripts are the result of a National Playwriting Competition the directors...
Editor's note: Thanks to the Ethiopian Community Development Council, the nonprofit organization responsible for administering the Afghan refugee resettlement program, we present a series of Voices contributions about the herculean efforts to bring 100 people from across the world to shelter and safety. We had hoped to present these three contributions closer to World Refugee Day on June 20, but - well, sometimes the news has a way of thwarting a newspaper's actual advance planning. Instead, we are deliberately presenting...
The Brattleboro Literary Festival invites everyone to join them on Friday, July 8, at 5 p.m., for their monthly online Literary Cocktail Hour with acclaimed author Sarah Manguso in conversation with Vermont author Makenna Goodman. Manguso's new novel, Very Cold People, takes place in the frozen, snow-padded, (and totally fictional) town of Waitsfield, Mass. It is a town that is not picturesque New England, but an unforgiving place awash with secrets. Very Cold People tells the story of Ruthie -
Visual artist, graffiti scholar, and educator Will Kasso Condry of Brandon has been selected as the first recipient of The Vermont Prize, a new endeavor aimed at celebrating and supporting the best visual art being made in Vermont today. A collaborative initiative of the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC), Burlington City Arts (BCA), The Current, and the Hall Art Foundation, The Vermont Prize is juried by one representative from each of the four partner organizations and one special guest...
In 2017, after searching for three decades, a master diver rediscovered a documented but long-lost Indigenous relic in the cove at the confluence of the Connecticut and West rivers. These petroglyphs - etched carvings in rock, made by Indigenous peoples thousands of years ago - have been submerged for a century, under water displaced by alterations to the river's flow from hydroelectric power stations upstream. Now, the Atowi Project - a two-year-old nonprofit that is reclaiming and revitalizing the area's...
This is not only my greeting, but also the greeting of all the young leaders of my country that I offer to you. My childhood began with a world of curiosity, I was very eager to know how the world works. Every night I fell asleep with the book under my pillow. My school bag was always heavy. My mother used to say, “Did you put a stone or a book in the bag?” I was 6 years old when...
Paintings by Mary Delaney will be featured in the Bill Wieliczka Memorial Gallery at the Hooker-Dunham Theater & Gallery for the months of July and August. Delaney has been drawing and painting for most of her life. She grew up in Brooklyn and Long Island, N.Y., and currently lives in Southampton, N.Y. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. She also studied foundation arts at Parsons School of Design in...
It started with a barefoot naked man, doused with fake blood and walking down the middle of Main Street. It ended with politicians, a faux nuclear waste cask, pro-abortion marchers, and the latest fashion stylings of Alfred Hughes Jr. Welcome to the Fourth of July in downtown Brattleboro, as the first Independence Day parade held since 2019 showed the town in all of its infinite variety. The 49th edition of “By the People: Brattleboro Goes Fourth” offered the traditional patriotic...
The Guilford Country Store is for sale, and the Friends of Algiers Village, the nonprofit that owns the building in which the store is located, is looking for new owners who will maintain the village business in the iconic, century-old tavern. The store, on Route 5, is currently a country store and fully-operating gourmet delicatessen. The country store has been a fixture in Guilford for generations, providing food, goods, and a place for people to gather. The nonprofit Friends of...