Smithfield Times October 2015

October 2015

COMPLIMENTARY

Volume 1 Issue 10

In this issue P 3

Pumpkins Rule the Season

By Brittni Henderson

P 6

Overbrook Academy

By Ron Scopelliti

P 16 Chainsaw Sculptor Damon Guistini

By Douglas Hadden

www.smithfieldtimesri.com

Michael and Julie Romano pose with their daughters, Reanna, 6, Stella, 4, and Cecelia, 3 months, in a pumpkin patch at Jaswell’s Farm in Smithfield. The Romanos include pumpkin picking among their family-building activities each fall season.

Photo by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times

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Fall is finally here — time to get pumped up about pumpkins

By Brittni Henderson Right now, at this very moment, I am surrounded by at least three different versions of a pretty popular orange member of the squash family. None of this was planned, may I add, but it adds to the mere fact that pumpkins are literally stealing the show right now. What’s up with the fact that the minute the calendar strikes September 1, no matter how swelteringly the weather remains, our attention goes quickly from pool parties to pumpkin spice lattes. Air fresheners morph from “Sandy Beach House Getaway” to “Perfect Pumpkin Harvest.”

Even our favorite décor changes—there is currently a sparkly fake pumpkin sitting on the table in front of me. Even the fakes get love.

As far as I’m concerned, pumpkins have been around long enough for them

Chris Jaswell helps Stella Romano, 4, center, and her sister Reanna Romano, 6, pick out the perfect pumpkins at Jaswell’s Farm in Smithfield. Photo by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times to be considered commonplace once the leaves start to turn and the air gets a little brisk. Ever since the emergence of social media, though, it seems like they have exploded. Whether you’re at the pumpkin patch picking a jack-o-lantern

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contender, walking out of your favorite coffee shop with a flavored beverage, or simply baking a family recipe, pumpkins get so much publicity. You can’t scroll down an Instagram timeline during the peak of fall without seeing at least 10 pumpkin selfies, along with a set of well-manicured nails hold a pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks.

Since social media perpetuates pumpkin popularity, I decided to use the same channel to see who had some answers for me. Without hesitation, the comments started rolling in. While many of the opinions varied, the majority of them had a similar message at the end of the day.

For Nicholas Boisvert, 26, it’s in his job description to like anything pumpkin-flavored when the fall rolls around.

Luckily enough for him, he absolutely loves it.

As manager of local Smithfield Coffee Company, Boisvert knows first hand how popular this variety can be.

“It’s a pretty great job, especially this time of year when people start to long for that warm and cozy feeling from a hot beverage as the weather becomes cooler,” he says.

“Once pumpkin spice is available it easily becomes the most popular flavor right away. At first we sell a lot of it iced since the weather is still a bit warm but as the season changes we will sell more of it hot and also start advertising specialty drinks like pumpkin spice lattes or pumpkin pie chai. Inevitably we will also make pumpkin muffins for a limited time as well.”

As far as the popularity is concerned? Boisvert believes it comes from a place deeper than just happy taste buds.

“It is reminiscent of a time when regular people were more involved in the harvests of this time of year that were essential for survival and abundance through the coming winter.”

Katie Carroll, 26, agrees.

“Pumpkins allow us to feel connected to a simpler, homey, and cozier time,” Carroll said. “In our fast-paced world, it can sometimes be difficult to stop, breathe, and enjoy the little things in life. Fall has always been about harvesting everything you’ve accomplished over the spring and summer, being thankful for what you have, and settling in for the inevitable cold winter. Despite our generation’s love for all things smart phones and social media, I think we still love to feel some kind of emotional connection to the past.”

Carroll and her family take full advantage of this season, as pumpkin picking is one of their most anticipated traditions. What started as Carroll’s grandparents taking the family on a Sunday trip to the local farm in 1967, evolved into a yearly tradition that includes almost 20 family members and significant others.

“I think it’s such a staple because it is a wonderful way to kick off the fall season with the entire family,” Carroll says. “Thanksgiving is typically seen as the big autumn holiday, but by that point the leaves are almost entirely fallen and people are looking towards Christmas.

With this Columbus Day tradition, we get to enjoy a true New England Autumn and, most importantly, no one has to host, cook, or clean up!”

The Romano family of Smithfield shares in the sentiment of quality family time and instilling tradition. For Michael and Julie Romano, these qualities were implanted in their lives as children, and they are excited to carry them on with their three young children Reanna, 6, Stella, 4, and Cecelia, 3 months.

“For our family, fall is full of apple and pumpkin picking, hayrides, caramel apples, s’mores by the fire, and Patriots football,” Julie says. “The very best aspects of fall take place in our kitchen. The girls adore using Nonnie and Mami’s recipes to bake up homemade treats like apple pie, cran-apple crisp, pumpkin pie, pumpkin seeds, and squash flowers.”

Julie believes that pumpkins are more than just a delicious taste; they are a harbinger of the changing weather and leaves that bring about happy times and family memories in New England.

As far as pumpkin spice lattes are concerned?

“We have a small obsession with [the ones] from Starbucks,” Julie shares.

As I’m finishing my own pumpkin iced coffee, I finally understand the deeper feelings that pumpkins, and all that fall has to offer, generates in our souls. The air gets a little cooler, the kitchen gets a little warmer, and we make some of the most important memories with our friends and family members. Our hearts are full and so are our stomachs. Fall is truly one of the best times of the year.

What types of traditions do you have with your family or friends? Let us know on Facebook or on Twitter @TheSfldTimes.

October 2015

UPCOMING EVENTS October and November 2015 National Circus and Acrobats of the People’s Republic of China Thursday, Oct. 15 | 7:30 p.m.

The Auditorium in Roberts Hall

˜ Flamenca Compania José Porcel

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Tuesday, Oct. 27 | 7:30 p.m.

The Auditorium in Roberts Hall

Spirit of India featuring the Masala Orchestra and Dancers of India Tuesday, Nov. 10 | 7:30 p.m.

The Auditorium in Roberts Hall

View complete list of events and buy tickets at www.ric.edu/pfa or call (401) 456-8144.

In addition, don’t miss RIC’s many wonderful student performances throughout the year.

Rhode Island College 600 Mt. Pleasant Ave. Providence Accommodations for persons with disabilities available upon request. Call (401) 456-8144 for assistance. TTY/TDD: 711.

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5

Overbrook Academy finds a home in Smithfield

By Ron Scopelliti

Photos by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times

The former St. Aloysius Home on Austin Avenue has a new occupant with a familiar local connection.

This summer, Overbrook Academy moved to the property. The Academy is run by the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi, the same Catholic group that administered the site’s last occupant, Mater Ecclesiae College.

Overbrook Academy is an internationally accredited boarding school for girls in grades 6 through 9.

Though new to town, the school has a long history.

“We are now starting our 31st generation,” says Barbara Mariscal, director of the academy. Overbrook Academy spent the past 23 years in Warwick, and was previously located in Connecticut and Texas.

The academy is not a typical middle school. It spe-

6

cializes in English as a second language (ESL) education, offering a ninemonth immersive program. Though Overbrook Academy is a pretty joyful place as displayed by these five most of the students come from Mexico, the academy also has students from students from Mexico who leap for a photo. From left are Natalia Abaroa, Venezuela, Chile, Spain, Colombia, Rebecca Apadaca, Paola Mancilla, Maria Jose Adame and Eugenia Bringas. and Korea. The 130 girls currently enrolled started “So it’s pretty common when they’re younger, either their academic year the first week of September. The middle school or high school, to have that experience school had already completed a month-long summer of living abroad.” camp program with 95 girls.

“It’s a very enriching program for them,” Mariscal Mariscal says the academy fulfills a special need be- says. “The girls have more hours of English grammar, cause in Latin America it’s not as common for students vocabulary and literature than the ordinary American to move out of their homes to go to college. student, but they follow pretty much the normal core “They study college, near home, and they continue liv- subjects.” They also take religion classes, including a ing in their houses until they get married,” she says. class in “Theology of the Body,” based on a series of

October 2015

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P PUR LE C E

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129 lectures that Pope John Paul II delivered over four years, exploring the human condition, sexuality, and marriage.

There’s daily Mass in the chapel, and after their classes the students can take part in a wide variety of activities including, dance, cross fit, horseback riding, and a number of different athletic and artistic pursuits.

The number of students is a vast increase compared to the last class of 12 full-time and 30 part-time students at Fritzia Cha of the United States, left, and Mater Ecclesiae, which closed Jiwoo Choi of South Korea listen intently in June due to low enrollto their teacher’s instruction on the use of ment. Prior to the closing, graphs to provide information. the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi had gone through a difficult period starting in 2009 when the organization confirmed sexual misconduct allegations against its founder, Fr. Marcial Josefina Krusell of Chile, left, and Maciel Degollado. In 2010 Pope Benedict XVI appointed a pontifical delegate to Andrea Gonzalez of Mexico work initiate an extensive reorganitogether on a desktop computer. zation of the group.

The Legion of Christ also faced two Rhode Island lawsuits challenging the tactics used to garner donations from two wealthy, elderly benefactors. One case was dismissed in Rhode Island Supreme Court because the claimant lacked the legal standing to pursue the claim.

According to the National Catholic Reporter, the other case resulted in an out-of-court settlement for an undisclosed amount.

The decision to move Overbrook Academy to Smithfield was based on several factors. Their former facility was owned by the Diocese of Providence and leased by Regnum Christi. Since the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi already owns the property on Austin Avenue, it made financial sense for Practicing their Catholic faith is the core the school to move. of the experience at Overbrook Academy In addition, Mariscal says, with students attending daily Mass.

“The facilities are better suited for the girls, especially the school building and the dorms.” They did, however, have to make some renovations to the academic building and the dorms, including adding more bathrooms to accommodate the larger number of students.

Director Barbara Mariscal Their new home is close enough to the old location to continue with almost all the assures the spiritual formation same staff, many of which studied at Mater Ecclesiae. and the education of young “Plus, it’s a beautiful town.” Mariscal adds. women from across the globe She hopes the students will get to see more of the town, particularly during their at the Greenville school. weekend activities, which take the students outside the campus.

“Every Saturday we visit a different place,” Mariscal says. The trips have included visits to Newport and the Boston Museum of Science, and a Duck Tour on the Charles River. She says she would welcome any suggestions of local places for outings and extracurricular activities, or even places they can take the students for dinner.

On Sundays, they have public service outings and are currently helping in several church parishes, visiting different nursing homes, and maintaining the existing relationships that they’ve established over the years. Mariscal says she’d enjoy the chance to expand these public service relationships into Smithfield.

“I would love to see if we could help here,” she says. “We’re looking for those ideas of how we can give back.

“We’re still learning. We’re still seeing what the town has to offer and what we can offer to the town.”

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Smithfield’s own version of The Fonz The life and legend of ‘Lug’ LaPlante

By Laurence J. Sasso, Jr. In the 1950s, long, long before Happy Days came into being, Ernie “Lug” LaPlante was The Fonz of Smithfield.

The warm and fuzzy TV show that spawned actor Henry Winkler’s character in a feel good look back at the era when rock and roll was born, debuted in 1974, nearly 20 years after Lug left his mark on the local scene.

LaPlante was the real deal. By his own admission, he was crazy about cars from the time he was in his early teens. Adopting the slicked-back pompadour hair style that was the signature of many teenage males in the fifties, Ernie easily could have been the model for Arthur “The Fonz” Fonzarelli.

Though he protests that he wore them for protection while riding his classic Indian Chief motorcycle, Lug sported a black leather jacket and engineer boots. Like the iconic, tough sitcom character that resembled him, he could end a potential confrontation with little more than an ominous glare, but Lug didn’t always stop there if pushed hard enough.

“I had my fights. I did all right,” he confides. He also had an uncommon flare for driving and knew all about cars at a time when many of his contempo-

Ernie “Lug” LaPlante poses with two of his many trophies that fill the shelves in the garage and in his house that attest to his successes on race tracks across the region.

Photo by Laurence J. Sasso, Jr./The Smithfield Times

8

raries were still trying to figure out when to downshift or how to double clutch.

In that age of cool, when Elvis and Buddy Holly were providing the culture with an impossibly romantic sound track for an entire generation, Lug, still a youth, was getting his baptism as a racing car driver. In the early 1950s, he competed at Seekonk Speedway in a 1949 Chevrolet Class B stock car.

He didn’t bring home many trophies then, but he learned the fundamentals of the sport, setting the stage for lots of victories later on.

In becoming well-known for an image that was impossible to ignore, he was surely aided by his distinctive nickname. Ironically, despite answering to it all his life, Ernie, now 76, has never been crazy about being called Lug. He can’t even say for sure how he got the sobriquet.

He thinks, perhaps, John Donahue, a cohort of his, came up with it. However, another contemporary, Tony “Junior” Polseno, owner of Pleasant View Orchards in town, claims to have coined the name.

“I would see him at the ball field, and he was big and burly, a big guy, you know, a big Lug.” Wherever it came from, the name stuck, and so did the image of his car, a customized 1951 Ford V-8 with a standard transmission that took its place in the after dark parade of street rods and soupedup rides that prowled Route 44 and the main roads of town. It was part of a scene, duplicated all over the country, that resembled the one George Lucas depicted in American Graffiti, his definitive movie about teens, their sweethearts, and their cars in the 1950s.

You knew the cars like you knew their owners.

“There goes Lug LaPlante,” someone would say, or “there’s Bobby Brown, and look, it’s Tiger Tetreault.”

There was even a car club, complete with their own jackets that had the group’s name, The Road Angels, emblazoned across the back. Today, as an original member, one of Ernie’s prized mementoes is a thick metal bumper plaque bearing the name of the organization. He got it after it passed through a succession of members, some of whom have died. These days it is attached to a trailer he uses to transport a

“The Fonz” showed up in Happy Days, Ernie “Lug” LaPlante struck a cool dude hot rodder pose beside his wheels in the summer of 1958. racing car he and his son enter at tracks throughout New England.

When prodded a bit, Ernie reminisces about the days when he was something of a legend in the town and its neighboring communities. He recalls Friday night dances at the American Legion Hall on Pleasant View Avenue still sits directly across the street from his original family home.

When the disc jockey, a man by the name of Amos Joly, who was the age of the dance-goers parents, is brought up Lug breaks into a grin and nods.

Everyone in their teens in Smithfield during those years went to the Legion Hall to dance at some time or other, and they all knew “Mr. Joly.”

Somehow in spite of the generational difference, Mr. Joly knew what to play, always ending the evening at 11 o’clock with “Good night My Love” by Jesse Belvin after three hours of The Platters, The Skyliners, The Five Satins, Paul Anka and the like.

Surprisingly, even though Ernie typifies the era in many ways, he wasn’t a big fan of rock and roll. He explains that he much preferred country and western music, his radio tuned to the likes of Hank Williams and Patsy Cline.

He didn’t spend all his time cruising in his distinctive Ford or learning how to race. He put in four years at LaSalle and had his eye on the future.

He characterizes the era of his youth as a good time to have grown up, observing that there was less concern for class and status and more emphasis on the individual, whatever his or her origins.

“We had the best of times. We didn’t care what you had or didn’t have. We enjoyed ourselves. If we hurt anybody it was ourselves.” (Except maybe for the occasional challenger who didn’t believe what

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For Ernie, as an adult, cars weren’t only his passion, they also provided his livelihood. He became the owner of Reservoir Auto Parts. The business had a territory that extended from Putnam, Connecticut to Provincetown, Massachusetts.

“I have been into cars my whole life,” he declares. Besides buying and selling them and running his parts business he has also never stopped racing.

The early start he got at Seekonk paved the way to competition all over New England at tracks including Loudon, N.H., and Thompson, Conn. He has shelves of trophies in the garage and in his house that attest to his successes. Also, he and his son, Paul, share a love of the sport.

“I put him in a car when he wasLug says with obvious pride.

He grows rhapsodic talking about a favorite racer they both drove at speedways all over the region. A modified 1936 Chevrolet three-window coupe, it was one of only 2500 ever made. Configured for racing, it reached a top speed of 144 miles per hour, he notes. He just sold it to a buyer in California, but he and his son have another race car.

LaPlante has been married for 52 years to the former Lorraine Tetreault of Manville. Besides Paul, they also have a daughter, Jeanne Ross, a teacher,

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of whom Lug is equally proud. There are a total of seven grandchildren, four girls and three boys.

He retired from business in the year 2000. “I had a stroke, and that was it,” he discloses. Then he shares an anecdote that illustrates his grit. He was rehabbing from the stroke and through his involvement in the United Commercial Travelers organization, where he has been an officer and leader, he and Lorraine had tickets to attend the Fourth of July fireworks display at the White House. His doctors said he wasn’t ready. He told them he was ready.

“They said don’t go. I said I’m going. They said don’t go again. I said I’m going, and I did,” he recounts with a chuckle. “I’m thick,” he adds. His wife, sitting nearby, nods with a knowing smile.

Then he admits the experience left him tired, but also provided him with confidence he would recover.

Today, he is doing well.

The one-time Smithfield symbol of teenage rebellion has lived in Cumberland for more than 50 years and is happy with his life.

“I wouldn’t change a thing. Nothing. I enjoyed my youth, and I’ve enjoyed my marriage.”

Out of everything, he is most proud of his family, he says. “I lived well. I enjoyed my life. I have no regrets.”

Asked if he will pose for a photo giving the

The Henry Winkler character ‘The Fonz’ in the 1970s sitcom ‘Happy Days’ could have been modeled on Ernie “Lug” LaPlante, who roamed the town in his hot rod in the 1950’s and tore up race tracks in the region with his stock cars, asserts contemporary Laurence J. Sasso, Jr. Photo by Laurence J. Sasso, Jr./The Smithfield Times thumbs up sign that The Fonz made famous, Ernie LaPlante responds with the menacing frown that made him famous when he was first known as Lug. Then he bursts into a grin and gives the sign with both hands.

9

Visiting Lincoln’s home brings awe and goose bumps

By Dick Martin Springfield, Missouri, the home of Abe Lincoln, was not what I expected it to be. It was so much more!

On our way to the Grand Canyon, I earmarked several places to stop, among them, the home of our 16th and greatest President, figuring it would be kind of neat to see the family home in which he lived, the first and only home he owned. Lincoln moved to Springfield in 1837, the year Springfield became the state capital, and bought his first house in May 1844. He was elected President and moved to Washington, D.C. in 1861.

The area includes his first home, his first law offices and his tomb. Interestingly, upon leaving, he stated in his farewell address to Springfield: “Here I have lived a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young man to an old man. Here my children have been born, and one is buried. I now leave, not knowing when, or

whether ever, I may return…” - A somewhat haunting reminder of the unpredictability of life.

Landing in Springfield, we found the area easy to negotiate (Don’t you love cities laid out on grids!). The Lincoln Home National Historic Site occupies a full block by itself with the Lincoln house as the centerpiece surrounded by other original homes with some restored homes added to complete the original neighborhood.

A brief movie clip at the museum visitors’ center tells about Lincoln’s rise to the presidency in the 1800s as an introduction.

Entering the Greek Revival home with our National Park Ranger guide Jessica Allen, we expected to find the usual collection of period pieces, etc. but instead we found the home pretty much as Lincoln had left it, including a number of original furnishings, such as

A replica White House is one of the highlights of a tour of the Lincoln Museum where reporter Dick Martin and his wife, Dale, posed with figures of the Lincoln family. his chairs, his desk, his wife Mary’s cooking stove, mirrors, and on and on. As my wife Dale and I entered and started the tour, we both got the same eerie feeling.

This is where one of the greatest ever lived. The hair went up on the back of my neck as we moved from room to room, like going back in time. Here were so many of Lincoln’s original possessions it was amazing

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and definitely added another level of comprehension and awe to the experience.

Once outside, my wife informed me that she had that peculiar feeling as well. To tell the truth, it felt haunted.

One of the rooms, of course, is ‘THE’ original room in which members of the Republican Party Committee formally informed Lincoln he was their candidate for President. If that isn’t enough to move you, maybe the desk on which he wrote his various letters and papers will.

Jeffrey Hendricks, one of the guides, informed me that people from all over the world make their way to Lincoln’s home each year. On average close to 1,000 visitors a day arrive during peak summer months and hundreds of thousands each year.

Some, he adds, leave the home in tears. It has that much of an emotional effect on visitors. One visitor, he recalls, from Delhi, India, came because his father had told him over and over again about “the great man” Lincoln and had read to him about him as a child. After his father’s passing, he made the journey. Lincoln not only changed the course of American history, but had a huge impact on world history as well. It is hard to know how far Lincoln’s influence stretched.

Photos of the home after Lincoln’s assassination in 1865 shows it bedecked with black draping and surrounded by rows of people, all in mourning. Lincoln’s only surviving son, Robert, maintained it briefly as a rental property before donating it in 1887 to the people of Illinois as a memorial. It was eventually donated to the U.S. in 1972 and is operated by the National Park Service.

After that experience, we headed to the Lincoln Museum, a few blocks away, expecting somewhat of a letdown, quite frankly. But, no, the Museum is an impressive testimony to Lincoln, delivered state of the art, including a hologram presentation to start the journey in which visitors get to see and hear the “ghosts” of the past talk about Lincoln and his impact. Here visitors enter a replica White House, a reproduction log cabin where Lincoln’s journey began, and follow his rise from log splitter to President via various media forms. Original letters and other documents are on display, as well, but the most impressive was the trip through a series of rooms for the “Lincoln experience.” The journey through those rooms where his speeches, persona, family tragedies and political highlights (and lowlights) concludes with a replica of his funeral coffin and wake left us both choked up. It has that much of an effect.

Later in the day, we took a ride to Lincoln’s resting site, Oakridge Cemetery, a massive tomb and tower with bronze statues surrounding it. Inside, the marbled tunnel led through a series of corridors adorned with bronzes of Lincoln in various poses and ages. The black marbled sepulcher beneath which Lincoln is entombed lent a somber atmosphere to the place and, again, creates an unfathomable emotional impact on visitors. The guide informed us that not only do people cry, they sometimes lie prostrate in front of the tomb, weeping. Over a million visitors come to the cemetery each year. It is the second most visited U.S. cemetery, behind Arlington Cemetery.

The enormity of Lincoln’s impact is evident here, as is the enormity of his life as Lincoln, the man. Not only was he huge physically at 6’4”, but he was a huge figure in our American heritage. Surrounding the town are various other Lincoln sites, including the Lincoln Presidential Library. At both museum stores, you will find 100s of books on Lincoln, more than you can imagine. This is the place to go If you are a history fan, and, especially, if you love Abe Lincoln.

Other information to know: Great coffee place near the museum, William Van’s; next door is the best place to go for lunch and homemade beer, Obed and Issac’s Microbrewery and Eatery. If you stay at one of the Hilton’s, everything is within walking distance and the prices are very reasonable. There are a number of other historic houses and sites nearby as well.

For more information go to www.visitspringfieldillinois.com.

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President’s Cultural Series

Rupert Boyd and Laura Metcalf in Concert WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4 7 P.M. (DOORS OPEN AT 6:30 P.M.) JANIKIES THEATRE Bryant University and the President’s Cultural Series present Rupert Boyd and Laura Metcalf in Concert on Wednesday, November 4, at 7 p.m. in Janikies Theatre.

Boyd, a New York-based Australian classical guitarist, is acclaimed as one of the most talented guitarists of his generation and described by The Washington Post as “truly evocative,” and by Classical Guitar Magazine as “a player who deserves to be heard.” He regularly performs as half of The Australian Guitar Duo with Jacob Cordover.

Metcalf, noted for her “gorgeous cello legatos” (Washington Post) and her “sensitive, melodic touch” (BlogCritics Magazine) enjoys an active career as a soloist, chamber musician, orchestral musician, and teacher. She is the cellist with the acclaimed string quintet Sybarite5.

Ticket Information General admission: $20 Smithfield residents: Two complimentary tickets per household ($20 each for additional tickets) Bryant Alumni: $10 if reserved in advance ($15 on concert night) Non-Bryant students and teachers: $10 with school I.D. Register online at www.bryant.edu/alumnievents or call (401) 531-6663.

For directions, visit www.bryant.edu.

11

And furthermore

A few favorite things

By Laurence J. Sasso, Jr. Even though Julie Andrews sang it, I’m not that crazy about the song “My Favorite Things”. However, I think the idea of listing some favorite choices from time to time is a good one. So, here, in no particular order of priority are a few of mine.

• The soft serve ice cream in the media dining room at Fenway Park. None better.

• Reading the Sunday paper in a beach chair at the Point Judith Light overlook.

• A loaf of very fresh Italian bread, some high quality provolone cheese, and a red delicious apple for lunch. My grandmother made me a fan when I was still too young to spell provolone. (Say, did I spell it right here?)

• Playing first base for the Smithfield White men’s softball team. Alas, my tenure is in the past now, but the time when the team was recording a run of eight championships in close succession is a treasured memory. We were a band of brothers.

• The harp playing of the very talented Sorana Scarlat, formerly of Smithfield.

• Trading texts or e-mails with my daughter. I always learn something.

• Cool summer nights with the windows open.

• Anything lemon.

• Dogs.

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• A new book to read, especially if it’s a biography.

• Being Smithfield and Rhode Island born.

• The waterfall in Harrisville near the Assembly building.

• The work of Pittsburgh music impresario T.J. Lubinsky on PBS-TV. He is doing more to preserve the iconic songs of the rock and roll era than any other single person.

• Speaking of that, three favorite tunes of mine are: “Only You” by the Platters, “Since I Don’t Have You” by The Skyliners (RIP Janice Vogel Rapp), and a tie between two songs by Roy Orbison – “Running Scared,” and “In Dreams.”

Hmmmmm. I guess that makes four, doesn’t it?

• Oh, what the heck I’ll round it up to five: “Good Night My Love.” Jesse Belvin originated it in 1956, but Paul Anka as well as The Four Seasons and several other notable performers also recorded it.

• Rawlings first baseman’s mitts. The best!

• URI. It did well by me, and I’m grateful.

• October! (Did anyone who has read my columns over the past few years think I could omit my favorite month from this list?)

• Trinity Repertory Company and the now littlementioned role that the Oscar-nominated ac-

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tor and Emmy award winner Richard Jenkins, a former long-time company member who stepped in as artistic director, played in saving the theater from oblivion.

Nice shoes.

Most anything Smithfield’s Gerry Goldstein writes. He’s a treasure in our midst.

Ford motor vehicles. Shoot me. It’s all I have ever driven.

The United State of America, its glories, its warts, its blemishes, its shortcomings and all.

Shirts with two pockets.

The works of Scituate sculptor Armand LaMontagne.

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My late mother’s sense of humor and her sense of honor; my father’s too.

My family and my friends. All of them. It’s a privilege to have them and to know they put up with me.

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Fall: A most colorful time to explore Olivia’s Forest

By Patti Shaffer Whether you like hiking through the woods or are a leaf-peeper looking for some fantastic fall foliage, there’s no better time of the year to get outdoors and explore the walking trails through “Olivia’s Forest” on Ridge Road in Smithfield.

I recently took a walk on its trails with Barbara Rich, chairwoman of the Smithfield Land Trust, the non-profit that owns and maintains the property.

The mature forest of 31 acres includes three short trails that cross a small stream flowing through the property on its way to the Woonasquatucket River.

Three rudimentary wooden footbridges cross the stream. Two historical cemeteries dating back to the 1800’s are also on the property.

In 2012, the property was donated to Smithfield Land Trust by Joseph Gallo and Annese Construction and named after Gallo’s granddaughter, Olivia. Gallo had purchased the property for his mother some 50 years ago, and after she passed away, he wanted the land to be conserved so that people could enjoy it.

The Smithfield Land Trust was established in 1999 by members of the community who felt that it was important to protect and preserve nature in Smithfield. Their goal is to preserve open space, protect wetlands, water bodies, ground and surface water resources, farm lands, historical or cultural places of interest, scenic views, unusual, exceptional or exemplary natural habitats—and to provide opportunities for research and education on natural resources on Land Trust-held properties.

They also maintain the historical cemeteries.

“Smithfield has an active historical cemetery volunteer group who keep them in good condition— repairing gravestones and keeping the grounds well- manicured,” said chairwoman Barbara Rich.

She adds, “the Land Trust has protected almost 1,000 acres of property in Smithfield since its founding in 1999.”

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Olivia’s Forest is a great place for a nature walk also thanks to Andrew Guilmain and Ryan Erbe, Boy Scouts from Troop 1 Georgiaville, who, for their Eagle Scout Project, were responsible for clearing and creating the trails to make them walkable. They also removed trash from the property and cleared land for a parking area. They enlisted help from other scouts from their troop including Roger Guilmain, the Troop scoutmaster (Andrew’s dad), along with other volunteers. The Boy Scouts, along with summertime youth employees of the Conservation Commission, also constructed the three footbridges that cross the stream.

Last year the RI Land Trust council worked with the Smithfield Land Trust and Smithfield Conservation Commission to get the three-quarter miles of trails mapped and paint blazed (painting geometric symbols on the trees). They also completed the construction of the parking area on Ridge Road near the intersection with Whipple Road.

The Green Dot and Orange trails follow old farmer’s cart paths and the White Dot trail weaves through a rocky-forested slope. The Green Dot also starts at the small parking area along Ridge Road.

Roy Najecki, a volunteer and board member of the RI Land Trust Council and Glocester Land Trust, who has hiked these trails most extensively, mapped the trails.

Najecki explains, “As you enter the property, if you slow down and look closely, you can discern how the Green blazed entrance trail was originally a farmer’s cart path. At certain times of the year, especially after a light cover of snow or frost, you can still see faint impressions of wagon wheel ruts on those paths. Actually, nearly all the trails on this property are not new creations but reuse of the old farmer’s cart paths.

It is not hard to imagine that the trail you walk today was trodden by cattle, oxen, and sheep 150 years ago as they were being led from pasture to pasture.”

He goes on to say, “Several old stone walls crisscross the property and are reminders of when they formed the boundaries of pastures for sheep and cattle. A section of the White blazed trail is a bit more

Barbara Rich, chairwoman of the Smithfield Land Trust, and Roger Watson check a map as they decide which trail to follow in Olivia’s Forest on a late September Saturday morning.

Photo by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times challenging and the adjacent slope shows the rocky deposits made in the last ice age as the glaciers receded.”

“As you head back to your car, and when the trees are bare of leaves,” adds Najecki, “you can see a small pond on the left created by a stone wall to impound water for cattle during the summer months.”

Interestingly, somewhere hidden on the property there is also a geocache (a container or box) where visitors can place small items or trinkets (something interesting, useful or fun) for someone to take— and a log-in notebook to say they were there and what they found. One of the principles of geo-caching is “take something, leave something.”

For those not familiar with geocaching, it is a high-tech hide and seek treasure hunt using a handheld device such as a Smartphone or GPS. There are thousands of geocaches in Rhode Island and over a million in the US. After discovering the cache on their hikes, the geocacher visits the geocaching website to log their find digitally and share their experience online.

Rich says, “It’s a great way to create an educational outdoor experience for kids and families to do together.”

For myself, an inexperienced hiker, I found the trails to be well marked and their trail map proved very helpful. The paths were somewhat more strenuous at times because of some occasional rough footing along the trails (with tree roots and small rocks and things of that sort)—but the trails are also short.

October 2015

Hiking through Olivia’s Forest proved to be a wonderful wilderness escape! However, make sure you wear hiking boots or a good pair of athletic shoes and apply insect repellant. The trail map is available for free online at exploreri. org.

Visiting Olivia’s Forest is free and is open from sunrise to sunset, all year. Barbara Rich, chairwoman of the Smithfield Land Foot traffic only and no Trust, and Roger Watson head off for a hike through hunting nor fires are allowed. Besides going for a Olivia’s Forest on a late summer day. nature walk and hiking, Photo by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times you can go snowshoeing in winter.

The trailhead is on Ridge Road, north of Whipple Road/Ridge Road intersection and across the street from 100 Ridge Road in Smithfield. There are 4 parking spaces available and is not ADA accessible. Neither bicycles nor horseback riding are permitted. Also during hunting season, it is required to wear fluorescent orange vests and hat for safety. Also, if walking with your dog, keep him on a leash. Check it out on www.exploreri.org.

For more information about the Smithfield Land Trust or Olivia’s Forest, or to volunteer, call 401.233-1000 ext. 122 or email: landtrust@smithfieldri.com.

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Damon Giustini carves a name for himself as a chainsaw sculptor

By Douglas Hadden Damon Giustini has always made his way with hard work and his two hands.

When he was 13, he worked as a dishwasher at the old Brook Manor Pub in his hometown of Attleboro, Mass. When Giustini, the middle of three sons whose parents Bob and Judith shared a chiropractic practice, got out of high school he headed at age 17 not for more schooling but straight into his grandfather Angelo Giustini’s business, B&N Casting, on Spruce Street in Providence’s Federal Hill.

“I was a caster and a mold maker,” in an operation his late grandfather ran for 50 years, Giustini related. As for what he learned in 10 years working with his grandfather, Giustini summarized, “Just the work ethic, how to show up on time. It gave me that steady foundation. There’s nothing like pouring molten metal on a hundred-degree day,” he smiled, working with molten tin, arsenic, cadmium, lead “and who knows what else.”

An independent sort, Giustini, of North Scituate, where his family moved when he was age 14, “got my own place” by the time he was 19. After the casting work basically fled to China, Giustini has worked as a landscaper, with occasional diversions to the Salt Lake City, Utah area to visit friends and go snowboarding. But finding another mode of expression was something that had been brewing in his mind for a long time.

“I had always seen the (chainsaw) sculptures, always had an interest in art. I always wanted to be an artist and make a living as an artist,” he related.

As a self-employed landscaper, he also cut down a lot of trees, learning to “run and cut with chainsaws,” and encountered large stumps that, to his eye, were like blank canvases awaiting a paint brush. In fact, “I was hoping to be an oil painter,” Giustini said.

“If you told me 10 years ago this is where I’d be,” he would not have believed it.

His first sculpture in 2012 took about three hours, was three feet tall and based on a common theme in the genre.

“I had a little statue of a perched eagle. I got it at a gift shop. I used that as my model.” His carving

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tool at the time was a Stihl Magnum, an approximately 20-pound chainsaw that the company on its website ranks as its most powerful. Giustini quickly determined however that the large chainsaw was “not the way to go” for the finer work.

“I’ve got about six chainsaws now, various weights and sizes,” down to a six-pounder for finishing work.

There were other lessons too. “I started with oak and I quickly discovered that isn’t the best (wood) to use. It’s more difficult to cut, heavy to move,” so he switched to pine. After carving comes sanding and staining (typically with polyurethane), and more lately painting features such as eyes to enhance the dramatic effect.

When he finished his first piece, “I was excited because I realized maybe I can do something like this.” A neighbor wanted to buy it “but it wasn’t sanded or good wood, so I gave it to her.” And a new career was born. He placed his second, more-realized eagle Damon Giustini recently spotted a tree trunk on Whipple Road (though still of oak) on his stone wall in Smithfield that remained from a tree struck by lightning. He along Danielson Pike with a for-sale transformed the stump into a “wood spirit” with a small owl. His sign on it. “It wasn’t long before some- dog, Shelly, an 11-year-old Black Lab, rests at his feet. one came along and bought the piece Photo by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times from me. That’s what encouraged me right there. I started to get special orders. People thousands of spectators. There is also the U.S. Open stopping by, taking pictures. The work,” he noted Chainsaw Competition, this year held in August in with a craftsman’s pride, “has improved since then.” Eau Claire, Wisconsin, which drew 11 competitive The art of carving wood with chainsaws traces to chainsaw artists including from Japan and Germany the early 1950s, an outgrowth, some say, of loggers with the others all from the Midwest. The art has sculpting wood on their lunch breaks. It has also be- grown to the point where specialty equipment is now come competitive, with the first world championship made to better suit carvers. held in 1987. The noted chainsaw sculptor Brian Giustini, 43, finds clients via word of mouth Ruth, of Pennsylvania, brought his art to Japan in but also by spotting potential “wood canvases” and 1992, setting up a chainsaw carving school there. An- knocking on doors, as he did recently after spying a other noted foreign outpost is the United Kingdom, trunk on Whipple Road in Smithfield that remained which hosts an annual open competition that draws from a tree struck by lightning. Having lived for a

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time on nearby Georgiaville Pond, Giustini was familiar with the neighborhood; he transformed the stump into a “wood spirit” with a small owl.

Eagles and bears are “the most popular” chainsaw sculptures he does, but Giustini, whose pieces can range from the low hundreds of dollars into the thousands, has branched out to other themes while enhancing his presentation of what he also sees as a performance art. “One thing I enjoy is people buy these to give as presents, birthdays, Father’s Day, whatever.”

Shortly after he started, he answered a request to do a six-foot mermaid for a client, attracted by Giustini’s stone wall display, for his wife’s birthday party at their home in Easton, Mass. The model this time was a mermaid Barbie he had seen in a fish tank, for what started out as a 500-pound block of pine. Doing the finishing work outdoors at his home, “I used an electric chainsaw to keep the noise down, sanded it, stained it,” and delivered the huge piece with help from a friend.

For a recent birthday party in Johnston, “I was kind of like the entertainment.”

Carving a bear using the tip of the saw for the fur, he poured gasoline on shards of the green pine wood (“it’s softer”) and lit it on fire. “It burns off the shards of wood and dries it,” putting on a surprise show that instantly riveted the large gathering’s attention. “It was like somebody stopped the record,” he smiled.

He has done one-piece baseball bats with painted baseballs at the end of the handle, while gnomes are another standard set piece, but “every carver carves bears.” Giustini, whose commissions have extended throughout New England, did a variation on that theme with a bear holding a fishing pole with a fish on the end, made of lighter wood to allow bobbing action and brightened with paint. “I don’t paint on canvas, I get to paint on wood,” which, like the stains, may require several coats for outdoor durability. “There’s a lot of painting and staining that goes with it.”

More recently, Giustini executed a flying bald eagle – its huge wings dramatically raised – for delivery to a client in Charlestown. “The wings were kind of pointed straight up. I try to make it like they have some life to them,” which also requires some finer carving. The ecstatic client told him, “I gotta try not to stay up all night looking at that eagle.”

“A lot of this work is done with an angle grinder,” for example under the beak of the Charlestown eagle. Similarly, he evolved past the grosser effects of a belt sander to ever-finer tools, such as Dremel rotary grinders with numerous attachments.

And unlike a smock-wearing oil painter working on canvas in a studio, Giustini works outdoors and dressed for the part. “I wear a respirator, hearing protection,” with exposure to gas and oil from the chainsaw, “protective shoes, gloves of course.

It’s a dangerous job. You can die from this very easily if you slice your leg open,” he said. “I just have an umbrella that I stay out of the sun with.”

Giustini, in his modest way, says that, “The work has gotten a lot better this year. The quality, the realistic look. People are buying these things to put in their homes, which was always one of my goals.”

Absent the large indoor work space required to continue his work in the colder weather, Giustini is considering forsaking landscaping forever and taking his chainsaw carving skills (“it’s an interesting job, it’s not like there’s a lot of people doing it”) on the road for the winter months, maybe across the South on the way back to Utah, politely knocking on doors where good candidate tree stumps are awaiting outside.

What Giustini likes most about his newly-carved vocation seems to be the creative freedom it offers. “Definitely. You’ve got the freedom to do whatever comes into your mind and there’s no limit to what you can do,” he said.

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Inside the Brown Bag The Costume

By Peg Brown “Upon that night, when fairies light/On Cassilis Downans dance…/Some merry, friendly, country-folks,/ Together did convene,/To burn their nuts, and pile their shocks of wheat,/And have their Halloween…”

Robert Burns, Scottish poet, Hallowe’en, 1785 I didn’t know that I owed thanks to my Celtic ancestors, both Scottish and Irish, for the pounds of candy I collected trick or treating over my life. However, the poem Hallowe’en written in the 18th century, confirms that this hallowed day and its many rituals were firmly rooted in the old world Christian celebrations of harvest and horror. The celebrations that evolved into the North American modern day Halloween have for centuries and in countries around the world had a number of commonalities—they usually involved dressing in costumes to scare off the spirits that might be walking the earth (guising as it was called in some countries), lighting candles to guide the souls of the departed, visiting homes, requesting bits of food or other treats, and threatening a prank if the request was ignored. As the Irish and Scottish immigrated to America and Canada during the 19th century, the observance traveled with them. Although the stuffy Puritans of New England held distain for this holiday as they did for most things related to the Church of England, by the 20th century, Halloween had firmly es-

tablished itself in the American culture.

However, as with most things, the ghosts and goblins of the past would hardly recognize Halloween today. If you have a great deal of patience, take a trip to Wal-Mart to confirm how things have changed. If you haven’t yet put together your costume and if you have the tenacity to wade through the tinsel, trees, glitter, ribbon, bows and ornaments, you might still find a few remnants of the orange and black holiday scattered somewhere near the clearance shelves. I understand the “hot” costume for the year for young girls is anything related to the Disney phenomenon “Frozen”— or in a pinch, any of the Disney princesses’ costumes will do. For young boys, I am guessing that the super heroes still provide the inspiration for their trick-or-treat outfits. And don’t forget the costume for the dog or cat in your family—according to last year’s surveys, 13.8 percent of Americans will dress their pets to the tune of $330 million.

All of this, of course, prompts me to recall the Halloween traditions of our youth. Store bought costumes were rare. As young girls, my sister and I often raided closets and trunks where, stored lovingly in tissue, were some prom dresses from my mother’s high school days. A favorite had a black velvet bodice, white bouffant tulle skirt, and tiny black bows made from sequins. Our own version

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A truly last minute and undesirable alternative was simply taking an old white sheet, cutting two holes for eyes (which never really seemed to line up

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with our line of vision, causing a night of tripping and readjusting the bed sheet to avoid falling on door steps) and taking to the street with a matching pillow case for our loot. There was a real down side in using a pillow case however—after a full night of running from porch to porch, there never seemed to be more than a few inches of candy in the bottom of the bag--always leading to disappointment. Another Halloween disappointment was the struggle with our parents who, in inclement weather, insisted we wear a coat over our costume! The requirement often led us to creatively try to hide this extra layer under our costume—quite a challenge when wearing one of those prom dresses.

I did check one website to see if I could determine what might have been the most popular costumes of our day. Pattern books from the 1950s and 1960s show that cat, leopard, rabbit and bunny costumes were popular, especially with the younger set, and early versions of space costumes were also in evidence (remember, this was the era of Sputnik, the race for space, and the original Star Trek television series). Also shown were witches, clowns, devils, the ever popular princesses, and superheroes Bat Man, Superman and Robin.

And the loot! Word quickly spread from gang to gang which houses were giving out full size candy bars—which cost 5 cents apiece at the time. And word spread just as quickly, identifying the houses that were resorting to apples and bags of popcorn. Part of the ritual of preparing for Halloween in our home was putting candy corn in small treat bags. Nobody worried as I recall about passing out “unwrapped” candy that had been assembled in other than a factory. The “big scare” of our day was always the rumor that someone might have put pins or a razor blade into the apples, causing us, when sorting our take for the night, to immediately put those aside for further adult inspection. I am sure that no one was worried about marijuana or heroin laced goodies. Perhaps the most important part of the night involved the sorting and trading of our candy. We were very protective of our favorite candy and you can bet there was more than one struggle over who ate my Milky Way (only to find out that it was Mother).

There were certainly some traditional recipes associated with Halloween—caramel corn and candy apples headed the list in our home. However, we never did get the red glaze for traditional candy apples to harden and we always dipped the apples into the liquid when it was too hot—resulting often in apple sauce on a stick. Caramel apples were the alternative—until we figured out that you had to unwrap about 100 individual caramels to get five or six apples. For obvious reasons that tradition didn’t linger long in the Cordwell kitchen. And, while the activity was often depicted in story books about Hal-

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loween, we never did bob for apples.

I recall that we did “celebrate” Halloween in school, at least in the early grades. I dimly remember costume parades in the old elementary gymnasium. Today, as we all know, Halloween, like many other holidays of our youth is under fire in school districts across the nation. As one superintendent in St. Paul, MN recently commented, “Halloween I think has a complicated relationship with religion.” With some roots in Christianity, it too is going the way of Christmas celebrations in public schools.

Besides, one of the arguments for removing all holiday celebrations from schools is that it will leave more time for teaching the core curriculum. (Feel free to make your own comments here.)

Oh, I almost forgot—The Costume. When I was about 7 years old, my mother made me the one costume I remember from my youth—a drum majorette uniform, complete with short black skirt, a red top and tall hat, all decorated with silver ribbon. The piece de resistance, however, were my tall white goulashes, decorated with fat red yarn tassels. A batman type black mask and baton completed the ensemble. My chances of becoming a drum majorette were very slim, so in the spirit of Halloween (no pun intended), this was truly pure fantasy.

(Note: I still have that baton which I could twirl in my best days. I now use it to fish dog hair out of my dryer’s lint trap.)

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Author’s notes: • The first jack-o-lanterns in Europe were actually carved turnips.

• The first wrapped penny candy—Tootsie Rolls.

• The average amount we’ll all spend on Halloween, $75.03; total expected to be spent on costumes, $2.6 billion; total spent on all things Halloween in 2013, $6.9 billion. Americans will buy more than 600 million pounds of candy just for Halloween this year; Reese’s, M&Ms and Snickers top the list as America’s favorite Halloween candies; kids will collect, on average, roughly 3,500-7,000 calories. According to some estimates, a kid would have to play basketball for 15 hours to work it all off.

• As proof that Halloween costumes reflect current culture—an article published last year by the Associated Press asked if it was too soon for Ebola zombies, bloody Ebola patients and faux protective gear to be a Halloween costume of choice this year.

One more note on the morphing of American holidays: Columbus Day is on the chopping block. Many communities are changing the name to Fall Weekend or Indigenous Peoples’ Day in an effort to be more politically correct.

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Pigs, lambs, chickens and kids are gone but memories stayed in historic Federalist home in Smithfield woods

By Dick Martin There is a little bit of Vermont tucked away in a quiet corner of Smithfield which few know about. And it’s for sale…

As you motor up the long, quiet paved driveway off Farnum Pike, it seems as if you are heading into a woodlot or some kind of park area, until you turn a corner and find yourself facing a circa early 1800s farmhouse surrounded by stonewalls, and massive George Washington maples. Once the center of a 100-acre farm, the 10-room Federal style garrison is surrounded by pergolas, a picket fence and stone and brick verandas. A testimony to early American hard work, skill and talent, it doesn’t seem possible that you could be only 15 minutes from Providence, and only a few short miles away from the bustling center of Greenville.

“A lot of people don’t know it’s here,” smiles Kelley Rowley, who along with her husband Gordon, have owned and lived on the property since 1981. “People who have lived in town still refer to it as the ‘Andrews farm.’”

The farm is loaded with history. Originally, the federal style, center hall edifice was the Silas Smith House, who constructed it c.1810. Silas was a descendant of Elisha Smith, who built the historic Smith-Appleby House on Stillwater Road, and was the grandson of John Smith, who arrived in Rhode Island with Roger Williams. Silas, a prosperous farmer, was actively involved in the local community, including being one of the founders of the Smithfield Exchange Bank, located next to Greenville Fire Station. A letter on EBay, written by Silas’wife, Esther, and dated June 26, 1842, describes some of the early conflicts of the inhabitants during the Dorr War, including an encounter with government officials who fired pistol shots at the chimney, marking it as the home of rebel sympathizers.

The home traveled through several families before landing in Fred Andrews’ possession, sometime after 1920.

“There are many people in town who still remember Fred Andrews stationed at the end of his driveway on Farnum Pike selling sweet corn and other vegetables out of the back of his pick-up truck,” says Gordon.

He also sold coal and operated the only school bus in town at one point in time.

When the Rowleys acquired the property in 1981, it was not as pristine as it is today.

“It needed a lot of work,” admits Gordon. “It had knob and tube wiring, the original blackout curtains from World War II…no heat except for a wood stove.”

“It was a typical farm,” adds Kelley.

The Rowleys rolled up their sleeves and went to work, rebuilding walls, and adding not one, but two heating systems: a forced hot air on the first floor and a forced hot water oil furnace for the second. They replaced sills, repaired clapboards, scraped, renovated, painted and landscaped, adding a variety of well

20

A white picket fence cast in the shade of giant George Washington maple trees paint a quaint pastoral scene at the Federalist period home of Gordon and Kelley Rowley hidden in the woods of Smithfield.

Photos by Dick Martin/The Smithfield Times thought out touches, such as a small decorative pond near the back steps. A massive, well maintained 30 X 40 foot barn with a gambrel roof stands nearby as does a four car garage. The barn’s first floor is supported by granite posts. Currently, Gordon makes use of it as a workshop of sorts. The aura of early American barn pervades with its gambrel roof offering extensive hay storage on the upper floor.

The house, which includes a three-room ell off the back, provides plenty of wandering room from basement to attic. It is the kind of grand old garrison that is filled with plenty of inviting rooms for a quiet read or nap, if you choose to do so. There is even one room with four windows and seven doors. Try to imagine that. It seems like it could be the central gathering place of the home. The basement has eight foot or better ceilings and more room for storage or what have you, including a walk out at one end, which is somewhat unusual for homes of this era. It is thought that Andrews once used it as a store for his produce, since there were shelves and a counter at one end.

There is even an original working outhouse with a domed ceiling, no less.

The Rowleys talk about the farm with affection. Here is where their two daughters grew up, and where their daughters’ friends found a special place to hang out.

“This was a great place for our kids to grow up,” says Kelley. “We had pigs, sheep, chickens and each other. All of our kids’ friends think of it as part of their childhood too. When my daughters were small, and we had lambs in the spring, she would take one into school with her for the other kids to see. They loved that!”

The fact that the 12-acre farm is surrounded by land trust parcels and state land only adds to its unique nature and offers the promise of continued seclusion and privacy which is rare to find these days.

“The part I like best is the setting,” adds Kelley. “The house is surrounded by George Washington maples which go back to the Revolutionary War. It doesn’t

October 2015

matter what time of year it is, it’s always beautiful!”

It would be hard to pick what the best place to spend a quiet evening or afternoon would be. There is the sunny stone patio and pergola on the south side. On the north side, a shaded vined brick floor pergola is neatly tucked inside the elbow

“It needed a lot of work,” Gordon Rowley, said about the condition of the house when he and his wife, Kelley, bought it in 1981. “It had knob and tube wiring, the original blackout curtains from World War II…no heat except for a wood stove.” of the ell and home. The ell itself, which has an early American feel to it, lies in between, and offers a breezy, comfortable spot with sliding glass doors on both sides of the first room. You could have a cup of coffee and read the paper in the morning on the south side, then have a glass of wine and cheese and crackers on the north side in the evening.

As far as being too far off the beaten path, the Rowleys recalled rarely losing power over the years, partly due to its close proximity to Route 295 and major nearby power lines. Regardless, an original cast iron wood stove sits in the middle of the modernized kitchen, add- On the north side of the historic house, a shaded ing ambiance and charm, as vined brick floor pergola is neatly tucked inside the well as practical application, elbow of the ell and home. The ell itself, which has an early American feel to it, lies in between, and if needed.

So, you ask, how could offers a breezy, comfortable spot with sliding glass anyone stand to leave this oa- doors on both sides of the first room. sis of quietude and privacy?

“When we leave, we’ll be sad,” admits Kelley. “But as we get older, we don’t need a big home.”

“We thought about getting a condo,” admits Gordon, “but said no, no way. I couldn’t stand being that close to someone else.”

The plan is to buy a small cottage somewhere in the country, they add.

Maybe a place in Vermont would be nice…

The farm is listed for $599,000. For more information contact Ed Duffy@949-5400 or go to edduffy.com.

The Smithfield Times, Inc.

21

Newsies brings its energy and verve to PPAC

By Laurence J. Sasso, Jr. Anyone with a drop of printer’s ink in their blood can’t help but have a soft spot in their heart for a show like Newsies. The high energy production opens Oct. 20 at the Providence Performing Arts Center for a one week run.

Some of us who edit, write, and report to earn our daily bread began our involvement with print journalism delivering papers by bicycle or on foot, working at our first jobs to connect our neighbors with the world as they ate their breakfast. In my case it was my own publication, The Neighborhood News, a single sheet mimeographed (very) local product which I distributed on my bike. It began a life-long romance with newspapers, magazines, and books.

Newsies gives journalism junkies like me, and anyone else who likes a good story set to music, a chance to look back at the heyday of newsprint. It was an era when circulation wars were big stuff and print was at the undisputed center of the media universe.

A publicity release from Disney Theatrical Productions provides this synopsis of the show: “Set in New York City at the turn of the century, Newsies is the rousing tale of Jack Kelly, a charismatic newsboy and leader of a ragged band of teenaged ‘newsies,’ who dreams only of a better life far from the hardship of the streets. But when publishing titans Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst raise distribution prices at the newsboys’ expense, Jack finds a cause to fight for and rallies newsies from across the city to strike for what’s right.” There’s a love story too, of course.

The musical’s book is based on a real event, the newsboy strike of 1899, which pitted undercompensated delivery squads of youths, many of whom were orphans, against the publishing moguls Pulitzer and Hearst. The strike became something of a legend and focused attention on the labor practices of the age, particularly as they affected children.

When it opened on March 29, 2012 Newsies was intended for a Broadway run of just 101 performances. The show’s fiercely devoted fans had other ideas, however, and they propelled the show to a run of 1005 performances, attendance of more than one million, and a gross of over $100,000,000. For information contact PPAC at (401) 421-2787.

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October 2015

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High School Happenings

By Joe Baxter “High School Happenings” is a new column that will be featured monthly in The Smithfield Times.

Joe Baxter, a junior at Smithfield High School, will report on high school news.

School is back! For students and teachers that means a lot of things. The first day of school brings alarm clocks ringing, rushing to make the bus, meeting new teachers, and seeing friends. But for one individual this year’s first day was the beginning of a new chapter in her life: Linda Murphy, Smithfield’s new Assistant Principal.

Before her first interview Murphy decided to research Smithfield High School. She was floored by all the school has to offer just by glancing at its website.

She said that it was love at first sight. After the interviews, she was extremely excited to hear that she had been selected as SHS’s new Assistant principal.

“I really won the prize,” she said.

When asked about her first day at Smithfield Mur-

New Assistant Principal Murphy: “I really won the prize.”

“High School Happenings” is a new column that will be featured monthly in The Smithfield Times.

Joe Baxter, a junior at Smithfield High School, will report on high school news. phy conceded she was nervous. Nevertheless, she feels very welcomed by the students, faculty, and staff.

“I really feel like I am a part of the Smithfield community, which is so important,” she said. She discussed the atmosphere in the high school, and the town saying how moved she was by the tight-knit community feeling. Murphy said that her favorite part about SHS is the people. She said that her favorite aspect of her new position is developing connections and relationships with students and staff on an individual basis.

“The students here are just fantastic,” Murphy replied when speaking about her philosophy on education. Her passion for the students is clear, and she put it simply, “Education is a career you can’t not love.”

Murphy, however, wasn’t always an educator. She began her career in the field of business management, which she enjoyed, but the 70-hour weeks started to wear on her, especially with a baby at home. So

Murphy began as an in-home daycare service, which she loved, but she wanted something more. She went back to school to earn an education degree. When she began teaching she fell in love with it.

“I realized that being an educator means that you get to influence the future in a profound way, so it was a no-brainer,” she said. She hopes to bring an excited and positive attitude with her to Smithfield.

Being positive is important to Murphy.

“There is always a positive in every situation, you just have to focus on it,” she asserted. The best way to start a new school year is with a positive attitude, she contended.

Murphy said she is delighted to be a Sentinel, and to begin her work in the Smithfield Community.

To all students, teachers, administrators, and staff I hope that you have a fantastic school year that brings many challenges, successes, and lessons learned.

Good luck!

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23

IMHO The jet set that might have been

By Ron Scopelliti Last month, an online publication rated my old school, UMass Dartmouth, as number one in an article called “The Definitive List of 19 Ugliest College Campuses in America.” The article, which was basically a slight revision of their 2014 article called “The Definitive List of 17 Ugliest College Campuses in America,” gave a rather inadequate justification of the rating by describing the campus’s complex design in one sentence, calling it “full of Brutalist spectacles.” As a fan of Brutalist architecture, I actually took that as a positive.

I’ve always really liked the campus. It reminds me of a cross between a Mayan ruin and a sci-fi city of the future. True it’s unusual and somewhat impractical but it’s undoubtedly thought-provoking, as evidenced by the numerous myths on campus about why the school looks the way it does. And if there’s one place where “thought-provoking” can trump “practical” in architecture, it’s a college campus.

At first, the article just got me angry, but then it started me thinking about what constituted ugly. I didn’t want to write a column based purely on ugliness, so my mind wandered to the classic Sergio Leone movie, “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.”

It got me thinking about the things that I think are good, bad, or ugly.

When it comes to the good, it’s probably not worth mentioning the obvious things like health, personal fulfillment, and bacon. So I started thinking of the unsung good things.

Like bear claws. Not the pastry, the real thing.

Though I have to cop to the fact that I was in Panera eating a bear claw when the idea came to me. Where would bears be without their claws? Sure, they’d still have big, nasty teeth and tons of muscle, but can you imagine some poor bear snatching a salmon from a fast-moving river and trying to hang onto it without any claws?

It would make for a great YouTube video as the bear fumbled about, but it would really diminish the mystique of the alpha predator, and we’re richer for having that mystique. It reminds us of the power and majesty of nature, especially when one of these guys tears open a hatchback like it was a sardine can, just to get to a granola bar that was left on the front seat.

I think binge-watching TV shows is another good thing. Whether it’s Netflix, Hulu, or any of the other web TV services around, I think they’ve brought a whole new dimension to obsessive television watching.

It’s not like the old days when you had to wait for a once-a-year marathon of “The Twilight Zone” or “The Three Stooges” to binge, or you had to buy a DVD set. Now, at a moment’s notice, you can decide to watch the entire sole season of “Firefly” in a day, amplifying the disappointment that the show never made it to a second season. On second thought, may-

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October 2015

be I should move binge-watching to my “bad” list.

At the top of my “bad” list are broken doorknobs. It sounds like an odd thing to fixate upon, but I went through a period when I had too many broken doorknobs in my life, both at home and in the office. The odd thing is, instead of repairing or replacing them, I’d compensate by not closing doors. But there was always the danger that I’d accidentally close a door and not be able to get in or out of the room because the doorknob didn’t work. I think I exaggerated this danger because of a time many years ago when I didn’t see “doorknob broken!” sign as I was leaving a URI dining hall, and got caught between two doors in a sort of airlock.

Luckily they were glass doors, and someone recognized my plight and let me out.

But what if the doors hadn’t been see-through or there was nobody there to let me out? I could’ve been stuck in some sort of bleak, existentialist one-man play come-to-life. Caught between two doors with nothing but my own thoughts.

That’s the sort of play I wouldn’t wish on any audience, so please, take this as a public service announcement, and make sure your doorknobs are all fully functional.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that instead of including broken doorknobs in the “bad” category, I should have put functioning doorknobs in the “good” category.

Having had so much trouble differentiating good from bad, I hardly know where to go with ugly. Defining something as ugly is a problem for me because a lot of the things I think are ugly also have a certain beauty to them. I think Rte. 146 is a particularly ugly road, but it has some beautiful areas alongside it, like Lincoln Woods, Purgatory Chasm.

I think Pontiac Azteks are ugly, but they’re so distinctive that I found myself hoping “Breaking Bad” would turn them into sought-after collector’s cars. I don’t think it did.

I think most CGI animation is ugly, but I kind of like the Minions. Then again, that could be because they look like Twinkies, which I now seem to be craving.

Maybe, as evidenced by my initial reluctance to write a column based solely on ugliness, I just can’t buy into writing that needlessly emphasizes the negative over the positive. I think in the future, I’d like to visit all 19 of those allegedly ugly campuses (which I wonder if the author of the article did before bashing their architecture) and find the underlying beauty in each of them. If nothing else, I suppose I’d at least find a place to get a Twinkie, and a dining hall to get some coffee to wash it down with. I hope the doorknobs all work.

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Meanderings The trouble with robots is …

By Dick Martin I’m waiting for the apocalypse…either that or the walking dead….or an invasion from outer space.

Think about it. In the past we had comic books, like Flash Gordon, where Flash flew to the moon and back. “Ain’t gonna happen” laughed people. “But, I love reading this make-a-believe stuff.”

What happens next? Boom, here we are sending space ships to the moon and taking a stroll on that pockmarked surface, planting a flag…maybe having lunar lunch. Don’t forget all those old space travel TV shows about living on other planets, rocketing into outer space, living on space stations, etc. Yep, we’re doing that. In fact, you can even sign up (for an enormous fee) for a trip into outer space!

So, the way I see it, comic books and now movies are the best predictions of what will happen in the future. That makes perfect sense in today’s world.

We used to talk about art imitating nature. Now we talk about movies imitating reality. Why else would

we have reality shows?

When I was a toddler, I remember watching a sci-fi movie about a guy inventing a flying suit and flying around, much to the amazement of everyone.

Now, we have jet propelled flying suits. Yves Rossy, a Swiss pilot, developed a flying suit, a kind of backpack with 8 foot wings and two jet engines. People call him Rocketman, among other names. Observers have watched him do loops and even fly over the Alps at 120 MPH. I can see the ad now: “Coming soon to a store near you: the new Rocket Suit! Why wait around for the bus or be stuck in traffic? Simply blast off from your front step and be at your workplace door in no time at all!” Of course, the price tag, like the first computers, will be astronomical, until the competition gets going and the price eventually drops to a reasonable cost. As long as people aren’t dropping from the sky from lack of fuel or whatever, this is a definite possibility! We saw it first

in a 1950s movie! Think Ironman is a fantasy?

Then there were all those movies about computers taking over the world, beginning with Hal, one of the stars of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I hated the slow moving film, but I was fascinated by the prospect of Hal: Heuristically programmed ALgorhytmic computer, who basically takes over the planet.

Tell me we aren’t being taken over by computers!

Everything is run by computers, it seems, even your car! Next thing you know, one of them will be smart enough to connect the dots and we, as humans, will be up the creek!

Remember the first robot story? Of course you don’t because the first one was published in 1868: Steam Man of the Prairies. It’s about a robot that pulls a locomotive in Ed Ellis’ novel. Then, another appeared in 1907, Tik-Tok , in L. Frank Baum’s novel Ozma of Oz. Looking back, they were both kind of ridiculous at the time, but…

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My first favorite robot was Robby the Robot in the series The Forbidden Planet. It was a kind of protective, good natured robot; precursor to the robot warning in the 1960s’ American television series Lost in Space: “Danger, Will Robinson!” I could deal with that. It would be nice to have a robot, I thought at the time. Some companion who would do my bidding, fetch a soda, clean my room, do my homework. That would be cool.

Then there was RoboCop, about a guy turned into half (or three quarters, whatever) robot who goes around catching bad guys.

I am not sure what to think about that. If he is part human and part robot, where is the halfway point? Does he have bodily functions, for example? Gives a whole different meaning to “feeling a little rusty…”

Then, of course, there was the Terminator. Ouch. Great protection, but scary enemy. And what about I, Robot?

We could go on with this, but let’s face it: this is now reality. First of all, we have industrial robots, which have taken the place of workers. I witnessed this firsthand at a Harley Davidson plant in Pennsylvania. This robot picked up a sheet of metal, rolled over to a press, placed it carefully on a mold, and then reached up and pushed the appropriate button. The machine pressed the metal into a perfect fender. The robot lifted it up, rolled to a stack of fenders nearby and placed it carefully on top, then whisked back to the stack of sheet metal. No breaks, no overtime, no complaining, no demands. Just endless work on task. Then there is the Roomba, a self propelled vacuum cleaner, and various other “cute” robots, including Janken, a rock-paper-scissors robot which has never lost to a human. In one second it can analyze the potential throw of its human opponent and counter him with a winning move.

We have robots that diffuse bombs, robots that can think on their own and robots that have the potential to feel, as well, according to some scientists. One of the most amazing and impressive discoveries is connecting robotic arms and legs to humans who have lost limbs. You wonder where this will all end up.

Well, here it is. According to the latest in Robotic News, there is already a movement underway to prevent the use of robots for sex! Yep, read that sentence again. That is what it said. According to the geek site Gizmodo, robot ethicists are already seeking a ban on a sex robot, Roxxy, which is in the process of being developed as you read this column. A company called True Companion claims to be developing “the world’s first sex robot.” They already have thousands of pre-orders for the $7,000 bot.

I, Robot, a fantasy? I think not.

But that isn’t the scary part. You know those sci-fi movies where the robots take over the world? According to the movies, this can happen. The scary part, however, is when modern day actual scientific geniuses start predicting the same.

Stephen Hawking warns that artificial intelligence could end mankind. British Broadcasting Corporation reported Hawking said: “The development of artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race.” Makes me not want to watch anymore sci-fi movies for fear of what I may see coming in the future.

And then there’s the Walking Dead?

Yikes. I’m not sure it’s make believe anymore…

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Time Capsules And Unexpected Finds

By Jim Ignasher “Bet you never expected to find a note in a bottle.”

I wrote those words more than 35 years ago on the outside of a rolled up piece of paper that I sealed in an empty Miller beer bottle to let whoever might find it know that the piece of paper inside contained a note. I was a junior at Bryant College, (Now Bryant University) sitting in my dorm room when the thought of making a time capsule (of sorts) came to mind. I decided the best place for the “message in a bottle” would be the heating duct over the door covered by a vent held in place by two screws. I figured that someday it might be discovered, giving the one who found it a small thrill out of finding something unexpected.

At the time I could only imagine who that person might be. Perhaps they had yet to be born.

I’ve left such things behind everywhere I’ve lived, even if it was by accident.

When I was fourteen I made a secret panel in the wall of my bedroom closet in which I would put certain things I thought worth hiding. The removable panel was totally undetectable. Imagine my surprise when I came home from college for a visit and discovered the closet lined with new cedar paneling! To this day several rolls of wheat-back pennies and a few other odds and ends are still entombed there waiting to be discovered during future renovations.

The house I grew up in was built in 1935, a fact I learned when a kitchen wall was being knocked down. Inside we found a folded yellowed newspaper, an empty Coca-Cola bottle, a ball of wax paper, (which presumably once held a sandwich), and a screw driver. I could imagine how a workman finishing his lunch simply placed everything in the wall before closing it up, but I wondered about the screw driver. Was that by accident, or design?

Making such discoveries can be fun, even if the relics aren’t worth much in terms of monetary value.

The notion of deliberately leaving something behind to be found by someone in the future isn’t exactly a new idea. Early man left cave drawings, and graffiti left by long dead laborers has been found in ancient buildings. Somewhere along the line this idea led to the creation of time capsules – caches of items left for future generations.

Some may be unaware that Smithfield also has a time capsule. It’s buried under a stone marker in Deerfield Park and scheduled to be opened in 2050 A.D. I hope I’m there to see it.

Who made the first time capsule, and when, is unknown, but the oldest known time capsule ever found in the United States was left by none other than Sam Adams and Paul Revere in 1795. It was only recently discovered in December of 2014 by workmen repairing the cornerstone of the Old State House in Boston. Items inside included five folded newspapers, 24 coins, and

28

a sterling silver plate attributed to Paul Revere.

Less than three months earlier, yet another time capsule, this one from 1901, was discovered hidden in the head of the gold-leaf lion atop the same building. One has to wonder how many others are yet unknown in a city with so much history.

What’s billed as “the world’s largest time capsule” is buried in Steward, Nebraska, said to weigh 45 tons.

Inside are hundreds of artifacts from 1975, including a 1975 Chevrolet Vega – a car rarely seen today.

Yet placing an automobile in a time capsule isn’t as original as one might think. A time capsule buried in 1957 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, contained a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere with five gallons of gas in the trunk – in case cars of the 21st century no longer ran on gas, a la George Jetson. Unfortunately, when opened in 2007, it was discovered that the special efforts taken to preserve the car during its fifty year hiatus had failed.

Some may be unaware that Smithfield also has a time capsule. It’s buried under a stone marker in Deerfield Park and scheduled to be opened in 2050 A.D. I hope I’m there to see it.

I once knew a man who worked for an historic home restoration company who told me of his most bizarre find while working on an old farmhouse in southern Rhode Island - a coffin containing human remains in the cellar! The homeowner had hired the company for restoration work, part of which involved the removal of a two-foot depth of the cellar’s dirt-floor before a cement floor would be poured. The gruesome discovery brought the job to a halt while authorities investigated and determined there’d been no foul play. It was surmised that the deceased had died during the winter months when the ground was too frozen to dig the grave, so they were “temporarily” buried in the cellar instead.

Apparently when spring arrived other chores took priority and well-enough was left alone. One has to wonder at what point over the ensuing years did a homeowner “forget” to mention to a buyer this tid-bit of information.

While I can’t verify his claim, I knew him well enough to have no reason to doubt him, for although such finds are rare, they do happen. In 1912 the Woonsocket Call reported a secret staircase and human bones were discovered during restoration work at the Governor Bellingham-Gray House in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Today the house is a museum.

October 2015

Closer to home is a story that appeared in local papers in October of 1965, about two boys who discovered a secret room in a 1794 house on Winsor Avenue in Johnston. The room contained some old leather shoes, but none of them made a pair, leading one to wonder why they had been saved.

Last year I ran into an acquaintance who is in the process of renovating an old house who told me about a pristine condition 1909 Rhode Island license plate he discovered while tearing up an old floor. Obviously it had been placed there for some future person to find. I was suddenly reminded of the note in a bottle I’d left in my old college dorm room.

Was it still there? This past July I decided to find out.

Most of the dorms at Bryant University are unoccupied during the summer, and after talking with a campus public safety officer, he agreed to escort me on my quest. He doubted I’d find anything due to renovations to the dorms over the years, and when I entered my former room I saw what he meant. Next to the heating duct were two conduits for the fire alarm system coming from the wall which hadn’t existed when I lived there.

Nonetheless I removed the vent and reached inside. The duct work makes an immediate right turn, and I’d placed the bottle there, but when I extended my arm I couldn’t feel anything. I reached deeper – nothing. Perhaps someone had found it after all. Yet I’d come prepared so that I could be sure. Using a small mirror and flashlight, I was able to look deeper around the corner. There I saw the bottle, just out of reach and tipped on its side; knocked over perhaps when the fire alarm system was upgraded. By using a bent coat hanger to extend my reach, I was able to retrieve it.

Aside from a little dust on the glass, it was just as I’d sealed it 35 years ago.

The first thing I noticed was that the labels were now “vintage” and no longer used by the Miller Brewing Co. I’d forgotten what I’d written in the note, which, unfortunately, wasn’t very much: just a date, March 27, 1980, and a couple of facts about the dorm. Wrapped inside the note was a picture cut from a college brochure showing what the dorms at Bryant looked like in 1980. Other than the mature landscaping of today, they look the same. One last item I’d added was a shiny penny dated 1979. Except for some slight oxidation along one edge, the coin still held a shine.

Well, I had my answer, and considered putting everything back, but the university couldn’t knowingly allow it, so I took it with me and put it on a shelf in my office. Recently a family friend asked about it and I told her the story. “That’s interesting” she said as she held the bottle in her hand, and then reminded me that she was born in September of 1980, several months after I had placed it in the heating duct.

I’ve wondered if any other like minded Bryant students over the years have done the same in their dorm rooms. I guess time will tell.

The Smithfield Times, Inc.

50 Years Ago – October, 1965 By Jim Ignasher Autumn is harvest season, and a bushel basket containing samples of apples picked from local orchards was presented to then Governor John Chafee during National Apple Week. (National Apple Week was established in 1904 by the U.S. Apple Association. In 1996, it was expanded to include the entire month of October. ) On hand at the presentation were Fred Lees, Howard King, Edgar Steere, Stephen Steere, Roland Swallow, John Wiggins, Mrs. Pulford, and her daughter Marilyn, who was the reigning R.I. Apple Blossom Queen.

The annual Farnum Heights Bike Race was held in Georgiaville, sponsored by the Farnum Plat Association. The race began at the corner of Old County Road and Lakeside Drive and meandered through the side streets. Youthful participants were divided into classes based on age and the size of their bicycles, and winners were awarded prizes.

Esmond Girl Scout Troop 894 camped out overnight at the Smithfield Sportsman’s Club during the Columbus Day weekend. The young ladies earned merit badges for learning “refractor baking” on makeshift tin foil convection “ovens”. The outing was supervised by Mrs. Joan Sweeney, Mrs. Phyllis Parsakian, and troop leader Mrs. Marjorie Demaine.

Seventeen Boy Scouts from Troop 4 in Greenville attended the Twin Valley Camporee held at Camp Yawgoog from Oct. 15-17. The troop earned a certificate of award for cross country hiking.

Mrs. Elizabeth Bancroft of Esmond received a “thank you” note from President Johnson for writing and sending a poem to the White House titled “Supplication For Peace”.

The Catholic Diocese of Providence honored Esmond resident Joseph A. Picard of St. Michael’s Parish with an outstanding achievement award for “outstanding leadership in helping foster a 4-point Catholic Youth Organization program.”

The Cranford Club celebrated 60 years as an organization by baking a massive cake and sharing it with the residents of Zambarano Hospital in Burrillville. (The Cranford Club was a Smithfield women’s service organization. Their many charitable works included volunteering at the hospital.)

The Smithfield Junior Women’s Club cancelled a wine tasting program scheduled for Oct. 11 at the Greenville Baptist Church, and held a Tupperware Party instead.

On Oct. 13, the Apple Blossom Garden Club held its regular meeting at the Greenville Baptist Church. Mrs. Feinberg, the guest speaker, talked about horticulture.

The Northern R.I. Mothers of Twins Club held their meeting in the church on Oct. 21.

The (Smithfield) Township Preservation & Development Council launched the “Smithfield Anti-Litter Campaign” with the goal of cleaning up copious amounts of trash that had accumulated along the town’s roadsides. The first area designated for cleanup was the stretch of Route 44 between Cedar Swamp Road and Greenville Center. The task was accomplished by numerous volunteers, among them were members of Boy Scout troops 1, 2, and 4, as well as members of several 4-H Clubs.

Construction on the Waterman Heights Nursing Home on Putnam Pike was completed, and on Oct. 24 the public was invited to attend an open house to inspect the building. The home was built on the site of a former apple orchard.

The Director was Mrs. Marian Stewart of Greenville, a former army nurse who served in WWII. Local auto dealerships advertised that the new 1966 models were in. The latest Studebaker’s were equipped with an improved ventilation system which allowed fresh air to move freely through the car while it was in motion. (This was a selling point in the days before standard AC in autos.)

A Pontiac dealer’s ad referring to the newly styled Tempest read: “Dramatically fresh and new; but still very, very, Pontiac.”

A Masquerade Ball, sponsored by the St. Aloysius Saint Peters Club, was held Oct. 30 at the Dillon Council Knights of Columbus hall in North Providence. Also on that night, the Smithfield Recreation Association held its annual Halloween Party in the (former) recreation hall on Esmond Street.

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I love, love, love Halloween, but I’m a big chicken when it comes to slasher flicks. I’m not at all acquainted with Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, or Michael Myers, and I still don’t know what you did last summer. To answer the famous question from Scream (1996) — the only slasher movie I’ve been able to watch all the way through — I don’t like scary movies. So here are some suggestions for all my fellow chickens who want to get into the holiday spirit with funny, rather than frightening, Halloween films.

For a hilarious spoof of a horror classic, try Young Frankenstein (1974). This Mel Brooks comedy stars Gene Wilder as Frederick, the skeptical grandson of the original Dr. Frankenstein, who returns to his family’s ancestral castle and attempts to recreate his grandfather’s most famous experiment. Far from a mean-spirited parody, Young Frankenstein pays loving tribute to its source material by including many gags drawn directly from the 1930s Frankenstein films. However, you don’t need to be familiar with the original Universal monster movies to appreciate Brooks’s character-based humor. In addition to the usual puns and pratfalls, Brooks mines comedic gold out of Marty Feldman’s affable Igor, whose hunch has a habit of switching shoulders; Cloris Leachman’s stern Frau Blucher, whose very name prompts horses to neigh in terror; and Peter Boyle’s surprisingly sympathetic Monster, who demonstrates his mental abilities by performing a song-and-dance number. The always dependable Madeline Kahn appears as Frederick’s shrill fiancée, and Teri Garr goes German as Inga, Frederick’s sweet and affectionate lab assistant.

For a wisecracking supernatural comedy, call the Ghostbusters (1984). Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, and Bill Murray star as Stantz, Spengler, and Venkman, a trio of downand-out paranormal scientists who start their own ghostbusting business to finance their unconventional research. Though the film quickly escalates their work from removing ghosts to saving the world, the three stars keep things light with their fantastic comedic chemistry and deadpan banter. The movie also renders the Ghostbusters more accessible by playing up their struggles as entrepreneurs; besides capturing slimy ghosts and thwarting interdimensional beings, the Ghostbusters also have to deal with city officials and the EPA. Fourth Ghostbuster Winston (Ernie Hudson) provides a much needed voice of reason during the movie’s more outrageous moments. Sigourney Weaver as the possessed client, and Annie Potts as unflappable secretary Janine round out the cast.

For a goofy, madcap take on an American legend, check out Hocus Pocus (1993). Embellishing the true story of the Salem Witch Trials, Hocus Pocus introduces Winifred (Bette Midler), Mary (Kathy Najimy) and Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker) Sanderson, who are executed for witchcraft in 1693. Three hundred years later, the Sanderson sisters are accidentally brought back to life on Halloween by disaffected teenager Max (Omri Katz) and his little sister Dani (Thora Birch). Max and Dani must stop the witches from achieving immortality with the help of a cursed cat (voiced by Jason Marsden) and a hapless and frequently headless zombie (Doug Jones). Now a Halloween television staple, Hocus Pocus has become a modern classic thanks to the ghoulishly gleeful performances by Midler, Najimy, and Parker.

What will you watch this Halloween while waiting for trick-or-treaters? Email me your movie plans at pmcivor@smithfieldtimesri.com.

October 2015

Payne’s Picks

by Sarah Payne

T AVon E RN the

WA T E R

Movie releases The Martian – October 2nd Matt Damon plays an astronaut stranded on another planet, waiting for NASA to come save him. Am I the only one who finds this storyline familiar? Is Interstellar ringing any bells? But in The Martian, Damon gets to be the lead and he plays a nerd instead of a lying jerk. And if you’re not crazy about the typical pace of sci-fi flicks, this one may be for you. Peter Debruge from Variety writes in his review, “With no acid-dripping extraterrestrials to menace him on Mars and no James Cameron-style greedy corporate villains ready to sacrifice him on Earth…

The Martian feels down right, well, Martian compared with the vast majority of space-travel films.”

Steve Jobs – October 9th Hollywood just can’t get enough of Steve Jobs. Two years since the last film about Jobs starring Ashton Kutcher, director Danny Boyle (127 Hours and Slumdog Millionaire) and writer Aaron Sorkin (Moneyball and The Social Network) are giving it go. This time Jobs is played by Michael Fassbender, who has much more impressive acting chops but looks much less like the real Steve Jobs. It is notable, however that the film got approval from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, who said, “I saw a rough cut and I felt like I was actually watching Steve Jobs and the others, no actors playing them. I give full credit to Danny Boyle and Aaron Sorkin for getting it so right.”

Movie review Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation These days, there are few things you can count on at the movies. But one thing is for sure—Tom Cruise will keep you entertained. How could you not enjoy watching Tom Cruise hang off the side of an airplane? But it’s just as enjoyable to watch Tom Cruise’s stunts as it is watching his female counterpart in the film, Ilsa Faust, played by Rebecca Ferguson. She’s relatively unknown, but her beauty and poise give her undeniable stage presence. And her character is great because she’s not just a love interest (I don’t recall even a kiss between the two). She’s an agent with some major skills. I can’t wait to see what Ferguson is in next!

Experience elegant, waterfront dining overlooking Waterman Lake while enjoying Executive Chef Jeffrey Paquette’s “new American comfort food with a twist.” The menu offers many French and Portuguese inspired dishes such as Wild Mushroom Risotto with White Truffle Oil, Buffalo Mac & Cheese, Pan Seared Sea Scallops over cauliflower puree with chili oil, Chili and Chips, Portuguese Jambalaya and Tenderloin Tips Stroganoff, among many others, all at affordable prices.

Concert review In The Valley Below August 7 was WBRU’s fourth summer concert series show, featuring In The Valley Below, held at the basin in downtown Providence. I was lucky enough to kayak to the show and watch from my seat in the river (which I highly recommend to anyone who owns a kayak). One donning suspenders and the other a white button up blouse from 1850 (I’m guessing), lead members Jeffrey Jacob Mendel and Angela Gail Mattson were in full hipster mode. They reminded me a lot of another male-female pair I’ve seen through WBRU—Broods. Check out their full album The Belt, which was released last year. By far the best song on the album is “Peaches.”

The Gift Do you want to see a super creepy film that will make you afraid to be home alone at night?

Well, my friend, The Gift is for you! It’s been a while since I’ve actually screamed in the theater, but The Gift is that scary. I think part of what makes it so scary is the slow build. Jason Bateman and Rebecca Hall seem like your average married couple. They aren’t doing anything out of the ordinary when they run into a former childhood friend and invite him to their home for dinner. Any of us could be in that situation. The Gift will also make you think. What if your partner is hiding a disgusting secret? Would you stay with that person? While the big reveal at the end isn’t quite as jaw dropping as I had hoped, the film definitely keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Album review Beauty Behind the Madness by The Weeknd A word of caution before you listen to The Weeknd’s new album: it’s a mixed bag. From dance-y and raunchy to sentimental and tender, The Weeknd embraces it all. “In the Night” sounds eerily like a 1980s Michael Jackson song. “Prisoner” features the typically brooding and sad Lana Del Rey. “Often” glorifies The Weeknd’s promiscuity. And “Angel,” the six-minute and 17-second final song on the album, is a sprawling love song, complete with guitar riffs of 1980s hair band quality. The album has simply exploded. As of this writing, it’s at its second week at number one on the Billboard 200 albums chart. And even though Abel Tesfaye (The Weeknd’s real name) is only 25, he’s appealing to more than just young people. Case in point: my mom was blasting his song in the car the other day!

The Smithfield Times, Inc.

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Stargazing

October’s Morning Planetary Parade and Two Meteor Showers

By David Huestis, Historian, Skyscrapers, Inc. Are you a morning person? Well, if you wish to view an absolutely beautiful grouping of planets during October you’ll need to forgo your beauty sleep and rise before the Sun. If you begin your planetary observing adventure on Oct. 1, the eastern sky before dawn’s early light will feature Venus (brightest), Jupiter (second brightest) and much dimmer Mars stacked above the horizon. Try observing every couple of days to see the planets shift position relative to one another. On the 9th a waning crescent Moon will join the sky scene. Each morning Jupiter and Mars will draw closer to one another, being in conjunction on the 18th. Jupiter and Venus will approach each other, coming to conjunction on the 25th.

Venus will then approach Mars, and they will have a conjunction on November 2-3.

At the end of the first week in October, Mercury will rise out of the Sun’s glare and will be visible in morning twilight below Venus, Jupiter and Mars. If you have difficulty locating Mercury, the waning crescent Moon will pass nearby on the morning of the 11th.

Each morning it will rise higher and higher into the sky, reaching a maximum elevation above the horizon on the 14th. Mercury will then sink lower and lower each morning, soon lost to the solar glare by month’s end.

This opportunity to observe four planets will be quite rewarding. I would recommend using any camera

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dawn. Orionids disintegrate in our atmosphere at around 41.6 miles per second, and they are also noted for producing fireballs that create persistent dust trains as they blaze across the sky.

The meteors appear to radiate out of the sky just above Orion’s head (hence the name of the shower) and not far from the bright red super giant star Betelgeuse, which marks his right shoulder. While Orion is an easy star pattern to identify, at 3 a.m. this giant constellation can be found high in the southeast sky. Maximize your meteor count by observing between midnight and dawn.

In conclusion, please remember that the local observatories are open for your viewing pleasure. Visit their respective websites for public observing schedules. Seagrave Memorial Observatory (http://www.theskyscrapers.org) in North Scituate is open every clear Saturday night. Ladd Observatory (http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Physics/Ladd/) in Providence is open every Tuesday night. Frosty Drew Observatory (http://www. frostydrew.org/) in Charlestown is open every clear Friday night. And don’t forget the Margaret M. Jacoby Observatory at the CCRI Knight Campus in Warwick (http://www.ccri.edu/physics/observatory.htm) is open every clear Wednesday night.

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to capture an image. If you are successful, email your images to astronomygolocal@gmail.com and I’ll try to get them posted on the Skyscrapers website.

During October there are two meteor showers of any importance. First up on the night of October 8-9 is the minor display of shooting stars called the Draconids. This shower currently only produces 10 or less yellowish slow moving meteors per hour. A waning crescent Moon will be in the early morning sky, so it won’t interfere with observing. Besides, this shower of particles is best observed between sunset and midnight when the constellation Draco is highest in the northern sky.

All you have to do is find Ursa Major (the Big Dipper asterism). Draco will be above it. While the meteors will emanate from this region of the sky, scan east and west up to zenith (directly overhead). These particles are fairly slow moving, hitting our atmosphere at only 12.5 miles per second. Draco stretches between Ursa Major and Polaris, the pole star, which is the end star in Ursa Minor (Little Bear), the Little Dipper asterism handle.

The best meteor shower of the month occurs on the night of October 20-21. That’s when the Earth passes through the remnants of Halley’s Comet. The First Quarter Moon will set around midnight local time, so it will not interfere with observing about 20 or so yellow and green meteors per hour at peak between then and

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Party with the animals in Smithfield

By Dick Martin Looking for that warm and fuzzy feeling? Head down to Warm and Fuzzy Animal Adventures!

There you will find Fresco, the ferret; Luca, the chinchilla; Iris, the Holland lop bunny; Chico, the Nancy Santopadre and her son, Joseph cockatiel; Al Pacino, the tortoise; Dosreis, hold two of the animal stars at two hamsters named Cookies and Warm and Fuzzy Animal Adventures: Enzo Cream; and even Millie, the pig on the rabbit and Al Pacino the tortoise. special occasions.

Photo by Dick Martin/The Smithfield Times In fact, you can have a party. All you have to do is bring the cake, and owner Nancy Santopadre will do the rest, from providing DePetrillo’s pizza to ice cream, and gift bags with animal crackers, chocolate lollipops in the shape of a pig, and other goodies.

“The kids love it!” says Nancy, who opened the store at 115 Pleasant View Ave. a few months ago. “They bring the cake, I do everything else.”

Everything else includes giving kids the opportunity to make friends with their favorite animals firsthand. A retired Providence juvenile police officer, and a full-time professor at Bristol Community College, Nancy started her “hobby” three years ago with a traveling zoo, which she still operates, going to places like Raymond C. Laperche School and other venues to give kids the opportunity to see animals close up and personal. Then she got the idea of offering a place where kids could come for birthday parties, especially during the winter months.

When the storefront opened up in Greenville, it seemed perfect. The location offers a double store front, in fact, with room for parties on one side and cuddling with animals on the other. There is also a variety of stuffed animals and tee shirts for sale as well.

Three levels of parties are available and each package differs. Please call for details. The parties are a two-hour Big Red Barn experience ($375); a one and one half hour The Average Day on the Farm event ($275); and a one hour and 15 minute Early Riser event ($200). And there is more in the works. Two after school programs for kids are available on Wednesdays: Session 1: 4-5:30 p.m., ages 6-9, Sept. 30 –Oct. 28; Session II: 4-5:30 p.m., ages 10-12, Nov. 4 – Dec. 2.

Nancy is also planning some special events around holidays, including the opportunity to meet and greet a turkey for Thanksgiving and get a photo with Tom the Turkey, as well as have a bunny visit for Easter with pictures available also. So far, she adds, she hasn’t decided on what to do for Christmas and Halloween, but it’s in the works.

For more information, go nancysfuzzypets@gmail.com or call 401-487-7184.

The company’s website is warmandfuzzyanimaladventures.com.

The Smithfield Times, Inc.

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Sentinel soccer to raise Pink Out funds On Saturday, Oct. 4, Smithfield High School Boys and Girls soccer teams will host their annual Pink Out event for the benefit of the Gloria Gemma Breast Cancer and Resource Foundation. Starting at 5:30 p.m. the boys team will host Scituate High School followed by the girls team hosting North Providence High School at 7:30 p.m. Before, during, and after the games, volunteers will host a raffle with an assortment of great prizes, many delicious pink treats (chocolate covered apples, chocolate covered Oreos, hope ribbon chocolate pops, egg biscuits, and many other treats) to purchase. Other Pink Out items will be sold with all proceeds going to the Gemma Foundation. In addition, the Smithfield Youth Soccer Association is painting the fields pink at Deerfield Park in support of the event. Pink Out T-shirts, socks, and other assorted items will be available for purchase as well.

Ocean State Baptist Church - Trunk or Treat Please join us for our annual Trunk or Treat at the Ocean State Baptist Church on Saturday October 31st from 5:30-7:30. Trunk or Treat is a fun-filled night where kids can come and get candy, popcorn and hot apple cider while checking out decorated cars in a safe environment! 600 Douglas Pike Smithfield, RI Scituate Turkey Supper Oct. 11 Trinity Episcopal Church, 251 Danielson Pike, North Scituate will hold its 36th Annual Turkey Supper on Sunday, Oct.11, from 3 to 7 p.m. at the church. This is a traditional homemade turkey dinner that includes: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans, butternut squash, cranberry sauce, rolls, coffee/fruit punch, and an assortment of home baked pies.

Tickets are: adults, $14; senior citizens (60+)

34

$12; children 6-10, $8; under 5 years free. Call 647-2322 to reserve tickets available at the door. Everyone is welcome and parking is free.

Oktoberfest Dinner Oct. 3 The Social Board at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church hosts its annual Oktoberfest Dinner on Saturday, Oct. 3 at 5:30 p.m. The dinner is a social gathering and is open to the public. Traditional German food will be served, including pork roast with sauerkraut, sauerbraten, German schnitzel, bratwurst, mashed potatoes, potato salad, salad, green beans with bacon and onion, red cabbage, dessert, and beverages. The cost is $15 for ages 15 and older, $7 for 7 through 15, and free for children under 7. Seating is limited.

Contact the church office at 232-7575 for reservations or tickets. The church is located at 54 Cedar Swamp Road (Route 5) in Smithfield about three quarters of a mile north of the intersection of Routes 5 and 44. The church website is www.orelc.org.

Casino Night to benefit Neighborhood Center The East Smithfield Neighborhood Center is sponsoring a bus trip to Foxwoods for a Casino Night Fundraiser with the proceeds going toward refinishing the floors at the center. The event is scheduled for Nov. 6 from 6 p.m. until 1 a.m. and the cost is $35 per person.

Package includes: • Round trip transportation from the East Smithfield Neighborhood Center, 7 Esmond St. Bus pick up is at 5:45 p.m., bus leaves promptly at 6 p.m. (Bus driver will not and can not wait for any late people) Bus will leave Foxwoods at 12 a.m.

• Dinner buffet ($24.99 value) or $10 voucher redeemable at any food establishment in casino.

• $10 bonus slot play For further information and reservations call Shanyn Turner at 401-301-5640. The trip has limited seating and is on a first come, first serve basis. Receipt of payment guarantees seats. Please email Turner for seat reservations at shanyn5@verizon.net. Checks should be made out to East Smithfield Neighborhood Center and mailed to Turner, 33 Farnum Pike, Smithfield RI 02917. Confirmation by email will be made once payment has been received. All sales are final, no refunds.

Corner — CVIX — Clear blue sky to feel the sunshine, Windy to cool us down, Three miles to exhaust our legs,

Noah

Fraioli

SHS parents will laugh to raise funds for students On Saturday, Oct. 24, the Smithfield High School Parents Council is hosting a Funny 4 Funds event at The Last Resort and Pub to benefit the students at SHS. Come out for a great night of laughs while supporting the students, the doors will open at 8 p.m. with the show to begin at 9 p.m. A donation of $20 per ticket is asked to enjoy a great show with three comedians. Light snacks and a cash bar will be available. For tickets to the show, please email paivaclan@aol.com or frabar34@cox.net.

Poetry

Community Events

This day that we had found Like another beautiful rock I cannot take with me.

The elements facilitated An album memory.

Boy Scout Troop 1 Greenville welcomes new scouts Troop 1 meets every Wednesday from 7-8:30 p.m. at the Greenville Baptist Church, 582 Putnam Pike, Greenville.

Blackstone Heritage Corridor Calendar Release Party To celebrate the release of its 2016 calendar, the Blackstone Heritage Corridor, Inc. is hosting a Calendar Release Party on Thursday, Oct. 15, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. at its offices at the One Depot Square, Woonsocket. Guests can meet the 12 photographers and purchase calendars.

The group will place a “Golden Ticket” inside one of the calendars, offering the winner a “Golden Corridor Experience” including two tickets for the Blackstone Valley Fall Foliage Train Excursion on Oct. 24 and a gift card to dine at Ciro’s Tavern in Woonsocket. Calendars cost $10 each and can also be purchased online at BlackstoneHeritageCorridor.org. The calendar is themed as “A Year of Celebration and Commitment. The Blackstone Heritage Corridor is celebrating its 30th Anniversary.

The 2016 calendar features some 50 different green living tips to inspire people to become stronger environmental stewards of the National Heritage Corridor. Photos that were selected best suited the themes of environment and celebration, the group said.

October Audubon events in Smithfield On Oct.10, from 10 to 11 a.m., at Audubon Powder Mill Ledges Wildlife Refuge the topic will be “Animal Clothes.” Do animals wear clothes? Should they? Come find out how animals protect themselves from the elements

and survive the seasons. Touch some fur, feathers and scales and meet some live animal visitors.

On Oct. 14, from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. and from 1 to 2 p.m., the topic will be “Animal Tales.”

Enjoy a nature story with your preschooler each month. Programs include a story with a nature lesson followed by a craft. Often a live animal comes to visit. “Mousekin’s Golden House” by Edna Miller will be read.

Powder Mill Ledges Wildlife Refuge is located at 12 Sanderson Road, Smithfield. Program fees are: $5/member child, $7/non-member child; Ages: Ages 3-5. Register online www. asri.org 30th Reunion for Smithfield High School Smithfield High School Class of 1985 is having its 30 year reunion on Saturday, Oct. 10, at Twelve Acres, 445 Douglas Pike, Smithfield.

Tickets are $50 and checks should be made out to SHS Class of ‘85 and mailed to: Jan Kelly, 139 Ridge Road, Smithfield, RI 02917.

Esmond Village is having a Christmas Bazaar Sat., Nov. 7, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m, at 6 Village Drive, Smithfield. Table rental: $20. If interested, call Sharon Finlay, (401) 233-0837. Table displays include crafts, baked goods, raffle baskets with gift certificates, money tree and scratch ticket tree, 50/50 raffle. Lunch will be served, and there will also be a visit from Santa.

October 2015

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Smithfield dog owners bring their pets to fundraiser walk for new dog park More than 100 people, many accompanied by their dogs, turned out for the town’s Dog Park Committee fundraiser on Saturday, Sept.

12 from Smithfield High School through Deerfield Park.

The group raised some $6,000 for the project in the town’s first Dog Walk, and deposited into the coffers to build the park, which will cost an estimated $100,000. The group is planning future fundraisers with the aim of raising $20,000 of the cost of the park.

“It was a pleasure to work alongside members of the dog park committee for several months to ensure the success of the town’s first dog walk to raise funds for our future dog park,” said Town Council member Suzy Alba. “I was energized by their hard work, dedication and commitment to seeing that we raise the support and funds needed.

“The event was an overwhelming success thanks to so many generous businesses and individuals in our community coming together to build up and better our community. I was excited and encouraged by the great turnout we had with more than 90 dogs registered and the more than 100 people that came out for the walk and festival.”

Many, many other local individuals and businesses made cash donations totaling more than $500, Alba said.

Alba credited fellow dog park committee members for the success of the: Chairwoman Beth Cerroni, Vice Chairwoman Anita Dudemaine, Tyler Choquette, John Garcia, Elaine Amoriggi, Melissa Calouro, Gigi Archambault.

Smithfield Rotary members, Land Trust Chairwoman Barbara Rich, Cheryl Cunha, and many family and friends of committee members pitched in, Alba said.

Alba thanked the following for their support: Todd Manni, Smithfield EMA Director; Ken Brown, the Smithfield Police Department; Finance Director Randy Rossi; Town Manager Dennis Finlay; Superintendent Bob O’Brien; and Sharon Gilmore, secretary to the Dog Park Committee and Smithfield Animal Control and Fire Department for setting up educational information booths for the community at the event.

The group’s next fundraiser is Sunday Oct. 4 at Chelo’s at Apple Valley Mall, where anyone who dines anytime that day and mentions the Smithfield Dog Park, will permit Chelo’s to donate up to 20 percent of their check to the Dog Park Fund.

The Committee also plans to have another fundraising event organized by the group sometime in January.

Checks can be made out to Smithfield Dog Park Fund and mailed to the Smithfield Town Hall, 64 Farnum Pike, Smithfield, RI 02917.

Alba encourages anyone who would like to help the effort to contact her.

The committee hopes to open the park at a site yet to be selected in spring 2016.

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Sponsors Best In Show - $500 each: Heritage Hills Nursing & Rehabilitation Center Muttley Crew North Paws Veterinary Center The Smithfield Times Pick Of The Litter - $100 each: Amica Mutual Insurance Company Appleand Orchard Bailey and Company Boyle & Fogarty Construction Kristene’s Kreations Michelle Lamoureux RD, LDN Navigant Credit Union Pixie’s Hair Salon Providence Mechanical Services RM Worcester Cleaning Service Second Chance Rescue Senator Stephen Archambault The Sentinel Group Thirsty Beaver Twirl Hair Salon

Vendors: Athens Pizza Beyond Chic by Johanna Kona Ice Live, Bark, Love Pet Sitting Services Modern Dog Training New England Lemonade New York Life Pet Supplies Plus Puppy’s Elite Smithfield Animal Control Smithfield Brownie Troop 922 (Handmade dog items and donated proceeds to the dog park fund) Smithfield Emergency Management Tim Jones, Cartoonist Donors to the Raffle: Apple Valley Grooming Beth Cerroni Cafe Such a Bagel Costantino’s Venda Ravioli Dave’s Marketplace Dynamite Auto Earth Dog Cookie Company Flaunt Boutique Fur Babies Laura Bovin Live, Bark, Love Muttley Crew No Risk Crossfit North Paws Veterinary Center North Providence Tire & Auto Center Parente’s Restaurant Petsmart Pixies Hair Salon Stephen Keene Terrazza Restaurant Thirsty Beaver Village Wellness Wine and Cheese Restaurant In-kind Donors: Danae Peloquin Photography (Event photography) Panera Bread (baked goods) Starbucks (coffee)

37

Celebrating 50 Years of Family Fun! The 50th Annual Brush ‘Camporee’

By Patti Shaffer Family reunions are always fun and memorable events. They are great places to reconnect, reminisce, and meet new family members. They also help teach younger generations about their roots.

Few know this better than Smithfield’s Brush family. Every year for the past 50 years, members travel from Smithfield, Chepachet, Scituate, Connecticut, Massachusetts—and as far away as Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and California—to get together, rain or shine, on Victory Day weekend in August for their 50th Annual Brush Family ‘Camporee’ (family campout).

This year the event was held from August 6 through August 10 at Water’s Edge Campground in Lebanon, Connecticut. Seventy-five to eighty people from ages 4 to 86 camped out in the Safari Field

(a dedicated group camping area). Some slept in full size campers, full size tents or pop-ups while a few folks stayed in nearby hotels or with nearby relatives.

Nancy Mendizabal, a Smithfield native and daughter of Donald Brush, who, along with his six siblings, originated this yearly event. Nancy’s dad, who is now 80 years old, and his siblings grew up on Tunmore Road in Greenville. Donald and his eighty-four-year-old brother, Frank, and their sister Barbara, age seventy-nine, also attended the event.

Nancy says, “Amazingly, every sibling was represented at this years annual camp-out weekend—four generations of family members including young children, teens, cousins, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, parents and grandparents.”

This year’s event started off with omelets made to

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order by Lex and Gunnar, ages 9 and 10, and since they were camped out on a hill, after breakfast they made a homemade slip & slide which many enjoyed several trips down, including kids, adults and even Nancy’s dad.

They played cards and games like Scattergories, Scrabble, Trivial pursuit, Bocce, Hi Lo Jack and cribbage.

“We are a family that loves to play games and cards,” exclaims Nancy. “Some of the card games go into the early hours of the morning.”

Happy campers also sat by the fire pit in the evening sharing favorite stories from the older genera-

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“A tradition for at least 20 years has been our noon time treat of corn on the cob,” says Nancy. “This tradition began when Russ and Amy Brush would bring the corn from Dame Farm. I think we went through about 10 dozen this year.

Our corn-on-the cob is always followed by a Grand Buffet where everyone contributes a dish and then we sit down to a great feast. This year’s buffet served over 70 people.

Then later in the evening we enjoyed home movies tions. Many of the stories are memories of the seven from our camporees in the 60’s.”

Brush kids growing up on Tunmore Road in Greenville—such as sibling pranks, creative inventions, In reminiscing, Nancy goes on to say, “When I (like a buzzer on the stairs that would alert them to was little, after the Christmas season, that’s what we anyone coming), potatoes in car mufflers and always cousins all looked forward to— ‘camporee’ time— stories about their first cars! “Most of which we have total cousin time! And still today all our children, all heard many times before,” adds Nancy, “but we ranging in age from 4 to 30, look forward to the same thing—camporee weekend in August.” laugh just as hard year after year.”

Other highlights of the reunion were a Sangria Nancy adds, “One cousin said to me that they are Tasting, a family talent show and a Chili cook-off. so thankful to our parents for starting this 50 years (Nancy’s ten-year-old nephew won the chili cook ago and keeping the tradition going.” off ). They played cribbage, pitch, horseshoes, and The original seven siblings, who grew up on Tuncampfire games and made Hobo pies. They even had more Road in Greenville, are: Frank Brush, Donald Brush, Dorothy Jackson, Barbara Brush and the late a movie night.

Mildred Parker, Robert Brush and George Brush.

Family fun is the name of the game at Water’s Edge Water’s Edge Family Campground in Lebanon, Conn. is a 10-acre campsite with a spring-fed lake. It also has a large recreation hall. All campsites are appropriately equipped and the lake is well stocked with fish.

In addition to swimming and fishing, you can go hiking, pitch horseshoes, play bingo, surf the Internet or just sit back and relax. Planned activities include children’s’ games and activities, bingo, a pig roast, potluck suppers, treasure hunts, live entertainment and dancing.

The campground is also ‘group friendly’ providing a dedicated group camping area, the Safari Field with 15 sites, a shared pavilion and fire pits.

The campground season is April 15 through October 15. Leashed pets are welcomes.

Fishing at Water’s Edge is ‘catch & release’. For more information, call: 860-642-7470 or email: office@watersedgecampground.com.

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Cool Air Creations

By Dick Martin Smithfield has some hidden secrets, including Cool Air Creations.

Looking for the perfect design for your organization, club, team, group or whatever?

They have it and places to put it, from cups and saucers to tee shirts, hats, jackets and even decal “skins” which you can cover your vehicle with.

Owner Dave Campbell began the business airbrushing tee shirts in Cool Air Creations, Smithfield, is a state of the art million-dollar business. Their portfolio ranges from his parents’ garage in small local companies to a wealth of name brand 1994, and selling them apparel manufacturers. to friends. Today, it is a state of the art million Photo by Dick Martin/The Smithfield Times dollar business that supplies everything and anything, it seems, to clients. Their portfolio ranges from small local companies to Fortune 500 behemoths, including a wealth of name brand apparel manufacturers.

Those clients include the Bruins, Red Sox and Patriots. Last year as we watched the waning minutes of the Patriots Super Bowl game, so did the staff at Cool Air Creations in their facility in Smithfield. When the Pats won, the lights went on and the manufacturing began.

“For us it was a double win,” says Ann Hall, outsource manager. “We were trucking out products the entire night so they would be on the shelves the next day.”

The secret to their success, says Campbell, is honest to goodness hard work, combined with passion and integrity. Their goal is to be the best in the industry, following their mission statement: “To become the promotional company of choice through our world class customer service, superior workmanship, honesty, integrity and community involvement while always keeping an eye toward continuous improvement.”

“We eat, sleep and breathe these words,” says Campbell. “No company will ever work harder for you. I guarantee it.”

For more information, call 888-288-TEES or go to their website at coolaircreations.com. The showroom, located at 10 Business Park Drive, Smithfield, is open Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday 8-5; Thursday 8-7 and Saturday 9-1.

40

October 2015

Conservationally Speaking

The Smithfield Youth Conservation Corps

By Sandra Mayer The summer “cleanup crew” known as The Smithfield Youth Conservation Corps walked the trails and roads of the town, cleaning up litter for several weeks this year.

They worked a six-hour day from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. four days a week, from Monday through Thursday, for five-to-six weeks during school summer vacation. The original program was started as our town’s participation in the state-funded OSCAR (Ocean State Cleanup and Recycling) program. This program began in 1985-86, partially to support a new mandatory recycling law in RI by removing bottles, cans, and litter from the roadsides, and to encourage that ideal by starting the program with litter-free public areas.

When the statewide OSCAR program lost funding, the Smithfield Conservation Commission assumed responsibility for continuing the program in our town, hiring young town residents, and assuming the expenses for the supplies and wages. The Commission has done this for all the years since then, and can’t seem to “shake” the original name for the group-- in all discussions, they are still “the OSCAR team”.

Members of the Smithfield team reported daily to the Conservation Center to plan the day’s schedule of trail work. Smithfield Conservation Commission Chairman Don Burns met each morning with them as the supervisor, as he has since the beginning of the

original program.

On a day with no rain, there is town-wide litter pickup, weed whacking, trimming, trail raking, or checking water overflow at the Stillwater Scenic Walkway. The ideal would be that they clean up an area once a season and it would remain clear of litter. The reality is that they have to revisit certain areas more than once a season to keep up with the litter being discarded.

The mantra that “If it IS clean, it will STAY clean” has not been the result yet in our areas, but the amount of litter has been reduced significantly. On a rainy day, the team catches up on paperwork, cleans and sharpens the tools, separates the recycling items and maintains the interior of the Conservation Commission headquarters at the Bouchard Conservation Center, off Waterview Drive (behind the Smithfield Police Station).

As is the case with most jobs, there are days that are good and days that are bad. One of the accepted threats of this job is, of course, a poison ivy rash---“part of the job” is what was said by one of the team members. There have been no threatening encounters with animals, wild or leashed. The best parts of the job are being outdoors, being relatively independent, and getting to know each other, according to the team members. The truck they use for the jobs is a good size, and has air conditioning to make the work on hot days “doable”. The driver of the work vehicle must be at least

18 years old, so one member of the 5-member crew must fulfill that requirement each year.

Some of this 2015 season’s highlights of “finds” were notable for the team members. The Best Find of 2015 was $11 in cash. The Worst Find of 2015 was used syringes. The Most Surprising Find of 2015 was a number of hand-written personal messages in the same penmanship, found randomly. As in years past, approximately one-half of the total find was empty alcohol bottles, assumedly thrown out car windows. This year’s report was that, in essence, there was little-or-no “dog poop” in our areas---attributed to the welcome help of the dog owners using the trails in taking responsibility for their pets. The Nicest Finds of 2015 were two small deer at Smith-Appleby House and a turkey with small babies beside Whipple Road.

Community involvement with the group has unfortunately been limited so far. They were given free lunch only once this year, at Papa Gino’s. One day on Esmond Street, a homeowner gave them glasses of water. On another day, a woman stopped her car and “donated” her trash. Autonomy is an important asset in this type of job, but a friendly wave or a “thank you” here-and-there might be appreciated more than you know.

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Manni received the same recognition in 2006.

Manni has coordinated emergency efforts for four major disasters declared by the president. He has also managed the response to the H1N1 influenza pandemic, infrastructure emergencies, utility failures, several severe storms and flooding since he became Smithfield’s Emergency Management Director in 2005. Prior to that, he was an emergency volunteer for the town.

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October 2015

Municipal Roundup

By Gordon Riley

FINANCIAL SERVICES

The Town Council met on Sept. 1 and Sept. 15.

At the two meetings, the council approved: • An amendment to Chapter 118 of the Liquor License Ordinance, raising the number of full privilege liquor licenses from 35 to 40.

• Lighting and field upgrades—pending contract review—to the Whipple Field Complex. The proposed fixtures will cost approximately $285,000, and are designed to maximize light output while minimizing residual glare.

Several residents spoke against the upgrades, worried that they might facilitate traffic and increase late night activity at the field.

• Comprehensive plan amendments, as well as zoning and ordinance amendments, to the Jake Development Company LLC/Rollingwood Acres Inc. at 296 George Washington Highway, and G.W. Properties, LLC property at 550 George Washington Highway. The amendments, made after a year’s worth of conflict, settled prior disputes over zoning restrictions to the property, and enacted a variance to change its function from Planned Corporate to Mixed Use and Residential. This will allow for a future business district, similar to the South County Commons in South Kingston.

Issues not yet approved, but tabled for ongoing discussion included: • The authorization of funds, amounting to $6,650, on behalf of the Police Department to conduct a feasibility study for a new animal shelter. The new shelter could cost upwards of $250,000, if approved.

• The discussion of a proposed Debt Service Fee, which would mandate that all residential and commercial real estate tax payers—including those in the Tax Freeze bracket—participate in the collective payment of town bonds.

The council will conduct further research before taking action.

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Recovery Radio brings help and hope to those struggling with addiction

By John J. Tassoni Jr.

We have all heard the staggering statistics from the Centers for Disease Control that Rhode Island tops the list of highest in the nation for drug and alcohol use. So far this year, there have been 126 confirmed accidental overdose deaths in the state, and more than 1,000 EMS administered doses of Naloxone (Narcan), reported by the R.I. Dept. of Health.

We must remember that addiction is a mental illness, a disease of the mind, and a horrible, complex and confusing disease at that.

It is not a crime. We cannot treat addicts as criminals.

Furthermore, addiction is totally treatable. There are many people in the recovery community who are ready to help - health care professionals, recovering addicts and alcoholics, their friends and family. There is also Recovery Radio.

Recovery Radio is the first radio show in the state to offer useful information to those suffering from alcohol, drug, and other addictions. It also features live interviews with people in recovery, who share their stories of hope and triumph over substance abuse. These are people who have reclaimed their lives and want to help others do the same.

The dialogue is real.

They talk about the serious physical, psychological, social and financial problems of addiction, and the process that is recovery, its rewards, its benefits, and its victories.

Recovery Radio’s guest speakers discuss the critical issues that lie beneath the surface of addiction, while it encourages people to add their voices.

Some of the issues are basic while others are extremely complex.

About 90 percent of addictions begin in the teenage years. Cigarette smoking, binge drinking, and marijuana are just launching pads for this often-inviting disease.

In a downward economy, drug dealing is an easy way to make money and a fast way to mask problems.

Most people understand the characteristics of addiction, but here are some facts provided by The Foundations Recovery Network that may surprise you: “Addiction is unpredictable—it can happen to anyone at any time. It does not discriminate among the rich, middle class, or lower class.

The misconception is that addiction only occurs to people who frequently abuse substances, are weak-willed, or if there is a family history of addiction.

Many also think that engaging in occasional substance use is a safe way to avoid addiction.

Not true.

The reality is that anyone can develop an addiction, no matter how many times he or she has used the substance, and whether or not there is a family

October 2015

history of addiction. Many illegal substances like heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine, can cause people to develop an addiction after just one use. Some legal substances, such as cigarettes and alcohol, have the potential for addiction after only a few uses.

Many addicts suffer from co-occuring disorders, which means that they may have an addiction along with at least one other mental health condition.

Co-occuring disorders happen when a person has two or more health conditions, particularly mental health conditions, at the same time. These disorders often involve substance abuse along with such mental health disorders as anxiety disorders (post-traumatic stress disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder), mood disorders (depression and bipolar disorder), personality disorders (antisocial and paranoia), and psychotic disorders; schizophrenia.

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that more than 8.4 million American adults (about 40 percent of the population) suffer from substance abuse along with another mental health condition. The study also showed that people who reported having at least one mental illness were twice as likely to also use illegal drugs. These numbers show the correlation between drug use and mental illness, whether the mental illness develops from drug use or if the drug use is a form of self-medication.

Relapse can happen during recovery.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) reports that relapse is common in addiction recovery. Addiction relapse is similar to relapse in other chronic diseases, like asthma, hypertension and type I diabetes. The NIDA clarifies that addiction relapse does not mean the person has failed in rehab, but rather that the person’s individual treatment plan needs to be monitored, revised or reinstated.

I invite you to join the over 2,000 listeners each week and the more than 6,000 monthly visitors to our website, and let us help you and your loved ones on the road to recovery, or allow us to share the information that you have to help others.

Recovery Radio is an hour-long program that airs Mondays from 3-4 p.m. on AM790, sponsored by Phoenix Houses of New England, The Providence Center, and The Journey: Hope, Health & Healing, Inc. Recovery Radio’s presenter, John J. Tassoni, Jr., is a business leader, social activist, recovery advocate, and former member of the Rhode Island State Senate, who sponsored legislation creating a high school program for teens in recovery.

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Fire Prevention Week is Oct. 4 through 10 and is an event recognized throughout the country. We typically think of October as Fire Prevention Month as the Smithfield Fire Department spends the entire month of October educating school children and community groups about the danger of fire and how to prevent fires from occurring.

The Fire Prevention Week theme for this year is “Hear the BEEP where you SLEEP”.

According to the United States Fire Administration, half of home fire deaths happen between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., when most people are asleep. Therefore, hear the beep when you sleep. Every bedroom needs a working smoke alarm!

• Install smoke alarms in every bedroom, outside each separate sleeping area, and on every level of the home, including the basement. Larger homes may need more alarms.

• For the best protection, install interconnected smoke alarms in your home.

When one sounds, they all sound.

• Test alarms at least once a month pushing the test button.

• Replace all smoke alarms when they are 10 years old or if they do not sound when tested.

• Some people, especially children and older adults, may need help to wake up.

Make sure someone will wake them if the smoke alarm sounds.

• When the smoke alarm sounds, get outside and stay outside. Go to your outside meeting place.

• Call the fire department from a cellphone or a neighbor’s phone. Call 9-1-1!

Stay outside until the fire department says it is safe to go back inside.

• When installing a smoke alarm, follow the instructions that come with the alarm.

• If cooking fumes set off alarms, either replace the alarm with one that has a “hush” button, which will silence the alarm for a short period of time, or install a photoelectric type of alarm.

Make a safe escape for your family: • If smoke is blocking your door or first way out, use your second way out.

• Smoke is poisonous. If you must escape through smoke, get low and go under the smoke to your way out.

• If pets are trapped inside your home, tell firefighters right away. Never reenter a burning building.

• Before opening the door, feel the doorknob and then the door. If either is hot, leave the door closed and use your second way out.

• If you cannot get out, close the doors and cover the vents and cracks around the door with cloth or tape. Call 9-1-1!

For more information visit www.usfa.fema.gov or www.firepreventionweek.org.

The Smithfield Fire Department invites you to our annual Fire Prevention Open House to be held on Saturday, Oct. 19, from 12 to 4 p.m., at fire department headquarters station, 607 Putnam Pike, in Greenville.

October 2015

Obituaries

Russell C. Lancaster Sr., 66, passed away on August 26. Russ was the son of the late W. Donald and Evelyn M. Lancaster. He was the husband of Nancy R. (Smith) Lancaster; father of Kimberly D. Lancaster Hageman and Russell Craig Lancaster Jr.; brother of David D. Lancaster and the late Douglas Paul Lancaster; grandfather to Abigail Grace Lancaster Hageman, Maxwell Joseph Lancaster Hageman, Brooke Riley Lancaster and Colin Russell Lancaster and several nieces and nephews. Russ and Nancy have lived in Smithfield for 37 years. Please omit flowers and make a donation to your favorite charity or Smithfield Fire Department, 607 Putnam Pike, Greenville, RI 02828, in Russ’s memory. For online condolences, please visit Russ’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/russ.lancaster.5 Edward Green, Jr., 98, of Smithfield, passed away Saturday August 29. He was the husband of the late Agnes C. (O’Beirne) Green for 72 years before her passing in 2013. He was born in Providence, a son of the late Edward and Annie Green. Mr. Green was an electrician assistant for the NY, New Haven, Hartford Railroad for many years before retiring. He lived in North Providence for 55 years before moving to Smithfield in 2011. He was the father of Edward J. Green and his wife, Joan, of Coventry, the late Raymond W. Green; and grandfather of three. He was the brother of the late Harold and James Green, Evelyn Farr, Edna Tabeshevski, Alice Athaide, Sarah Holman, Mary York and Florence Sparks. In lieu of flowers, donations to Alzheimer’s Association, 245 Waterman St., Suite 306, Providence, RI 02906 will be appreciated.

Anthony J. Aiello, 81, passed away surrounded by his loving family, Thursday, Sept. 3. He was the beloved husband of Ann G. (Butera) Aiello. Born in Providence, he was a son of the late John and Elena (DeMarco) Aiello. He was a Korean War army veteran, a member of the Knights of Columbus, and was a Red Sox and Patriots fan. Mr. Aiello lived in North Providence before moving to Smithfield in 1969 and wintered in DelRay Beach, Fla. for many years. He was the owner of the former Aborn Construction Co., Inc. for over 25 years before retiring in 1995. Besides his wife, he is survived by his loving children, Michael J. Aiello and his wife , Rose of North Providence and Teri A. Drew and her husband, Lance, of Smithfield.

He was the cherished grandfather of Andrea Aiello, Matthew, Kimberly and Katherine Drew and David Aiello. He was the brother of John Aiello of North Providence and James Aiello of East Greenwich. In lieu of flowers, donations to Home & Hospice Care of RI, 1085 North Main St., Providence, RI 02904 will be appreciated.

The Smithfield Times, Inc.

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October 2015

Brian Waita, a senior; Michael Sullivan, a junior; Dean Nichols, a senior; and, Taylor Persechini, a senior, were among 10 members of the Delta Chi fraternity at Bryant University, who undertook a local community project by painting the fence at the athletic field complex at Smithfield High School shortly before school opened in September.

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The Smithfield Senior Center celebrated its 20th anniversary in September with a month-long series of activities, including a trivia game organized and emceed by The Smithfield Times. Publisher John J. Tassoni Jr., right, posed the questions to a group of center members.

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Smithfield YMCA going GaGa for kids with help from Home Depot The Home Depot Store at The Crossing sent employees to the Smithfield YMCA on Friday, Sept. 18, to build a “GaGa Pit” for the Before/After School Program participants and summer campers.

The volunteers undertook the community service project through a grant that paid for supplies from Home Depot to the Smithfield YMCA. According to gagacenter.com, “GaGga is a fast paced, high energy sport played in an octagonal pit. The more players the better!

Dubbed a kinder gentler version of dodge ball, the game is played with a soft foam ball, and combines the skills of dodging, striking, running, and jumping, while trying to hit opponents with a ball below the knees. Players need to keep moving to avoid getting hit by the ball. Fun and easy, everyone gets a serious workout.”

GaGa Pits are all the rage for school age Teamwork was the order of the day when Home Depot employees from the company’s store at The Crossing pitched in to build a GaGa Pit at the Smithfield YMCA as a community project. From left to right, Melanie Cavolo and Steve children.

Goldstein lug lumber while Michelle Santos, Ellen Levesque and store manager Marcello Arantes ready another piece of wood.

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Dystance4Dystonia Zoo Walk ­­— A Huge Success Photos by Albert Tavakalov/The Smithfield Times

More than 400 people gathered at Roger Williams Park Zoo for the first-ever Providence Dystance4Dystonia Zoo Walk on Saturday, June 27. In communities across the country, Zoo Walks are raising

Some of the 400 walkers in the Dystance4Dystonia Zoo Walk step off in the bright sunshine to raise funds for research into the disease.

public awareness and research funds for dystonia, a little-known neurological disorder. The Providence event raised nearly $20,000 to benefit the Dystonia Medical Research Foundation (DMRF). Sue Baron

Sue Baron and her son Bryan Baron address the participants in the Dystance4Dystonia Zoo Walk at Roger Williams Park Zoo.

of Smithfield is the chairman and founder of the RI Dystonia Support Group and the Providence Zoo Walk Event Coordinator.

Beth Paolero wheels her daughter Maddie Paolero along the route of the Dystance4Dystonia Zoo Walk at Roger Williams Park Zoo accompanied by their pet dog Reno.

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October 2015

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The social media landscape is an ever-changing area that marketers are continually challenged to utilize in a way that translates well to their customer.

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First we have to ask, do we want to exist in a social space? If the answer is yes then advance to outlining your strategy. If no, consider optimizing your website to act as a social channel. By including blogs, private photo sharing or open discussion forums on your website, you can still provide a social engagement side to your business. Think of this environment as a place to inform interested parties about your business, current projects your incentive programs. Most of all, keep your messaging relevant, focused and shareable.

Secondly, do we want social engagement? Craft a clear strategy that nurtures your brand and messaging that includes a human side to your company.

Being socially engaged offers a variety of opportunities for you and your customer to interact and is limited only by your creativity. As technology continues to develop, experiences with your business are immediate and personal. In fact, some current social media trends are less about broadcast messaging like in years’ past, and focus more on customer insights and experience; as a result positions of “Chief Experience Officer” are being phased in to focus solely on user experience.

Social media is even dictating to businesses that it’s time to loosen up. This might be a challenge for your brand but social engagement actually calls brands to support and engage the human element. Show your fans that you have a human side. If trends are not enough for you, recent data suggests that brands are experiencing increased loyalty based upon adding some humor into their social media strategy.

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Federally insured by the National Credit Union Administration. *ATM Fee refunds up to $25 per qualification cycle when criteria are met.

“I am in the dental field & can definitely separate the good doctors from the mediocre doctors. Dr. Beagan & his staff are the model office. You get great patient care & a great smile!” - Kim, Smithfield, RI “University Orthodontics is the best! Everyone in this practice goes out of their way to make each visit special, even FUN!”

- Alyson, E. Providence, RI

“I’ve been dealing with Dr. Beagan’s office for a while & not once was I unhappy. They make you feel more like family than clients, they are the best.”

- Kendra, Riverside, RI

Smithfield

1 Garnett Lane, Suite 8 Greenville, RI 02828

(401) 349-4355 North Smithfield 900 Victory Highway North Smithfield, RI 02896

(401) 762-2830 Cranston

95 Sockanosset Cross Road Suite 301 Cranston, RI 02920

(401) 942-0300

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