New Hampshire Magazine June 2021

N E W H A M P S H I R E M AG A Z I N E

THE GRANITE STATE'S RUGGED REALITY STARS: Ethan Zohn * Tyler McLaughlin * Laura Zerra

JUNE 2021

The Return of

S U M M E R FA M I LY F U N

Summer Family Fun!

E XC E L L E N C E I N N U R S I N G

Our guide to 10 top spots, each open and eager to welcome you

N H ' S R U G G E D R E A L I T Y S TA R S

Live Free.

A VISIT TO SUNAPEE HARBOR

June 2021

$5.99

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NURSING Celebrating our frontline heroes

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A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR NHMAGAZINE.COM

Vice President/Publisher Ernesto Burden x5117 eburden@mcleancommunications.com

“Thank you” doesn’t seem like enough There is no such thing as a “typical” day for a health care worker. They go in not knowing exactly who they will be helping or what types of situations could arise. And yet, they still go. They are there to help those who could be experiencing some of the worst days of their lives. And yet, they still go.

It’s an honor to help recognize the dedication and hard work that our state’s health care workers put in on a daily basis, especially the 2021 Excellence in Nursing Awards recipients. And that is why I would like to say thank you. Thank you to each and every health care worker who is doing their part to make our communities and our state a better place to live. The past year has been difficult for so many reasons, and you have all continued to go above and beyond to help find a way forward. So, again, thank you. Thank you for your time, your sacrifice, your perseverance, your resilience. It does not go unnoticed or unappreciated.

Editor Rick Broussard x5119

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New Hampshire Magazine® is published by McLean Communications, Inc., 150 Dow St., Manchester, NH 03101, (603) 624-1442. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without the written permission of the publisher is prohibited. The publisher assumes no responsibility for any mistakes in advertisements or editorial. Statements/opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect or represent those of this publication or its officers. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information contained in this publication, McLean Communications, LLC.: New Hampshire Magazine disclaims all responsibility for omissions and errors. New Hampshire Magazine is published monthly, with the exception of February and April. USPS permit number 022-604. Periodical postage paid at Manchester 03103-9651. Postmaster send address changes to: New Hampshire Magazine, P.O. Box 37900, Boone, IA 50037-0900 PRINTED IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

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Contents

June 2021

top from left: courtesy, illustration by john r. goodwin, by kendal j. bush; inset clockwise from top left: by kendal j. bush, courtesy, by marie sapienza; by susan laughlin and by jared charney

46

64

54 First Things

603 Navigator

603 Informer

603 Living

30 A TALE OF THREE GIGS

6 Editor’s Note 8 Contributors Page 10 Feedback

by Bill Burke

Features 44 Transcript

Meet Ross Mingarelli of CandleTree Soy Candles in Concord.

84 EYES IN THE SKY

by David Mendelsohn

by Susan Laughlin

46 Head Back to NH’s

Family-Friendly Fun Spots Find out what’s new and improved (and what to expect) at 10 favorite summer fun attractions.

by Melanie Hitchcock

54 The Granite State’s

Rugged Reality Stars

Ethan Zohn of “Survivor,” Tyler and Marissa McLaughlin of “Wicked Tuna” and Laura Zerra of “Naked and Afraid” all call New Hampshire home.

See how the Live Free or Die state prepared them for reality TV success.

88 Seniority

12 SUNAPEE HARBOR

POST-PANDEMIC ANXIETY

by Kendal J. Bush

by Lynne Snierson

20 Our Town OSSIPEE

by Barbara Radcliffe Rogers

24 Food & Drink GHOST KITCHENS

by Anna-Kate Munsey photos by Jared Charney

36 Blips

NH IN THE NEWS

by Casey McDermott

38 Politics

90 Local Dish

THE FOURTH B

by Brion O’Connor illustrations by John R. Goodwin

by James Pindell

64 Excellence in Nursing

40 What Do You Know?

In partnership with the New Hampshire Nurses Association, we’re pleased to introduce you to this year’s Excellence in Nursing Award winners. photos by Kendal J. Bush

A LUPINE TRUCK ROAD

by Marshall Hudson

42 First Person WHY I GARDEN

by Henry Homeyer

ON THE COVER Spending time at White Lake in Tamworth makes for a great summer day.

For our top 10 summer family-friendly fun spots, see page 46. Cover photo by Jerry Monkman

STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE

by Susan Laughlin

94 Health

THE HEALTHFUL HOME

by Karen A. Jamrog

96 Ayuh

DOWN IN THE DUMPS

Volume 35, Number 4 ISSN 1532-0219

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 5

EDITOR’S NOTE

Most years, around this time, the magazine office looks like a warehouse filled with supplies for our annual Best of NH Party, held each June for the past 19 years. For our 20th year, we’re shaking things up.

F

irst of all, the party is being held on the evening of August 21 and, secondly, for the first time ever we’re taking it on the road, a little ways north of our Manchester home base to lovely, historic Shaker Village in Canterbury (see ad on page 63). Both changes were inspired (or required) by the challenges of the pandemic, but the resulting plans have been so fresh and exciting, I wonder why we haven’t thought of them before.

The “vibe” of our Best of NH Party has always been one of cheerful excess — too much food and drink, too many booths, too much music for a person to get through it all in an evening. That formula has kept people coming back year after year, but it’s always seemed a shame there wasn’t a more intimate version of the Best of NH experience to share with fellow lovers of the Granite State.

And now there is.

Our Shaker Village party will be an outdoor, sit-down affair under a giant tent on a green lawn with a limit of 300 tickets for sale.

We’re offering tickets to this year’s winners first since this is largely a celebration of their work, but also because winners of the Best of NH are the kinds of people you’d want at a great party. Of course, they are also busy folks, so we should still have a number of seats for those with different reasons to come.

Here are a few good reasons why you might want to be among them.

1. Shaker Village is one amazing spot: If you’ve ever been there on a beautiful summer evening, you’ll have an idea of how charming and fascinating a place it is and how blessed the state is to have it. We’ll have free tours of the village for attendees (they will start early) and a chance to explore the grounds and walk down to the famous Shaker ponds.

2. Canterbury is packed with Best of NH stuff: This one small town is home to some of the finest artists and artisans of the state,

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including Furniture Master David Lamb, the Fox Country Smokehouse (famous for adding its own smoky touch to local meats and cheeses), and two of the state’s most famous fiddlers — Jordan Tirrell-Wysocki and legendary contra-dance caller Dudley Laufman.

We’ll be tapping into the local talent pool for a number of surprises for this year’s party.

3. Our Granite State “Summit of Humor”: Faithful readers of our “Ayuh” page and lovers of Yankee humor alike will know the names Rebecca Rule and Ken Sheldon. Both are award-winning and beloved storytellers who have spent their lives explaining “what’s so funny” about New Hampshire to its own inhabitants. These two comic icons will perform together for the first time on the Best of NH stage with a show designed to warm your heart while making you laugh. This is one for the history books, and only our lucky 300 guests will be able to say “I was there.”

4. Great music and other festive offerings: Along with a variety of local food and drink on hand, we’ll have demonstrations and displays from the keepers of local culture and art showcasing their talents and products (with many samples and giveaways in the mix), so guests will take more home with them than just memories and insights.

Instead of the fun bustle of a noisy party at the ballpark in June, we’re planning a cool and invigorating soirée — picture the kind of event where you’re just happy to soak it all in and where you’ll have stories to tell for the rest of the year about the things you saw and did on one sweet, delicious and delightful evening in August.

I wish you could all join us, but with space limited, visit bestofnh.com and check availability. I think this party will be just what we all need to shake off the COVID blues.

photo by bruce richards

Where’s the Party?

Contributors Before calling the Monadnock Region home, photographer Kendal J. Bush — who took the photos for the Excellence in Nursing Awards and wrote and photographed “Navigator” — traveled the world as an editor and videographer for the National Geographic Channel and NBC. She combines years of experience as a photojournalist with her film school education to yield beautiful, creative portraits as well as corporate, wedding and event photography. See more of her work at kendaljbush.com.

for June 2021

Editor of the former Parenting NH magazine Melanie Hitchcock wrote the summer fun feature story “Head Back to NH’s Family-Friendly Fun Spots.”

Freelance writer and journalist Brion O’Connor wrote “Rugged Reality Stars.” His work has appeared in a number of national magazines and newspapers.

New Hampshire Magazine contributing editor Bill Burke wrote “Informer.” He is the author of Disney World travel guide “Mousejunkies!”

Longtime New Hampshire Magazine contributor and former art director Susan Laughlin wrote “Living,” “Artisan” and “Local Dish.”

Master Gardener, writer, editor and teacher Henry Homeyer wrote “First Person.” Learn more about him (and gardening) at gardening-guy.com.

Editorial intern Anna-Kate Munsey wrote “Food & Drink.”

She is looking forward to her senior year at the University of New Hampshire.

About | Behind the Scenes at New Hampshire Magazine The Newt Goes Online (And Gets a New Look)

No. These newts don’t count. Keep looking.

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Eagle-eyed newt hunters may have already — ahem — spotted this, but for everyone else, we’re pleased to announce that you can now enter to win the monthly Spot the Newt prize online at nhmagazine.com/ spot-the-newt (or just check out the links on the right-hand side of the magazine’s homepage).

The new page features an easy entry form, information on that month’s prize, the previous winner, and newt swag such as T-shirts and mugs.

We still welcome and count mail-in entries (both email and physical), but we hope this makes things more convenient for loyal newt spotters and those new to the contest.

For those who have no idea what we’re talking about, each month we invite readers to scour the ads throughout the magazine in search of our state’s official amphibian, the red-spotted newt. If you find all four newts hidden on ads, enter the page numbers online, or write them down along with your contact info and mail them in. (See page 11 for mail-in address.)

You’ll be entered to win a local prize, courtesy of our friends at New Hampshire Made (nhmade.com).

Feedback

nhmagazine.com, facebook.com/NHMagazine & @nhmagazine

Another Keto Meal Plan Fan

Old Man Reborn?

Just went to my mailbox and was delighted to find my May 2021 issue of New Hampshire Magazine. Enjoyed the story about The Old Man and the Little Brother [“Informer”]. After watching a recent one-hour television presentation about our landing on Mars and the exploration of its surface, maybe someday we will have the technology to tastefully recreate and return The Old Man back to where he belongs.

I can’t wait!

Tom Follansbee North Hampton

The Author, Revealed

Thank you for publishing my entire story on the Old Man’s Little Brother.

When I originally sent you the article, I included my photo. For some reason, you identified the Milton Mills librarian, Betsy Baker, as me!

Nice issue, again, during this time of Covid. Good job — always like your editorials and glad you had the vaccine shots!

Bonnie Meroth Epping Editor’s Note: Sorry, Bonnie.

We fixed it online and here’s your actual smiling face.

A Keto Meal Plan Fan

I am very interested in keto and would love to win a copy of Kassey Cameron’s “The Beginner’s Keto Meal Plan.” It sounds like the perfect way to try this way of eating so I will be successful with it. I know some people become overwhelmed with keto, not knowing what to eat and eliminating carbohydrates. There are tons of recipes online, but they’re not all good.

Thank you for the article and the offer [“Living,” May 2021].

Valerie DelGiudice Bedford 10

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Love New Hampshire Magazine, longtime fan and lifelong native. You betcha I’m interested in going keto! I’m emailing you because page 79 said to, and because I’m getting married in October and would love to shed some pasta-loving pounds! Give me a chance to win this book, I promise I’ll put it to good use!

Shayna Austin Wilmot Editor’s Note: When we receive review books that we think readers might enjoy, we’ll sometimes offer to give the copy away to a lucky (or keen-eyed) one. We had so many requests for Kassey Cameron’s book that the publisher agreed to provide us with some extra copies to meet the demand.

Climb to the Clouds

My name is Rob Widdick, president of Sports Car Club of New Hampshire (SCCNH for short). We are a nonprofit club with 501(c)7 status composed of nearly 200 members (and counting). With our partnership with the Mt. Washington Auto Road (MWAR), we are hosting a hill climb event that attracts many drivers from around the world. Travis Pastrana and Dave Higgins, for example, are just a couple of big names who have participated in the last few events.

We’ve announced our rescheduling of the world–renowned motorsport event known as Climb to the Clouds. We’d love to have help spreading the news of the new date, and thought that New Hampshire Magazine would be perfect to reach out to.

For information on the Climb to the Clouds event, visit mt-washington.com/climb-to-the-clouds.

Separately, is it possible to add this to the event calendar as well?

Rob Widdick Deerfield Editor’s Note: We’re happy to add this event, and invite anyone to enter local events at nhmagazine.com/calendar. Be sure to check out NH Magazine in July for a feature story on the Climb to the Clouds.

No Pets at Odiorne I was thumbing through my May issue the other day, looking for places to visit with my pet. I came across the “Best Places” article [May 2021] and there was Odiorne State Park with a picture of a dog and “Pet Friendly” on the photo. So I packed up my dog and off we went only to be met at the gate with a sign that indicated no pets.

I thought you might want to put a retraction in your upcoming issue. Fortunately, Odiorne park is not that far for me, but I am sure there are others who might travel some distance and would not be pleased to find out their pets were not allowed.

Thanks for your attention.

Lissa Colombo (subscriber since 2010) Brentwood Editor’s note: Sorry about the error. We’ve corrected the online version of the story.

Love Letter to Seabrook The article about Seabrook was so very interesting [“A Love Letter to Seabrook,” May 2021].

My husband and I both worked at Seabrook Station. When I was there, there were over 8,000 people working daily. Engineers of all disciplines came from all across the country.

Please put me in to win a signed copy of “A Visual History of Seabrook” by Eric Small.

I didn’t know people from Wales came to that area. My family, the Clements, were part of the co-founders of Haverhill, Massachusetts. I think some of my family also came from Wales, and the Clements from England.

Most interesting is the Yorkshire dialect. At my age (78) and being raised by my grandparents born in 1888, the words still appear.

The New Hampshire Magazine is a staple in our home.

Louise Dobson Hampton

courtesy photos

Send letters to Editor Rick Broussard, New Hampshire Magazine, 150 Dow St. Manchester, NH 03101 or email him at editor@nhmagazine.com.

emails, snail mail, facebook, tweets

Spot four newts like the one here hidden on ads in this issue, tell us where you found them and you might win a great gift from a local artisan or company.

To enter our drawing for Spot the Newt, visit www.spotthenewt.com and fill out the online form. Or, send answers plus your name and mailing address to:

Spot the Newt c/o New Hampshire Magazine 150 Dow St., Manchester, NH 03101 You can also email them to newt@nhmagazine.com or fax them to (603) 624-1310.

The May “Spot the Newt” winner is Louis Marino of Nashua.

May issue newts were on pages 11, 41, 33 and 85.

Thank you for your commitment and dedication to nursing excellence and for always going above and beyond to comfort, heal and educate.

NEED A GOOD REASON FOR SPOTTING THE NEWT?

This month’s Spot The Newt prize is a $50 self-care variety package from NH Made. Lotions from Sweet Grass Farm with essential oils, goat milk soap from Joy Lane Farm, organic Chappy’s Chapstick, Simple Pleasures soy candles, and decadent caramels from Van Otis will soothe and delight your senses. These products and more are available at the NH Made retail store, 28 Deer St. in downtown Portsmouth.

Jennifer Pletcher, MPH, BS, RN, CEN STROKE PROGRAM MANAGER / NURSE EDUCATOR EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT

250 Pleasant Street Concord, NH 03301 • (603)225-2711 • concordhospital.org nhmagazine.com | June 2021 11

603 Navigator “And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” — Roald Dahl Sunapee Harbor may be small, but it’s well worth your time this summer.

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Our Town 20 Food & Drink 24

The Other Side of Sunapee Land of the Flying Goose STORY AND PHOTOS BY KENDAL J. BUSH

T

ucked away between Newbury, Newport and New London, the quiet community of Sunapee Harbor has been making some happy noise this spring. That’s good, since many of the folks who visit Sunapee every year drive right past the rustic summer-camp-style sign that points the way to the harbor, missing out on a half-day or more of shopping, noshing and relaxing on Sunapee Lake.

Bill and Pamela Stocker, owners of the Sunapee Rock shop, are helping spread the word. “We’ve met folks who’ve come to Sunapee for years who never realized there was such a thing as Sunapee Harbor,” says Pam Stocker. “It’s one of those best-kept secrets about a half-mile from the main highway.”

A map of Lake Sunapee, on display at Prospect Hill Antiques nhmagazine.com | June 2021 13

603 NAVIGATOR / SUNAPEE HARBOR

Pamela and Bill Stocker, owners of the Sunapee Rock Shop. These one-of-a-kind, industrial-looking light fixtures are are handmade onsite by Bill Stocker.

Henry and Harriet Ford have been summering at Sunapee Harbor for 35 years.

Two folks who are very familiar with the chill bliss of the harbor, Henry and Harriet Ford of Hillsborough, have been summering on their sailboat at the harbor slips for 35 years. “Sometimes we just sit on the sailboat and watch all the theatrics on the harbor,” recalls Harriet before Henry pipes in, “We go out and anchor to swim and snorkel.” The couple appreciate the lake and the harbor for the cleanliness and laid-back atmosphere. “It is not as 14

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commercial as the other big lakes. All of the homeowners around here are very protective of the lake.” Henry and Harriet look forward to having their boat back in the water in the next few weeks as summer draws closer. July and August are prime tourist months at the harbor, where the area typically sees the population expand to double, sometimes triple the year-round population.

If you don’t happen to have a boat or a

friend with a lakehouse, you can book passage on one of the daily excursions offered

by Sunapee Cruises. The dinner cruise on the MV Kearsarge heads out every evening at 6:30 p.m. for a two-hour dinner cruise. If a grab-and-go lunch is more your style, you can visit the Anchorage, pick up a lobster roll at Fenton’s Landing or treat yourself to some smoked BBQ at the Wildwood Smokehouse. The daily 2 p.m. cruise lasts about an hour and a half, and provides a narrated tour that includes close-up views of the harbor’s inland water lighthouses.

Tim Fenton has worked on boats for 22 years and married into the family that’s owned Sunapee Cruises since the 1960s.

“My wife and I met on the boat — it’s a big part of our family history,” says Fenton.

“It’s a labor of love, which most family businesses are.”

Local business owner Rick Mastin casually leans against the gunwale of the MV Kearsarge and chimes in, “This and the Anchorage are the reason people come here. There’s a place to eat and a boat ride that draws people to the other businesses.”

But, Mastin notes, those are really just starting points to a growing community of attractions.

Tim Fenton, seen here onboard the MV Kearsarge, is the owner of Sunapee Cruises. He’s worked on boats for 22 years.

One of the newest additions to the business community is the A & E Harbor Shop run by Ayla and Elyn. The small shop perched across the harbor offers Sunapee souvenirs as well as handmade items from other young entrepreneurs in the area.

Ayla, 13, and Elyn, 10, started their business in a small corner of an aging building

that they quickly outgrew. “We kept expanding — we were doing really well and Mom kept getting us more inventory,” recounts Ayla. “I do payroll,” interjects Elyn “and we made the ‘meet-the-maker’ posters so people who come to the store can learn about who made the items.”

The girls are grateful for the local busi-

A & E Harbor Shop run by Ayla and Elyn (at left) offers Sunapee souvenirs as well as handmade items from other young entrepreneurs in the area, including area favorite Sanctuary Dairy Farm Ice Cream.

ness people who helped them get a start.

“Mr. Mastin [Rick] and Mr. Flint [Cory] gave us a few of their product lines. Mom is a CFO of a company, so she taught us about accounting and payroll,” says Ayla.

The girls haven’t hit a profit yet, but they are optimistic that the business will move into the green this summer. The top-selling item in the shop was also created by a young Sunapee entrepreneur, Beck Johnson, who started the Sanctuary Dairy Farm ice cream business when he was 13.

“He’s a role model to other kid entrepreneurs around here,” says Ayla. “He started a successful business that is still going even though he is in college now. It’s the best ice cream in town, its locally made, everything is fresh, they even have a petting zoo at the dairy farm.”

Mastin leads the way down the hill for a short stroll over to the Wildwood Smokehouse, where Debbie Samalis serves up breakfast at the 22-seat (23 if you count the saddle) restaurant where all of the ingredients are fresh and everything is handmade. “It’s a small establishment,” says Samalis, who runs the smokehouse with her son Ben, who is also the cook.

Having owned several large restaurants in Manchester before relocating to Sunapee, Samalis says the small size was intentional.

The western saloon-themed bar opened as a local hangout. Now the smokehouse offers a Sunday Reggae-themed brunch from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. with all your breakfast favorites, out-of-this-world quarter-inch slices of bacon in a maple glaze and the almost-famous make-your-own bloody

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 15

603 NAVIGATOR / SUNAPEE HARBOR

mary menu. In addition to a killer Sunday brunch, the Wildwood Smokehouse is known for the BBQ brisket cooked in the authentic wood-fired smoker, which is fed hourly. Samalis shares her optimism about changes to the harbor: “It’s really nice, the direction the harbor is going. There is a farmers market starting this summer and the Fentons have a new boat on the way.”

Between bites of a fluffy handmade waffle topped with whipped cream, banana and pecans, I ask Mastin how he and Samalis met. “She has the alcohol,” Mastin laughs while turning down a bloody mary (because “it’s only 11 a.m.”). “This was the end of the day,” he recalls. When Mastin and Cory Flint embarked on their Prospect Hill business journey, this is the spot where they would review the day’s work.

The venture that began with Prospect Hill Antiques in the Georges Mills section of Sunapee. It’s since grown to include Prospect Hill Home, which occupies the building formerly used as an ice house.

Although the harbor location offers a variety of unique antiques, fine art and custom furniture are the main attractions.

After taking a stroll through all three levels of the gallery, Mastin starts up his 1932 Ford Tudor for a ride over to the Prospect Hill flagship location about five miles from the harbor. Stopping along the way, he tucks his sleek black hot rod into the driveway of the Lake Sunapee Manor that’s home to “the Barn,” a former hotspot for music and dancing back in the late ’50s to early ’70s.

Debbie Samalis serves up breakfast to her brunch customers at the Wildwood Smokehouse.

The Barn is a rock ‘n’ roll icon — it’s the first public place Aerosmith gigged together as a band. It’s rumored that Steven Tyler met Joe Perry at the Anchorage down on the harbor, and the rest is history.

After I snap a quick fan pic of The Barn, we continue on to the Prospect Hill Antiques Barn that gained notoriety in the ’70s as a place that transported East Coast Victorian antiques to California. After finishing high school, Cory Flint started working for the Sullivans, who owned the antique business. Years later, Flint bought the business and currently runs it with his wife Renee and general manager Mastin.

Cory and Renee are Sunapee natives, and they always knew they wanted to raise a family in the area.The 12,000-squarefoot barn holds about 16,000 to 20,000 antiques at any given time. The shop is a popular destination for visitors as well as the folks who have homes here. “It’s been fun. I still love the business,” says Cory

Flint. “It doesn’t feel like I go to work, ever — except when we are moving heavy stuff, then it feels like work.”

Sometime before the turn of the 19th century, steam-powered boats became part of everyday life on big lakes.

Fifty-foot steamboats gathered tourists at train stations and delivered them to swanky hotels, private docks and towns that bordered the shores. On Lake Sunapee, for instance, travelers jumped off the Concord Railway in Newbury to climb aboard one of several steamboats that would make up to 20 stops.

Today, the harbor touts 18 businesses with options for dining, fine art, custom furniture, smoothies, ice cream, boat tours and more. There is also an abundance of hiking and other outdoor recreational opportunities year-round.

The “Land of the Flying Goose” was the name given by the original inhabitants of the area: “Suna,” meaning goose, and

Prospect Hill Antiques in the George’s Mill section of Sunapee. Left to right: Prospect Hill Antiques owners Cory and Renee Flint and General Manager Rick Mastin

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603 NAVIGATOR / SUNAPEE HARBOR

603 NAVIGATOR / SUNAPEE HARBOR

Help a child.

A view of Lake Sunapee from the harbor

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CASANH.org/info | (603) 626-4600

NEW HAMPSHIRE

“apee,” meaning lake, are the Native American Algonquin words that describe the shape of the lake, with Sunapee Harbor as the beak of the flying goose. Today, about 3,500 residents call Sunapee home.

Rick Mastin and the other business members of the Sunapee Harbor community are working hard to spread the word about Sunapee’s best-kept secret. A Lake Sunapee Center for the Arts NH show planned for July 17 to 25 should help spill the beans on the harbor’s attractions.

“The harbor has been my go-to for years,” says Mastin. “Even when I didn’t live here, I’d come over for lunch, a beer, to run into friends and so on. This is the place to bring new friends or visitors so they see what I see when I say ‘home.’ As soon as I had the chance, I moved back to Sunapee after being away for a while.”

Now Mastin feels comfortable speaking on behalf of his business neighbors. “We are in a very amazing spot here,” he says.

“The really cool crew that is building the harbor businesses make this place unique.

Everyone is working together to make this a ‘worth it’ destination spot.” NH

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CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR

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603 NAVIGATOR / OUR TOWN

photo courtesy paul keleher, visitnh.gov

Ossipee Lake with a view of the Ossipee Mountains

From the Guts of a Volcano

Over the rough terrain of the Ossipee Mountains rose little crossroads settlements

BY BARBARA RADCLIFFE ROGERS

O

n the New Hampshire road map, routes 16, 25 and 171 draw a lopsided circle around a huge empty space.

It’s not quite empty, as a few roads — some of them unpaved — penetrate the undeveloped mass of the Ossipee Mountains. But none goes through, leaving the largest and least disturbed wildlife habitat in the region.

With the slightest excuse, I will always begin with the geology, and in the case of Ossipee, it largely defines the town. The poster child of ring dikes, the Ossipee Mountains are famous among geologists as one of

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the best examples of this volcanic phenomenon. Geologist Stanley Williams described it as “one of the few places in the world that offers access to the guts of a volcano,” and it’s one of very few examples with the outer ring almost entirely intact.

Briefly put, it’s what’s left of the cone of a 10,000-foot volcano that first erupted 100 million years ago. Viewed from the air, it’s an almost perfect circle, with Dan Hole Pond just inside its southeast rim. You can get a good view of the circle of mountains from the summit of Bayle Mountain,

roughly in the center. The trail begins on Marble Road, shortly past Connor Pond, and crosses through a boulder field of glacial erratics dropped at the end of the ice age, a later chapter in the region’s geologic story.

Although the hills in the southeast corner of Ossipee were more hospitable to farming, settlers began to move into the rougher terrain of the Ossipee Mountains, forming little crossroads settlements.

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Former Carroll County Sheriff James Welch (1877-1959) in his book of reminiscences, “High Sheriff,” speaks of the mountain families who lived in this remote area, and of seeing their deserted houses alongside the roads in the 1950s. He speaks, too, of mill sites along the Lovell River, which flows out of Connor Pond (“one of the handsomest little lakes in NH,” he adds), where farmers took their grain to be ground.

In our wandering around Ossipee’s backroads, we found one of these mill sites on the Dan Hole River, a little brook that flows from Dan Hole Pond — another lovely lake backed by the Ossipee Mountains. Where Thurley Road crosses the brook, the remains of a mill’s stone foundations line both sides.

We were looking for some of these old settlements. Dorrs Corner and Moultonville are both still active little communities; in Chickville, just outside the ring of mountains, we found only a small 1838 church and a large cemetery.

We followed Granite Road into the easternmost corner of town in search of Leighton Corners, where a tiny meetinghouse built before 1812 is marked by a National Register plaque. Original settler John Leighton’s house is beside the road, next to the white farmhouse of Maplehurst Farm.

Near Granite Road is Duncan Lake, where President Grover Cleveland summered. The cottage is still there, a few yards from Route 16, and the town beach is named for the president, whose fishing

F nhmagazine.com | June 2021 21

photo courtesy bangshift.com

What’s left of the Whittier Bridge no longer carries traffic and today stands on dry land.

Below, the bridge before being moved, as it appeared in 2008 over the Bearcamp River

This 1920 Ford Model T pickup uses an original Ossipee snowmobile conversion kit, invented by Virgil White.

photo courtesy mountain view station

boat is a prized exhibit at the Grant Hall Museum of Ossipee History. Cleveland’s daughter Francis, who continued summering at the lake, is remembered as the founder of The Barnstormers’ summer playhouse in Tamworth.

Of these scattered settlements, three of them thrived and grew into Ossipee, Center Ossipee and West Ossipee, spaced along Route 16 and the parallel railroad line that opened the region to tourism in 1871.

Ossipee became the county seat, and the small brick courthouse in its center was built in 1916, a good example of Colonial Revival architecture. It housed the superior court until 2004, when the new building opened on Route 171. On the opposite side of the street is the stately white Second Congregational Church.

Center Ossipee sits squarely on the rail line, which crosses its main street; the old rail depot is now Mountainview Station restaurant, and across the street an impressive wooden grain depot stands beside the tracks.

Just around the corner, we found a newer addition, Sap House Meadery, where we sampled a flight of three honey wines. In the 10 years the meadery has operated, owners Ash Fischbein and Matt Trahan, who were named New Hampshire’s Young Entrepreneurs of the Year in 2014, have created a repertoire of more than a dozen meads based on local honey and locally grown

photo by stillman rogers

603 NAVIGATOR / OUR TOWN

The old train depot in Center Ossipee is now home to the Mountainview Station restaurant.

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berries and fruits. We were especially interested to learn of their meads made with foraged ingredients, such as sumac, elderberry and spruce tips; after tasting the latter, we left with a bottle.

Before the railroad came through, the nucleus of Center Ossipee was about 500 yards east, where we found the Grant Hall Museum of Ossipee History, in the former Grant’s Store, moved here from elsewhere in town to serve as a museum.

At the northernmost edge of town is West Ossipee, a busy crossroads of routes 16, 25 and 41. The steep mountainside above it was once the Mt. Whittier ski area and, until it closed in 1985, its gondola cars rose on cables suspended over Route 16. The base terminal building now houses Tramway Artisans, a gift shop.

The intersection is a landmark for our family, as it’s conveniently located between home and our favorite ski mountains; the children have never let us pass without stopping for lunch at Yankee Smokehouse.

If the sign with its cheery pink pigs doesn’t get attention, the mouthwatering fragrance emitting from the barbecue in the yard will.

The Whittier Bridge, built in 1870 to carry the old Route 25 across the Bearcamp River, is a rare example of a Paddleford truss.

It no longer carries traffic, or even crosses the river; it stands forlorn on dry land off Nudd Road, hauled off its abutments for repair in 2008 and still there. It’s not fenced and no signs warn visitors off, so of course we ventured under it for the rare opportunity to see how these bridges are constructed.

West Ossipee holds a place in White Mountain — and winter sports — history as the birthplace of the snowmobile. White’s Garage was a landmark at the intersection; its owner, Virgil White, invented a conversion system in 1913 to allow a Ford Model T to be driven on snow. His principle was simple: He put wooden runners on the front and a double set of wheels with tractor treads in the back.

He patented the name “Snowmobile,” selling the conversion kits — about 25,000 of them. These vehicles were not for recreation: In a day before roads were plowed, they allowed winter travel at a faster pace than a sleigh, especially important for doctors, mail carriers and others who needed to travel in all conditions. White sold the snowmobiles for $750 and conversion kits for $400; in 2011 an original White 1923 model was sold by Sotheby for $27,000. NH

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603 NAVIGATOR / FOOD & DRINK

Matt and Dalila Provencher, owners of Red Beard’s Kitchen, use the facilities at Noodz on Elm Street in Manchester.

Ghost Kitchens “G New Hampshire chefs deliver the goods, minus the traditional restaurant setting

BY ANNA-KATE MUNSEY / PHOTOGRAPHY BY JARED CHARNEY 24

nhmagazine.com | June 2021

host kitchens” perhaps sounds like the paranormal hunter TV show producers have run out of ideas, but there are no jump scares here, just tasty takeout.

Most Granite Staters’ first introduction to the concept was the news that Food Network celebrity chef Guy Fieri was

bringing his Flavortown Kitchens to New Hampshire. Rather than build a new, standalone restaurant, Fieri chose to operate three ghost kitchens in Salem, Nashua and Manchester.

The sort-of-spooky name has nothing to do with things that go bump in the night, unless you count chefs banging

around kitchens in what should be the off-hours. Ghost kitchens, rather than undergoing the expense of opening their own restaurant, work out of an already -established restaurant or retail space, usually offering just delivery or takeout.

Some also sell their products at local specialty shops and farmstands.

Throughout the pandemic, the food industry was forced to make innumerable adaptations in order to survive.

Delivery services boomed, and in a rare silver lining, a few local entrepreneurs took advantage of a hungry, homebound population weary of cooking seven days a week.

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603 NAVIGATOR / FOOD & DRINK

603 NAVIGATOR / FOOD & DRINK Here are three New Hampshire ghost kitchens offering homecooked meals, artisanal pizza and late-night eats.

Red Beard’s Kitchen

Matt Provencher started the innovative Red Beard’s Kitchen with his wife Dalila after the pandemic revealed a need for quality takeout food. Together, they cook out of Noodz restaurant’s kitchen in Manchester, where they prepare homecooked comfort food meals, which customers only need to heat up. They offer pickup times on Tuesdays and Fridays.

Each frozen, handpacked meal comes with an ingredient list and instructions for preparation and cooking. Currently, they offer soups such as seafood chowder, creamy tomato bisque and broccoli cheddar, as well as entrées including shepherd’s pie, baked haddock and lasagna.

Many of the ingredients used at Red Beard’s come from local farms. All of their fish is sourced from New England Fishmongers, and they get produce from Three Rivers Farmers Alliance. Currently, their products are available at farmstands across the state — including Contoocook Creamery, Vernon Family Farm and Brookvale Pines Farm.

In addition to Red Beard’s, Provencher works full time at another restaurant, and he and his wife are raising three daughters.

The main challenges in starting up the business, says Provencher, were the logistics, such as getting their permit application approved, due to the lower number of staff in the Manchester city offices.

Pushing through was worth it though — the best part, he says, is the local connections.

Customers are excited to eat locally sourced food, and the farmers are glad to have one more outlet for their products.

Find more information about Red Beard’s Kitchen on Facebook, and place online orders at red-beards-kitchen.square.site.

Ray Street Pizza

A longtime amateur pizza chef, Beau Gamache recently quit his full-time technology sales job to focus on his new venture, Ray Street Pizza in Manchester.

Cooking was always a hobby of his, but after his then-girlfriend returned from Italy talking about delicious pizza, he began attempting to recreate it. Today they’re married, and his full-time job is handcrafting New York-style, ultrathin-crust artisanal pizzas.

Several years ago, Gamache began sharing his creations on Instagram under the handle

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Beau Gamache crafts artisanal pizza at Bayona Café in Manchester’s Millyard.

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“ThePizzaGram,” and ended up gaining quite a following by posting photos of the pizzas he was making for friends and family.

After spending time selling pizzas out of his house (on Ray Street, hence the name), being approached by an old friend and executive chef, and doing several popular pop-ups in collaboration with Collectus Culina, Ray Street Pizza finally got its own space — of a sort.

Bayona Café in the Jefferson Mill building, which temporarily closed when the downtown lunchtime crowd disappeared, is now home to Ray Street.

Ray Street is a one-man show at the moment, but Gamache hopes to hire several part-time employees to help with prep and cooking in the near future. And, looking out even further, possibly taking the next step to a full-time gourmet pizza restaurant.

After many years of working under constantly changing tech companies, he is definitely enjoying being his own boss. The freedom in his schedule has been enjoyable as well.

“It’s awesome. I come to the kitchen in the morning, I prep, I get some time usually

Fry’d

Gamache offers take-out and delivery pizza.

in the middle of the day and I’ll go home and see the kids or I’ll get stuff done. It’s awesome. It’s like, I am busy but I get to basically do whatever I want, all the time,” he says.

Currently offering takeout and delivery, Ray Street also caters private events, both formal and informal.

The menu changes often, including inventive weekly specials, such as specialty pizzas and even street tacos. Some menu staples include the sweet pepperoni, margherita moderna and sausage ricotta artisanal pies.

There are also gluten-free, dairy-free and vegan options.

Ray Street Pizza is open Tuesday through Saturday, and orders can be placed through Facebook and at raystreetpizza.com.

After attending a food truck festival during a California vacation, University of New Hampshire senior Darren Gibadlo knew he wanted to bring the concept back to Durham. However, due to campus restrictions, the food truck idea evolved into a ghost kitchen now operating out of Wildcat Pizza. The team first opened their doors (so to speak) in early March, and have been well-received by the college community.

Their motto is “food for friends, by friends,” and the idea is to keep the food affordable, local and inclusive. In order to best reach their target audience — hungry college students — they utilize a variety of social media platforms, including Instagram and TikTok, and also send out a weekly newsletter.

The Fry’d guys, a group of six friends, have devoted most of their free time to the business, including sacrificing the typical senior-year traditions. “We’re pretty much nocturnal,” Gibadlo jokes. “We’re getting through it and definitely trying to focus on that mental health and work-life balance for sure.”

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 27

PHOTO COURTESY FRY’D

603 NAVIGATOR / FOOD & DRINK

Fry’d in Durham is all about the late-night eats.

Akashi city - Hyogo product of japan @hatozakiwhisky | Imported by: Marussia Beverages USA | marussiabeveragesusa.com | Please Drink Responsibly

However, they’re keeping their attitudes positive and enjoying growing their brand together, says Gibadlo. As both friends and roommates, they try to keep their relationship as business partners separate. They each take on a specific role — such as chief financial officer or director of morale — but do a lot of collaboration, including with marketing and kitchen work.

They hope to bring food truck to the Seacoast area this summer, and they’ll be back on campus for the fall semester.

Fry’d is open Wednesday through Saturday from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. Online orders can be placed at frydlatenight.com. NH

More Ghost Kitchens Good & Planty

A virtual restaurant by Tom Puskarich with a vegan and plant-based menu operating out of Restoration Café in Manchester. Orders are placed online for delivery or pickup. Open Tuesday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. good-n-planty.com

DingDongDeliver.com

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nhmagazine.com | June 2021

Tom Boucher, CEO of Great NH Restaurants, launched the delivery-only service DingDongDeliver.com out of their catering facility on Union Street in Manchester. Menu items include favorites from T-Bones, CJ’s and the Copper Door. Cold-packaged meals arrive on your doorstep with reheating and cooking instructions. Delivery is available in Manchester and Bedford, or you can pick up orders at one of the restaurants. Delivery hours are Thursday through Saturday from 1 to 5 p.m. Pickup is available at all locations on Thursdays (Fridays in Concord and Laconia) between 4 and 8 p.m.

Creative Chef Kitchens

This ghost kitchen space in Derry is used by a number of local businesses. Visit creativechefkitchens.com to find everything from prepared meals and catering services to pantry staples and desserts.

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 29

603 Informer “Who hears music, feels his solitude peopled at once.” — Robert Browning

ERIC BONESKE PHOTOGRAPHY

Aaron Goodro (back middle) on stage at Carnegie Hall with Sarah McLachlan

Linoprint by John Herman

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Blips 36 Politics 38 What Do You Know? 40 First Person 42

A Tale of Three Gigs Ministry, mercy and the road to Carnegie Hall

BY BILL BURKE

I

because, well, there’s a sold-out Carnegie Hall full of people waiting to hear Sarah McLachlan.

Such is life for the multiskilled and quick-witted Goodro — an in-demand drummer, the pastor of the First Baptist Church in Plaistow, and founder of Mercy Street, a six-year-old organization that helps families affected by addiction and to provide hope for those in recovery.

“Usually when we’re playing in New York we get out late and head back home,” he

COURTESY PHOTO

t’s Saturday night and Aaron Goodro is sitting behind the drums onstage at Carnegie Hall just a few feet away from Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan. No time to entertain rockstar dreams though — before the end of the night he’ll be on the road back to Plaistow so he can lead Sunday morning church service.

Then he’ll be preparing for a weekly gathering where he’ll counsel families who have lost loved ones to addiction But first, he’s got to count off the band

Aaron Goodro sits behind the drums on performance day at Carnegie Hall. nhmagazine.com | June 2021 31

COURTESY PHOTOS

603 INFORMER / A TALE OF THREE GIGS

Aaron Goodro standing in front of his congregation and the view from behind the kit on the roof of the First Baptist Church

says of the journey — both literal and figurative — from Carnegie Hall to Main Street in Plaistow. “Then, within the next day or so, I’ll be taking out the trash and doing the things I neglected while I was away.”

It often finds the 47-year-old father of two in very different worlds, depending on the role he’s filling that day. There’s his calling, of course, but then there are the rock shows, theater productions and recording sessions that take him from the pulpit and put him on stage.

“People will do a double take,” he says, laughing. “They’ll ask, ‘So, what’s your day gig?’ I’m a pastor — yet there I am playing ‘American Idiot’ musical theater in full eyeliner on stage.”

He was part of New Hampshire composer Tim Janis’ ensemble playing Celtic music on the “Today” show in March, and since 2013, he’s been traveling to the Big Apple a few times a year for shows organized and produced by Janis. It’s put him on the Carnegie Hall stage with artists like McLachlan, Loreena McKennitt, Zachary Levi, Andrea Corr, Matthew Morrison, Colbie Caillat and Melora Hardin, among others.

“It really is kind of a thrill to be there,” Goodro says of performing at the revered New York City auditorium. “The venue is impressive, but working with people I’ve played music with for 20 years is also a thrill. The breadth of the musicians on stage is great and really challenging.”

Though Carnegie Hall typically hosts more classical music performances, Goodro says, “Backstage there are some really amazing pictures of people who have played there, like Ella (Fitzgerald) and the Beatles.

One night Bono was there the night before we played.”

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For one performance, he played in a show created by Sibylle Szaggars — the wife of actor Robert Redford.

“Right before we started, I look up and in the money seats off to my right, the first tier, is Will Calhoun, the drummer for Living Colour,” Goodro says. “He had worked with Sibylle before and on variations of that piece. That was a fun, nerveracking moment.”

It wouldn’t be the last memorable moment that night, which is now memorialized among friends as the night Goodro fell asleep onstage at Carnegie Hall.

“It was exhausting because I had a click track in my left earpiece that was synced with the very precise timing of the video,” he says. “In front of me was a video monitor so I can see what’s going on, with the measure and the beat number and the image being projected. So, I’m reading charts and watching the video and listening to the click and watching the conductor. I was on a large stage with a lot of strings, so I’m the ruler by which they’re measuring. It was really exhausting to keep pace for that long of a duration.”

Halfway through, Robert Redford began a spoken word segment.

“It was very peaceful and I was very comfortable in my drum seat. I closed my eyes for a few moments and just nodded out. In my own home, I’m known for being able to sleep very quickly, but it’s not like I was snoring and drooling.”

It’s that unflappable nature that allows him to face audiences in a world-famous venue with the same calm demeanor he has stepping in front of his congregation each week.

“It’s fun stress. It’s not life-and-death stress. I do a lot of life-and-death stuff, and that’s not it.”

He’s now eight years into that standing Sunday morning gig as the pastor of the Plaistow First Baptist Church — his latest spiritual (and actual) home in 24 years spent throughout southern New Hampshire churches. It’s also a role that also sees him getting behind the drums as part of the service’s musical performances each week. And lately, that stage has been slightly higher than normal.

When the pandemic altered life everywhere last spring, Goodro did some quick planning and decided to elevate the Sunday service. Literally. He and his fellow musicians took their equipment, a PA system and some microphones out onto the roof of the church — for 58 weeks in a row, regardless of conditions. Whether through sheer luck or divine intervention, there’s only been one rainy Sunday during that time.

“It’s a great outlet,” he says. “When we play indoors, I can’t really hit. I have to play with dynamics. Outside, I can go full ham. I kind of unleash. The full church hadn’t seen that side of my personality or musicality. It’s fun to do that.”

Parishioners park in the lot below, filling the space between the hall and the town’s elementary school, signaling approval through quick bursts of a car horn. Song and message selection is carefully managed.

Goodro’s plan all along has been to offer a 30-minute experience.

“Usually our format is a welcome, a couple of songs, a little sermon, a short time of prayer, a couple of songs, the benediction, and we’re out.”

Then there’s his Tuesday night mission:

Mercy Street. Formed to help families through addiction and loss, it all started six years ago when he began noticing an unfortunate trend.

“I began to recognize I had done a handful of funerals for people who had overdosed on heroin or opioids,” he says. “I was starting to realize this when I saw that a young woman from a former church I was at, and I had a little interaction with, had passed of an overdose.

Goodro took an unusual step and called the funeral home. “I said to them, ‘You know me, I’m not a hearse chaser. But if they don’t have a church affiliation, I’d like to help.’ I was connected with the family, and I cold-called Doug Griffin. The first thing he said to me was, ‘Pastor Aaron, is my Courtney in heaven?’ It got a lot more real to me then.”

Goodro admits that before he got involved in the recovery community, he “naively thought, why would anyone do heroin? I was being a dismissive jerk and judgmental,” he says.

“Once I looked at that question, it struck me that there are always reasons people do drugs, and that’s what made me develop more compassion for the project.”

Working with Griffin, Goodro began to build the organization. At first, it was a vigil to give parents a place to grieve their adult children. That evolved into a meeting on the third Sunday of the month. Now, Mercy Street meets every Tuesday at 7 p.m. Sometimes there are as few as 10 to 15 people in attendance; other times as many as 40. Over the years, as the opioid crisis, in particular, raged, it grew into a place for people to talk about addiction, recovery and loss.

“We’d gather in the sanctuary, there would be some music, someone would speak, and then, organically, people started bringing food,” he says. “We’d be in the sanctuary for an hour, and then we’d spend two hours after that talking and eating and finding a connection in this.”

It grew to the point where the group needed a name. Mercy Street, chosen by its music-loving founder, was inspired by a Peter Gabriel song, which was in turn inspired by the work of poet Anne Sexton, who struggled with mental illness before taking her own life in Boston in 1974.

“The song is based off of one of her poems,” Goodro says. “She was looking for a place called Mercy Street. A place of respite.

Sadly, I don’t know if she found it or not.”

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603 INFORMER / A TALE OF THREE GIGS

603 INFORMER / A TALE OF THREE GIGS

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Aaron Goodro addresses an addiction awareness event in front of the “Angels of Addiction” paintings by Ann Marie Zanfagna.

Providing that safe harbor is a key element for the group. Goodro has adopted writer Johann Hari’s philosophy: The opposite of addiction isn’t sobriety, it’s connection.

“There’s no formula for us,” he says, pointing out that Mercy Street isn’t a 12-step program. “We’ve been through some joyful times and some really tragic times of loss.

My background is in social work, but I’m not qualified to treat anyone for substance abuse disorder. I can have compassion for someone with cancer, but I’m not qualified to treat them, obviously.”

According to Goodro, that compassion is needed now more than ever. As New Hampshire emerges from the pandemic, counselors are finding that the drug crisis is worse than it was before COVID-19. By the end of last summer, a segment of people in recovery started going back out again, seeking relief from the quarantine and distancing that had become necessary.

“It’s the isolation,” he says. “Isolation in anything is challenging, but for a person who struggles with addiction, they need that community to help out. They get fed up, the stress is too much. For people trying to seek

normalcy in a pandemic, I can see where that quick escape might offer an allure.”

Then the meeting ends for another week, and Goodro checks his schedule. There will be another show, then another service — maybe a wedding, a funeral — and a call to pack up his drums for another opportunity.

“There is some weight to this stuff, but music and drumming helps me recreate and connect with people in very different situations and from very different lifestyles that I don’t always have access to,” he says.

Goodro was recently talking with Todd Sucherman, drummer for the band Styx, who gave him some advice — ostensibly for when he was stepping behind the kit, but something he’s adopted as a way of approaching each of his roles.

“He told me to be prepared, have good gear, and leave people at the gig better than you found them. I can aspire to that. Not to his level of playing, but I can try to leave people better than I found them.” NH

Learn more Mercy Street at FBC Plaistow 122 Main St., Plaistow facebook.com/mercystreetplaistow

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603 INFORMER / IN THE NEWS

Blips

Monitoring appearances of the 603 on the media radar since 2006

On Pointe

A Dover native prepares for her biggest dance role yet

Brooke Wilson

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If you’ve spent any time on TikTok lately, you might’ve caught a small glimpse into what it’s like for Brooke Wilson to embark on the next phase of her ballet career — a role she’s been preparing for since she first twirled through a Dover dance studio at age 3.

More than 61,000 people subscribe to Wilson’s feed, @brookeeliza11, a kind of virtual journal of her life as a soon-to-be professional ballerina, from the glamorous (like the pirouettes and panoramic sunset views from her Miami dorm) to the not-so-glamorous (like the unfiltered posts about blisters, foot stretches and shin splints) to the mundane (like the no-frills video of Wilson breaking in a new pair of pointe shoes that’s been watched 8.8 million times).

But offline, 18-year-old Wilson is preparing for her biggest role yet — a spot with Boston Ballet II, a prestigious program that “bridges the divide between training and professional careers with major dance companies.”

It’s something she’s dreamed of since she was first getting her footing as a dancer, training at the Northeastern Ballet Theatre in Dover under the mentorship of Edra Toth, herself a former prima ballerina with the Boston Ballet. In those dreams, though, she never imagined she’d be auditioning for her big break via Zoom — one of many ways her corner of the dance world has adapted to the pandemic.

“I actually like the energy of auditions — you can feel everyone’s energy, I feel like everyone can be inspired by everyone in the room,” she says. “When it’s just on Zoom, it’s just you on the screen — it’s less pressure in that way, but more pressure because you really have to be focused on yourself and can’t watch anyone else.”

And after spending most of her teen years far away from her family — training in New York City, at The Rock School for Dance Education in Philadelphia, and

courtesy photo

BY CASEY McDERMOTT

most recently at the Miami City Ballet School — Wilson’s looking forward to this homecoming.

“I’ve lived really far away since the summer after seventh grade,” she says.

It’ll be a nice change to know her parents are only a short drive away from her performances, she says, and nice to know her decision to get serious about her dancing career at age 13 — forgoing a “normal” high school experience in favor of online classes and lots of strenuous physical training — paid off.

“It was a lot,” Wilson says, “but I don’t regret it at all because it was what I needed if I wanted to pursue ballet professionally.”

Her advice to aspiring dancers hoping to follow a similar path is simple: Try not to stress too much over things you can’t control, but don’t avoid putting in the work to improve the things you can control.

“Even though improving the stuff that you’re not good at isn’t fun, it makes you such a strong dancer in the long run,” she says.

And, above all, make sure to hold onto the joy that brought you to dance in the first place.

“If that gets lost,” she says, “you’re kind of missing the goal.” NH

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If you’re looking for a good slice of Greekstyle pie in New Hampshire, look no further than Tilton House of Pizza. Though you probably already knew that, the secret’s out: Food & Wine Magazine singled out the Lakes Region spot on its recent list of The Best Pizza in Every State. Tilton House of Pizza gets high marks for its take on the classic New England Greek-style pizza or, as Food & Wine puts it, “their buttery, generously topped, unrepentantly Greek monstrosities.”

News from New Hampshire and

Congratulations are in order for Portsmouth residents Chris Stinson and Amy Greene, who were part of the crew behind the Oscar-winning film “Sound of Metal.” The movie, which portrays Riz Ahmed playing a drummer experiencing hearing loss, earned two Academy Awards for Best Sound and Best Film Editing. And New Hampshire also serves as the backdrop for some of the movie. As Stinson recently told WMUR, “We kind of insisted on it.” nhmagazine.com | June 2021 37

603 INFORMER / POLITICS

The Fourth B

Will New Hampshire ever legalize marijuana?

BY JAMES PINDELL / ILLUSTRATION BY PETER NOONAN

L

ove it or hate it, New Hampshire has long balanced its budget in a unique way. Instead of using a statewide income tax or sales tax, the Live Free or Die state collects money, as a Republican lawmaker once put it, from “booze, butts and bets.”

He was, of course, referring to the deals to be had at the state-run liquor stores, the lower-taxed cigarettes, and the nation’s oldest state-run lottery here in the Granite State.

This is why, in 2021, it’s starting to get weird that there isn’t a fourth “B” in the mix: buds.

The past decade has seen a remarkable shift in American public opinion about marijuana.

Following the shifting politics and seeing an opportunity to raise revenues, lawmakers in some states have followed suit by legalizing marijuana — and then heavily taxing it.

Suddenly, 15 states have fully legalized marijuana for recreational use. In addition, every other remaining state — except Idaho and Nebraska — allows for marijuana to be purchased and used for medical reasons. New Hampshire allows for medical use of cannabis, but year after year, lawmakers in Concord reject the idea of full legalization.

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New Hampshire is an island on the issue — we’re surrounded by states that have legalized the substance for recreational use. So, while residents of Vermont, Maine and Massachusetts continue to visit New Hampshire for cheap liquor, New Hampshire residents are leaving the state to buy legal marijuana.

There is no need to overthink the reason why pot isn’t legal in New Hampshire. It’s simple: No governor in recent times has wanted it legalized. This includes popular governors like Democrat John Lynch and Republican Chris Sununu.

Here is the thing: Given the local poll numbers, it’s sort of a no-brainer for any ambitious politician. The most recent poll found that 68% of Granite Staters wanted marijuana to be legal for recreational use, and that data is actually a few years old.

Yet, at the same time, not only is the current governor against it, many in the Statehouse are as well. The Concord Monitor found that of the 48 Republican and Democratic candidates running for the 24 State Senate seats last year, only 20 supported legalization.

Here is the thing: The politics on the issue in the state are complicated, especially philosophically.

As it turns out, marijuana is the collision point in a number of fault lines in state politics. When it comes to internal Republican politics, it pits social conservatives against libertarian-minded conservatives.

Within the Democratic Party, the dynamic is more generational, but they are beginning to realize how they could spend new money from taxing marijuana. Indeed, the last two Democratic nominees for governor backed legalization.

At the same time, US Representative Chris Pappas, a Democrat, reversed his previous position to decriminalize possession of marijuana and went even further, backing employers’ rights to mandate drug testing for marijuana. It isn’t hard to see him facing a Republican who feels the opposite way next year and making a campaign issue out of it.

I mean, this is New Hampshire. It’s hard to be all moral about the idea of having legal pot stores when the state puts liquor stores literally on the highway. NH

603 INFORMER / ARTISAN

NURSES ARE SUPERHEROES IN SCRUBS Connection thanks you for the long hours spent working to keep us healthy and safe during the pandemic. We appreciate all that you have done and continue to do.

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WE LOVE OUR NURSES. At Wentworth-Douglass our team of 3,500 staff members includes over 500 dedicated, hard-working, compassionate nurses who go above and beyond for patients, families, colleagues and friends each and every day.

They provide care non-stop - 24/7, 365 days of the year. But the care doesn’t stop at the bedside. They hold holiday parties for patients, they coordinate weddings, they connect with families near and far.

Their dedication has changed the lives of many in our community. Beyond the clinical care they give, they inspire, they teach, they share, they shine.

They are an integral part of the family at Wentworth-Douglass that cares for our community. They are healthcare with heart.

Thank you for all you do.

789 Central Avenue, Dover, New Hampshire 03820 (603) 742-5252 | wdhospital.org nhmagazine.com | June 2021 39

603 INFORMER / WHAT DO YOU KNOW?

A Lupine Truck Road A mysterious sign leads to a wildlife wonderland STORY AND PHOTOS BY MARSHALL HUDSON

I

was eastbound on NH Route 25A somewhere between Orford and Wentworth, when the first hand-lettered sign grabbed my attention, “Lupine Tour ...

4 Wheel Drive Vehicles Only ...” I just happened to be driving a four-wheel drive pickup, so this seemed like an opportunity not to be bypassed. I made the turnoff and started up gravel roads that got narrower and steeper with each turn. The sign at the next intersection read, “High Clearance Vehicles Only!” and I wondered what I was getting into. The next sign suggested that I “Go Slow” and then, “Please Stay On Road.”

I was hoping not to end up in a ditch, so staying on the road was agreeable to me.

Although the sign did make me contemplate turning around.

I ended up in Quinttown, an area mostly forgotten about in the southeastern corner

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of Orford. Quinttown was named after Benjamin Quint, a sailor who served with John Paul Jones during the Revolutionary War and settled here in 1788. Census records indicate there were at least seven Quint households by 1840, and it was once a thriving village of over 200 people before the Civil War. With the construction of the railroads and free land out west, Quinttown steadily declined, and by 1910, fewer than 40 people called the village home. Today it’s mostly forests, cellar holes and history.

I drove through a gate and another sign told me I had just entered onto the “Thomson Family Tree Farm & Wildlife Habitat Area.” New Hampshire is a small state and I had met Tom Thomson before — he and I have bumped into each other and worked on mutual projects a handful of times over the last few decades. I contacted Tom and

The Thomson Family Tree Farm & Wildlife Habitat Area is a hidden gem.

we met up for a personally guided tour of this lupine truck road.

Tom and his wife, Sheila Thomson, purchased this 1,060-acre tract in 1989 from International Paper, a multinational forest products company that was then selling off much of its New England landholdings.

Most of the accessible portions of this property had been aggressively logged prior to the Thomsons’ purchase and the land needed attention. The initial goal was to establish vegetation on the disturbed slopes to hold the soil. An access road was needed to facilitate cleanup and stabilizing of the

When the lupine are in bloom, the Thomson Tree Farm is open to the public.

Tom Thomson in the field of lupine

site. International Paper had left a skid road and Thomson made it serviceable, hiring contractors and repairing three miles of truck road. The Thomson family installed culverts, cleaned roadside ditches, graveled the skidder roads, installed water bars, and crowned the road surface to shed runoff. To stabilize the raw slopes and disturbed areas Tom seeded winter rye to get something growing quickly, but then got creative.

“I had been reading that lupines have a deep taproot,” he says. “I began experimenting mixing lupine seeds with a conservation mix to seed down the steep banks. The first year I was rather disappointed as we did not have any lupines, or at least I didn’t think we did. The lupine is a perennial, but sometimes they do not actually bloom until the second year. As I took a closer look, I could see that I did have some very small plants, and by the next year they were flowering. It did well, and lupine flower spikes shot up.”

Tom added more lupine seeds to the mix the following year.

Lupines have lower maintenance requirements than other vegetation, and they tend to choke out some of the less desirable species like poison ivy. Lupines will adapt to different soil types and can grow in sandy soils or heavy wetter soils; they’re also nitrogen-fixing legumes capable of thriving in poorer soils or summer droughts. Once the lupines are established, they will continually reseed themselves.

The waist-high lupine flowers before me are shades of lavender, pink, blue and white.

These contrast delightfully with the yellow, white and orange colors of the daisies, blackeyed Susans, devil’s paintbrush, white clover and other wildflowers. “What I didn’t realize at the time was how much they would add to the beauty and esthetics of our forestland,” says Tom. “Today, with our wildflower mix, the former log landings, truck roads and skid trails are a thing of beauty during the months of June, July and August.”

Another benefit of the lupines is that they provide good cover for ground-nesting birds and nectar for pollinators such as bees, butterflies and hummingbirds. Deer, black bear, moose, hawks, herons, partridge, bobcats and turkeys are frequently seen.

Although mountain lions don’t officially exist in New Hampshire, reported sightings have occurred here. On the day I toured the site, I saw a black bear who stood and looked at me while I stood and looked at him, both unconcerned about the other. I lost count of the number of turkey, grouse and deer I saw.

In addition to the extensive woodlands of this managed tree farm, the property contains several other unique features.

There is a high elevation pond, six associ-

It’s not unusal to spot wildlife including moose, black bear, hawks, partidge, turkeys, bobcats and more.

ated wetlands, a natural floating bog, two scenic waterfalls and the remnants of a water-powered, up-and-down sawmill that operated between 1845 and 1862 until forced to close when the labor force dried up as men marched off to the Civil War. Another feature of special interest is the Eastman Ledges with its commanding views. I’ve never had much fear of heights, so I casually ambled to the edge to look out over and caused my host to skip a heartbeat or two. It is a very long way down. If you are feeling energetic, a trail at

Great blue herons

these ledges connects you to the Appalachian Trail, and from there an ambitious jaunt in one direction will take you Mt. Katahdin in Maine, or the opposite direction will bring you out on Springer Mountain in Georgia.

But the highlight of this tour is the vast areas of lupines in vibrant bloom. If you’d like to see them for yourself, the Thomson family opens the road to the public during the peak bloom season. This varies with the weather, but typically starts the end of June and lasts a few weeks. The tour is on a woods road, and you’ll need a four-wheel drive vehicle with good ground clearance, or utilize the small parking area at the bottom and hike up the road. Bring a picnic lunch and enjoy the vistas overlooking the wildflowers to the mountain views extending into Vermont and New York. Bear in mind this is privately owned property open to the public at the discretion of the landowners, so treat it like it was your own. To find it, just follow the signs. NH

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603 INFORMER / FIRST PERSON

Why I Garden It’s more than just tomatoes and peonies

BY HENRY HOMEYER / ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOSH YUNGER

I

’ve been messing around with plants and seeds — and getting wet and dirty — for more than 70 years. I learned a lot from my mother’s dad, who I called Grampy. He was a fabulous gardener and we spent a lot of time together as I grew up.

One of my earliest memories — I was probably 2 or 3 — is in the garden with Grampy. He was weeding his asparagus bed, and I was hanging out with him, looking at creepy-crawly things — earthworms and beetles, I suppose. Suddenly, thunderheads appeared, but we were quite a distance from the house and barn. Grampy scooped me up and plunked me down on a pile of weeds in his old wooden wheelbarrow. He raced back to the house pushing his wheelbarrow, arriving just before the rain. What fun that was.

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Grampy came from the old country, Germany, in the early 1900s. He was a tailor by trade, but a farmer at heart. After his wife died when I was 7, I would take a train from New Haven, Connecticut, to Worcester, Massachusetts — by myself — to visit with him. Sometimes I stayed a week, sometimes a month, and I did so every year until he died on my 21st birthday in 1967.

Grampy taught me about gardening by example, not lectures. He gardened and I watched — or helped. One of my first tasks was to stand on a wooden apple crate with a long stick and stir up a wooden barrel full of water and hen manure. Then I was allowed to dip a little metal can that concentrated frozen orange juice came in back then, and to give each tomato plant one serving of manure tea.

Stinky? You bet. Great fun for an 8-year-old.

Grampy never asked me to weed.

Grampy’s kitchen table usually had a stack of magazines on it, including a little one called “Organic Gardening and Farming.” It was printed on newsprint and had no color pictures, but Grampy loved the articles. Later the magazine name was shortened to “Organic Gardening,” and it still is being published by Rodale Books — though now it has bigger pages, and has lots of color photos. He used it as his guide to better gardening, and I have too.

In 1970, as a young schoolteacher, I bought a drafty old wooden building that had been a butter factory in Cornish Flat, The Cornish Creamery. It had no gardens — except for a few common orange daylilies along the front of the house. At first, I was just a vegetable gardener, growing lettuce and tomatoes.

Later, when I came back from the Peace Corps in 1982, I started planting flowers. I dug up a peony that my mom grew in Connecticut that had been my grandmother’s — before she passed away in 1953 — and brought a piece of it to Cornish Flat where it bloomed magnificently. I was hooked.

I decided to take the UNH Master Gardener program and learned a lot. I’d recommend that 10-week course to anyone who wants to learn every aspect of gardening, from flowers and lawns to trees and disease control. Of course, being a Master Gardener meant that I had to volunteer to help others in my community, which I continue to enjoy all these years later.

I started writing a gardening column for my hometown paper, the Valley News, in 1998. I realized that I knew little about trees and shrubs, so I took a course on them at the Vermont Technical College in Randolph, Vermont. We went on plant walks every week to learn ornamental trees and shrubs on the campus and at Dartmouth College.

“Eat what you grow, grow what you love to eat.”

About the artist

Joshua Yunger is an artist and musician living in Strafford, Vermont. He has focused on printmaking since attending the Art Institute of Chicago in 1994. Before that, he studied oil painting with Clifford West at AVA Gallery in Lebanon. He is the author and illustrator of the children’s book “Hippo and Monkey,” and he has created linocut illustrations for several books written by Henry Homeyer, as well as illustrations for various newspaper and magazine articles.

At that time, I was also introduced to the books of Michael Dirr, who I consider the premier “woodies” expert in America. His 1,200-page tome, “Manual of Woody Landscape Plants: Their Identification, Ornamental Characteristics, Propagation and Uses,” is my bible. I’ve also been fortunate enough to get to know him and take several plant walks with him, learning more every time. All his books are not only instructive but also amusing — he is very opinionated. By now I have over 80 different kinds of trees and shrubs planted around my house.

So at age 75, why do I still garden? It’s in my blood, I guess. Starting young helped, I’m sure. But I do love the sheer beauty of Siberian iris and Japanese primroses and the excitement of seeing the first snowdrops opening in March. I love the fragrance of my grandmother’s Festiva Maxima peony. I love the friends I make through the writing a gardening column and from giving lectures to garden clubs and libraries.

Do I have any advice for new gardeners?

Sure, lots. First and foremost, gardening should be fun. That means never work until

your back hurts (or not very much). Garden with your loved ones, especially children. Eat what you grow, grow what you love to eat.

You don’t have to grow eggplants if you don’t really like them. Thin your carrots and eat them standing in the garden.

What else? Take time to look at butterflies, smell the flowers. Rejoice when your young apple tree produces its first fruit. Plant bulbs every fall, even more than you can really afford. If you have goutweed or Japanese knotweed, consider selling the house! Anything else can be managed. Share your tomatoes — not just your zucchinis — with others. Put cut flowers in an elegant vase on the table every week from March to November.

I believe gardening will keep me going until I’m 100. After all, I do so want to see what comes back after a hard winter, and blooms again. NH Henry Homeyer lives and gardens in Cornish Flat, New Hampshire, in a house he bought in 1970.

He is the author of four gardening books and writes a weekly gardening column for a dozen newspapers around New England. His website is gardening-guy.com.

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nhmagazine.com | June 2021 43

603 INFORMER / TRANSCRIPT

Light Work Photo and interview by David Mendelsohn Smelling a crayon can take you back to your childhood. Ross Mingarelli of CandleTree Soy Candles puts wicks in scented wax to take you wherever you want to go. Mixing a pinch of this, a thimbleful of that into his secret candle potions, he works in a space the size of a Hobbit’s closet on Concord’s Main Street, yet displays upward of 1,000 candles at a time. Wild blueberry, fresh tangerine, buttered popcorn — even dill pickle and beef jerky. So flick a Bic, spin up some light jazz, and just kick back to dancing lights and simmering scents. Choose your pleasure, inhale and enjoy. Ah, the good life, illuminated.

I was born and raised in Warner. I own a small tree service business and usually have no work in the winter except for plowing snow. This means I have a lot of time to fill.

One of my friends mentioned to me that I should check out Pinterest to look for some hobbies I could try. I first started making candles as a hobby in the winter five years ago.

I picked up all the supplies I felt I needed to start experimenting — plus I picked up a soy candle book.

I use 100% soy wax, which is all natural and clean burning. Some other candles use paraffin wax, which is petroleum-based — the smoke that comes off the candle can be bad for your lungs and body.

Every time I made a candle, I got different options on how I could improve each candle I made. I spent countless hours and a lot of money trying to figure things out.

My candles are offered in 10-ounce square jars with wood tops, but I can also make custom candles in any size to the customer’s request. I’ve even had fun making 500-ounce candles with different themes like “Batman and The Joker.”

My colors are custom because it makes my candles more unique and fun to make. I currently have over 600 candle scents, and this will continue to grow as time goes on.

My store on North Main Street is only 7 by 12 feet, just 84 square feet.

At first I was nervous because of how small it was, but then I started making the place my own, and after a couple months, I ended up making this a long-term opening. This little store was now getting new people hooked on CandleTree, and my customer base has grown a lot.

The business name came from [combining] my tree service business and my candle business, hence “CandleTree.”

Customer favorites are getting varied now but some are: farmhouse cider, apple harvest, cocktails by the pool. white sage and sea salt, lilac, pineapple orchid, and lemon lavender.

I plan on making my candle business my full-time priority.

I feel like candlemaking found me, and that is how I know I was meant to be a candle maker, aka the “Candle Man.”

Getting a Handle on Candles Last year, Ross Mingarelli created what he thinks is the largest soy candle in the entire state of New Hampshire — a 500-ounce monster (actually designed to look like a minion from the movie “Despicable Me”) using a parfait of his popular lemon-blueberry scent.

With the advent of electricity providing abundant light (and even appearing in tiny faux-candle flicker lights), the humble candle must now perform such stunts to remain relevant, but the glories of waxy illumination go back thousands of years to the dawn of civilization. The ancient Egyptians soaked reeds in animal fat about 5,000 years ago, and within a couple of millennia had developed candles with wicks of papyrus dipped in beeswax. Colonists in early New England discovered that boiling the grayish-green berries of bayberry bushes produced a sweet-smelling wax that burned cleanly. Extracting the wax from the bayberries was tedious, so the popularity of bayberry candles diminished.

Now, as far as scents and colors are concerned, the sky is the limit.

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 45

Head kcaB to ➔ NH’s

friendly

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A lot can change in a year, and that is especially true at some of New Hampshire’s most popular familyfriendly favorites. Last summer was like no other, with indoor fun especially at a premium. While we were hiking and biking or hunkered down, several familiar spots took the opportunity to renovate, add more activities or open exhibits. There are a few new places to visit too.

Here are the attractions that you’ll want to add to your summer fun to-do list.

By Melanie Hitchcock

PHOTO COURTESY SANTA'S VILLAGE

What’s new, what’s improved, and why you need to visit this summer

Get jolly in June Many were disappointed when Santa’s Village in Jefferson had to close in November 2020 before the holidays, but now is your chance to make up for lost jolly and reacquaint yourself with Santa himself.

Santa’s Village, where it is always Christmas, opens Memorial Day weekend, and is introducing a new event this year: The Jolly June FEASTival.

For 11 days in June, the park will celebrate the halfway point to Christmas.

Pay a special admission price and you can feast all day on park favorites such as doughnuts, pizza, burgers, ice cream and drinks.

Between treats, hop on popular rides such as Santa’s Train or the Christmas Ferris Wheel. And don’t forget to feed the reindeer. They are sure to want a treat too.

Santa’s Village in Jefferson › santasvillage.com nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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Take a tour, go back in time Learning can be fun, and the American Independence Museum in Exeter is historical proof.

Join the American Independence Museum for an hourlong guided tour of the Folsom Tavern. The new Folsom Tavern tour, according to the museum’s website, examines its history, the place that taverns held in Colonial and Revolutionary history and the different experiences that people had in taverns.

The tour is about 45 minutes, then you can continue exploring the tavern and museum grounds on your own.

Also, a modified version of the American Independence Festival returns in July with a mix of in-person and virtual events.

American Independence Museum in Exeter independencemuseum.org

More than mini golf Chuckster’s in Chichester and Mel’s Funway Park in Litchfield have added to their long list of attractions and activities for 2021.

Both places are adding bumper boats — imagine bumper cars but substitute in motor-driven inner tubes and add water.

Mel’s bumper boats are open now while Chuckster’s expects to have them available Memorial Day weekend. In addition, Mel’s has added a “mini area” for the younger children in your family. It features mini go-karts and its own mini bumper boat area and other activities.

Mel’s Funway Park in Litchfield melsfunwaypark.com

PHOTO BY MA BLANCHE

Chuckster’s in Chichester (second location in Hooksett) chuckstersnh.com

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PHOTO COURTESY LEE WRIGHT / VISITNH.GOV

GRAND REOPENING

PHOTO COURTESY CANDIA SPRINGS

A

fter a year off, high-flying fun is making a return to southern New Hampshire.

Candia Springs Adventure Park did not open in 2020, but it is under new ownership and a grand reopening was scheduled for midMay as of press time.

Families can enjoy an adrenaline-fueled day by taking advantage of the several attractions Candia Springs offers — a water park, zip-lines and a state-of-the-art aerial adventure park.

Candia Springs Adventure Park in Candia › candiasprings.com

nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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Exploring the arts PHOTO BY SHARI SYCHOV

The John Hay Estate at The Fells has a long tradition of providing educational programming for families and children.

This year they are launching the Children’s Summer Art Series on June 22.

On Tuesdays through July 20, children can explore writing, poetry and the fiber arts and more with guest educators. The series is open to all ages. The Fells also offers other programs and camps for preschoolers through teens or take the kids on a hike through the 83-plusacre property that was once home to statesman John Hay.

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PHOTO COURTESY LIVING SHORES AQUARIUM

PHOTO COURTESY ELLEN LLOYD BLAIR / VISITNH.GOV

The Fells in Newbury › thefells.org

A N E W L O O K AT H I S T O R Y he Wright Museum of World War II, home to more than 14,000 items, has gotten a makeover. Renovations were completed at the 30,000-square-foot museum in early 2020.

Among the improvements is the new 1,600-square-foot DuQuoin Education Center, a redesigned theater and library, expanded second-floor art gallery, archives room, lobby and museum store.

The 2021 season kicks off with two new exhibits, both of which focus on the role women played in WW II. They will be open from May 1 to June 10, 2021.

New exhibits will be added later in the year.

The Wright Museum of World War II in Wolfeboro wrightmuseum.org

Not just another fish tale

T

here is a new reason to head to Story Land this summer, though it is a bit fishy.

Story Land opened Living Shores Aquarium — the state's first aquarium — in November 2019. It was only open a few months until it had to shut down due to COVID-19. But the wait is over. Families can return in May to meet more than 1,000 new friends.

The aquarium, open year-round, includes more than 32,000 square feet of interactive tide pools, immersive activities, and exhibit. Visit the otters, touch sting rays, interact with tropical birds and more, according to the website.

Living Shores Aquarium tickets are sold separately, but you can opt for the Story Land unlimited platinum pass that will get you into both parks.

Ages up to 2 get in free.

While you are there, you know you are going want to check out Story Land, the more-than-65-year-old theme park that has fun for all ages.

Run, don’t walk, to the antique cars, storybook houses, teacups, Cinderella’s Castle and more.

PHOTO COURTESY CANDIA SPRINGS

PHOTO COURTESY THE WRIGHT MUSEUM

T

Living Shores Aquarium at Story Land in Glen › livingshores.com

nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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All-in-one Dave & Buster's in Manchester and Block Party Social in Hooksett both came on the scene last year. If you are looking to eat, play and hang out with the family all in one place — these are your spots.

Block Party Social was formerly Space Entertainment Center. More than arcade games and laser tag, you can try out the high ropes course with 180-degree zip-line (only one of two in the country), climbing walls, billiards and a huge interactive game space. They also offer food, with a menu put together by Executive Chef Christopher Cate.

Dave & Buster’s, which is located at the Mall of New Hampshire, features food, arcade games, virtual reality experiences, and massive screens to watch your favorite local teams.

Dave & Buster's in Manchester › daveandbusters.com Block Party Social in Hooksett › blockpartysocial.com

PHOTOS COURTESY MCAULIFFE-SHEPARD DISCOVERY CENTER

PHOTO COURTESY BLOCK PARTY SOCIAL

ON THE MOVE

Before you go:

PHOTO COURTESY DAVE & BUSTERS

What you need to know about summer 2021

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Gov. Chris Sununu dropped the statewide mask mandate in April, but attractions are expected to continue to follow CDC guidelines regarding COVID-19. Masks and social distancing will still be required, and admission capacity will be limited. Plan ahead — reservations and advance ticket purchases will be the norm in the coming months.

W

hen the Mount Washington Observatory’s Discovery Center in North Conway closed last year, they partnered up with the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center in Concord.

Eighty percent of the exhibits have been relocated to the McAuliffeShepard Discovery Center — including the Shaky Shack, the replica of the 1930s-era observatory staff ’s mountaintop cabin in which the highest human-observed surface wind speed on Earth was recorded in 1934.

Earlier this year, the Discovery Center also upgraded the technology for their planetarium. You won’t want to miss seeing a brand-new starstudded planetarium show.

McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center in Concord › starhop.com

By train or bike — your choice Get ready to ride the rails this summer.

The Hobo & Winnipesaukee Scenic Railroad is unveiling a new rail experience in late May. You will be able to pedal rail bikes along a mid-1800s rail line on a trip that begins and ends at the historic Laconia Railroad Station in Veterans Square.

The route takes you past the site of the former Laconia Car Company, which built rail cars from 1848 to 1928, then over a trestle bridge crossing the Winnipesaukee River and Durkee Brook before reaching the shore of Lake Winnisquam. It is two hours of adventure for those ages 5 and older.

If you would rather save your energy and take in the beauty of the Lakes Region by train instead, check out the Hobo & Winnipesaukee Scenic Railroad schedule.

The new season starts Memorial Day weekend. NH PHOTO COURTESY HOBORR.COM

The Hobo & Winnipesaukee Scenic Railroad in Lincoln, Meredith, Weirs Beach and Laconia › hoborr.com nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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ew Hampshire residents have long cherished the ideal ideal of “rugged individualism.”

We’re not antisocial. We’re self-reliant.

We can get things done, on our own if necessary.

It’s a trait that has come in handy for local contestants in adventure reality shows, who have succeeded on their wits and their tenacity. Like these three favorites. >

> By Brion O’Connor / Illustrations by John R. Goodwin

PHOTO REFERENCES COURTESY: ETHAN ZOHN, SUVIVOR, VIACOM - CBS / TYLER M cLAUGHLIN, WICKED TUNA, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC / LAURA ZERRA, NAKED & AFRAID, DISCOVERY CHANNEL

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sked how he would describe himself these days, 2002 “Survivor” champion Ethan Zohn of Hillsboro lets out a hearty laugh: “Jewish wilderness icon. How’s that?” The answer reveals many things about Zohn — his confidence, his love of the outdoors, and his finely tuned self-deprecating sense of humor.

In reality, this 47-year-old native of Massachusetts defies simple portrayals.

Zohn has a long list of occupations, including social entrepreneur, humanitarian and advocate, author, speaker, athlete and media personality. But perhaps the one most responsible for Zohn being a New Hampshire resident is this one — two-time cancer survivor.

After winning “Survivor: Africa” in 2001 (which aired in 2002) and competing in “Survivor All-Star” in 2004, Zohn participated in several additional reality shows, including “The Amazing Race” and “Fear Factor.” Last year, he reprised his debut role in “Survivor: Winners at War.” “Back in the day, there weren’t that many reality shows. So, if you did really well, they just put you on another show,” he says.

“They recruited you for everything else.

I’m proud of some of them, and I’m not so proud of a lot of them. I just said ‘yes’ to everything.”

Life changed irrevocably, however, when Zohn fell ill with Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a rare form of blood cancer.

“I was diagnosed for the first time in 2009, and had my first stem cell transplant, which worked for about 20 months,” says Zohn. “In 2011, just after I got home from playing in “The Amazing Race,” I relapsed, and had a second stem cell transplant, using my brother, Lee. That was in 2012.

I’m nine years in remission.”

Part of the recovery, he says, was leaving his home in New York City, where he had met his wife, Lisa.

“The whole reason we moved to New Hampshire is for my health. I lived through cancer in New York City, which obviously has some of the best hospitals in the world, but it’s also the most disgusting place for a cancer survivor,” says Zohn.

“I was actually living an isolated lifestyle, like we’re doing here, but I was in New York, post-transplant,” he says. “I was in isolation for 400 days. I had a compromised immune system for years, so I wore the mask, the gloves, no public transportation. I’m used to that. That’s my life.”

Those hardships continued to fuel Zohn’s altruistic initiatives. A former professional soccer goalkeeper who played in southern Africa — “In Zimbabwe I got the nickname ‘Zo,’ which means ‘slow white elephant,’” he says, chuckling — Zohn took a portion of his winnings from 2002’s “Survivor: Africa” and, with several teammates, founded Grassroots Soccer, a global program headquartered in Hanover.

“It’s an adolescent health organization that uses the power soccer to educate and inspire and mobilize young people to overcome their greatest health challenges,” he says. “We’re in 60 countries, and we’ve graduated 13 million kids from the program. That’s my life’s work right there.”

In the same vein, Zohn doesn’t shy away from sharing the lessons gleaned during his cancer diagnosis and treatment, the trauma of an arduous recovery, and the perseverance required to deal with both.

“I’m very vocal about it. I truly believe the details of my story can help others out there, and I chose to make my battle public on purpose because I was in a position where people are paying attention to me,” says Zohn. “I wanted to use my crisis to help others out there. That’s my whole life ethos — service over self, and to make happiness real for others.”

Clearly, Zohn and his wife and their two cats, Lucy and Griffin, have found happiness at their “quintessential Scandinavian lakehouse” in Hillsboro. He continues his work with Grassroots Soccer, and has served as an assistant soccer coach with Hillsboro Junior High and the Black Rock Football Club at High Mowing School in Wilton. The couple have invested in a local farm named Mickle’s Pickles, and enjoy mingling with residents at Tooky Mills Pub & Restaurant and Mediterrano Turkish & Mediterranean Restaurant.

“There were a lot of reasons pulling us to this area,” Zohn says. “We looked at other spots, in New York and in Massachusetts, and we just settled on this little spot in New Hampshire on Loon Pond. We just couldn’t say no,” he says.

“It was a total fixer-upper, a camp house that we converted into a four-season house.

My wife is an interior designer, and she just fell in love with the bones of this place that was built in 1925.”

In addition to working his own property, growing vegetables, picking wild blueberries and splitting wood, Zohn and his wife have quick access to several favorite nature preserves close by.

“We’re right near Fox State Forest,” says Zohn. “We have a path that leads to hundreds of miles of trails, so we just love exploring in Fox State Forest. We’re walking or hiking through there all the time.

And there’s a little swimming hole that we like here, Beard Brook. It’s a total local thing,” he says.

“It’s got a little waterfall, and at the end of the waterfall are these little pools. Just yesterday, they were stocking it with rainbow trout. I found the Fish and Game guy, and he’s throwing in 1,200 rainbow trout.”

“I wanted to use my crisis to help others out there. That’s my whole life ethos — service over self, and to make happiness real for others.”

All of which can make New York City, and his previous life, seem miles away.

“I don’t see myself as a celebrity,” he says.

“However, living in New York City for a long time, being in the public eye, it was absolutely freaking awesome. But it was a little bit invasive at times, especially when I was sick with cancer. There were people outside of my house trying to get that one picture of me with my walker. That gave me a bad taste. I was never more famous than when I was sick. That’s the state of where we are in this world.”

In New Hampshire, he says, no one knows who he is. “I can wear pajamas to the market, it doesn’t matter. Being able to pave our own path forward was really appealing to us. Our first outing at Tooky Mills Pub, just chatting with some locals, and someone said, ‘Your teeth are too perfect to be from New Hampshire.’ And we thought, ‘All right, we’re in the right place.’” nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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n a show filled with grizzled New England fishermen, Tyler McLaughlin is the baby-faced assassin of “Wicked Tuna.”

Debuting on the show’s second season a decade ago, at the tender age of 23, McLaughlin quickly established himself as a force to be reckoned with.

“The show really is the best fishermen on the East Coast,” says McLaughlin. “When you’re out there on the water competing against these guys, you’re competing against the best of the best. And it is tough.”

But McLaughlin has always welcomed the challenge, because he’s supremely confident in his own abilities. Much of that had to do with the fact that he wasn’t a newcomer to the cut-throat world of competitive tuna fishing.

“I grew up fishing with my father, so I was seasoned well beyond my age,” says the 33-year-old Portsmouth resident. “By the time I got on the show, I had already won every tuna tournament up in Maine, invitational tournaments, 40-boat formats.

I’ve won those multiple times. So I really had a good handle on the fishery. Everyone knew who I was.”

McLaughlin’s reputation led to him joining “Wicked Tuna,” and later the spin-off “Wicked Tuna: Outer Banks.” He made the show’s talent recruiters look brilliant, making an immediate impression.

“My first year on the show, I wound up beating all the boats and winning it,” he says.

“Over the years, I’ve had more second-place finishes than any other boat on the show, and I’ve managed to win three times.”

Between the two shows, McLaughlin has filmed 17 seasons. His latest victory, on “Wicked Tuna: Outer Banks,” had an unmistakable “full circle” feel to it.

“I caught my first bluefin when I was in second grade, with my dad in North Carolina,” says McLaughlin. “That’s pretty ironic, because the show we’ve been filming for seven years down in the Carolinas has been all about tuna fishing. So I went back down where it all started.”

He actually started at the tender age of 3, with his father Marty, owner of McLaughlin Transportation Systems, a moving and storage business based in Nashua. Through his school years, he played traditional ball-andstick sports, from soccer to tennis to golf, but nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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weekends were often reserved for fishing.

“My dad works crazy hours. He’d be leaving before we even go out for the school bus. Weekends would be with our dad, and Dad would want to go on the boat. So my sister and I were lifejacketed up at a young age. That was what we did.

There were no video game options,” says McLaughlin.

“Dad would be all fired up to get us out there,” he adds. “And when you’re going out on the boat, it’s a full-day commitment. There’s no crying or having a bad day. You’re committed because you’re going offshore four miles tuna fishing.

My dad wanted to get tuna fish more than anything. No matter how many tantrums my sister and I threw, we were out there, trying to catch tuna.”

Fortunately, McLaughlin and his younger sister Marissa shared their father’s passion, most of the time. The apprenticeship soon became an avocation, and then a vocation. McLaughlin continues to work for the family business, but also launched PinWheel Tuna Fishing Charters out of Rye Harbor.

“I’ve definitely found a way. I’ve wanted to be a commercial fisherman my whole life,” he says, acknowledging his attitude caught some “Wicked Tuna” rivals off guard. “When you’re young and trying to break into an industry, put your stamp on it and try to make it your own, people are going to try to push you out. So I came in with a little bit of a mouth on me.”

Which, of course, makes for great television. It also highlights the difference between talent-based reality shows, such as “American Idol” or “The Voice,” and adventure-based reality shows that build on the same cast season after season.

“We’re competition and a story,” says McLaughlin. “It’s not a one-year-anddone thing. People have literally watched me grow up for the last 10 years that I’ve been a part of this.”

As a result of his results on the open waters of the Atlantic Ocean, McLaughlin feels right at home among “the best of the best.” And while “Wicked Tuna” is generally focused on the Cape Ann fishing community of Gloucester, Massachusetts, McLaughlin flies the Granite State banner with an unmistakable sense of satisfaction. He fishes out of Rye Harbor and Portsmouth, and has an affinity for Gosport Harbor on the Isles of Shoals.

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during plenty of storms. We get these big northeast winds in the fall, and if it’s going to blow for 10 hours, it saves you the extra six miles of going all the way in. You’re right there, so when the wind breaks you’re the first one to the grounds and you can get your spot,” says McLaughlin. “Some of the best times in my life have been just hanging out in Gosport Harbor. Whether it’s with my dad after his kidney surgery or as a kid in my little Boston Whaler, there’s always been something about the Isles of Shoals that has always been a special place for me,” he says.

“When I’m traveling around, I’ve got Rye, New Hampshire, on the back of my boat and I’m proud of that,” he says. “I’m proud to be fishing all up and down the East Coast, representing New Hampshire.

I’ve got some haters out there, for sure, but that’s the way it’s going to go. It’s a competition.”

McLaughlin’s loyalty is buoyed by his mate aboard the PinWheel, his 31-yearold sister, Marissa.

“When you’re on the filming schedule, I don’t think there’s anything more intense,” he says. “It’s not just like a weekend tournament. It’s a long film shoot, and it’s a lot of days on the water, trying to outlast the other crews.

“Some of those boats have three and four guys, and it’s just me and my sister,” says McLaughlin. “That says a lot about her.

There aren’t many women in the fisheries.

And I’m just so proud of her.”

As the young buck on “Wicked Tuna,” McLaughlin also knows he’s a role model for a younger generation of fishermen. And he takes that responsibility to heart.

“When I’ve been out there, over the past decade or so, I’ve been able to have 60- and 70-fish seasons,” he says. “So when I have people razzing me down at the pier, I look at them and say, ‘How many 50-fish seasons have you had? I’ve put them across the dock. I’ve done it.’

McLaughlin says his calling has always been New Hampshire’s waters. “That’s where I grew up as a 12-year-old kid, fishing the coast for bass, and becoming really good,” he says. “By the time I was 14, I already had over 30 bass that were over 50 pounds. Some people bass fish their whole life and never get a 50-pounder. I was mastering the craft, and I learned all of that just fishing out of Rye. When you do the same thing over and over, you get perspective, you gain sea time. You get salt.”

hen wanderlust gets ahold of you to the extent of “Naked and Afraid” star Laura Zerra’s happy affliction, the idea of “home” might seem counterintuitive. Zerra is a self-proclaimed nomad, and she walks the talk.

If she’s not traveling, something is amiss.

Yet there are two places she does call home — her current abode in Missoula, Montana, and New Hampshire.

“I feel like Montana and New Hampshire are very similar,” says the 35-year-old Zerra. “Montana is my western state, and New Hampshire is my East Coast state.

And it seems like I’m always just passing between the two of them.”

People often ask her where she’s from,

and the answer isn’t a typical one. “So many of my friends are spread out all over the world,” she says. “I call myself a people collector. Even though I travel and don’t see them every day, they’re like my family.

And the concentration of those people is higher in New Hampshire than anywhere else. I feel like it’s home, even though life is taking me elsewhere.”

More than a decade ago, Zerra, a free spirit originally from western Massachu-

setts, was hitchhiking through the Granite State when something almost inexplicable struck a chord with her.

“It was a combination of the land and the people. I just resonated so much with the people I met,” she says. “They were doers, not just talkers. The caliber of people, people who did what they said they were going to do, people who love doing things outside in wild places. There’s a quality of the people that is just authentic. There’s a drive and a motivanhmagazine.com | June 2021

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tion, and I just really connected with it.”

In 2010, Zerra went to work as a farrier with Slim Sharp at Sharp Shoeing in Belmont, and worked nights processing wild game at the Baker River Deer Farm in Wentworth. Those jobs followed stints at Great Hollow Wilderness School in Connecticut sharing primitive survival skills, an internship with the Buffalo Field Campaign in West Yellowstone, Montana, and teaching at Roots School in Vermont, with a train-hopping romp through Mexico “studying jungle survival” tacked on for good measure.

After moving to Colorado in 2011 for “a half-minute,” Zerra followed her heart back to New Hampshire, spending much 62

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of her time in the White Mountains and the Lakes Region. She stayed either in Belmont or at a friend’s log cabin “out in the middle of nowhere” on the outskirts of Groton. It was at that cabin that recruiters from the Discovery Channel tracked her down.

“All my friend has is a landline — he’s never had a cell phone in his life — and they wound up calling his landline. I still don’t know how they got his number,” she says.

But that’s where they found her to pitch “Naked and Afraid.”

“It was the first season of the show, and they were calling around looking for a girl survival expert. We’re kind of few and far between,” Zerra says, laughing. “My name kept coming up when they were calling different survival schools, and they somehow hunted me down.”

The Discovery folks gave Zerra a quick rundown of the show, which features a pair of contestants — male and female — in “some of the most extreme environments on Earth,” according to the channel’s website.

Each duo “is left with no food, no water, no clothes, and only one survival item each as they attempt to survive on their own,” says Discovery. That was all Zerra needed to hear.

“I said, ‘Sounds like an adventure. I’m in,’” she says.

Adventure is a recurring theme in Zerra’s life. She has done four seasons of “Naked and Afraid,” in remote locations ranging from Panama and the Peruvian Amazon to Colombia and the Philippines.

And there’s the single season of “Frozen and Afraid” in Alaska “where they drop me off in waist-deep snow on a mountaintop.” She teamed with Andrew Ucles for the documentary “North America: The Wild Meets the Weird” before traveling Down Under to learn about Australian wildlife.

“The fact that ‘Naked and Afraid’ is a show is my least favorite part,” says Zerra.

“I wouldn’t say I’m shy. By nature I’m an extrovert. But I’m very much concerned about being that person who gets obsessed with image and ego.”

Becoming a personality or influencer wasn’t the goal, she says, “It was the fact that they were going to take me to this place that I’ve never been to, and I was going to have this adventure that I couldn’t create for myself. That’s what I’m addicted to.”

Asked if her time in New Hampshire prepared her for the rigors of the show, she replies without hesitation. “Oh, absolutely,” she says.

“It’s the mindset, because for me, survival is 90% mental attitude,” says Zerra.

“The whole spirit of New Hampshire, and that attitude of going out and completing something, there’s a positivity, a hardiness, and a quiet strength.”

A perfect example is the typical New Hampshire winter, where storms can leave residents without power for days, or deposit thick blankets of snow that need to be shoveled out. That’s when the state’s “can do” attitude kicks in, Zerra says.

“There’s no complaining, there’s no entitlement,” she says. “It’s life. We’ve done it. It was the mental attitude that drew me there in the first place. I was fairly young when I first moved there, and it really made me who I am. The spirit of New Hampshire is something that was really instilled in me, and it’s something that I still carry with me,” she adds. “It really had a huge effect, especially on my willingness to jump into something unfamiliar. I knew that I could complete [“Naked and Afraid”], and I wasn’t scared to try it.”

The key, she says, is “embracing” hardships. Again, Zerra credits New Hampshire with sharpening not only the survival skills that made her a force on “Naked and Afraid” but also with developing a bulletproof outlook.

“It’s the idea I’m focusing on the good parts of a challenge,” she says. “If you want to find the bad, there’s always bad. If you want to find the good in something, there’s always good. That’s what I love about New Hampshire. The concept of not just suffering through a challenge, but embracing it.”

Ice fishing, she says, is a great example.

“These people are stoked to go and sit in a freezing little ice hut. They’re not going to just be in the house, with the heat on 80 and pretending winter isn’t happening.

They’re actually going out.”

It’s those people, she says, that she misses most when her wanderlust takes her far and away.

“The kind of people that New Hampshire draws in, those are my kind of people,” says Zerra. “That culture. People have your back in a way that’s real. It’s that authenticity. They’re so solid, and I know that will never change.

New Hampshire, she says, will always feel like home. “Even though I’m not there all the time, it’s a place that I carry with me, and I feel like my time there made me who I am. It’s a place near and dear to my heart, and always will be.” NH

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Excellence in NURSING When you think “Greatest Nurse of All Time,” Florence Nightingale might come to mind. But comparing today’s modern nurses to the famous one of the 19th century doesn’t give our nurses the credit they deserve. Since Nightingale founded the first nursing school in 1860 at St Thomas’ Hospital in London, the nursing profession has come a long way. Today’s nurses are highly skilled and integral healthcare partners in modern medicine. Recent events reminded the world of just how often nurses are the unsung heroes of the medical community. These talented individuals provide their skills and sacrifice on a daily basis, and now, thanks to COVID-19, we have a glimpse of the debt we owe.

New Hampshire Magazine, in partnership with the New Hampshire Nurses Association, is proud to highlight nurses’ important contributions with the annual Excellence in Nursing Awards. This past winter, we accepted nominations for New Hampshire nurses in 13 vital specialties, from pediatrics and public health to leadership and education. The winners were selected by an independent committee of nursing leaders from adjoining states. Each nurse profiled in the following pages represents the very best in nursing — those who go above and beyond to comfort, heal and teach.

Our Granite State nurses are tops Photography by Kendal J. Bush 64

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Erin St. Gelais BSN, RN-BC, CPAN MEDICAL-SURGICAL NURSING

WENTWORTH-DOUGLASS HOSPITAL

Working in a post-anesthesia care unit (PACU) requires flexibility, compassion and critical thinking, says Erin St. Gelais. “You never know what will come through the door, how a person will wake up, what their recovery will be or what their needs are,” she says. “You have to learn to anticipate needs and critically think your way through cases. And like any nursing discipline, it takes a lot of compassion.”

She started working as a registered nurse at WentworthDouglass Hospital in 2005 and joined the PACU team in 2012, where she cares for patients recovering from anesthetics. There are many parts to her job, but “having the ability to make people more comfortable and contribute to taking away pain after a procedure is a very rewarding part,” she says.

Though this past year was difficult, St. Gelais focuses on the inspiring people who rose to the occasion.

“We all see stories that have been coming out of the pandemic of frontline workers, first responders, even retired healthcare workers coming back to help out in any way for tireless hours to care for those in need no matter the circumstances just because there was a need,” she says. “A lot of those we care for are pretty amazing and have some pretty inspiring stories if you listen.”

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Margaret Georgia

MBA, BSN, RN, CCM

SENIOR NURSING LEADER

DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK MEDICAL CENTER As director of care management for Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Margaret Georgia, by definition, plays a critical role in the care given to patients, but like everything during the past year of pandemic, the stakes have increased.

“I oversee a department that is responsible for care coordination and discharge planning,” says Georgia, who has been a nurse for 40 years. Determining and guiding the steps for the timely release from the hospital involves more than just a happy ending to a patient’s stay, it affects the work of everyone else in the facility. “If we don’t discharge patients, we don’t have capacity to admit new patients who need our care,” she says.

Facilitating communications between patients, families and teams of health care providers internally and out in the community requires strong critical thinking skills to solve the problems that pop up in hospital settings. “You have to be organized and able to juggle many things at the same time,” says Georgia. “Above all, you have to have integrity and be a patient advocate,” she says, and especially in a time when the role of a patient’s family is more of a challenge due to quarantine restrictions.

Georgia recalls a serendipitous admission to the hospital she endured while a student in nursing school: “I experienced from a patient’s perspective what a difference a nurse can make at a most vulnerable time in someone’s life.” It might also help that she comes from a “long line of nurses” in her family. “My mother and two of her sisters were or are nurses as well as many cousins,” she says. “I strive to meet the standards that they set for all of us.”

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ER Nurses in the Spotlight In a year like no other, we’ve all learned quite a bit. And not just about viruses and vaccines and variants — we’ve witnessed much of the best and, sadly, some of the worst of human nature. While it’s distressing to see divisions form over something as potentially unifying as a global health threat, the hospitals of New Hampshire displayed something heart-lifting and inspiring — professionals of all kinds, from custodial staff to medical staff leaders, donning PPE (personal protective equipment — but you’ve probably already learned that) and literally risking their own lives and health for the good of their communities.

So, this year we’re showcasing four nurses chosen by their supervisors and hospital administrators for specific contributions to patient health and efficient operations in the emergency department — the most forward of the frontlines of the COVID battle. We asked each nominee for a positive note on how the lessons of the pandemic crisis might improve health care in the future.

In her six years at Catholic Medical Center, Sarah Jones, RN, has served as bedside RN, nursing supervisor and clinical nurse manager in the Emergency Department and Clinical Decision Unit. She became famous for her positive attitude and willingness during the height of the pandemic, leading her staff with poise, professionalism and determination. Jones also serves as an AEMT with Milford Ambulance and has spent countless hours as-

by Rick Broussard

sisting in COVID-19 vaccination clinics at SNHU. “We’ve learned how important teamwork is,” says Jones. “Not just in the nursing department but at all levels of the hospital. Now, it’s a more cohesive approach, and it’s been a long learning curve with changes, sometimes daily, in guidance from CDC and the administration. The pandemic showed where some of the weaknesses have been and that will provide a better patient experience going forward.”

Meredith Findley, RN at Cottage Hospital for seven years, has served as an emergency department nurse and is currently the clinical leader of the Emergency Department. “Meredith has provided steadfast leadership, ongoing education and unwavering support to the emergency department team throughout the pandemic,” says Holly McCormack, chief nursing officer and interim CEO at Cottage Hospital.

Findley has also volunteered her time at COVID-19 vaccination sites such as the clinic held at the Horsemeadow Senior Center in Haverhill.

“The pandemic has shown us how strong and resilient healthcare workers are,” says Findley.

“The number of hours we all had to put in, covering for each other while away from our families, helped us recognize the importance of each others’ roles. It has really brought us closer together and that will improve care for everyone,” says Findley.

Sarah Crowley is a Portsmouth Regional Hospital float nurse who supervisors describe as “amazingly nimble during the scope of the pandemic.” She spearheaded the clinic for interventional monoclonal antibody therapy infusions at PRH, and she served as a hold nurse in their main emergency room during the pandemic, helping to transition patients to the main floors with care and attention to detail.

“One thing I’ve learned is how much of what we do goes back to patients feeling comfortable with their providers,” says Crowley.

“People come in terrified of the virus and terrified of the infusion equipment, and I’ll play some music for them to calm their nerves,” she says. “We’re all in this together and this has all brought me closer than ever to patients. For a whole new generation of nurses to experience this will make us stronger.”

Hannah Nolan, RN, has worked at St. Joseph Hospital for three years serving in the Emergency Department. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Nolan displayed courage, adaptability, flexibility, patience, clinical skill and knowledge, says Clinical Director of Emergency Services Jeanne Kennedy. ED leadership at first balked at picking one nurse when all have shown such dedication, but admitted they couldn’t do much better than Nolan. “She’s compassionate, attentive, and highly respected by her peers, the patients, and providers,” says Kennedy.

“I know it sounds cliché, but the struggles we all encountered throughout the past year really made us come together as a family,” says Crowley, “and not just among our colleagues but with our patients as well. We all had to strive for a new level of patience and compassion that ultimately has helped us to become better nurses and doctors.”

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Jennifer Krueger

BSN, RN, CPN

PEDIATRIC AND SCHOOL NURSING

ELLIOT HOSPITAL

After finishing nursing school in 2013, Jennifer Krueger spent time in the float pool at Elliot Hospital, working in various units. While she’s grateful for the wide range of skills she gathered along the way, when she arrived in the pediatric unit, she knew her floating days were done.

“My patients are what make me strive for excellence in nursing,” says Krueger, who is now the resource nurse on the pediatric unit, meaning she’s usually the charge nurse and is a part of the leadership team, helping her coworkers with their patients and managing the unit during her shifts.

“Hospitalizations are stressful for both the child and their family,” says Krueger.

“It is very rewarding to be able to make a positive impact for them during a difficult time.”

During her first winter on pediatric unit, a boy — who happened to be the same age as her daughter at the time — was in her care. “This hospitalization was especially difficult for his mom,” says Krueger, who ended up helping both mom and son through a stressful time. “This family had a big impact on me, and taught me the importance of caring for not only the patient but also the family,” she says.

No one wants to find themselves in a hospital, but it can be extra overwhelming and frightening for children. Luckily, Krueger understands what kids need.

“I feel that patience is an extremely important characteristic for nurses in pediatrics,” she says. “It takes time to build trust with a child to help them feel comfortable with the care you are providing. Something as simple as giving medication can cause a lot of stress for a child. Being patient with them and adjusting your approach to their needs can help ease their fears.”

Evie Stacy

MS, APRN

PSYCHIATRIC AND MENTAL HEALTH NURSING

DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK CLINIC

Like many health care providers, Evie Stacy felt the impact of the pandemic. As a pediatric nurse practitioner and child/adolescent psychiatric nurse practitioner in the Embedded Psychiatry Department at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Manchester, she’s helped young people deal with a scary new world.

“Life has been turned upside down with the loss of routine and the lack of social interactions with peers,” says Stacy. Anxiety and depression are on the rise, she says, as “families are struggling with loss of jobs, financial stress or parents trying to work from home. Remote schooling presents significant challenges as well, and it causes increase in anxiety for all members of the family.”

But Stacy is equipped to help young people through these unprecedented challenges. After working in community mental health with the mentorship of a child psychiatrist, she returned to graduate school at Boston College, learning more about mental health/psychiatric nursing.

“The most important aspect in providing mental health care is to carefully listen to the child or adolescent,” says Stacy. “I encourage honesty, as there are no right or wrong answers to my questions. Developing a therapeutic and respectful relationship allows me to provide more effective care.”

She’s put her skills to good use over the years, helping young people grow and mature. She recalls a college student who was dealing with significant anxiety. As he was about to graduate, he invited Stacy to his senior art show, letting her know her support was crucial to his success. “It was an honor to attend,” she says. And then there was the young man in middle school with Tourette’s disorder. His vocal and motor tics were so severe they prevented him from attending classes. He’ll be graduating from college next year.

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CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR 2021

EXCELLENCE IN NURSING AWARD WINNERS ADVANCED PRACTICE NURSING

EMERGENCY NURSING Janet Carroll, RN, CEN, SANE-A, SANE-P, Nurse Manager - Forensic Nursing Program, Emergency Department, Lebanon

Jillian Belmont, DNP, MSN, APRN, AGACNP, Lead Associate Provider, Neurology, Lebanon

AMBULATORY CARE NURSING Lisa Wesinger, BSN, RN, BMTCN, OCN, Blood and Marrow Nurse Navigator, Hematology, Lebanon

CARDIOVASCULAR NURSING

Margaret Georgia, BSN, MBA, RN, CCM, Director of Care Management, Care Management, Lebanon

John Flynn, BSN, RN-BC, Clinical Nurse, Cardiology-Cath Lab, Lebanon

PSYCHIATRIC & MENTAL HEALTH NURSING

SENIOR NURSING LEADER

Evie Stacy, MS, APRN, Advanced Practice Nurse, Embedded Psych Services, Manchester

PROUD, COMPASSIONATE, RESILIENT Thank you to all of our 3,400 nurses for going above and beyond to deliver expert, compassionate care to each and every patient. It takes someone special to be a nurse, and we’re proud to have such an extraordinary team.

More locations than any other health care provider in New Hampshire dartmouth-hitchcock.org

Polly Campion

MS, RN

PUBLIC HEALTH NURSING

NH STATE COMMISSION ON AGING, FORMER STATE LEGISLATOR

Polly Campion’s interest in public health began with a stint as a VISTA volunteer assisting a nurse practitioner and a mobile medical van with well-child exams in rural Vermont. Or maybe it began with her mom, who was a lifelong public health nurse, “always seeking to connect community members with resources,” recalls Campion. Nurses seem to find their callings early in life.

After a career detour into elementary education, Campion returned to nursing to work for 24 years at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and to serve four years as a NH state legislator.

This last role, along with roles in organizations such as the NH Health Care Quality Assurance Commission, where she was the inaugural chair, have allowed her to perform the most important single skill of a public health specialist: “Advocacy,” she says.

The ability to see the big picture while learnng of the details of individual experiences is the gift of the advocate, says Campion.

“Know that systems and processes influence individual actions, successes and challenges,” she says. “Then use that perspective to create policy changes and improve systems of care.”

Campion currently chairs the NH State Commission on Aging and participates in the COVID-19 Senior Support Team as regional coordinator. And she continues, above all, to advocate for patients, groups and the greater Granite State.

Jamye Cutter

BSN, RN

MATERNAL-CHILD HEALTH NURSING

GRANITE VNA

“I’ve had the privilege of meeting so many families facing difficult times ahead, and it is their resilience and courage that keeps me motivated to be a better nurse, grow in my career, and meet the needs of my community,” says Jamye Cutter.

As a pediatric nurse, Cutter provides skilled nursing care in the home to maternal child health parents. “I do new mom and baby visits, IV therapy, chemo, assessments of infants and children, and anything else that you can think of that relates to nursing,” she says. “I also coordinate community resources and work with area agencies on a regular basis. I provide support and education to families regarding medical diagnoses and infant growth and development.”

Cutter has devoted her life and career to caring for women and children. During her career, she’s learned that there isn’t any single key to success. “Compassion, integrity and honesty are all vital to providing excellent care to families,” she says. “The families that I serve are at one of the most vulnerable times in their lives. They may be welcoming a new baby into the home and trying to adapt or they may be facing the death of a child and need guidance and support.”

As hard as the work may be at times, Cutter is buoyed by her patients, especially by the special reminders they’ve sent her over the years, like the Christmas tree ornaments she holds dear. “Each ornament carries a memory,” she says.

“One ornament was handed to me as I walked out of their home for the last time,” she recalls. “Even though it had been a mere few hours after hearing her baby’s heartbeat for the last time, that mom thought of me, and wanted to give me something to always remember her baby. Each ornament, its own journey, with a special place in my heart.”

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YOU

We appreciate and thank you—our nurses—for your service, commitment and leadership.

Nursing isn’t easy. The most rewarding things never are. But, somehow, the nurses at CMC make their hard work, dedication and compassion seem effortless. That’s why our nurses deserve a special recognition for their efforts to inspire, innovate and influence every day!

Thank you for making us shine!

Manchester, New Hampshire CatholicMedicalCenter.org

Janet Carroll

RN, CEN, SANE-A, SANE-P

EMERGENCY NURSING

Nurse Manager, Forensic Nursing Program and NH SANE Program Co-director

DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK MEDICAL CENTER and NH COALITION AGAINST DOMESTIC AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE

Janet Carroll has worked as a registered nurse for 21 years, primarily in the emergency department. She began specializing in forensic nursing in 2005, and currently works in that field, providing specialized medical forensic care to patients who have experienced acts of violent crime such as sexual assault, physical assault, strangulation, gunshot wounds, domestic violence, human trafficking and more.

It’s crucial, says Carroll, to remain “calm, nonbiased and nonjudgmental in the midst of controlled chaos.” She is inspired to be the best nurse she can by both the patients she treats and her family of colleagues.

In addition to her work at Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Carroll works part time with the NH Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence.

She is co-director for the New Hampshire Sexual Assault Nurse

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Examiner program (SANE), a group of nurses who trained to provide comprehensive care to sexual assault survivors, including conducting forensic evidence collection.

SANE’s goal is to help victims by minimizing both physical and psychological trauma while ensuring that physical evidence is properly collected and preserved.

“I never thought of getting into forensic nursing until I was working a night shift and a woman came into the emergency department reporting sexual assault,” says Carroll. It was a busy evening in the ER, and combined with short staffing the woman “did not get the one-on-one care she needed and deserved,” she says. “It was [at] that moment that I decided to further explore forensics, and it has expanded from there.”

Congratulations

Our nurses set the standard for excellence!

Recipient of the Nursing Excellence Award for Pediatric and School Nursing

Jennifer Krueger RN, BSN, CPN Elliot Hospital

We applaud Jennifer and all our nurses for their dedication to patients and commitment to providing the highest quality care.

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Jennifer Pletcher

CEN, PhD CANDIDATE

MPH, BS, RN,

NURSE EDUCATOR/RESEARCHER

CONCORD HOSPITAL

Given that Jennifer Pletcher is this year’s winner in the nurse educator/researcher category, it’s not surprising that she identifies the “tenacity to always ask why, followed by the commitment to get to the truth of the answer” as the most important trait for someone in her field.

From the outside, it appears that her ability to multitask is just as important to her success. Pletcher works both clinically and as an educator in the ER at Concord Hospital, collects data to evaluate the hospital’s stroke care process, and is working on her dissertation, which is focused on ER visits exacerbated by substance use disorder and how nurses can help navigate this increasingly complicated situation.

For Pletcher, education, research and making evidenced-based changes are how the health care system will improve to better serve patients no matter their circumstances. Throughout her career, she’s traveled the country and witnessed the disparities that exist in health care. During an internship with James Vara, Gov. Sununu’s commissioner for substance use disorders and mental health, “there was a tangible, palpable connection between evidence, or lack of evidence, shaping policy to best advocate for patients and patient care,” she says.

These experiences exposed some of the flaws in the system, but she’s not discouraged. “There are so many difficult ‘problems’ within health care, which are sometimes overwhelming,” she says, but by focusing on the small victories she’s inspired to keep trying.

When a patient arrived in the ER with an injection site infection due to substance abuse disorder, she asked him and his significant other if they had access to Narcan, a potential life-saver in the case of opioid overdose. Both, says Pletcher, looked at her in shock — simply because “I was seeing him as a human being worthy of assistance in his life course as he pursued his own definition of health,” she says.

“The fact that this patient was surprised to be treated with dignity inspires me to push forward, break molds, educate other nurses, and provide data with analyses through research in hope that one day, regardless of patient health or socioeconomic status, being treated human is never a surprise.”

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Jillian C. Belmont

DNP, FNP, AGACNP, SCRN

ADVANCED PRACTICE NURSING

Lead Associate Provider, Neurology Co-director, Neurology Advanced Practice Provider Fellowship Assistant Professor in Neurology, Geisel School of Medicine DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK MEDICAL CENTER

Understanding her “why” is Jillian Belmont’s key to success, a trait she also sees in her talented colleagues.

“Every day I am inspired by their knowledge, collegiality, their passion and their constant fight alongside patients, which leads to limitless learning and elevation of those around them,” she says. “I show up to work every day and I know my ‘why.’ When I look around at my peers, they undoubtedly are showing up to work every day with an understanding of their ‘why.”’

One of the most important things she’s learned is to never take anything for granted.

“You never know how much time, how many days or even the number of breaths you may have left,” she says. “As I learned very quickly in nursing, life can change very quickly and without notice. Never take a day, a moment or opportunity for granted.”

Belmont started her career in 2008 as a bedside nurse. She continued working full time while pursuing a master’s degree and family nurse practitioner certification, kickstarting her career as a neurology NP in 2012 at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. In 2017, she received a doctorate in nursing practice from Northeastern University. A year later, she obtained her adult geriatric and acute care NP certification. Now she works as a neurology nurse practitioner and serves as co-director of DHMC’s neurology Advanced Practice Provider post-graduate fellowship, president of the local American Association of Neuroscience Nursing chapter and president of the New Hampshire Nurse Practitioner Association.

Though Belmont’s years of education and professional growth speak to a strong work ethic and desire to always learn more, she says that the most important skils for someone in her field are “compassion, respect and resilience.”

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John T. Flynn

RN, BSN

CARDIOVASCULAR NURSING

Lead Associate Provider, Neurology

DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK MEDICAL CENTER

For John Flynn, it’s all about kindness, all the time.

“Fred Rogers shared the three ways to ultimate success.

The first way is to be kind. The second way is to be kind.

The third way is to be kind,” Flynn says. “I am surrounded by kind and dedicated caregivers. They inspire me with every life-saving class to promote team care of each other and our patients, within moments of emergencies.”

Flynn is a cardiology nurse in the cardiac catheterization laboratory (cath lab) at the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Heart & Vascular Center, where he’s worked since 2005. Before working in the field of cardiology, he was a nurse at the Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth (CHaD).

Each week, he teaches both adult and child advanced life support classes with members of the DHMC team.

In addition to coworkers and patients, Flynn finds inspiration in Mother Teresa. He often references her quote, “I can do things you cannot, you can do things I cannot: Together we can do great things.” To Flynn, her message emphasizes the importance of teamwork in order to provide kind care to his patients.

“In our cath lab, emergent team care is delivered in seconds, every day, with clear team roles. The healing outcomes are the combination of our kindness to each other and the reverence to needing each other,” he says.

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Judith Joy

PhD, RN

FRONT LINE/ADMINISTRATIVE NURSING LEADER

Front Line/Administrative Nursing Leader at NH COVID Alliance Senior Support Team, Volunteer Statewide Coordinator

For Judith Joy, working in elder care is both challenging and fulfilling, especially during COVID-19. When the pandemic hit, she was recruited to be the statewide lead for the NH COVID Alliance Senior Support team, a multidisciplinary remote team that supports senior care facilities. Joy and her team recruited volunteers from groups such as the New Hampshire Nurses and School Nurses associations, and together monitored facilities daily in an effort to reduce outbreaks.

The success of the program can be attributed to the diverse experience of the volunteers, says Joy — but strong leadership is crucial as well. Listening, she says, is one of the essential qualities for any leadership role. “Listening supports effective decisions, helping to determine when and from whom to seek input,” she says.

Inspiration comes both from her role as a leader and from her associates. “My nursing colleagues throughout my career have encouraged me to continue growing in formal education and experience,” she says. “I owe them any success I might have.”

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Let’s explore your Medicare plan options Together, we can discuss your needs and review plan options. I can even help you enroll. After all, you deserve to feel confident in your decision.

1-on-1 help in person, online, or over the phone Johnathan Trammell 1-603-361-9050 TTY: 711 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., 5 days a week johnathan.trammell@anthem.com NH Lic. #2449812 Authorized Agent

For costs, exclusions, limitations, terms, and complete details of coverage, please contact your agent or the health plan. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of Anthem Health Plans of New Hampshire, Inc. HMO plans are administered by Anthem Health Plans of New Hampshire, Inc. and underwritten by Matthew Thornton Health Plan, Inc. Independent licensees of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.

Anthem is a registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. Y0114_21_123303_I_C_6010 10/01/2020 510637MUSENMUB_6010

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Lisa Wesinger

RN, BSN, OCN, BMTCN

AMBULATORY CARE NURSING

Blood and Marrow Transplant/ Cellular Therapy Nurse Navigator

DARTMOUTH-HITCHCOCK MEDICAL CENTERNORRIS COTTON CANCER CENTER

Each patient holds a special place in Lisa Wesinger’s heart.

One in particular stays with her. A man undergoing cancer treatments created a “Ken Burns-like” movie of happy memories from his life, with characters portraying the disease as dark, villainous skeletons, and a superhero named “Captain Chemo” fighting the battle for him. He had hoped to eventually share the movie with his medical team, but his disease progressed rapidly, moving up the timeline. “I was able to honor his final wishes and packed an auditorium with over 70 people. He sat at the top of the room and proudly watched the reactions of the audience — there was not a dry eye to be had,” Wesinger says.

Wesinger spent the first 21 years of her career working as a hematology special care nurse at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center.

In 2019, she transitioned to the blood and marrow transplant clinic team, working as a blood and marrow/transplant cellular therapy nurse navigator. Her responsibilities include guiding patients and their families through the complexities of stem cell transplant and CAR T-cell therapy.

“Being committed to the patients and caregivers and developing trusting relationships is very important in my specialty,” says Wesinger.

Although it’s never easy to watch people undergo such arduous medical battles, Wesinger’s patients “inspire me each and every day,” she says. “Patients facing a cancer diagnosis need to be strong and stay strong. Every day they deal with the uncertainty of what the next day brings. We provide hope and fight right along with them.”

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Catherine Oliver

BSN, RN

HOSPICE-PALLIATIVE CARE and/or GERONTOLOGIC NURSING

Nurse Manager Community Living Center (CLC) MANCHESTER VA MEDICAL CENTER

Catherine Oliver’s first job as a nursing assistant at the New Hampshire State Hospital was the kind that tests the resolve of new nurses, often leading them to pursue other careers — but not Oliver.

She joined the military, went to school and graduated from New Hampshire Technical Institute in 1999, and started working for the VA Medical Center, where she has remained in the same unit for over 20 years serving rehab veterans and veterans at end of life.

For motivation, Oliver looks to her family and mentors.

“Susan Roswell gave me a great foundation to grow from; Jen Winslow has mentored me and taught me professional etiquette; and Dr. Moscola shared her vast knowledge with me to ensure everything that we do is evidence-based practice. I wouldn’t be where I am today without any of them.”

You need patience and compassion as a nurse, but you also need a sense of humor, she says. “I am always looking for ways to improve the veteran experience and give them the highest quality of life possible,” she says. “Humor and making someone laugh are great ways to accomplish that. Our veterans and families are happy because the staff here have improved their lives for the better, from the simple task of cutting their hair to providing exceptional end-oflife care. We smile because they do.”

nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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Summer Fun in New Hampshire

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603 Living “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new lands but in seeing with new eyes.” — Marcel Proust

Dawn at the Sea Shell Stage and beyond on Hampton Beach by Marie Sapienza

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Seniority 88 Health 94 Ayuh 96

Eyes in the Sky

The ups and downs (and alphabet soup) of drone piloting

BY SUSAN LAUGHLIN

H

ave you ever wanted to fly like a bird but have a fear of heights?

Well, no worries — not everyone is genetically engineered to be a fighter pilot or Amelia Earhart. But, with a little imagination, a few technical skills and a small drone, you can experience the joy of flight without leaving the ground: Take in the vista, watch the river run, get a new perspective on your neighborhood, and cruise smoothly with the wind beneath your rotors and your feet planted firmly on the Earth.

Today’s drones use GPS, radio frequency and Wi-Fi for guidance and rely upon many recent-year improvements in cameras and batteries. Enthusiasts have been building and customizing their own drones since 2012, but the market has really expanded in the last four years with ready-to-fly systems. That’s the good news. Now, let’s look a little closer.

Consumer-level drones, also known as quadcopters, could be considered a cousin to radio-controlled (RC) aircraft where hand controllers give enthusiasts the joy of flying a mini-replica airplane. Drones make no attempt to masquerade as the Red Baron, but the onboard camera, and the ability to hover and turn like a helicopter, change the game.

Still, there are some restrictions — both RC aircraft and drones are classified as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and are under heavy regulation by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to ensure safe airspace for airplanes and the property and people below.

Flights for modelers (those who fly model aircrafts) and pilots of small drones under 250 grams (.55 pounds) have to be at or under 400 feet in altitude and in uncontrolled airspace (Class G). The operator must have visual line of sight (VLOS) of the vehicle, so range is limited. Use in other airspaces are permitted with prior authorization, and can be acquired “on the fly” in some cases through low-altitude authorization notifica-

tion capability (LAANC) with the AirHub app. Thankfully, the software will not let the UAV be flown in restricted airspace.

Recent FAA changes allow small drones equipped with rotor guards to fly over people and at night with lights. Recreational drone pilots do not need a pilot’s license, but the craft needs to be registered with the FAA using the number marked on the craft. The fee is just $5. Though not required at the moment, soon recreational flyers may need to pass the recreational UAS safety test.

It gets more serious for commercial drone operators. They are required to get a pilot’s license under the FAA’s Part 107 regulations. Also, the definition of recreational or commercial is not based on the size of the vehicle but the purpose of the flight. Want to give an aerial photo to your employer? That’s commercial. It is mandatory to ask for waivers before flying above 400 feet in restricted and unrestricted airspace and at any level over public parks or privately owned land.

Oh, and yes, in 2023 all UASs will need to support remote ID to provide identification and location to the FAA. The FAA regulators are doing their best to keep enthusiasts happy and commercial UAV pilots profitable, while keeping airspace safe for passengers. And, indeed, it is illegal for drone operators to harass or invade the privacy of those on the ground but, no, you can’t shoot one out of the sky since landowners do not actually own the airspace above their property.

In addition to FAA regulations, New Hampshire passed a law in 2016 making it illegal to conduct video surveillance of a private citizen lawfully hunting, fishing or trapping. Local municipalities and state parks might also have their own set of restrictions.

There is a lot to learn before taking flight.

Kyle Hirshkind, the program manager for the UNH Drone Academy, says they

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603 LIVING / DRONES FOR EVERYONE began classes for commercial pilots in 2017 after the interest in drones really took off.

The courses help commercial pilots pass the necessary tests, plus learn how to fly the craft and take and process video and stills.

“We see police officers, real estate agents, photographers, farmers and hobbyists sign up for our two- and four-day classes,” says Hirshkind. It’s hands-on training, as they offer a fleet of practice drones for student use.

But what type of drone is best for you?

For beginners and hobbyists, drones are surprisingly small and fold up even smaller. The ideal quadcopter is under 250 grams — the legal weight limit the FAA has set for hobbyists and recreational use. DJI is a respected manufacturer, and their Mini and Mini 2 models are just a palmful, but have amazing agility, and the Mini 2 even offers 4K video.

All rigs have a return to home (RTH) button that monitors battery life to get the drone back to its starting point.

Flight speed can get close to 40 mph, but in cinematic mode, at 14 mph, the video is very stable — think of those IMAX theater shows of flights over Earth’s most interesting terrain.

Squint just a little and you can reproduce that — at a lower altitude, of course. The video and photos recorded on the onboard SD card are acceptable — however, photo enthusiasts have become post-production experts, using computer programs to enhance, edit and add music to their flyover movie experiences.

Prices range from $350 to $800 for these mini models.

The next-larger-size drone is often used by serious enthusiasts and professionals who have managed to make money with their aerial photography and videography skills. At Commercial work by Marie Sapienza to document a Superfund site

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This double rainbow over Sunapee Harbor was captured by Peter Bloch with his DJI Mavic Pro 2 that sports a Hasselblad camera.

this level, you do need to get a pilot’s license, which goes deep into FAA requirements — the sorts of things actual, real small-plane pilots need to know, minus how to fly a real plane. These larger models can be more agile, hover smoothly, go farther with more robust connectivity, have object avoidance, and better onboard cameras. Prices ranges from $1,200 and up.

Marie Sapienza of Newton is a lawyer by profession but an artist at heart. She was introduced to photography in her grandfather’s darkroom. Now, in addition to her traditional still photos of seascapes, landscapes and night shots of the Milky Way, she has taken to the bird’s-eye view with her DJI Phantom. Her artistic eye guides her aerial lens, but it can be tricky to shoot in “official” places like our state parks, she says: “It will be a turf war to legislate rights to airspace. It is a huge deal that

will be fought in the courts at some point.”

As a lawyer, Sapienza is happy to be afforded the freedom to pursue photography.

“And earning money for commercial shoots doesn’t make me feel so bad about spending so much money on drones,” she says. She is thinking her next purchases will be a foldable model, like the DJI Mavic 3, to carry in a backpack, along with a newer model with customized camera and the FAA’s remote ID system built-in.

Top-of-the-line models for photography range from $5,000 to $20,000 for carbon fiber construction, 5.2k video and 360-degree rotating gimbals for all-around views from the mounted Hasselblad camera. Best not to crash one of these. By the way, you can purchase liability and crash insurance. Might be a good idea.

Anthony Dolan is a Sunapee real estate agent who was flying for fun and paying for aerial real estate photos when he realized he could do it himself, especially since he already had an art background. Now he takes all his own commercial stills and video from his DJI Inspire quadcopter. And, of course, he has his pilot’s license. “The FAA is going to be cracking down hard in the near future,” says Dolan. “All they have to do is monitor YouTube for suspicious flights and connect a few dots. All the evidence is recorded in the software,” he says.

Beyond photography, there is a new world of high-speed drones. First person view (FPV) looks to be crazy fun. The operator sees the drone’s view via a pair of goggles, which also sport the antennas. Yes, it is a geeky look, but the experience appears to be immersive. You are the bird now! But don’t

Aaron Levesque of the Facebook group 603 FPV Drones

Anthony Dolan captured his daughter’s socially distanced graduation ceremony during the pandemic with views of Lake Sunapee in the distance.

break the FAA’s rules. You’ll need another person on hand, a “visual observer,” to ensure your situational awareness as your view is limited to that of the drone’s camera.

Aaron Levesque of Nashua is the administrator for the Facebook group 603 FPV Drones and also helped start the North East Racing Drones club. “I spend a lot of time chasing cars,” he says, by which he means piloting his FPV drone at the Epping Dragway or motorcross events to follow racing cars — without being a nuisance, of course. It takes real piloting skills with “the sticks,” as FPV drones are fast, reaching speeds of up to 89 mph, in order to follow cars. Plus, competitively racing these tiny drones through a course with 5-foot-square gates has become a thing at FAA-approved facilities.

At 34, Levesque, like others his age, was born with a joystick in his hand. “My child-

hood dreams are now a reality,” he says. What was virtual piloting now happens in real time and real space. And the crashes are real too.

“If you don’t crash, you’re not flying hard enough. It’s no problem, I built the plane and so I can fix it too,” says Levesque. For FPV beginners, he suggests the Emax Tinyhawk for indoor flying with goggles ($219).

With all the commercial applications and competitive recreational use, the future is ripe for more technical development. Researchers at the University of Florida are training students to use a simple headset ($500) or brain computer interface (BCI) to guide craft.

Beam me up, Scotty!

If you are not ready to gear up, it’s still possible to enjoy drones and their capabilities. Find countless shared videos from licensed drone pilots on Facebook, YouTube and Vimeo. Fly over glaciers, national parks

or view “ballet” performances of synchronized drones for light shows at night. Google “FPV” and “bowling alley” for an amazing flight on YouTube. Watch other FPV drone pros race their rigs through obstacle courses — it’s almost as thrilling as watching Anakin Skywalker pod racing against Sebulba in the Boonta Eve Classic.

For less nerve-racking viewing, woodworker Peter Bloch of New London has a series of evocative flyover shots on Vimeo choreographed to music — some even composed by his wife Kathy Lowe. He’s perfected that peaceful easy feeling as he takes flight over marshes and streams, revealing colorful reflections and carefully curated patterns of foliage and forestation. Take a virtual trip, it’s worth it.

For better or worse, drones are everywhere — exactly 1,782,479 of them as of January 2021, according to the FAA. You’ll notice their use in cinematography with high and wide shots in movies and even tight shots in television ads where you fly right along with the FPV drone through a building or car window.

Notice, too, the overhead shots on the evening news for a fire or accident. Drones are even being used on Mars! And maybe one day you’ll hear a slightly annoying buzz and find your throughly researched and 4.3 star-reviewed, waffle maker on your front step. Amazon’s Prime Air and the FAA are currently hammering out the details for delivery via drone.

Above all, fly safe. Fly Free or Die is not the state motto. FAA fines will reportedly be in the $200,000 range. Public safety is serious business, but quick delivery can be important too. Look — it’s a bird, its a plane — no, it’s the Cusinart Waffler Pro — and just in time for breakfast! BUZzzzzzZZZZ. NH

Learn more FAA DroneZone, faadronezone.faa.gov UNH Drone Academy, training.unh.edu Drone clubs offer community assistance online with recommendations and problem solving through crowdsourcing. Find the following groups on Facebook: 603 FPV (NH Drone Pilots) NH Drone Enthusiasts New Hampshire Drones Mobile app sanctioned by the FAA: B4UFLY shows safe flying status of your location. (Also available online for preflight planning and research: b4ufly.kittyhawk.io) Hate Drones?

Visit Throw Stones at Drones on Facebook.

The author decries the annoyance of drones, but applauds useful applications.

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603 LIVING / SENIORITY

Afraid of the New Normal

Anxiety about returning to the world after the pandemic is on the rise

BY LYNNE SNIERSON / PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY JOHN GOODWIN

“N

ow comes the hard part — what to tell all those people I’ve told, ‘We really need to get together when this is all over,’” comedian Bill Maher kidded in the opening monologue of a recent episode of his HBO show when looking to the light at the end of the long COVID-19 pandemic tunnel.

But the levels of stress, anxiety, depression and even suicidal thoughts that people across all age groups and demographics are experiencing at the prospect of going back to the “old normal” way of life is no joke.

In fact, it is so serious that it’s already reached alarming rates.

The American Psychological Association (APA) released a study in June 2020 that 49% of adults feel uneasy about returning to in-person interactions once the pandemic is over. Furthermore, the APA determined that 48% of those who have already received the vaccine say they still are uncomfortable about communing with others.

This mental health crisis has hit seniors especially hard.

“All of us are seeing a very large amount of stressed-out people,” says Nancy Rotkowitz, L.I.C.S.W., M.L.A.D.C., who has 30 years of experience and is currently an independent practitioner with Counseling Associates of

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Plaistow. “It’s taken its toll on the senior population. For them, some of it has to do with recognizing their own mortality.”

Data from the Centers for Disease Control, which tracks the number of cases contracted and the number of deaths due to COVID-19 in the United States, indicates that on May 4, 32.2 million people were afflicted with the virus and about 574,220 people have died as a result. In New Hampshire, the numbers on the same date were more than 95,000 cases and 1,305 deaths recorded.

Seniors remain the most vulnerable population, but according to the CDC, active cases are declining. Additionally, fully vaccinated seniors are now 94% less likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 as of press time in early May. “A lot of seniors are stressed about reintegrating back into the world. Is it safe out there? They are wondering if it really is. This pandemic challenged a lot of people’s belief about safety,” says Rotkowitz, who consults with peers on this topic. “A lot of people in the 65-plus crowd have friends or family who caught the virus and died. Then we have the next group down in age [50-plus] who have lost their parents. We therapists are seeing patients with a lot of anxiety, and we see patients with it who never had anxiety before.”

The pandemic crisis, now in its second year, necessitated social distancing and social isolation, even from close family. Many of the older adults who are still working were able do their jobs remotely from home and with only virtual contact with colleagues.

As a result, people created individual bubbles and insulated themselves in what has come to be called their COVID cave. As a consequence, for many, social skills got rusty and people got into a familiar rut in what became their “new normal.”

Now, breaking out of the bubble and having to go back to their former lifestyle is not just scary, it feels alien, and that’s causing a sharp rise in anxiety and panic attacks.

“I’m actually seeing a level of agoraphobia in some where they are becoming afraid to leave their homes because they’ve been home for so long and now are used to it,” Rotkowitz says. “When we have a fear and we have to challenge that fear on a daily basis, as a human being we learn to adapt and overcome that fear. But when we’re given the opportunity to run from that fear, the fear becomes larger.”

The current political divisiveness in the country, adversarial and conflicting positions taken by the two sides on medical science, the spread of conspiracy theories, and random social media posts only exacerbate the problem.

Confusion has overtaken clarity. There is a crisis of confidence.

“The ambiguity of our political climate is a big part of this. Who do we trust? We used to believe in science and trust the scientists and now some people are wondering about all that,” says Rotkowitz. “Is it a negative thing to question? Probably not. It’s good to be educated and informed, but that feeling of security was pulled out from under people’s feet. Now they may feel that OK, we’re being told it’s safe now, but is it? Is it OK to believe that?

“You have to look at a cost-benefit analysis. The benefit is to get back out there, but what is the cost? And do we believe that if we go out and walk into the grocery store that we won’t catch the virus and die in two weeks?”

Pandemic Anxiety Will the widespread availability for vaccines against COVID-19 make 2021 just like the Roaring Twenties? We might feel like letting loose, but experts caution this is no time to rouge your knees, roll your stockings down, paint the town and all that jazz.

In reality, gradual steps are needed to reacclimate to normalcy. Moving too fast will increase, not decrease, depression, panic and anxiety. Try to practice meditation, mindfulness or other calming techniques.

Dr. Asim Shah, professor and the executive vice chair of the Department of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences at Baylor University, offers these other tips:

A friendly

new place!

The Peabody Home is becoming

1. Limit your news intake.

2. Focus on facts and evidence.

3. Eat well, exercise and get enough sleep.

4. Reduce alcohol and/or drug consumption.

5. Stay optimistic.

6. Focus on the positive.

7. Remember that tomorrow is a new day.

The pandemic has also altered the dynamics of families and relationships. According to the experts, more than half of young adults across the country moved back home with their parents or an older relative because of economic necessity and/or they didn’t want to ride it out alone.

As the adult kids then move back out of the home, it’s the empty nest syndrome all over again.

“In that situation the isolation is huge, especially in the senior population. It really affects them. I know that not being able to see their grandchildren for over a year really affected them. It caused a lot of depression,” Rotkowitz says. “Family dynamics have changed because of the pandemic and we weren’t ready for it. We thought we were smarter. We thought we were more equipped. We weren’t.”

Nevertheless, there are pandemic positives to be gained.

“I’m always a solutions person,” she says.

“There can be learning and growing from what we’ve been through. If there is something we can learn from this, it’s to ask on a daily basis what are we doing to take care of ourselves? What are we doing for our extended family? What are we doing to be part of our community? What are we doing as a humanity? We get so caught up in the daily chaos. Instead, let’s focus on what we are doing so that we can make sure if something hits us again, we are going to be more emotionally and environmentally prepared.” NH

24 Peabody Place, Franklin, NH

Visit online: Peabody.Place

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603 LIVING / LOCAL DISH

Strawberry Shortcake Shortcake Biscuits Makes 7 to 9 biscuits 2 cups all-purpose flour 2 tablespoons baking powder 2 teaspoons cardamom (optional) 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 tablespoons sugar 2 tablespoons sanding sugar (plus extra for sprinkling on top) (Use a total of 3 tablespoons of sugar if omitting the sanding sugar.)

1 tablespoon lemon zest 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 11/4 cups heavy cream Preheat the oven to 425°F; move a rack to the top third of the oven.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, both sugars and cardamom, if using.

Make a well in the flour/sugar mixture, pour the vanilla, lemon zest and cream into the well, and stir until it just comes together. If there’s dry flour around the sides and bottom of the bowl, stir in a bit of additional cream or milk until all the flour is moist.

Scoop out the batter and form into a small ball with your hands.

Place the balls on an ungreased or parchmentlined baking sheet.

STORY AND PHOTOS BY SUSAN LAUGHLIN

H

ere’s an easy recipe to take advantage of fresh local strawberries straight from the field. Using heavy cream gives the biscuit its richness, so no butter or oil is necessary. The sanding sugar inside adds a little crunch, while a touch of cardamom adds a homey spice. And, of course, a dollop of whipped cream seals the deal, especially if it’s from a local dairy.

Strawberry Picking Tips Picking season for strawberries starts in mid-June and can go to mid-July, but the selection can dwindle after the Fourth of July in southern regions of the state. Weather is a big factor in determining their sweetness. Too much rain can water down the flavor, and too little sun affects the taste too. Don’t go too late in the day either. Select berries that are solid red, as they will not ripen any further after picking. The cap and stem should also be attached. Enjoy them that afternoon, or store in the refrigerator for two to five days. Honeoye, Earliglow and Allstar varieties are well known for their sweetness. If you are picking for jam, sweetness is less of a concern as tart berries may have more natural pectin. The size of the berry doesn’t really matter, but the smaller ones are usually sweeter.

For berries past their prime, purée them in a blender with a little sugar. Now you have a sauce for pancakes and sundaes, or use it frozen on popsicles or a granita. Finally, you could add equal parts oil and vinegar and create a strawberry vinaigrette.

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Brush the tops of the biscuits with cream and sprinkle with more sanding sugar.

Bake the biscuits until they’re golden brown, about 12 to 16 minutes. Remove from the oven, and cool them right on the pan, or on a rack.

Split the biscuits in half horizontally using a serrated knife. Top each bottom half with berries and whipped cream. Add the top halves, and top with additional whipped cream, if desired. These are very tender biscuits, and can be difficult to slice in half if not high enough. To make it easier, just plop all the goodies on top.

Whipped cream Whip a cup of heavy cream or whipping cream with 2 teaspoons of sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla until stiff. For the best results, chill the bowl, beaters and cream before hand.

Strawberries 3 pints of strawberries, hulled and sliced Juice of a lemon 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/3 to 1/2 cup of sugar or sweetness level of your choice.

Stir up and let macerate for 15 minutes before serving.

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PATHWAYS TO HIGHER EDUCATION IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

ASK THE

Experts As campuses begin to reopen, New Hampshire colleges and universities are putting lessons learned during the pandemic into action. We reached out to higher education experts to learn how these schools are making higher education more accessible, more affordable and allowing residents to pursue new opportunities.

MEET THE HIGHER EDUCATION EXPERTS

Susan D. Huard

Kim Mooney

INTERIM CHANCELLOR OF THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE SYSTEM OF NH CCSNH.EDU

PRESIDENT, FRANKLIN PIERCE UNIVERSITY FRANKLINPIERCE.EDU

Ken Ferreira

Jacob Rogenski

ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT, STUDENT FINANCIAL SERVICES, FRANKLIN PIERCE UNIVERSITY FRANKLINPIERCE.EDU

ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF ADMISSIONS, FRANKLIN PIERCE UNIVERSITY FRANKLINPIERCE.EDU

nhmagazine.com | June 2021 91

ASK THE EXPERTS :

PATHWAYS TO HIGHER EDUCATION IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

Community College System of New Hampshire CCSNH.EDU • Great Bay Community College, Lakes Region Community College, Manchester Community College, Nashua Community College, NHTI, River Valley Community College and White Mountains Community College

Q

Q

Why is now a particularly good time to consider a community college education?

A

“New Hampshire’s seven community colleges throughout the state offer affordable, close-tohome options for those at various stages of their educational journey. We’re not a one-size-fits-all proposition — New Hampshire community colleges provide flexibility in terms of scheduling and programs.

Many students attend part-time while pursuing a certificate or degree, so they can work and manage family responsibilities. Programs range from the technical trades — that have historically been offered — to business, healthcare, liberal arts and sciences. Our colleges offer many programs that produce graduates in high demand, even in today’s economy. Whether students want to begin a four-year degree pathway or learn skills for a profession, there are hundreds of in-person and online options. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis, so there’s still time to enroll.

Fall classes begin August 30 for full-semester classes, but there are also start dates in late-September and October.”

How are CCSNH schools making education more accessible, convenient and safe? Will remote offerings continue?

A

“Small classes, many with fewer than 20 students, make learning more personal than in large lecture halls. Much of our in-person learning will return this fall, although we will still offer some remote options for the convenience of our students and to accommodate various student schedules.

We look forward to being back in classrooms and labs! We’ll continue with some of the safety protocols that have been in place over the past year as needed, based on evolving public health guidelines.”

Q

In what ways does CCSNH make higher education more affordable?

A

“New Hampshire community colleges are far more affordable than most other

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Q

educational options. We are accredited by the same organization that accredits four-year colleges in New England. We provide quality education at an affordable price — whether students are looking to transfer to a four-year school after graduation or go straight into the workforce with a certificate or associate degree.

At $215 per credit plus fees, one (30-credit) year of full-time study at a CCSNH college costs about $6,500.

Students are eligible for financial aid and scholarships.

Additional federal aid due to the pandemic has recently been part of students’ financial aid packages as well, and will continue through the fall.”

What are some of the benefits of a community college education?

A

“Community college graduates who earn a two-year associate degree typically enjoy among the highest employment rates in the state and nation, because our programs are aligned with real opportunities in today’s economy. Several of our colleges are also nation-leading in helping students move up two or more economic quintiles. But most important, if you are a student who is looking for a high-quality, real-world education in a supportive setting that is close to home, fits within a family budget and opens doors, your local community college would be a smart choice!”

— Susan Huard, Interim Chancellor of the Community College System of NH

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Franklin Pierce University FRANKLINPIERCE.EDU

Q

al costs, which average $1,000 per year. Students may utilize a combination of Federal Direct student loans, private scholarships, tuition payment plans, and other “Fueled by our successful operations throughout educational loans to cover these costs. the last academic year, we are “Should costs increase, the PPNH planning to continue full in-person program will still deliver free tuition learning and operations in August It’s exciting to be and fees for all four years of undergrad2021. This will include the continuate studies at Franklin Pierce Univerlooking ahead to the uation of in-person classes, athletic sity, provided the student continues to competition and reintroduction of fall with in-person qualify for the award.” other university events, including events and activities — Jacob Rogenski, Associate Director of robust visitation opportunities. Our Admissions, Franklin Pierce University students want to be here, and proved returning, safely and Who qualifies for the program, that by their adaptability in abiding by and how do I qualify? strict health and safety guidelines over responsibly. the last year that made our in-person — Kim Mooney, President, “To qualify for the Pierce Promliving and learning possible through Franklin Pierce University ise New Hampshire program, a the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. student must meet the following criteria: Every one of our students, faculty and • Be a first-time, full-time, incoming student for the fall staff made adjustments to ensure our continued oper2021 semester. ations and continuity of learning, and it’s exciting to • Be a resident of New Hampshire and plan to be a be looking ahead to the fall with in-person events and residential student at Franklin Pierce’s Rindge campus. activities returning, safely and responsibly.”

Students who choose to commute will be eligible for a — Kim Mooney, President, Franklin Pierce University prorated discount.

• Earn a 3.0 or higher high school cumulative GPA. How is the university making higher education • File the Free Application for Federal Student Aid more affordable?

(FAFSA) and demonstrate a household gross income of “Through our Pierce Promise New Hampshire under $100,000. award, Franklin Pierce University demonstrates • A separate application is not required for the Pierce our commitment to providing access to an affordable Promise New Hampshire program. Once a student has education. This program is just one of the ways I can been accepted to Franklin Pierce University and has connect with New Hampshire students and their famisubmitted the FAFSA form, the University will deterlies and show them that a pathway to a Franklin Pierce mine eligibility and notify the student of the award as education is not only affordable, but well within reach. part of the financial aid process.

“Our Pierce Promise New Hampshire (PPNH) “Students remain eligible for the Pierce Promise program provides eligible students with free tuition New Hampshire award by maintaining a 3.0 GPA at and fees for all four years of undergraduate studies. A Franklin Pierce University. Should a student’s family’s student receiving a Pierce Promise New Hampshire AGI (Adjusted Gross Income) as reported on the FAFaward is responsible for room, board, books and other SA, which is filed annually, remain under $100,000, the supplies, for an estimated average cost of about $17,000.

Pierce Promise Program will continue to cover tuition The average cost to live on campus in our residential and fees for all four years of attendance at Franklin halls with a full meal plan for a freshman student is Pierce University. If the AGI changes over time, the $15,000. Books and additional supply costs will vary by award will be prorated.” program and concentration, but students should plan — Ken Ferreira, Associate Vice President, Student Finanto spend $1,100 per year on those materials. Additional cial Services, Franklin Pierce University expenses can include transportation and other person-

What are Franklin Pierce University’s plans for the fall semester?

A

”

Q

Q A

A

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603 LIVING / HEALTH

The Healthful Home How to reduce common health hazards

BY KAREN A. JAMROG / ILLUSTRATION BY MADELINE McMAHON

T

he pandemic upended many aspects of daily life, including where we spend our time. Especially with telecommute arrangements likely to remain more common than they were prior to COVID-19, our home environments matter more than ever. And while we like to think of home as a safe haven, mold, carbon monoxide, pesticides, insects, secondhand smoke and other factors can endanger health. Here we highlight a handful of common home hazards and offer tips to keep you and your family safe.

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Lead paint Federal legislation in 1978 banned the use of lead-based paint in residential settings, but according to the EPA, lead paint still exists in millions of homes. With New England’s plentiful stock of older homes, lead paint is a special concern in our region, says Beverly Baer Drouin, section administrator of the Healthy Homes and Environment Section at the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services.

Contrary to what many believe, lead paint can be hazardous even if it’s not visibly

peeling or chipped. Daily activity, such as walking up and down lead-painted stairs or opening and shutting lead-painted doors and windows, creates friction that can generate lead dust, putting children, in particular, but also adults at risk.

One solution is to cover it. If lead paint is present in your home, “you need to keep it enclosed or encapsulated with something else,” Baer Drouin says. For example, you can apply a liquid coating of an encapsulant (available at hardware and paint stores) over the lead paint, or install carpeting on lead-painted floors or stairs. Lead-painted windows can be swapped out with vinyl replacement ones.

Dealing with lead is not always a simple matter, though, so do your homework and consider hiring a pro.

GET YOUR

Get some air

Bad news for those of us who prefer our toast extra-crispy (OK, burnt): We are creating hazardous indoor air pollution. Indeed, one study indicated that burnt toast might be more toxic than traffic fumes.

Clearly, burning food is not a good thing to do, but the more consistent conditions in your environment can pose an even bigger threat than occasionally overcooking something, says Scott Lawson, founder and president of The Lawson Group in Concord.

One of his top tips? Bring in fresh air as much as possible. Quoting an old axiom, Lawson says, “Dilution is the solution to pollution,” meaning the more fresh air you have in your home, the more you can reduce indoor contaminants. Lawson acknowledges that, given the weather in New Hampshire, it’s not always practical to open the windows, but says that, when it’s too chilly to let in outside air the old-fashioned way, Granite Staters can use mechanical means, such as an HVAC system, to support healthful air exchange.

Radon All New Hampshire residents, Baer Drouin says, regardless of where they live in the state and the age of their home, should test for radon, a colorless, odorless gas that can exist in granite and soil and seep into buildings. Radon exposure is the second-leading cause (behind smoking) of lung cancer, according to the American Lung Association.

Radon test kits can be purchased in stores for less than $20, but starting in June, the state expects to offer free radon tests to residents, Baer Drouin says, through the website of the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) at dhhs.nh.gov/dphs/radon/index.htm.

Arsenic New Hampshire homeowners who rely on a private well for their drinking water should also test for arsenic, a colorless, odorless, tasteless element that naturally occurs in rock and soil, and can also result from human activity such as pesticide use.

Long-term exposure to arsenic has been linked with cancer, heart disease, diabetes, impaired brain development in children and other health problems. Researchers say about one in five wells in the state contains dangerous amounts of arsenic.

Moisture Water leaks can lead to a number of problems including mold, insects, mice, deterioration (raising the risk of lead-paint troubles if your home has lead paint) and injury, so invest in a good roof, and if your home springs a leak, don’t just grab a bucket — fix it. Renters should promptly report maintenance-related problems, including water leaks, to their landlord.

GEAR

Shoddy or misguided housekeeping Renters and homeowners alike should also keep their homes clean. Especially if anyone in your home has allergies or respiratory troubles, vacuum with a HEPA filter, if possible, to catch small particles, and don’t neglect to change the filter when it’s due.

Good housekeeping also includes properly storing food, not leaving dirty dishes in the sink overnight, and picking up pet messes, Baer Drouin notes.

However, consider what you scrub with.

Even cleaning supplies can pose a health hazard if they contain toxic ingredients or are used improperly. Bleach, for example, is a registered pesticide, Baer Drouin says.

“Sometimes people think, ‘If I use a little bit of chemical to clean, a lot of it might be better.’ They don’t realize the impact that can have on them.”

Fortunately, an assortment of Earth- and body-friendly cleaning products is available today, and DIYers can easily find recipes online that Baer Drouin says work just as well as commercial products, but without the potential adverse health effects. NH

Learn more National Center for Healthy Housing’s Principles of a Healthy Home: nchh.org/information-and-evidence/learn-abouthealthy-housing/healthy-homes-principles

On radon, including a NH map of where radon has been shown to be prevalent: dhhs.nh.gov/dphs/radon/index.htm

On arsenic, including a list of companies that provide water testing: dhhs.nh.gov/dphs/lab/documents/fs-arsenic.pdf

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603 LIVING

NO ES! K JO

Down in the Dumps for Jokes

T

he comedy world is finally coming back to life, and I’m ready to go!

Despite the fact that the pandemic has kept me from being on a stage for over a year, I’m armed with some killer new material that’s been tested, honed and thumbs-up approved.

How, you may ask, am I so confident in this new stuff when I’ve never tried it on a stage? Did I test it doing Zoom shows? I’d rather perform to the backup camera on my truck. Did I workshop it on the phone with fellow comedians?

“Hey, Tony, is this funny?”

Dial tone.

“Tony? Tony? Tony?”

I could run the new ideas by my wife, but she’ll just tell me to ask Tony.

No open mics. No easy Elks club or soccer fundraiser gigs where you can slip in a new chunk of untested material without risk. So, I found a new test audience. An

audience that’s honest. An audience that’s happy to help. An audience that’s starving for some laughs. For over a year now, I’ve been testing my new jokes on the guy who runs the gate at the dump.

His name is Mikey, and he spends all day sitting in a hut asking town residents, “What ya got?”

Almost everyone answers “trash,” and Mikey waves them through, but I like to keep him sharp by responding with something funny like, “the paintings from the Gardiner Museum heist” or “election ballots” or “the New York Jets.”

Once I get my captive audience laughing with a sharp opener, I hit him with my new stuff — the Mac and Cheese chunk, the weed-whacker incident or how slowly detectives open envelopes in Netflix crime documentaries.

And if Mikey laughs, I know I’ve got something. See, he feels no obligation to

fake it, like those Zoomheads. He hasn’t been drinking (probably) like those Elks club crowds. He’s literally sitting all day in a pile of crap, so If I can get him to laugh, I know I’ve got a winner. And if he doesn’t laugh, the joke is garbage and goes in the left dumpster at the top of the hill.

So, once a week or so for the last year, I’ve been tossing a few bags of trash and some broken down Amazon boxes in the back of my truck and heading up to the open Mikey at the dump. I’ll try a few new bits, hoping to tickle Mikey’s funny bone, and if I strike out, I can always go to the street jokes. “... I’m not Willie Nelson! See ya next week, Mikey.” NH Jimmy Dunn is bringing the comedy show to you this summer! Backyard shows, workday events, social clubs, restaurant patios, yachts or dinghies. Check out jimmydunn.com and host a show.

BY JIMMY DUNN / ILLUSTRATION BY BRAD FITZPATRICK 96

nhmagazine.com | June 2021

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Inside every dose of the COVID-19 vaccine is an opportunity to get back to what we’ve missed.

We’re making great progress. But it’s going to take a lot more vaccinated people before we have the chance to be close again. Now it’s time to roll up your sleeve and get vaccinated as soon as you can. The COVID-19 vaccines are safe, effective and will save lives. With every appointment, every vial, every dose, we believe there’s hope inside.

Get the facts at: go.d-h.org/vaccine

Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital • Cheshire Medical Center • Dartmouth-Hitchcock Mt. Ascutney Hospital and Health Center • New London Hospital Visiting Nurse and Hospice for Vermont and New Hampshire (VNH)