Yankee Magazine July/August 2015

While thousands of boys cherished their memories of fun-filled days on the shores of a Maine lake, the son of this camp’s owners couldn’t wait to get away. When he finally returned, reluctantly, years later, he came to appreciate just how special the experience had been. by Jon

Marcus

80 /// A Place Just Waiting to Be Painted

In Old Lyme, Connecticut, where one of America’s most famous artists’ colonies thrived a century ago, the landscape still has the power to inspire. text by Justin Shatwell, photographs by Sara Gray

96 /// The Hardest Deadline

In shock after a horrific quadruple murder that had just claimed their editor and close friends, the staff of a small-town New Hampshire weekly knew they had only hours to publish. by Richard Adams Carey

80 features Bonus digital content! For quick and easy access, just download our free Yankee Connect app to your smartphone. Then look for this symbol in our pages, launch the app, and scan the marked photos to get videos, slide shows, or audio files.

Trapping the Moon

An 80-year quest to harness the energy of the vast tidal range off the coast of Eastport, Maine, may finally be close to fruition. by Wayne

Curtis

ON THE COVER

74 /// The Boy Who Didn’t Like Summer Camp

travel

34 /// Sandcastles by the Sea

Just step out your door and hit the beach—here’s our guide to the simple and timeless pleasures of the oceanfront summer vacation. by Christina Tree

home

52 /// The Farm at Stone Acres

Stewarded by multiple generations of the same Connecticut family, a historic garden proudly cultivates the storied heirlooms of ages past. by Tovah

Martin

60 /// Open Studio

Maine quilt and appliqué artist Jo Diggs brings a painter’s eye to her colorful and intricate fabric landscapes. by Annie Graves

food

62 /// A New Yankee Clambake

Inspired by one of Cape Cod’s best restaurants, Yankee presents a fresh and easy take on a classic New England seafood tradition. by Amy Traverso

70 /// Local Flavor

In small-town New Hampshire, Kimball Farm’s rich ice cream and generous portions draw loyal fans from far and wide. by Amy Traverso

72 /// Recipe with a History

52

YANKEE ALL ACCESS

10

INSIDE YANKEE

12

MARY’S FARM

34 departments

Ratatouille Summer by Edie Clark

14

LIFE IN THE KINGDOM

Spare Parts by Ben Hewitt

18

FIRST LIGHT

Vermont’s annual Stella fane convention gathers skywatchers from all over the world … best 5 attractions along U.S. Route 6 … and other goings-on around New England this season.

102

COULD YOU LIVE HERE?

Littleton, New Hampshire by Annie Graves

108

HOUSE FOR SALE

The Yankee Moseyer visits the Cobb Hill community in Hartland, Vermont.

128 EVENTS CALENDAR

132

POETRY BY D.A.W.

NH AD RESOURCES Yankee Insider .................... 7 Best of New England ...... 32 Pet-Friendly Travel ............ 50 Fun at the Water’s Edge..... 51 Amazing Vermont Dining Experiences ..... 67 Marketplace .................. 133

1121 Main St., P.O. Box 520, Dublin, NH 03444. 603-563-8111; editor@YankeeMagazine.com

PUBLISHER Brook Holmberg

EDITORIAL

EDITOR Mel Allen

ART DIRECTOR Lori Pedrick

MANAGING EDITOR Eileen T. Terrill

SENIOR LIFESTYLE EDITOR Amy Traverso

SENIOR EDITOR Ian Aldrich

PHOTO EDITOR Heather Marcus

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Joe Bills

ASSISTANT EDITOR Aimee Seavey

INTERNS Bethany Bourgault, Taylor Thomas

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Annie Card, Edie Clark, Annie Graves, Ben Hewitt, Justin Shatwell, Ken Sheldon, Julia Shipley

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Julie Bidwell, Kindra Clineff, Sara Gray, Corey Hendrickson, Joe Keller, Matt Kalinowski, Joel Laino, Jarrod McCabe, Michael Piazza, Heath Robbins, Kristin Teig, Carl Tremblay

PRODUCTION

PRODUCTION DIRECTORS David Ziarnowski, Susan Gross

SENIOR PRODUCTION ARTISTS Jennifer Freeman, Rachel Kipka

DIGITAL

VICE PRESIDENT/PRODUCTION & NEW MEDIA Paul Belliveau Jr.

DIGITAL EDITOR Brenda Darroch

WEB DESIGNERS Lou Eastman, Amy O’Brien

PROGRAMMING Reinvented Inc.

ADVERTISING: PRINT/DIGITAL

VICE PRESIDENT/SALES Judson D. Hale Jr. (JDH@yankeepub.com)

SALES IN NEW ENGLAND

TRAVEL, NORTH (NH North, VT, ME, NY) Kelly Moores (KellyM@yankeepub.com)

TRAVEL, SOUTH (NH South, CT, RI, MA) Dean DeLuca (DeanD@yankeepub.com)

DIRECT RESPONSE Steven Hall (SteveH@yankeepub.com)

CLASSIFIED Bernie Gallagher, 203-263-7171 (classified@yankeepub.com)

SALES OUTSIDE NEW ENGLAND

NATIONAL Susan Lyman, 646-221-4169 (susan@selmarsolutions.com)

CANADA Alex Kinninmont, Françoise Chalifour, Cynthia Jollymore, 416-363-1388

AD COORDINATOR Janet Grant

MARKETING

CONSUMER

MANAGERS Kate McPherson, Kathleen Rowe

ASSOCIATE Kirsten O’Connell

ADVERTISING

DIRECTOR Joely Fanning

ASSOCIATE Valerie Lithgow

COORDINATOR Christine Anderson

PUBLIC RELATIONS

BRAND MARKETING DIRECTOR Kate Hathaway Weeks

NEWSSTAND

VICE PRESIDENT Sherin Pierce

DIRECT SALES MANAGER Stacey Korpi

SALES ASSOCIATE Janice Edson

YANKEE PUBLISHING INC.

established 1935

PRESIDENT Jamie Trowbridge

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Judson D. Hale Sr.

VICE PRESIDENTS Paul Belliveau Jr., Jody Bugbee, Judson D. Hale Jr., Brook Holmberg, Sherin Pierce

CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER Ken Kraft

CORPORATE STAFF Mike Caron, Linda Clukay, Sandra Lepple, Nancy Pfuntner, Bill Price, Christine Tourgee

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

CHAIRMAN Judson D. Hale Sr.

VICE CHAIRMAN Tom Putnam

DIRECTORS Andrew Clurman, H. Hansell Germond, Daniel Hale, Judson D. Hale Jr., Joel Toner, Cor Trowbridge, Jamie Trowbridge

FOUNDERS

ROBB & BEATRIX SAGENDORPH

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NORMAN ROCKWELL MUSEUM

“A

OPEN DAILY YEAR-ROUND

9 ROUTE 183

STOCKBRIDGE, MA

View the world’s largest collection of original Rockwell art. This summer, enjoy highlights from the permanent collection, Rockwell’s 323 Saturday Evening Post covers, plus New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast. Rockwell’s studio open May to October. Free gallery talks. 36 scenic acres. Dine at the Terrace Café.

www.NRM.org

413-298-4100

Celebrate the grand opening of Maine’s largest lobstering exhibit! Experience the authentic story of Maine’s most iconic industry, from trap to table. Enjoy everything lobster with boat cruises, music, demonstrations, touch tank, activities and fun for the whole family. Free admission for kids and Maine Lobstermen’s Association members.

www.MaineMaritimeMuseum.org

207-443-1316

Photo: (c) Norman Rockwell Museum. All rights reserved.

THE BEST CLAM SHACKS

Summer in New England wouldn’t be complete without enjoying some deep-fried seafood at a dining-in-the-rough clam shack! We’ve rounded up the best in the region:

n The Clam Box Ipswich, Massachusetts

n J. T. Farnham’s Seafood & Grill

Essex, Massachusetts

n The Clam Shack

Kennebunkport, Maine

n Lenny & Joe’s Fish Tale

Madison, Connecticut

n Evelyn’s Drive-In Tiverton, Rhode Island

For the rest of the list, go to: YankeeMagazine.com/ClamShacks

YANKEE CONNECT

Inside Yankee: Editor Mel Allen explains what went into putting the July/August issue together (p. 10).

Mary’s Farm: Edie Clark reads from her new book, As Simple As That: Collected Essays (p. 12).

First Light: See more photos from Stellafane, Vermont’s annual stargazers’ convention (p. 18).

Open Studio: Discover more of Jo Diggs’ appliqué work (p. 60).

Local Flavor: Chill out! Learn to make the perfect banana split (p. 70).

Recipe with a History: Get a second helping of succotash with step-by-step photos (p. 72).

The Hardest Deadline: Read the original newspaper account of the Colebrook tragedy (p. 99).

The Brand New Pearl Mist anam C &anal

Points of Distinction

Just 210 guests onboard

The largest in-class staterooms

All private balconies

Fully stabilized for comfortable coastal cruising

the The Panama Canal is

The Promise of Summer

know it’s impossible to read with your eyes closed, but in just a moment I’ll ask that you close your eyes. (No, not yet—stay with me a moment longer.) I want you to imagine waking up to the sun streaming into your seaside room. Look out and see it sparkling on the ocean. Step onto your patio or balcony, or open the door and feel the cool morning sand on your toes. And listen. (Now close your eyes and pay attention to the sounds of a beach day coming awake.) The gulls are demanding their breakfast, and the waves are rushing to the sand, crashing and spraying, then tumbling away, then rushing back. Open your eyes now and turn to “Sandcastles by the Sea” (p. 34), which will put you as close to the beach as possible, whether in a tent, a cottage, or a famous resort. We know that summer rooms on the beach can be pricey, which is why we’ve included so many different options. What ties them together is that each one offers a favorite spot on the beach just beyond your door, on a day that promises to stretch ahead forever.

The people of Eastport, Maine, know something about the promise of the sea, too. The inexorable surge along Passamaquoddy Bay is so impressive that engineers have looked at those 20-foot tides with longing, searching for a way to convert nature’s own power to electricity to light thousands of homes and businesses. Since the 1930s, when Yankee was making its own first ripples across the New England landscape, the people who live in the small towns along the bay have listened to optimistic plans for a tidal-energy project that could mean renewed prosperity in their lives. Those hopes have always been dashed. But in the past few years, innovative technology and a new vision have again entered the conversation Down East. “Trapping the Moon” (p. 90) tells the story—a story that’s still being written—of the first ocean energy project to deliver electricity to the public grid anywhere in the United States.

Inside our pages, if you keep your eyes and ears open, you’ll find summer waiting. Just bring your cooler and a blanket. You’ll like what you find—I promise.

Mel Allen, Editor editor@YankeeMagazine.com

Use the Yankee Connect app to see what went into putting this issue together. Editor Mel Allen explains.

Richard Adams Carey is the author of four nonfiction books. His newest one, In the Evil Day: Violence Comes to One Small Town (October 6, 2015, release), immersed him for 13 years and more than 300 interviews in the memories of the people of Colebrook, New Hampshire, who on August 19, 1997, saw their small-town life shattered when one man’s vendetta spilled over from anger into gunfire. “It’s a great and powerful story, as rich in beauty and grace as it is in terror and grief. I’m glad it chose me,” Carey writes. “The Hardest Deadline” (p. 96) is an adapted excerpt that shows how the local newspaper’s staff struggled with their shock and heartbreak to try and make sense of the tragedy that had befallen their fellow citizens.

Ratatouille Summer

Under the summer sun, a garden ripens and a body grows stronger.

ast summer, my garden was better than any I’ve had in years. I suppose it was a combination of a good amount of rain and a lot of sunny days. The curious thing was that we had so few really hot days and yet I had a bumper crop of both tomatoes and eggplants. They virtually popped off the vine, especially the eggplants, a July miracle in a northern garden. They were gorgeous, deep purple, almost black, shiny as if polished. It seemed that as fast as I picked them, more ripened from behind the modesty of their pale-green leaves, and more of the light-violet flowers emerged to bear more fruit.

In the spring, I was ill and wasn’t sure I would even plant a garden. That would have been a first. I get stubborn about things like that. Determined to make it happen, I went down to my favorite nursery in Northfield, Massachusetts—Fairview Gardens. I’d made this spring pilgrimage for many years, so I knew the owner, Steve, as a result. (Sadly, I’ve recently learned that Fairview Gardens has shut its doors after 50 years in business.) The rain was enough to deter other customers, but, under an umbrella, he went about with me around his extensive outdoor showroom, helping me decide between varieties, placing the six-packs of seedlings into a wheeled cart, and then filling the back of my car with all the young upstarts. They jostled and wagged back and forth all the way home.

A week later, a young man named Jonas came to help me plant—more like he planted and I directed. Still weak, I sat in a chair beside the garden, again in the rain. Wearing a bright-yellow slicker, I felt like an imperious granny as I pointed my cane at the places where I wanted the Swiss chard, the kale, the eggplants, on and on. With gentle direction, Jonas planted well, and, probably because of the rain, the seedlings took quickly and started out on their summer’s journey.

More than ever, I felt great pleasure in looking out the window at this garden’s progress, especially at the zinnias, which rose rapidly and soon bloomed. It seemed that everything in my good earth was on a race to ripeness. Jonas, strong and willing, came every week and pulled the modicum of weeds, watered when necessary, mowed the lawn. With the pink, scarlet, and bright-yellow zinnias in the center, my traditional ring of orange marigolds around the edge (marigolds have always kept pests away), and the squash plants’ enormous, cartoonish yellow blossoms, my garden became a colorful flag of encouragement.

Slowly but surely, by late summer I was out there harvesting, my cane resting against the doorknob. I needed it less and less. I rustled through my collection for the ratatouille recipe, the perfect dish for my burgeoning garden. Everything I needed was right there: eggplants, zucchini, basil, sweet peppers, tomatoes. Garlic, of course. I cut it all into chunks with my big, sharp knife. The kitchen filled with the fragrance of harvest, mostly with the heady scent of the basil. The colorful brew cooked down into a tasty stew. I like to add a hot pepper or two, giving the mix a little bite.

When the crickets start talking in the evening, I know those summer evenings, the ones we think back on when the snow is high, are fewer and fewer. Too chilly to sit out very late. Of all my lifetime of summers, this one was my most challenging. And yet, in a way that’s difficult to explain, one of my most rewarding. I froze some of the ratatouille so I could remember.

Edie Clark is the author of What There Was Not to Tell: A Story of Love and

War

Order your copy, as well as Edie’s other works, at: edieclark.com

Use the Yankee Connect app to hear Edie Clark reading from her newest book, As Simple As That: Collected Essays.

Spare Parts

In rural

’m skidding balsam-fir sawlogs from our woodlot on a fine Saturday morning in late July when one of the many small linkage pieces that make up the tractor’s three-point hitch comes loose and drops to the forest floor. The three-point hitch is the mechanism at the rear of the machine that allows for the operation of numerous implements, such as the cable winch I use for skidding logs. A tractor without a functioning three-point hitch is like a pizza without pepperoni: not entirely useless, but definitely compromised.

I stop the tractor and bend to the ground in search of the missing part, which turns out to be little more than a bolt that in a fit of engineering genius has been modified in a manner ensuring that an off-the-shelf hardware-store unit won’t suffice. The forest duff is cool and soft as it sifts through my fingers, and I crab-walk back and forth along the skid road, though I don’t have high hopes for recovery; I’ve been cutting a copse of balsam fir at the farthest westerly corner of our property. The skid road is nearly a half-mile long, and I can’t say exactly or even roughly where the not-quite-abolt has dislodged, so after my second pass fails to uncover the missing piece, I abandon my quest and strike out in search of chanterelle mushrooms, a mission I know has a far likelier chance of success. Why, only yesterday the boys returned from the woods with pockets bulging and tongues wagging. “Look, Papa, look,” they called, racing across the lawn, choice specimens clutched in their

Vermont, finding what you need isn’t always about what’s easy and efficient.

CABOT

PHOTOGRAPHS BY PENNY HEWITT

sweaty palms. “The first chanterelles! The first chanterelles!” We fried the mushrooms in butter from the morning churning and ate them with fresh eggs, thinking ourselves royalty.

Still, the tractor needs its hitch rehabilitated. Not long ago, if I needed a tractor part, I’d go to Rowell Brothers, the tractor and farm-equipment repair business on the outskirts of Hardwick, a small town of about 3,000 folks eight miles east of us. I always liked going to Rowell Brothers; it was cluttered and confusing and generally unkempt. There were parts stacked upon parts, some on shelves, but many more simply heaped in piles atop the dusty floor, and although there must have been a vague organizational logic to the system, I was never able to figure it out. The air was thick with the mingled smells of grease, rubber, and cleaning solvents. It should have been an objectionable odor, but for some reason wasn’t.

The man behind Rowell’s counter was Morris Rowell, and I’m not sure how old he was, but certainly older than 70. Maybe older than 80. If Morris didn’t have the part I needed, he’d write it down on a scrap of paper and promise to order it, and when I’d call a week later to see if it had come in, he’d say, “Oh, dang, I forgot,” and then he’d order it. Dang: Morris is the only person I’ve known who uses that word. After a while, I learned not to wait a week before my first call. That speeded up the whole process considerably.

There was a two-bay garage attached to the parts room, and anyone could walk freely into the garage to ask a question of Chris or Fred, the mechanics. There was no “employees only” sign; I doubt Morris gave much thought to liability, though he probably should have, given the profusion of parts and tools, most of which were heavy or jagged or precarious or some combination of the three. These parts and tools were invariably as old as I was or older; Chris and Fred didn’t think much of newer machines, though to be fair, the own-

ers of newer machines probably didn’t think much of the minor chaos that prevailed in the garage at Rowell’s.

But replacing the almost-bolt from the stock at Rowell Brothers isn’t an option this time, because the business closed last year. Morris spent some time trying to find a buyer, but no one stepped forward. It was one of the few times I wished I was wealthy, because I would have loved to buy the place. I wouldn’t have actually wanted to run it—I’m not completely crazy—but since I was wealthy, I could have just hired someone.

Heck, maybe Morris would have stayed on for the right deal. Maybe then when I needed a part I could have still stopped at Rowell’s and Morris would have either extracted the part from where it was buried under a pile of entirely unrelated parts where no one but Morris could find it, or written it down and then forgotten to order it, and in a few days I’d call to see whether it had come in. “Oh, dang,” he’d say, and then I’d know that my part was really on its way.

As it is, I get my part at Tractor Supply, which is sort of like the Walmart of farm-and-garden-supply stores. I’m not sure how many Tractor Supply stores

THIS PAGE , FROM TOP : Rye and Fin work on Dad’s 20-year-old Ford truck; a harvest of wild chanterelle mushrooms, a sure sign of summer. OPPOSITE : Ben and Fin have an impromptu consultation as Rye hangs out with the cows.

there are across the country, but I think quite a few. I know of three within a one-hour radius of our place, though I’ve never needed to visit one before; Rowell’s always sufficed.

I quickly find the part I need, with no assistance from any of the clerks. It gleams in a well-lit bin and is cheaper than I thought it might be, and I briefly consider buying two, so that I’ll have a replacement if I lose another one. But then I have the irrational notion that maybe I’ll find the original one after all and thus have no need for a backup.

I check out and emerge back into the sunlit afternoon. During the entire transaction, I’ve spoken only three

words: “Cash” and “Thank you.” I suppose I could have talked more, but to be honest, I just wanted to get out of there, because it smelled funny. Or maybe it was just that it didn’t smell the way I thought it should smell. No grease. No rubber. No solvent. And then I get it: It smelled clean.

On my drive home from Tractor Supply, my new part tucked securely into a front pocket of my work pants, I consider my family’s dependence on the machines that make our life possible. Or maybe “possible” isn’t the right word, because of course people did what we do for generations before the advent of the combus-

tion engine. They pulled sawlogs with oxen; they felled trees by axe and crosscut saw; they rode to church behind the muscled flanks of horses. In my weaker moments, which seem to coincide with the breakdowns that plague our nearly two-decade-old Ford plow truck, I romanticize the days before connecting rods and exhaust valves, before wornout brakes and car insurance. Certainly before tractor parts that fall to the forest floor, to be found some unknowable years hence by someone who finds his eye drawn to the inorganic shape of rusted metal, lifts it from the ground, and ponders its history.

Yet we’ve also benefited mightily from the vehicles we’ve owned. We carried this house—or the majority of it, anyway—stick of lumber by stick of lumber in the bed of a tricolor, twowheel-drive Dodge pickup of late-’70s vintage. We’d bought the Dodge for $200 from the fellow who lived up the road from the $100-a-month cabin we rented while building. Actually, “cabin” is far too generous a word for the structure, which didn’t have running water but which, through an ill-advised assemblage of extension cords, featured not one, but two, live electrical outlets.

That Dodge never broke down on us. Not even once. It had a standard-shift transmission with a three-speed on the column, and finding the right gear was an art form unto itself; those of you who know old trucks know exactly what I’m talking about. It was powered by a sixcylinder engine, and when its bed was fully loaded with lumber, it could barely climb the steep hill at the road end of our driveway, and even then only if I backed into the road to get a run at the slope.

Whenever I hear people discussing modern trucks, arguing horsepower and amenities, torque curves and tow ratings as if they were matters of life and death, I think of our old Dodge, which was woefully inadequate in each of these categories but which still managed to get done what needed doing. Heck, I even shaved in its side-view mirror the morning of our wedding.

The old Dodge truck does double duty as Ben gets ready for the big day: August 17, 1998, when he and Penny tied the knot.

We drove that truck for two years, and would have driven it longer if the frame hadn’t succumbed to rust. I parked it in the woods behind the house, in part because no Vermont hill farm is complete without at least one abandoned vehicle listing into the ground, and in part because we just couldn’t bring ourselves to send the old girl for scrap. Two days later, I returned with a crescent wrench, removed the side-view mirror, and bolted it to the bathroom wall.

Eventually, thrift prevailed over sentiment, and we hauled the Dodge to the salvage yard. I can’t remember exactly how much we received in scrap value, but I remember thinking that it wasn’t much less than we’d paid for the truck in the first place.

When I return from Tractor Supply, I walk to where I left the tractor and install the almost-bolt. It’s a perfect fit, and just like that, I’m back in business. This makes me happy, and I think that maybe it’s okay that Rowell Brothers has closed. The world will keep spinning. The parts we need to keep our tractor running will keep being made, and I’ll still be able to find them in those well-lit bins at Tractor Supply. In some ways, it was easier than buying parts at Rowell’s; no digging through the logic-less piles, no reminder calls to Morris, no risk of bumping against something sharp or hot or oily.

But the funny thing is, those things are exactly what I miss.

A note on Cabot’s location from Darcie McCann, executive director of the Northeast Kingdom Chamber of Commerce (and a Northeast Kingdom native): “Many residents of Cabot feel more of an affinity with the Northeast Kingdom than central Vermont, being right on the border, and we’re proud to have them in the fold … Considering yourself a resident of the Northeast Kingdom goes beyond borders but often [reflects] where a person feels most at home. It speaks volumes that the Hewitts identify with our independent spirit … We’re proud to count them as Northeast Kingdom residents.”

—Eds.

Ben Hewitt’s fourth book, The Nourishing Homestead: One Back-to-the-Land Family’s Plan for Cultivating Soil, Skills, and Spirit, was published this year by Chelsea Green.

First LIGHT

On Breezy Hill in Springfield, Vermont, stargazers of all ages gather at the 1954 Stellafane conference, sponsored by the Springfield Telescope Makers and the Amateur Telescope Makers of Boston (based at Harvard’s observatory). This year’s event is set for August 13–16.

ONLY IN NEW ENGLAND : The Town Festival … pp. 22–23

KNOWLEDGE & WISDOM : Facts, stats & advice … pp. 24-25

THE BEST 5 : U.S. Route 6 Attractions … p. 26

LOCAL TREASURE : Perry Grist Mill … pp. 28–29

UP CLOSE : New England Flag & Banner … p. 30

The Skywatchers

Since 1926 hundreds of amateur astronomers and telescope makers have gathered on a Vermont hillside at their own “Shrine to the Stars.”

BY ROWAN JACOBSEN

’m standing on Breezy Hill in the black ink of a Vermont midnight in mid-July, surrounded by savants and telescopes. “Switching to M11,” somebody whispers as the barrel of his scope swings through the dark. “The Wild Duck Cluster.” We pilgrims from near and far crane our necks at a firmament so sharp it crackles. “Check out M31, the Andromeda Galaxy,” says another, in the hushed tones that seem appropriate for the darkness. “Just rising over that white pine.” We can’t see one another’s faces, just the muted red flashlights that bob around like will-o’-thewisps, occasionally glinting off the obsidian skin of a homemade scope.

Nearly a thousand of us have come to Stellafane, the annual convention of the Springfield Telescope Makers, which has taken place on this hallowed hill since 1926. This year there are visitors from Brazil and Ireland. One man rode his motorcycle straight through from Toronto. Another walked more than 250 miles. We all fumble our way across the grassy hillside, waiting our turn to peer through the 12-inch Dobsonian or the 25-inch Newtonian at the arcing dustcloud of an ancient supernova, or some ghostly nebula hiding in the dark. With scopes this powerful, even the dullest patch of seeming nothingness turns out to be shot through with stars. I lean into the eyepiece of a 5-inch 1906 Clark refractor, restored to its gleaming brass youth by its new owner, and gasp: Saturn hangs so bright that it feels etched onto the glass.

To become a member of the Springfield Telescope Makers, you have to make your own scope. The housing is pretty straightforward and leaves lots of room for creativity, which is on full display during Stellafane (adapted from the Latin for “shrine to the stars”): from hand-carved wooden telescopes to one made from tin cans, plywood, and a metal salad bowl, with three crutches for a tripod. The challenge is the mirror, which concentrates the light of the sky into the eyepiece; its surface must be blemish-free to within millionths of an inch. That’s something the Springfield Telescope Makers have been accomplishing by hand since 1923, when Russell Porter trained the first 16 people in the art, which involves placing the glass disc of

COURTESY OF THE SPRINGFIELD TELESCOPE MAKERS

They’re here to celebrate that with good hands and a questing mind, mere mortals can make meaning of the night.

your mirror blank on a barrel and slowly grinding the surface with increasingly fine grit while circling the barrel to even out the curve. Then you perform a Foucault Knife-Edge Test, developed in 1858 by Léon Foucault (yes, the pendulum guy), using a pinpoint of light, reflection, and a razor blade. Shadows indicate fine imperfections that can then be ground away. How fine? “Remember when NASA screwed up the Hubble Telescope mirror?” one club member says. “They were off by a couple of microns. Any amateur telescope maker with three razor blades and a lightbulb would have seen that problem.”

That steampunk vibe permeates Stella fane, a throwback to that great Modernist era of exploration when cutting-edge science was within reach

of anyone with some basic supplies and the right DIY spirit. Porter became hooked on “the wonderful mechanism of our universe,” as he put it, during 11 years of Arctic exploration, teaching himself to make telescopes at a time when that was the only way to get one. He found a ready audience in Springfield, Vermont, a mill town in the heart of Precision Valley—the Silicon Valley of its day—where American machine-tool manufacturing

first wowed the world. Springfield was a hotbed of mechanical know-how, scientific curiosity, and cool tools. In 1925 Scientific American ran a story on the group, triggering an explosion of interest in amateur astronomy.

Stellafane’s heart is its bubblegumpink clubhouse. Stories differ as to the origins of the alarming color; Porter’s daughter claimed that he requested spruce-gum pink, a subtle shade lost on the paint mixer. But once in place, the hue became as much a part of the Stellafane identity as the wroughtiron logo over the door: a man with a top hat and umbrella peering through a giant refractor. The Heavens Declare the Glory of God! reads the inscription on the eaves, taken from a psalm. A sundial protrudes out of the back wall. Along with Porter’s sketches of the original club members, the inside walls are strewn with arcane formulas and symbols worthy of the Freemasons. Out front is the Porter Turret Telescope, which looks like a cross between an old Dutch windmill and a machine-

ABOVE : A Perseid meteor pierces the night sky over Breezy Hill, August 2010. INSET BELOW : Polar explorer and Stellafane founder Russell Porter grinds a telescope mirror, c. 1920–25. OPPOSITE, FROM TOP: The Great Globular Cluster (Messier 13) in the Hercules constellation; a handmade Dobsonian telescope.

(MESSIER 13); BOB O’CONNOR (2014 CONVENTION)

gun emplacement, and still uses some of the original 1930 hardware.

Days at Stellafane are devoted to displays of new homemade telescopes, solar observation, and workshops (“Telescope Making Demo: Dobsonian Basics,” “How to Use a Medieval Astrolabe,” and so on). But as the light fades, the scopes come out, and soon Breezy Hill bristles like a porcupine. Strangers cluster in the dark and swap stories.

Tom from Springfield, the third generation of his family to be a Stellafane member, built his first scope when he was 13 years old: “There’s nothing that beats looking through the telescope you made and seeing Andromeda for the first time. Wow!” He’s been coming back ever since. “It’s the innovation you see. People who think out-

side the box. No two telescopes are the same. Every year when I come here, I see something new.”

Paul from Lowell is at his first convention. He’s built a set of four-footlong red binoculars out of sonotubes. “I want to plug myself into the universe with both eyes,” he explains. “When you look through both eyes, instead of squinting through one eyepiece, everything jumps out at you. It’s like you’re flying through space.”

John from Long Island has a cannon of a scope, so long you have to climb a stepladder to look into the eyepiece. His 32-inch lens is one of the largest homemade lenses in the world. After he finished it the first time, the company

that was supposed to add the mirror coating cracked it, and he had to start over. How many hours has he put into this thing? “I dunno,” he shrugs. “A few thousand, easy.”

Phil from Boston is at his 40th Stellafane. He made his first scope as a teenager, won an award, and went into optics. One of his lenses now sits on Eros, the asteroid visited by NASA in 2001. Another was used to fit the Hubble Telescope with its corrective lenses. Phil is showing off his Gregorian telescope, a multimirror design from the 1600s that requires heroically precise optics but makes for spectacular planet viewing. “Why?” I ask him. “Why do it yourself, when Google can

serve up eye-popping images of these same objects in seconds?” In response, he chokes up. “I’m a spiritual person,” he says. “When I go up into the White Mountains with a scope and look at the Orion Nebula, I see it with my own eyes. I see all the atmospherics going on, the subtle textures on the nebula. It’s not just an image on a computer screen; it’s the real thing. To me, it’s a slice of heaven. Just look at the gables on the clubhouse!”

The heavens declare the glory of God. And the firmament sheweth His handiwork. So says the psalm. But religion is not what drives these children of Galileo to cast their nets across a billion light-years of cosmos and a billion years of time. They’re here to celebrate the still-astonishing news that with good hands and a questing mind, mere mortals can make meaning of the night.

Conference details, an events calendar, and information for beginning stargazers at: stellafane.org. To view photos of handmade stargazing equipment, go to: Yankee Magazine.com/Telescopes

Rowan Jacobsen is a freelance journalist and the award-winning author of six books on food and natural history; his latest is Apples of Uncommon Character (Bloomsbury USA, 2014). His previous stories for Yankee include “The Monk in the Orchard” (Sept./Oct. 2014) and “Counting Fish” (Nov./Dec. 2013).

The Town Festival

Whether it’s Old Home Days, a 250th anniversary, or the annual Strawberry–Pumpkin–Lobster–Potato Festival, we Yankees love a celebration— so much so that we make sure they’re all basically the same.

BY KEN SHELDON

ILLUSTRATION BY MARK BREWER

he day begins with a road race, which, depending on the time of year, may also be an obstacle course, what with the frost heaves, spring run-off, or leaf-peepers. Most participants are diehard competitors who’ll run in rain, sleet, or driving snow—some are even pushing babies in jogging strollers that cost more than your first car. The first prize is a jug of maple syrup or a jar of honey. No cash—this is New England, remember?

Town festivals often have a theme, such as “Remembering the Past and Embracing the Future with Hope, Dignity, and Respect for All Life While Celebrating Our Basic Freedoms”—chosen by a committee who argued over it longer than the framers of the Declaration of Independence. Of course, the Founding Fathers weren’t making T-shirts.

There’s always a craft sale, where you’ll find a wide variety of homemade items not available anywhere else, probably with good reason: painted rocks, coffee-can birdhouses, bakedbean candles, and more than a few “What were they thinking?” creations.

Of course, the highlight of the day is the parade, led by the Grand Marshal—generally the oldest resident in town—who agreed to do it only so people would stop pestering him.

Then it’s the preschoolers marching in formation—if by “formation” you mean “more or less the same direction.” There are homemade floats put together the night before, firetrucks, antique cars, and finally the marching band, a group of youngsters looking as happy to be marching in wool uniforms in August as you might expect. Don’t be late, as the parade generally lasts a full seven minutes.

Stop by the bake sale to sample a hundred varieties of zucchini bread, zucchini muffins, zucchini cookies, and other delicacies designed to hide zucchini, which is practically an in vasive species at harvest time in New England. These days, there’s also a selection of baked goods that are gluten-free, GMO-free, trans-fatfree, and for the most part flavor-free. For heartier fare, check out the food tent, where you’ll enjoy a wide array of fried items guaranteed not to be good for you.

Don’t miss the book sale at the library, where you’ll find the complete works of Danielle Steele, piles of National Geographic s that someone’s wife finally convinced him to part with, and old biology textbooks in which the germ theory is presented as a new idea.

The day’s events are made possible by the hard work of the festival com-

mittee, most of whom are newcomers to town who were hoodwinked into it before they knew what was involved. “It’s a rite of passage,” says town clerk Edith Wyer. “Kind of like jury duty.”

Stick around for the chicken barbecue, a must at town events in New England, mainly because guys like to make big fires. The barbecue is often a benefit for some local organization, which may make you feel better about eating half a chicken, several pounds of side dishes, and a whoopie pie.

The evening events kick off with a talent show at the town hall or meetinghouse. By law, the talent show must include at least one Simon & Garfunkel song, one recycled recital piece, one musical number on the accordion (or possibly ukulele), and one homegrown comedian telling the same jokes he tells every morning at the diner.

Dance the night away to the music of the Moody Greys, four local guys still playing the same songs they played in high school, only slower, and these days they sit down a lot instead of jumping around.

At the end of the day you’ll head home with tired feet, a full stomach, and a few more memories for your scrapbook. No, it’s not Mardi Gras or Rio Carnival, but it’s our town, and we wonder why anyone would want to live anywhere else.

USEFUL STUFF FROM 80 YEARS OF YANKEE

Who Yankees Are and Other Things Children Believe

Did you know that New London is the capital of New England? That a trawl is what sailors speak with? Or that Connecticut is much smaller than it sounds? I’ve collected these and similar gems of misinformation during the eight years that I’ve taught fifth-graders in St. Louis County (Missouri) public schools.

... Who Yankees Are:

“Yankees are Eastern-accented Americans.”

“Yankee is a spare word for when you can’t think how to say Easterner.”

“Yankee is an alias for New English.”

... New England Facts:

“The people of New England call their falling water a natural resource. Here, we call it rain.”

“Their clams make chowder. They have been taught how.”

... Historical Notes:

“New England may be new to England, but it is old to America.”

“When British troops tried to enforce the British laws, the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord fired a shot

that was heard around the world! I know this sounds crazy, but it was in the days of witchcraft and everything.”

... Way of Life:

“Hunting bears in Maine is the very exciting way of getting killed.”

“When a person collects the maple syrup, oxes haul the sap to the sugarhouse where he is cooked.”

... Geography:

“If the shoreline of Maine was straightened out, it would reach to Mexico. But we must cut government spending somewhere.”

“Maine is in the Far East, not counting anything by the Western Hemisphere.”

— from “Maine Is in the Far East,” by Harold Dunn, June 1963

7/3/1916

the fateful day when “Chubby” Woodman of Essex, Mass., became the first person to batter-fry a clam

5,000 guests at the biggest clambake Woodman’s ever hosted (1938 in Marietta, Ohio)

101 family recipes in Woodman’s cookbook

3rd

on the list of significant events written on the back of Chubby and Bessie’s wedding certificate (after two sons’ birth dates): “We fried the first clam.”

WE WERE RIGHT ALL ALONG

Suzanne Collins (born 1962 in Hartford, Connecticut) is the author of the multimillion-selling Hunger Games trilogy, among her other well-known works. Her father was a career army officer who served in Vietnam. “It was very important to him that we understood about certain aspects of life,” she told Scholastic Inc., her publisher. “It wasn’t enough to visit a battlefield, we needed to know why a battle occurred, how it played out, and the consequences.” Collins makes her home in Connecticut with her family.

tweaks to Chubby’s original fried-clam recipe

300+ family members who have worked at Woodman’s since 1916

1,620 clams Woodman’s fried on a busy day in 1916

125 customers in line to eat at Woodman’s on an average summer day

70 CENTS what Chubby charged for a basket of fried clams in 1916

75 seconds it takes to fry a clam

TWO MILLION fried clams Woodman’s now serves annually ( plus steamers and chowder)

“I think we put our children at an enormous disadvantage by not educating them in war, by not letting them understand about it at an early age.”

compiled by Julia Shipley

Keep It Simple

Allard recommends that newbie jam makers go the basic route and get some success under their belts. “Raspberries are a great first option,” she says. “They’re naturally high in pectin, and if you do it right, they’ll keep their deep-red color. The jars of jam will look beautiful.”

The Right Pot

To avoid a boilover, Allard advocates using a wide pot that’s three times as high as the depth of your berries. Begin on low heat to warm the mixture up; then, as soon as it starts to seep juice, add sugar. You want your mixture to be equal parts berries and sweetener. Once the mixture begins to boil, bring the heat down to medium and continue to cook off the excess water.

Set It Right

How to Make Preserves

Third-generation jam maker Vicky Allard owns and runs

or Vicky Allard, the search for new preserve flavor combinations is limitless, almost addicting. “I’m always discovering possibilities,” says the English-born Vermonter, who in 2009 founded Blake Hill Preserves with her husband, Joe Hanglin. “It can be a problem.” Allard’s quest began as a young girl, making preserves with her mother and grandmother in their family home. It continues today in a big kitchen set on a quiet dirt road in Grafton, where she produces Blake Hill jams, marmalades, and chutneys, which have earned international accolades and are sold in more than 300 stores across the country.

Jam reaches its perfect set point at 220°. An instant-read thermometer is a must, and you’ll know you’re getting close to that finished point as the mixture’s bubbles begin to get smaller. But Allard, who doesn’t add pectin to her products, also notes that you can employ other methods. For example, start by placing a plate in the freezer when you begin cooking. As you near setting, take it out and place a dollop of the hot jam on the surface. Let it sit for a minute; then run your finger through it. If it’s developed a nice skin, you’re done. If it’s still runny, keep cooking. Another trick: Dip a spoon into the jam, turn it on its side, and hold it over the pot. If the drops cling to the spoon and sheet off, you’re there.

Put a Lid on It

Jam jars must be clean and sterile. “Don’t use anything that has cracks or is compromised,” Allard says. Once they’re clean, run them through the dishwasher without detergent, or place them in the oven at 275° for 15 minutes to bake them. When you’re ready, fill the hot jars with your hot newly made jam, keeping just a quarterinch of space at the top. Then seal tightly with a new lid. Finish by putting the jars into a hot-water bath—make sure they’re submerged at least two inches—to create a proper vacuum seal.

Let It Grow

As you become more comfortable making and canning preserves, start experimenting. Allard’s suggestion: Follow your senses. “Browse around your local market and explore the herbs and spices,” she says. “Think about what kinds of flavor combinations would work well.” One of her big sellers is a raspberry and hibiscusflower preserve that she played around with a few years ago. More recently she’s explored ways to do something with chai. Says Allard, “Think about the flavors that you enjoy and love to eat.”

More information at: blakehillpreserves.com

Blake Hill Preserves in Grafton, Vermont. BY IAN ALDRICH

What to See on U.S. Route 6

Connecticut-based travel journalist Malerie Yolen-Cohen became obsessed with what was once the longest transcontinental highway in America—U.S. Route 6—which runs east/west through 14 states, from Provincetown, Massachusetts, to Bishop, California. (Today its stretch is second only to U.S. Route 20’s.) She wrote the first mile-by-mile travel guide: Stay on Route 6: Your Guide to All 3,652 Miles of Transcontinental US Route 6. Here are her five favorite attractions, each just a few turns off this classic highway, in the New England towns through which it passes.

Pilgrim Monument

Completed in 1910 to commemorate the Mayflower passengers who spent their first five weeks in the New World at what is now Provincetown, this obelisk is the tallest all-granite structure in the United States. Climb the 252-foot tower for a bird’s-eye view of the Cape; then spend some time in the “Grandma’s attic of P’town”— the Pilgrim Monument Visitors’ Center Museum—which highlights early Native American life, the European settlers, the area’s whaling and fishing industries, and the influx of artists to this end-of-the-earth locale. Provincetown, MA. 508-487-1310; pilgrim-monument.org

Green Briar Nature Center & Jam Kitchen

In 1903 Ida Putnam began selling her jams and jellies to travelers on “the only highway that went all the way to the end of the Cape—Route 6A.” Preserves are still cooked in Ida’s kettles over the original burners, and you can sample as many as you’d like before buying. Also on site are the interpreted trails and spectacular wildflower garden of the Nature Center, offering programs for kids and adults year-round. Next door you’ll find the Briar Patch Conservation Area, the inspiration for the quirky animal characters of Thornton Burgess’s beloved children’s stories. Sandwich, MA. 508-888-6870; thorntonburgess.org

Millicent Library

Fairhaven, Mass., is considered an unsung Epcot, thanks to Henry Huttleston Rogers, one of the founders of Standard Oil, who endowed the town with fancifully designed public buildings. In 1894, Rogers’ close friend, Mark Twain,

dedicated the French Gothic Fairhaven Town Hall, and if you walk into the Italian palazzo–style Millicent Library, you can still see Twain’s handwritten speech hanging unceremoniously on the wall above the periodicals. Fairhaven, MA. 508-992-5342; millicentlibrary.org

Mark Twain House

It’s thrilling to stand within reach of Mark Twain’s well-worn writing desk—close enough to scrutinize the scratches and indentations in the dark wood. Take the popular one-hour tour of Twain’s mansion on the hill, where docents recount stories about his servants, his family, and his doomed business ventures, but first walk through the Visitors’ Center, which now houses Twain’s desk, the Paige Compositor— a typesetting device that ruined him financially—and other personal items. Hartford, CT. 860247-0998; marktwainhouse.org

Hill-Stead Museum

Theodate Pope Riddle, one of America’s first women architects and daughter of Cleveland iron magnate Alfred Pope, designed this distinguished Colonial Revival home as a country estate for her globetrotting parents. At the turn of the last century, the Popes toured Europe annually, often purchasing blurry Impressionist art straight from the starving artists before said artists—Degas, Monet, Manet, Cassatt—became famous. Mounted within reach over fireplaces and on walls, the paintings are as accessible to visitors as they were to the home’s original residents. Farmington, CT. 860-677-4787; hillstead.org

For more on this iconic highway, visit: stayonroute6.blogspot.com

VIEW OF RACE POINT FROM CAPE COD NATIONAL SEASHORE’S PROVINCE LANDS VISITOR CENTER

A Most Unusual Gift of Love

THEPOEMREADS:

Dear Reader,

The drawing you see above is called The Promise. It is completely composed of dots of ink. After writing the poem, I worked with a quill pen and placed thousands of these dots, one at a time, to create this gift in honor of my youngest brother and his wife.

Now, I have decided to offer The Promise to those who share and value its sentiment. Each litho is numbered and signed by hand and precisely captures the detail of the drawing. As a wedding, anniversary or Valentine’s gift or simply as a standard for your own home, I believe you will find it most appropriate.

Measuring 14" by 16", it is available either fully-framed in a subtle copper tone with hand-cut double mats of pewter and rust at $135*, or in the mats alone at $95*. Please add $14.50 for insured shipping and packaging. Your satisfaction is completely guaranteed.

My best wishes are with you.

All major credit cards are welcomed. Please send card name, card number, address and expiration date, or phone between 10 a.m.-6 P M PST, Monday through Saturday. Checks are also accepted. Please allow up to 2 weeks for delivery. *California residents- please include 8.0% tax

Please visit my Web site at

“Across the years I will walk with you— in deep, green forests; on shores of sand: and when our time on earth is through, in heaven, too, you will have my hand.”

Mill of Dreams

Celebrating a historic Rhode Island gristmill, the joy of jonnycakes, and the couple who loves them.

BY AIMEE SEAVEY

o you wanna buy a mill? ” Thirty years later, Bob and Diane Smith still chuckle at the memory of the phone call that changed their lives. With no previous experience and both nearing retirement age, there were plenty of reasons to decline, but instead the couple had just one question: “How much?”

Built in 1703, the Samuel E. Perry Grist Mill in the village of Perryville in South Kingstown, Rhode Island, is a weathered wooden structure with a cheerful red front. Bob remembers when gristmills were plentiful in the area, and how he spent a childhood of Saturdays visiting them. “I know sometimes I must have annoyed the miller,” he says, “but watching the grinding was just something I enjoyed, and I always dreamed of owning one myself.”

Bob and Diane met at the University of Rhode Island (back when it was Rhode Island State College) and married in 1949. They eventually settled in nearby Wakefield, where they shared a keen interest in local history. When the chance to buy the old Carpenter’s Grist Mill came in 1985, they felt that the rewards of ownership would outweigh any challenges—especially if it also meant more jonnycakes, which (this being Rhode Island) it most certainly did.

With more than three centuries of continuous grinding history, the mill (renamed the Perry Grist Mill, for the original owner) is the last in the state to use water power to produce stone-ground

jonnycake meal, made from native Rhode Island–grown whitecap flint corn. It’s notoriously difficult to grow, but has a wonderfully nutty flavor that many folks feel tastes best as a platter of jonnycakes, hot off the griddle.

Sharing this classic Rhode Island dish has been a favorite part of the job (“Bob always has his griddle with him,” quips Diane), and likely the easiest. Bob learned how to grind, while Diane designed new packaging and marketed the meal to local shops and inns. Now on grinding days (announced in the local newspaper) they demonstrate the mill’s operation and show visitors how to make jonnycakes (offering free samples); they keep a regular table at the local farmers’ market, too. Once Diane even slipped a bag of jonnycake meal to celebrity chef Bobby Flay at a clambake; an endorsement on his website soon followed.

It’s been a labor of love for the Smiths, but mindful of their age, in 2012 the couple deeded the mill to the South Kingstown Land Trust for future preservation. In turn, the trust

leases it back to them as the operators for a dollar a year. The Smiths say they feel lucky to live in a community that both values and supports its past,

but you can’t help but feel that the good fortune runs both ways. Boosted by the Smiths’ efforts over the past three decades and the continued support of the Land Trust, it’s all but guaranteed that the Perry Grist Mill will keep grinding some of the state’s best jonnycake meal for years to come.

It’s a role that Bob Smith is proud of. “I’ve been very fortunate in my life, and having the gristmill has been very rewarding and special,” he says. Then he leans forward and gestures toward his wife of 60 years. “I’ll tell you what, though,” he adds. “Of all the wonderful things that ever happened to me, that’s the best.”

And like any good partner, Diane laughs warmly and promptly returns the compliment. “I wouldn’t have known a thing about gristmills without Bob,” she says. “I listened and learned and grew to really enjoy it. We both did. It’s been just wonderful.”

SAMUEL E. PERRY GRIST MILL 364 Moonstone Beach Road, Perryville, RI. 401-783-5483

OPPOSITE : The historic Perry (formerly Carpenter’s) Grist Mill, grinding Rhode Island–grown whitecap flint corn since 1703. ABOVE : Managers Bob and Diane Smith.

Appliqué, a technique in which colored fabrics are layered, with sections cut away to reveal the colors beneath, dates back to at least 980 B C , when it was used to make a canopy for the funeral of Egyptian Queen Esi-mem-kev.

When NEF&B opened in Boston’s garment district in 1892, its primary products were signage flags and gonfalons for retail stores.

NEF&B has made flags for Ritz-Carlton since the hotel chain opened in 1920. And in 1960, when John F. Kennedy returned to Massachusetts to vote in the presidential election, NEF&B made the banners and bunt ing for the rally at Boston Garden.

When legendary Boston Celtics coach and club executive Red Auerbach and his team began their run of 16 NBA championships in a 30-year span starting in 1957, NEF&B began crafting the team’s championship banners. In 2008, two years after Auerbach’s passing, the company produced the Celtics’ 17th and latest banner.

Sewn behind the label of every championship banner is a good-luck penny.

The company’s largest custom project? After winning the 2013 World Series, the Red Sox commissioned a 196x37-foot banner to be draped over the Green Monster at Fenway Park.

In 2006, new owner Ned Flynn sent potential clients postcards of the Celtics raising their 1984 championship banner. The response was incredible: “Out of 2,200 intercollegiate athletic programs in the country, we now do work for about 2,000.”

In a typical year, the company’s 28 employees produce more than 10,000 flags and banners.

—compiled by Joe Bills

More often than not, New England Flag & Banner flies under the radar, but this Watertown, Massachusetts, company, the country’s largest producer of custom, hand-sewn appliqué banners and flags, is responsible for some of New England’s most iconic sports imagery.

JOHN TLUMACKI/THE BOSTON GLOBE COURTESY OF NEW ENGLAND FLAG & BANNER

Celtics general manager Red Auerbach and forward Larry Bird raise the 1984 basketball championship banner at Boston Garden.

SparHawk

Mint Green Teal Maine Tourmaline

The most significant find of tourmaline anywhere in the world is happening in Maine right now!

A treasure trove of tourmaline crystals has been found just 28 miles north of our store. Gems have been cut. Jewelry has been made. SparHawk Mint Green Teal Maine Tourmaline –brighter and more brilliant than emerald and available now at Cross. Check out our latest creations on-line, then call or visit our store.

Jewelers to New England Since 1908 570 Congress St., Downtown, Portland, Maine www.CrossJewelers.com 1-800-433-2988

SparHawk Maine Tourmaline

EDITORS’ CHOICE

BEST of NEW ENGLAND

BEST INN RESTORATION THE INN AT HASTINGS PARK LEXINGTON, MA

A thoughtfully restored antique property located in one of New England’s most historic districts, this 22-room Relais & Chateaux inn has gorgeous interiors featuring a contemporary twist on the traditional. Its casually elegant restaurant, Artistry on the Green, serves regional seasonal cuisine.

781-301-6660

www.innathastingspark.com

BEST CAR & MOTORCYCLE COLLECTION SPRINGFIELD MUSEUMS SPRINGFIELD, MA

Four world-class museums covering art, history, and science, plus the Dr. Seuss Sculpture Garden, all for one low admission price. Impressionist art. motorcycles, fossils, Chinese cloisonné - there’s something for everyone at the Springfield Museums! Minutes from I-90 and I-91.

413-263-6800

BEST LAKESIDE B&B WOLF COVE INN POLAND, ME

The gift of nature’s beauty surrounds you. The warmth of gracious hospitality envelops you. Delightfully distinctive gourmet breakfasts satiate you. At the Wolf Cove Inn “Wow” is the word. Your gateway to all of Maine! And bring Fido too!

207-998-4976

Each year, the editors of Yankee Magazine scour the six-state region to find the best attractions, dining, lodging, and shopping for inclusion in our “Best of New England” awards. Enjoy this collection of current and past winners.

To search the complete list of winners while you are on the go, download our free “Best of New England” app in iTunes: apple.co/1zVCfci or Google Play.

BEST TRADITIONAL SALT-GLAZED POTTERY SALMON FALLS STONEWARE

DOVER, NH & OGUNQUIT, ME

Handcrafters oftraditional salt-glaze stoneware since 1986. Visit their retail stores in Dover, NH or Perkins Cove, Ogunquit, ME, where local artisans produce wheel-thrown and hand-decorated pottery for everyday use.

800-621-2030

BEST FAIRYTALE LUNCH PICKITY PLACE / MASON, NH

Experience the enchanting cottage that inspired Elizabeth Orton Jones’s Little Golden Books version of Little Red Riding Hood. Untouched by time, this is a mecca for gardeners, epicureans and anyone looking for inspiration and relaxation. Have a Pickity

Day

603-878-1151

BEST DESIGNER ROOM THE HARRASEEKET INN FREEPORT, ME

A family-owned, AAA Four Diamond hotel featuring two restaurants, fireplaces, indoor pool, select pet-friendly rooms. Book direct and get free breakfast and tea. Complimentary transportation from Amtrak Downeaster station. Two blocks to L.L.Bean. Best shopping in NE. 800-342-6423

BEST HARBOR FRONT MOTEL

VINEYARD HARBOR MTL VINEYARD HAVEN, MA

Offering year-round accommodations just a few blocks from the center of Vineyard Haven. Amenities include: private baths, CTV, A/C, refridgerator, maid service, and free parking. Kitchenette and 1-bedroom apts. also. Enjoy the private beach and views from the beautiful patio and sunny decks.

508-693-3334 | 877-693-3334

www.vineyardharbormotel.com

BEST IN-TOWN COUNTRY INN HARTSTONE INN & HIDEAWAY CAMDEN, ME

Steps from Camden Harbor, ‘A Sophisticated Retreat and Culinary Destination’ (Fodor's New England). Awarded the prestigious AAA Four Diamond rating for lodging and dining. Reward yourself and your tastebuds! Two-night cooking classes & spa packages from $350.

207-236-4259

www.hartstoneinn.com

BEST BICULTURAL

INTERPRETATION PLIMOTH PLANTATION PLYMOUTH, MA

Plimoth Plantation brings to life the stories of the Pilgrims and the Native Wampanoag people. Exhibits include the Wampanoag Homesite, 17th-Century English Village, Craft Center, Plimoth Bread Company, Plimoth Grist Mill and Mayfl ower II. Plan you visit now.

508-746-1622

www.plimoth.org

BEST BEACH TOWN HAMPTON BEACH VILLAGE DISTRICT HAMPTON, NH

Re-Discover Hampton Beach rated #1 in the United States for water quality. Free activities include fireworks, world class sand sculpting, talent and volleyball competitions, and Children’s Week.

603-926-8717

www.hamptonbeach.org

BEST FAMILY INN THE NONANTUM RESORT KENNEBUNKPORT, ME

Traditions begin here. Enjoy the seasonal family activities program, kayak & bike rentals, outdoor heated pool, magical fairy garden, scenic lobster boat cruises, and trolley tours! Close to the beaches and Dock Square shops. TripAdvisor

Certificate of Excellence winner.

888-205-1555

www.nonantumresort.com

BEST BEER IN NEW ENGLAND THE NEW WORLD TAVERN PLYMOUTH, MA

With a huge selection of beers and a unique menu, The New World Tavern offers something refreshing for its guests including everything from burgers to steambuns to Asian–inspired noodle dishes. Live entertainment, private function room, Plymouth’s largest selection of craft beers.

508-927-4250

www.thenewworldtavern.com

BEST RETRO RETREAT CASABLANCA MOTEL MANCHESTER, VT

Vermont’s Best Retro Escape from Main Street to the mountains, a simpler way to stay. Ten charming, restored cabins offering a vintage vibe with modern amenities, friendly innkeepers, and realistic rates. Make this your Manchester destination. Pets are welcome in select cabins.

802-362-2145

www.casablancamotel.com

PHOTO: BOB DENNIS

Reconnect with past Editors’ Choice winners and learn for yourself why they received Yankee

The GUIDE TRAVEL

CASTLE HILL INN

On the grounds of this luxurious and historic lodging on Newport’s rocky western peninsula are several shoreside cottages ( THIS PAGE AND OPPOSITE ) along a private stretch of beach: light and airy retreats overlooking the mouth of Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay. Sunset sails from the inn’s marina and cruises to nearby Mackerel Cove are all part of the maritime magic here.

SANDCASTLES by the sea

THERE’S NOTHING SO PLEASING AS STEPPING OUT YOUR DOOR ONTO THE BEACH AND INTO THE SHIMMERING WAVES. HERE’S OUR GUIDE TO SOME OF THE MOST INVITING AND TIMELESS PLACES TO STAY.

LIKE WAVES, EVERY BEACH HAS ITS OWN distinct rhythm. It widens or shrinks with the tides and changes subtly with each hour, from dawn to dusk, and beyond, as you glimpse the immensity of the night sky shining on the water. Those of us who love the sea know that sleeping beside a great beach is the ultimate luxury.

Last summer we prowled the New England coast and islands searching

for “sandcastles,” our name for the best beachside places to stay. We looked for reasonably priced motels, B&Bs, and campgrounds as well as luxury resorts. Years ago, our quest would have been easier. In the era of steamboats, trains, and trolleys, New England beaches were lined with seasonal lodging, from basic to grand. Most vintage venues have disappeared, many taken by fire or storms, others claimed by soaring coastal prop-

BY CHRISTINA TREE

erty values. A fraction, however, have survived, some to become today’s version of “grand,” while others, tucked between lines of cookie-cutter motels and pricey beachside rentals and condos, remain affordable “sandcastles” to which people return summer after summer.

What has remained unchanged through the decades is the sand, the water—and our urge to get as close to them as possible.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY BOB PACKERT; MODELS: RICHARD SWEETMAN (TBW MODELS, RI), KIRSTEN O’CONNELL

maine

By the 1930s, “motor courts” had mushroomed along the Maine coast, among them The Dunes on the Waterfront on the tidal Ogunquit River. An open pasture in 1936 when Aaron Perkins’ grand father began building here, the 12 acres are now landscaped lawns and flowerbeds, salted with well-spaced vintage cottages with wood-burning fireplaces and screened porches. There are now also several multiunit buildings in matching white clapboard and green shutters, and the former barn is a spacious lobby/living room with coffee, breakfast muffins, and a corner filled

with books and board games for rainy days. There’s a pool and playground as well as shuffleboard, plus a dock with available rowboats. Guests are handed a tide chart at check-in, their key to the beach.

At low tide, walkers can easily cross the riverbed. At midtide there’s enough sun-warmed water for a toddler to learn to swim, as I once did. From the opposite side of the river, a boardwalk path through the dunes puts guests smack in the uncrowded middle of three-milelong Ogunquit Beach. The sand by the water is firmly packed, good for jogging and strolling, and still there’s plenty of soft sand back by the dunes to stake

out your umbrellas and supplies for the day. “This is a hidden oasis,” Ginette Belanger confided, after we’d met several times coming and going between The Dunes and the beach. “When I was a child, my family rented a house near the beach, and now this is my paradise, the place I come with my son and his children.”

In Scarborough, farther up Maine’s southern coast, I heard an uncannily similar story about a very different beach and its sandcastle. “I love this beach, the way it slopes gently to the water,” Marisa Rondina told me, adding, “If there’s a room for me at The Breakers, I come.” Marissa and I were seated on the sea wall above Higgins Beach, a half-mile long and backed by summer cottages. I’d spotted her coffee cup from our B&B, The Breakers Inn . Marissa has been coming here off and on for more than 30 years and now usually stays more than a week at a time with her husband. It’s easy to understand why.

I woke here to the thrum of waves and the slant of the early-morning sun through the blinds. I slipped into shorts, a T-shirt, and rubber Crocs, and padded down the stairs and out onto the sunporch, with its fragrant pot of freshly brewed coffee. Stepping across Bayview Avenue to the beach, I found a few surfers already skimming gracefully on sizable breakers.

Higgins Beach changes more than most in the course of a day. Surfers and dog walkers are permitted only before and after certain hours; the exposed sand itself shrinks almost to its rocky seawall at high tide and stretches out expansively at low. Because this is a residential neighborhood and parking is limited, it’s a bit of a local secret: relatively uncrowded at midday but a spectacle later in the afternoon as surfers and standup paddleboarders converge from all directions.

Built in 1900 as a family home, The Breakers opened as an inn in 1932 and has been owned since 1956 by the Laughton family. It’s the kind of place that regulars book in January. Our first

THE BREAKERS INN

An abundance of ocean-view windows and comfortable nooks ( THIS PAGE ) grace this comfortable Maine B&B, originally a sizable family home when it was built in 1900. It overlooks half-milelong Higgins Beach ( OPPOSITE ), a popular spot for surfing and standup paddleboarding. At low tide you may even spot the remains of a shipwreck from 1897. Bordering the northeast end of the beach is the tidal Spurwink River, known for excellent striped-bass fishing.

THE DUNES ON THE WATERFRONT

On the far side of the tidal Ogunquit River from the resort’s classic clapboard cottages, the sand dunes of pristine Ogunquit Beach are aglow in coastal Maine’s rosy-gold light. Rowboats are available for high-tide crossings, or you can walk across at low tide. Nearby on the mainland side is the famed Marginal Way, taking you over the bluffs on foot to the village of Perkins Cove.

crack at it came only after Labor Day, when we lucked into corner room #1 with its picture window framing the beach and the Atlantic. The B&B’s 15 guestrooms (with private baths) vary widely in size and shape, but all boast water views and cost roughly the same. (Regulars feel as though they’ve won the lottery if they score one of the tower rooms, #2 or #10.) The actual room is incidental to the hospitable feel of this place, though, thanks to its shared spaces, including a comfortable living room and wraparound dining room/ sunporch. Rodney Laughton orchestrates made-to-order breakfasts here, and the inn also offers a picnic lunch during the high season.

In Cape Elizabeth, just around a bend in the rocky coast from Higgins Beach, Inn by the Sea is our most luxurious Maine sandcastle. This low-slung, shingled resort with ocean views is set above spreading lawns. A 200-yard boardwalk leads past a salt pond to a gently curving mile of soft sand. Early one June morning, this wooden path was edged with wildflowers and cattails, shaded by trees full of chirping birds. Piping plovers darted out from the edge of the dunes, leading tiny chicks. Gulls congregated by the marsh, terns swooped up and down along the shore, and a raft of eider ducks bobbed along on the swells just beyond the gentle waves. The entire beach is part of Crescent Beach State Park, but daytrippers gather by the bathhouse some way down the sand; because it’s protected by offshore Richmond Island, it appeals primarily to families with small children.

At Inn by the Sea rooms range from “traditional” doubles with gas fireplaces to family-size family-geared units to two-bedroom cottages with full kitchens; most have balconies or patios with water views. Amenities include a pool, a full spa, and the popular Sea Glass restaurant. Dogs and children are enthusiastically welcomed.

Of course, not all sandcastles need walls. Hermit Island is a 255-acre,

Pure Maine Family

Tidepools, wildlife, hiking trails, and eight pocket beaches tucked between rocky outcroppings make this secluded little peninsula on Maine’s Casco Bay a paradise for families who want to escape into nature. Once the site of a thriving colonial-era fishery, the island is named for a lone shepherd who lived here with his flock at the turn of the last century.

sand-fringed neck of land not far from Popham Beach (south of Bath). A campground on its southern end offers 270 sites, well spaced and secluded, with more than 50 of them facing directly onto sandy stretches along the shore. Beyond the camping area are acres of private beach and hiking trails through woods and meadows.

There’s no electrical power or running water, but drinking water, hot showers, and flush toilets are conveniently located. Rates begin at $37 per night. Only tents, small to medium-size pop-ups, and small pickup campers are permitted. Visitors and pets aren’t allowed. Guests register at the Kelp Shed, also a gathering place with a fireplace, a pool table, and video games, as well as coffee, snacks, and rainy-day games.

Hermit Island was purchased in 1948 by Sumner Sewall, a former Maine governor. It’s maintained by Sumner’s son Nick, who worries about the rising tide of taxes that threaten this place—a summer paradise for generations of beach-loving families who

return year after year to sleep enveloped by sea breezes in one of Maine’s most iconic places, where summer memories are made and endure.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

No-frills beach access has long been the draw for families at Seaside Village Resort on North Hampton State Beach. Billing itself as “New Hampshire’s only resort directly on the sand,” this low-key complex consists of several mismatched buildings ranging from basic 1930s motel units through a family-size apartment and cottage (formerly a teahouse) to a row of shingled 1980s “townhouses.” While “resort” may be a misnomer, the venue’s 20 units and welcoming check-in area are tasteful, clean, and literally steps from a glorious stretch of sand. Now wedged among multimillion-dollar beach homes, Seaside Village is a throwback to a quieter, more relaxed time.

By contrast, nearby Hampton Beach —by far the most famous one and a half

miles of sand along New Hampshire’s 18-mile coastline—draws action-loving beachcombers with frequent free concerts on the Seashell Stage, big-name performers at the Casino Ballroom, and mega events such as the annual June sand-sculpting contest and August Children’s Week. Arcades and fried dough evoke this resort town’s era as a trolley destination (see p. 140 in this issue for more Hampton history), and Hampton Beach State Park is rated one of the cleanest in the country.

The sand is backed by a seawall and busy Ocean Boulevard, so technically no lodging is right on the beach, but Ashworth by the Sea comes close, sited at a major crosswalk and beach entrance. Dating from 1912, this iconic 106-room hotel features a ballroom, a popular restaurant, a breakfast café, and a lounge, and boasts it own multigenerational following. “It’s all about the beach,” staffer Eileen Menard told us. “Guests park [a luxury here], drop their stuff, and head out in bathing suits. They don’t get back in their cars until they leave.”

ASHWORTH BY THE SEA: Prime views let guests keep tabs on the sandy oceanfront, part of New Hampshire’s Hampton Beach State Park . Plus, streetside are the classic arcades, shops, and seafood shacks of this longtime favorite beach town. Nonstop summer events here include fireworks, a sand-sculpting competition, a children’s festival, a regatta, and performances at the Casino Ballroom and the Seashell Stage.

Discover the Lake Sunapee Region

The Adventure Park at Mount Sunapee Resort

Zip-Line Tours, Aerial Ropes Course, Mini-Golf, Disc Golf, Downhill Mt. Biking, Airbag Jump & Climbing Wall. 603-763-3564 mtsunapee.com

Village Sports

394 Main St., New London, NH. We want to be your paddleboard shop. John Kiernan Jr., Owner since 1979. 603-526-4948

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There is ALWAYS Something to Do Here!

Outdoor

Eastman Community Association

Live where you love to play. Multigenerational recreational community, lake, golf, trails, tennis and more. 603-863-4240 eastmannh.org

LakeSunapeeRegionChamber.com

877-526-6575

Four-Season Family Fun!

Sunapee Cruises

Narrated tours, Dinner Cruises and Private Charters. See beautiful Lake Sunapee from the best seats around. 603-938-6465

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Fine Artist Exhibition

August 1-9, Free Admission-parking 10-5pm. Hosted by Sunapee Landing Trading Company, 356 Rte 103, Sunapee. (Loon Lighthouse and Sunapee Mt. Copyright Deborah Bacon)

Lyon Brook

Enjoy an independent lifestyle in a warm community atmosphere at Lyon Brook Condominium, New London, NH

603-526-6633 www.lyonbrook.com

Four Seasons Sotheby’s International Realty

We represent some of the finest listings throughout New Hampshire and Vermont. 888.526.4050

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Prospect Hill Antiques

Antique furniture & a treasure trove of fabulous finds awaits you! 1 mile from Lake Sunapee in Georges Mills. Open daily 10-5. 603-763-9676

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New London Barn Playhouse

One of the oldest summer theaters in the USA. Award-winning professional productions presented in an historic converted barn.

603-526-6710 www.nlbarn.org

Pleasant Acres, LLC

Sunapee’s award-winning property management company for lake front homes & high-end estates. 603-526-2482

www.PleasantAcresNH.com

Bonin Architects & Associates

Residential, Commercial & Landscape Design. Meredith & New London, NH 603-526-6200

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CHATHAM BARS INN

Classic Shingle-style cottages dot the inn’s quarter-mile stretch of private beach, overlooking Cape Cod’s Chatham Harbor. In addition to tennis, golf, biking, fishing, and other activities, this full-service resort offers whale-watch and seal cruises; guided tours of Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge; and, for the young sters, a pirate-treasure hunt.

maSSACHUSETTS

Resort towns on Boston’s North and South shores, once studded with beachside seasonal lodging places, have long since morphed into suburbs. Cape Cod, by contrast, was a quiet back water until the decades after World War II, when long strips of sand along Nantucket Sound were carved into private fiefdoms, prompting creation of the National Seashore in 1961 to preserve the 40-mile Outer Beach.

Today Cape Cod offers by far New England’s largest number of beachside places to stay. We checked every town on the Cape for beachside lodging with a genuinely welcoming feel and access to sand. The following is a sampling of places that fill the bill.

The vintage 1914 Chatham Bars Inn has changed gracefully with the times and is the Cape’s sole surviving (now year-round) grand beachside resort. Facilities include a nine-hole golf course, tennis courts, a secluded spa with its own pool far from the family-geared pool, a boathouse, and a fleet of sailing, fishing, and tour vessels—plus four restaurants, 40 guestrooms, and imposing public spaces in the inn itself. Another 150 guestrooms and suites are divided among 35 scattered “cottages,” including 17 separated only by beach plums from a stretch of sand along Chatham Harbor.

On the midsummer night when we checked in, the inn’s Beach House Grill was featuring a midweek buffet-style lobsterbake. We settled into a sandside table, our plates heaped with seafood and fixings, and feasted on the view. Fishing boats were moored offshore, and boys were playing sand soccer while girls competed on the sidelines with hula hoops. We watched the neon sunset until it totally faded.

At breakfast, the picture windows in the inn’s dining room framed the water view, and the tables were draped in linen. Outside on the less-formal terrace, tables were filled with families, the kids outfitted for morning programs such as standup paddleboard-

Nashua | North Conway

Glass Vase by Robert Burch

ing. Down on the beach, fishing boats were heading out from neighboring Chatham Fish Pier, as a dozen or so seals eerily serenaded the sun from an offshore sandbar. We caught the Bar Tender, a 1930s-style launch, across the narrow harbor to North Beach, an endless barrier beach backed only by dunes. We sunned, swam, strolled, and sunned some more.

Just down Shore Road from the Chatham Bars, The Hawthorne , a handsome seasonal motel that has been owned by the same family since the 1960s, offers sweeping water views and a path to its own private beach. The comfortable rooms and suites include several with cooking facilities. Across town on Nantucket Sound, the Chatham Tides is another beachfront motel still in the same family who built it in the ’60s; there are efficiency units with patios on the beach, and more units are stepped up a hill, with large “townhouses” overlooking the water.

“You could never build this close to the beach today,” Margaret Hagberg told us at the Beach House at Bass River, explaining that her husband built this shingled, 26-unit two-story motel in 1976 on family-owned property. It faces a private stretch of beach flanked on both sides by sand stretching a total of two miles. “We attract people who like to walk,” she added. With its patios and balconies, this is the kind of place where you never really leave the expansive view. Each room is different: uncluttered, but fitted with air conditioning, a fridge, and books; some are furnished with antiques. There’s coffee and homemade granola in the common room.

“We want our guests to have that warm, relaxed feeling,” Helen Kossifos told us at By the Sea Guests in Dennisport. This airy, three-story, beachside house was built originally as an annex to the vast but vanished Belmont Hotel and has been run by Helen’s family for more than 50 years. A classic guesthouse with one bath to a floor, it’s since been renovated and now offers a dozen

Original art by Peter Ferber

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TAKE THE CRUISE FERRY BETWEEN PORTLAND, MAINE & YARMOUTH, NOVA SCOTIA

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comfortable rooms and several condostyle units. Life here centers on the glassed-in sunporch, where guests gather for breakfast and plan their days—which frequently entail moving no farther than the few steps down the front porch to the hotel’s private piece of beach.

A ferry ride away on Martha’s Vineyard, Winnetu Oceanside Resort is about as good as it gets for families. The 11-acre property includes two heated pools and a spa and fitness center, as well as huge outdooor chess pieces to move around. Organized activities, ranging from a toddler program and antiquefiretruck rides to yoga on the lawn and kayak tours, are included in the accom-

modations, which range from studios to fully equipped homes, all furnished with an eye toward easy access to magnificent three-mile-long South Beach.

On Nantucket, The Wauwinet , nestled between two beaches, represents the ultimate in low-key luxury amenities and access. Dating to the 1870s as a destination for shore dining and from the 1880s as a modest inn, it was renovated decades ago by the Karp family, who maintain the 32 rooms and four cottages, plus the new three-bedroom shingled Anchorage House, as an elite resort. It’s open only from mid-May to mid-October; amenities include a spa and fine dining.

RHODE ISLAND

Despite its small size, the Ocean State boasts 400 miles of shoreline, including three dozen beaches and several of New England’s most luxurious sandcastles. The Ocean House , set high above the beach in Watch Hill, replicates the grand hotel opened here in 1868; it’s been rebuilt from scratch with fewer rooms and added amenities. Its sister property, the Weekapaug Inn in Westerly, has been renovated down to its 1930s studs and reopened as another luxurious, year-round beach resort. In Newport, the Castle Hill Inn, built in 1874 atop an oceanside bluff as a private summer home for Harvard biologist Alexander Agassiz, is now another elite retreat and includes several cottages on its private beach.

Block Island, 12 miles off Point Judith, retains an unusual number of Victorianera hotels, but most are set high on hills or bluffs to catch the breeze. The exception is The Surf Hotel, a rambling, towertopped 1870s classic with steep gables and a long verandah, sited on the edge of Old Harbor, handy to the village and ferry, and at the beginning of three-milelong Crescent Beach. It’s been owned by the Cyr family for almost 60 years; its 34 rooms and public spaces, including a restaurant with terrace dining, were recently renovated. Baths remain shared (there are basins in the rooms), and so rates remain unusually affordable.

Top ratings for creature comforts combined with beach access, however, go to the neighboring Avonlea, Jewel of the Sea. This truly beachside B&B offers great charm, plus air conditioning, a generous buffet breakfast, afternoon cookies, and wine with hors d’oeuvres. Nine nicely decorated rooms offer private baths (some with jetted tubs); there’s also an expansive wraparound porch from which guests step onto sand.

CONNECTICUT

The Connecticut shoreline isn’t known for its public sand; there are just four saltwater state beaches. By far the long-

Graced by generous Victorian décor and expansive porches ( THIS PAGE and OPPOSITE ), this 140-year-old establishment overlooks a stone jetty stretching out into Block Island’s Old Harbor. Below and to the left, smoothand-sandy Crescent Beach extends some three miles north. Shops, galleries, and ferry service are nearby.

PET FRIENDLY PETTRAVEL FRIENDLY TRAVEL

est and most appealing is Hammonasset in Madison, a town that also draws wellheeled summer residents to several town and private beaches. Visitors have access to the sands at West Wharf thanks to the Madison Beach Hotel, replacing its modest predecessor, adding the requisite spa and ballroom to fill beds year-round. It’s still just 32 rooms, each with a private piece of the balcony, which stretches the length of the upper floors; pet-friendly rooms have ground-level patios.

Hurricane Arthur was due to strike on the July afternoon we arrived. Down in the hotel’s Wharf Restaurant, the porch tables were filled with patrons watching the surf. After dinner we retreated to our balcony as the rain came, the darkness defining the coast with its lights, lengthening it almost beyond the horizon, with a dim glow emanating all the way from Long Island. The beam from Faulkner Light, a few miles offshore, regularly swept the water. People with umbrellas and rain jackets drifted down to the pier and out onto the sand.

This beach isn’t big, but it has character, curving to a rocky point with tidepools, abutting the stone jetty at West Wharf. In the morning we were roused by the insistent cry of a gull; we had turned off the air conditioning in preference to the breeze through the room’s wide-slatted floor-to-ceiling shutters. Already, early risers were out, ignored by a heron poking in the seaweed and rabbits scurrying around in the beach grass.

Again I was reminded of what constitutes true luxury for a beachlover: putting your feet up, weatherproofed from sun or rain, yet still right there, with a view of sand and surf and the option to walk down and plunge in.

See our picks for the prettiest seaside towns: YankeeMagazine.com/Coastal

When You Go …

Rates and seasonal schedules vary throughout the year. For the latest information, call or check venue websites.

MAINE

t H e Dunes on t H e Waterfront: Ogunquit. 207-646-2616; dunesonthewaterfront.com

tH e Breakers Inn: Scarborough. 207-883-4820; thebreakersinn.com

Inn By t H e se a: Cape Elizabeth. 207-799-3134; innbythesea.com

Her M I t Islan D : Phippsburg. 207-443-2101; hermitisland.com

new hampshire

s e as I D e V I llage r esort: North Hampton. 603-964-8204; seasidevillageresort.com

a s H Wo rt H By t H e se a: Hampton Beach. 603-926-6762; ashworthhotel.com

MAssachusetts

C H at H a M Bars Inn: Chatham. 800-527-4884; chathambarsinn.com

tH e HaW t H o rne: Chatham. 866-217-9818, 508-945-0372; thehawthorne.com

C H at H a M tID es: Chatham. 508-432-0379; chathamtides.com

BeaC H H ouse at Bass rIV e r: S outh Yarmouth. 508-394-6501; beachhousecapecod.com

By t H e se a g u ests: Dennisport. 508-398-8685; bytheseaguests.com

W I nne tu oC e ans I D e r esort: Edgartown, Martha’s Vineyard. 508-627-4747; winnetu.com

tH e Wau W I ne t: Nantucket Island. 508-228-0145; wauwinet.com

rhode island

t H e o C e an House: Watch Hill. 401-584-7000; oceanhouseri.com

Weekapaug I nn: Westerly. 401-637-7600; weekapauginn.com

Castle H I ll Inn: Newport. 401-849-3800; castlehillinn.com

t H e s urf Hotel: Block Island. 401-466-2241; thesurfhotelbi.com

aVonlea, Je W e l of t H e se a: Block Island. 401-466-5891; blockislandinns.com/ accommodation-type/avonlea

connecticut

Ma D Ison BeaC H H otel: Madison. 203-245-1404; madisonbeachhotel.com

Christina Tree is a longtime Yankee contributor and the author of more than a dozen travel books, including Explorer’s Guide volumes for Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, the Maine coast and islands, and the Berkshire Hills and Pioneer Valley.

Fun at the

MAINE

CONNECTICUT

Ogunquit Chamber of Commerce

Ogunquit, ME

Attean Lake Lodge

Jackman, ME

Fifteen lakefront cottages located on a totally undeveloped mountain lake, offering boating, sailing, kayaking, canoeing, hiking, wildlife & bird watching and a full American plan. The ultimate vacation spot. 207-668-3792

atteanlodge.com

RHODE ISLAND

Madison Beach Hotel

Madison, CT

A world of tranquility and comfortable elegance awaits you at Madison Beach Hotel. Our dog-friendly hotel is the premier beachfront resort in Connecticut, featuring an awardwinning spa, restaurant and lounge, all just footsteps from the beautiful Long Island Sound.

203-245-1404

madisonbeachhotel.com

VERMONT

Ogunquit, Maine, our Beautiful Place by the Sea, offers the premier destination where you can experience miles of beautiful sandy beaches, quaint seaport coves, fine dining, superior accommodations, a selection of unique shops, theaters, museums, and businesses in one convenient location.

207-646-2939

ogunquit.org

Bear Spring Camps Rome, ME

If you want to relax and recharge, this is the place. Spend liesurely days, boating and swimming or enjoying lawn games including tennis and pickle ball. All meals are prepared and served in the lodge. Minutes to Belgrade Golf Club. 207-397-2341

bearspringcamps.com

Block Island Ferry

Narragansett, RI

The Block Island Ferry brings you to carefree island life! Climb aboard the high-speed or traditional ferry year round from Point Judith, RI or get there quickly this summer on the high-speed ferries from Newport, RI or Fall River, MA. 866-783-7996

blockislandferry.com

Mountain Lake Cottages

Westmore, VT

Lakeside Cottage in Vermont’s scenic Northeast Kingdom. Relax on your porch and enjoy the view of beautiful Lake Willoughby or take advantage of the many outdoor activities. Cottages sleep 5 with 2 bedrooms, full kitchen, fireplace, and porch facing the lake. 800-757-3072

vermontmountainlake

cottages.com

Gosnold Arms

New Harbor, ME

For 90 years, Gosnold vacationers have watched harbor activities from our steamboat wharf, visited historical places, and viewed Monhegan and nearby islands by boat. According to some historians,explorer Bartholomew Gosnold was a first visitor to this beautiful area in 1602.

207-677-3727

gosnold.com

MASSACHUSETTS

Russell Orchards Farm & Winery

Ipswich, MA

Family-owned farm and unique store featuring our own produce, local goodies and ice cream. Animal barnyard, u-pick fruits in season. Specializing in award-winning fruit wines with wine tastings Fri-Sun. Fromscratch bakery serving cider donuts and fruit pies. A beloved tradition for families and a must-see destination.

978-356-5366

russellorchards.com

Rough Point, the Newport Home of Doris Duke Newport, RI

On famed Bellevue Avenue, this magnificent house museum is still decorated as its heiress owner left it. Tour the extensive collection of art accumulated by two generations of the Duke family. Explore the expansive grounds and the 270 degree ocean view. 401-847-8344

newportrestoration.org

Photo by Ray Casbourn Photography

The GUIDE HOME

Stone Acres’ side gate is flanked by colorful begonias in urns, as rambling roses climb the arbor overhead; the path leads visitors through neatly trimmed 170-year-old boxwood hedges into a traditional English garden. OPPOSITE : The property has been farmed since the 1760s. The “new” main house, shown in this photo from the early 1900s, was built in 1830.

THE FARM AT STONE ACRES

BY TOVAH MARTIN

hristian Careb was 15 years old when he landed his first job at Stone Acres, a gentleman’s farm in Stonington, Connecticut. The year was 1978, and Chris was just getting the hang of milking a dairy herd when word came that Charlie Gavitt, the property’s 80-year-old gardener, needed a hand in the formal flower garden near the main house. Heading up from the barn, Chris ducked beneath blossom-smothered rose arbors and brushed shoulders with a quarter of an acre of boxwood hedges. As he made his way past the billowing peonies, phlox, and iris that had been growing at Stone Acres for a couple of centuries, he fell in love. “It was this magical world, like living in a past time,” he says, his eyes still misting at the memory.

Gradually, Chris found himself being called over to help in the garden more often, which suited him just fine. Not that it was easy work; the learning curve was steep, and his mentor was a laconic Yankee, disinclined to play teacher. So Chris followed Charlie around and extrapolated lessons from watching how to plant, when to mulch, what to grow and where. He sheared boxwoods that had stretched to 20 feet in some places, bringing them back to their more-sculptured form. By the time Charlie retired at age 90 after 70 years at Stone Acres, Chris knew the garden’s rhythms.

Nearly three decades have passed since Chris became head gardener, and he’s learned that gardens, even historic ones, aren’t locked in time; they’re

living, evolving things. When the glassed-in grapery disintegrated, Chris carefully lifted out its panes and burned the bittersweet that had taken hold, but preserved the skeletons of the gnarled fig trees that had long ago succumbed to frost; today they look like natural sculptures. He has devoted himself to bringing the property into the current century while being ever mindful of its storied history.

Stone Acres began its life around 1760, built as a comparatively plain, 64-acre farm for Dr. Charles Phelps, a local physician and Stonington’s first probate judge. It was Phelps’s grandson Charles, a successful dry-goods merchant, who added the lordly Greek

PHOTOGRAPHS BY KINDRA CLINEFF (photos on pp. 54–55, text continued on p. 56)

Stewarded by multiple generations of the same Connecticut family, the landscape at Stone Acres is a gracious reflection of the property’s storied past.

CONTEMPORARY

A quarter-mile of boxwood hedges distinguishes Stone Acres’ expansive gardens. Here, rambling roses climb the top of the wood-and-glass grapery. BELOW : Stone Acres passed through several generations of the interrelated Phelps, Edwards, and Paffard families over the years; shown here are photos of some of the 20th-century members, including framed portraits of Erskine Phelps, a prominent Chicago businessman ( MIDDLE ), flanked by Edith Rizer Paffard (Chris Careb’s first employer) and her husband, Dr. Frederic Paffard.

Nearly three decades have passed since Chris Careb became head gardener. He’s learned that gardens, even historic ones, aren’t locked in time; they’re living, evolving things.

Arching over the gravel walkways of the main garden (seen here from the cupola of the house) are rose arbors supporting old climbers whose names were lost long ago.

(text continued from p. 53)

Revival addition in 1830 on earnings from trade with China. Not content with a mere mansion, he added a carriage barn, an ice house, a glass grapery, and expansive ornamental gardens. The layout of the original garden would be recognizable to visitors today, according to Connecticut garden historian Karen Cowperthwaite, who researched Stone Acres’ story. An acre or more of beds, divided into three sections, were planted with popular flowers of the time—phlox, yarrow, roses, nepeta, valerian, rose campion, love-ina-mist. But even as those blooms have gone in and out of fashion over time, they’re still steadfastly in residence at Stone Acres: a joyous collection of heirloom annuals and perennials, no matter what the current floral fashions might be. Chris grows flowers that can’t be found in most gardens: old-fashioned clove pinks (dianthus), foxgloves, fragrant nicotiana, Canterbury bells, and a litany of other bygone blooms whose names have been all but lost to time.

And those middle beds are still buttressed by a cutting garden planted with peonies, irises, daisies, lupines, and the like, plus a vegetable garden chock full of edible kitchen staples.

Of course, the paradox of maintaining an old garden is that it requires constant renovation to maintain the status quo. ‘New Dawn’ is the rose on some of the arbors. But every year, Chris engages in bloody combat with the unruly canes of unidentified, deeply redolent roses after they finish their brief performance for Father’s Day. Replacing them with reblooming but less-heady modern roses never entered his mind. Nor are there any newfangled reblooming irises or ‘Bloomerang’ lilacs putting on a late-season show.

“There’s a time for everything here,” Chris says. “I love the succession from the red shoots of the peonies until they brown in autumn.” Plants are allowed to bloom, then fade.

That said, he does let himself experiment. Every winter, Chris leafs through seed catalogues and orders novelties like tithonia to try. And friends have donated Montauk daisies, platycodon, and meadowsweet. That’s the beauty of a multigenerational garden: It keeps expanding. But, Chris notes, “the garden never breaks character.”

ABOVE : Chris Careb at work in the place he’s loved since 1978. BELOW : Eliza Adams Edwards at Stone Acres in the early 1900s. Today, Chris Careb grows many of these same heirloom varieties.

America’s Lost Masterpiece The $100 Union

Original sketches found at the Smithsonian

Imagine that you were examining artifacts in the Smithsonian Institution and you found a never-seen-before sketch for the largest and highest denomination American coin ever proposed. That’s precisely what happened when a coin expert was exploring the collection at this celebrated public institution not long ago.

To his own surprise, the numismatist found the original-design concept for a one hundred dollar denomination created by George T. Morgan, arguably the greatest American coin designer. These sketches, hidden within an original sketchbook for nearly a century, represent perhaps the grandest American coin ever proposed—the $100 Union®.

George T. Morgan will always be remembered for his most famous coin, the Morgan Silver Dollar. Until recently, the world knew nothing of Morgan’s larger and higher denomination $100 Union concept design. The secret’s out!

For a limited time, you can secure the world’s first and only $100 Union Proof struck in pure .999 silver at our special price of only $99 (plus s&h). Call today!

GROWING A HISTORIC GARDEN FROM SEED

hris Careb takes the slowbut-sure route to growing the heirlooms at Stone Acres: Rather than spend precious time and resources driving around the countryside randomly seeking bygone plants at nurseries, he simply sows seeds. Not only does that give him access to sometimesarcane plants from the past, but it also helps him fill the garden on a meager budget. For half the price of a single plant, he can produce dozens of pots overflowing with fillers. Nobody had to suggest the seed route to Chris Careb—he’s just your typical frugal Yankee.

So, when other gardeners are climbing the walls with cabin fever, Chris Careb is sowing his begonias and tucking perennial seeds, such as dianthus, columbine, and lupines, into the freezer to trick them into the fast track toward germination; delphinium does time in the refrigerator. How does he know the duration of the big chill? Simple: He reads the seed packets. And while the perennials are chilling out, he’s starting the annuals.

Ultimately, Chris sows all the seeds—annual and perennial—by the same method. Using a soilless mix, he sows seeds directly in cell packs to save one transplanting step. He sprinkles the seeds lightly on the soil surface, covers them with vermiculite, spritzes them with a mister, and labels each variety. And the labels are an excuse to exercise New England frugality, too. Rather than investing in pricey labels, he has a nifty solution: “Used venetian blinds. Friends save them for me and I cut them into six-inch strips.”

Then, more recycling: To raise the humidity and diminish the amount of time spent spritzing, Chris uses plastic dry-cleaning bags to make tents, supported by the venetian-blind strips. Voilà— a makeshift greenhouse.

When the seedlings are ready, he transplants them into four-inch pots before they take up their positions in the garden. Thanks to a few dozen packets of relatively inexpensive seeds, Chris achieves the same fervor and flavor as yesterday.

CHRIS’S FAVORITE PLANTS TO GROW FROM SEED:

columbine rose campion

dianthus

Sweet William

love-in-a-mist

Oriental poppies

hollyhocks

lupines

chives

thyme

rhubarb

salvia

feverfew

balloon flower

dahlia

SOURCES

Select Seeds: Union, CT. 800-684-0395; selectseeds.com

Johnny’s Selected Seeds: Winslow, ME. 877-564-6697; johnnyseeds.com

Stokes Seeds: Buffalo, NY. 800-396-9238; stokesseeds.com

Lupine

At Stone Acres, head gardener Chris Careb finds that a little Yankee ingenuity pays off in a bounty of colorful blooms and healthy foliage—at minimal cost.

Rose Campion & Foxglove

Love-in-a-Mist & Nasturtium Columbine

When old photographs were found showing that the makeshift supports for the roses were once sturdy arbors, Chris brandished his carpentry tools and built bona fide supports of cedar posts. The day that Edith Paffard, Chris’s first employer here and wife of a descendant of the original owners, decided that the gardens were overgrown and needed revitalizing was a nail-biter. But the following spring, after digging up and respacing 10,000 overgrown bulbs, “the flowers came up like a carpet,” Chris recalls. “Squill, windflowers, camassias, and hyacinths form a sea of blue.” Similarly, weigela, potentilla, clethra, and azaleas that were swamped by other plants were salvaged. An old garden continually needs revitalization, but Chris Careb is forever willing to do whatever must be done. “This place touches my heart,” he says. “I know, it sounds like a Hallmark card. But it’s true.”

When Mrs. Paffard passed away, she left Stone Acres to a partnership of her daughters. Although her children— especially Wynne Delmhorst—desperately struggled to keep Stone Acres in the family, renting it out for weddings and other events, the time came when ownership was no longer feasible. The next-best solution was to find a caring and sensitive owner, a process that is still actively in motion. Some things are worth preserving, even if it’s only a Sweet William that everyone else long ago forgot.

Stone Acres will welcome visitors through the Garden Conservancy’s Open Days program on July 18 this year. Check gardenconservancy.org for information on specific dates for other New England locations this summer, as well.

Jo Diggs

A Maine quilt and appliqué artist brings a painter’s eye to her startling fabric landscapes. |

BY ANNIE GRAVES

he 1910 white-clapboard house sits on a hill rising over Portland, Maine, about seven minutes from downtown, in a pretty neighborhood called Deering Heights. “It’s a notfrivolous Victorian, moving toward the Craftsman style,” says Jo Diggs as she surveys her home. “There’s practically no room that doesn’t have at least one diagonal wall.”

Hanging on those colorful walls are the New England landscapes Jo assembles from boxes and bolts of cloth stuffed into her workroom (formerly the formal living room). Not quite quilts, nor strictly appliqué art, these intricate pieces paint pictures of purple mountains streaked with light, farmhouses nestled into snow, a stand of birches framing a snow-capped mountain.

“In the quilt world, we call them art quilts,” Jo says. Each one is stitched with pinprick precision, layered with colorful strips of cotton to reveal an interplay of light and dark, a burst of color here, subtle shading there. Jo calls it “irrational color.” The scenes teeter between the surreal and the serene.

Beginnings

If life is stitched together like strips of material, it has taken this appliqué artist on a circuitous route to and from New England, but always with a constant thread of sewing. Born in Pittsburgh, Jo was

Use the Yankee Connect app to discover more of Jo Diggs’ work.

educated at Wellesley and Harvard (a master’s in teaching), with a detour in the ’60s to New Mexico, where she first discovered the intricate reverse appliqué work—called mola —of the Kuna Indians of Panama. For years she produced appliqué clothing because “I didn’t think you could do appliqué and frame it—I thought you had to put it on a garment to sell it.” But by the time she settled in Portland in the mid-’80s, she had found her way to the art-quilting world and was garnering attention and prizes, including a piece accepted into the collection of the National Quilt Museum in Kentucky.

Inspirations

Whether it’s a moonlit snowscape or a cluster of birches, the essence of New England breathes through Jo’s landscapes—just don’t go looking for any specific landmarks. “I’m working from imagination, but they’re pure New England,” she smiles. “People will come up to me at a show and say, ‘Oh, I know exactly where that is—that’s the back of Mount Washington.’ And that’s okay with me.”

Jo often depicts New England icons —snow, birches, and dark firs—in

both the large art quilts and her smaller framed pieces, which resemble delicate watercolors. “What I’ve learned to love is the clarity of the New England winter,” she says. “I adore taking it down to the black-and-white. You get carried away when you’re allowed to use every color in the book.”

But Jo does use color, as with the swirling pastels of Green Valley (OPPOSITE), a Vermont-ish sunset scene. Her style has evolved to incorporate fractured and multiple images and handdyed fabrics. “I wanted to expand on doing single landscapes to make them more contemporary, more artistic, more evolved visually,” she says. “The point

is to have a landscape start in one place, and then morph.” When Jo teaches, as she has for decades, “I teach about the layering,” she says. “I’m teaching a method of assembling landscapes. I’m teaching color, depth, and distance; shapes, balance, and rhythm.”

Workday

These days—she’s almost 80, though you’d never guess it—Jo’s time is divided, as it has always been, between working on large art quilts ( Many Winters, for example, measures nearly 7 feet) and smaller “production pieces” (starting at 2 by 6 inches), sold at Markings Gallery in Bath, Maine.

“There are cutting days and there are sewing days,” she explains. “Back when I was more of a production artist, I would get fabric out, and more fabric, and, I’m not kidding you, there have been times when I had to crawl over piles of fabric to get out of the studio.”

Standing at her massive work table, she surveys this studio filled with antique quilts, vintage pillows, bits and scraps.

“I only ever wanted to do one thing,” Jo says. “I’m doing what I want to do, and I’m getting good at what I want to do. There are days where it’s just pure pleasure for me to be strapped to this table doing nothing but sewing.”

Her eyes gleam as she points to a framed appliqué, bright with highlights and rich with shadows: “I worked 20 years to figure out how to get a reflection like that!”

View more pieces at: jodiggs.com. Jo Diggs’ work is sold at Markings Gallery in Bath, Maine (markingsgallery.com), or you may contact her directly at 207-773-3405. Smaller framed pieces (e.g., 12x12 inches) range from $160 to $235; larger framed pieces (e.g., 24x20 inches, up to 38x28 inches) range from $455 to $1,455. (Her quilts are not for sale.) Many of her handdyed fabrics are from Mickey Lawler at Skydyes, in Hartford, CT (skydyes.com).

OPPOSITE , TOP : Lush color and striking depth create a powerful image in Green Valley, a 21”x14” appliqué work completed in 2000. ABOVE : Jo Diggs at work on Garden II , an 82”x68” quilt.

The GUIDE FOOD

INSPIRED BY THE COOKING AT ONE OF CAPE COD’S BEST RESTAURANTS, WE ASKED FOR A FRESH TAKE ON SOME CLASSIC NEW ENGLAND RECIPES. WE GOT THAT—PLUS A LOOK INTO A MOST UNLIKELY, AND FRUITFUL, PARTNERSHIP.

BY AMY TRAVERSO

Clambake A New Yankee

his is a story of two men who found an unlikely home on Cape Cod, and in doing so, changed the way their community eats. One of them is a native son, raised in Falmouth, Massachusetts, but lured away at a young age to New York, where he became a darling of the glittering Manhattan restaurant world. The other came from the edge of central Europe, seeking shelter from a war. Both have since put down roots in the Cape’s sandy soil, raising their families here, and doing work that allows Cape Codders and wash-ashores to all eat like kings (or at least like city folk) and gives local farmers a new market for their goods. Having tasted some of that food for ourselves, we asked these two, Matt Tropeano and Vojin Vujosevic, to tackle a most authentic Cape Cod meal:

the clambake. Only, we wanted a clambake that anyone could make at home, on a stove, far from the salt air. They complied, with a menu so delicious that it stands as a Yankee classic.

The story of Pain D’Avignon, the business that Vojin (rhmes with “coin”) started and where Matt is now executive chef, really began in the early 1990s, as the former Yugoslavia stood on the brink of war. Vojin was a young college student in Belgrade, an inveterate traveler who had already visited America many times as a tourist and exchange student. His parents suggested that it might be time to go back. “Nobody wanted to go to war,” Vojin says. “It made no sense to anybody. My parents thought it was very wise that I come back to the U.S. and continue school and ‘plan on not coming back for a while.’ Those were the words of my father.”

PHOTOGRAPHS BY HEATH ROBBINS RECIPES BY MATT TROPEANO STYLING BY CATRINE KELTY

Vojin pauses to make himself a cup of espresso—his third or fourth of the day. He’s standing in the kitchen of the house he shares with his wife, Diana, and two young sons. It’s a modern Cape, airy and white, with a big deck that serves as an outdoor living room, dining room, and kitchen from May to October. From there, the view is of gardens and trees and the blue waters of Follins Pond. It’s a lovely spot, but getting here was an uphill climb.

Vojin landed in New York in 1991 and found a community of Serbian expats working at a French bakery owned by Eli Zabar of the eponymous Upper West Side food emporium. “We thought we’d do something similar in Massachusetts because there was no great bread there,” Vojin says. “And Boston was more European, more of a place that I would like to live and spend time in.” So he and three friends searched for a storefront on Beacon Hill. When that proved too expensive, they looked south. “Someone said, ‘Cape Cod is the place to be,’” Vojin recalls. “‘It’s beautiful, it’s big, it’s touristy. Open up a bakery there and then you can move to Boston.’”

The group set up shop on Main Street in Hyannis, hired a baker, and spent the next few months learning his secrets. “Working 20 hours a day, you learn the trade pretty quickly,” Vojin says. “That’s all we did—bake bread. For the first year, I baked bread for nine months with no days off.” Soon they were selling to restaurants and shops on the Cape, then in Boston and New York. Eventually, the other partners sold their shares of the company and Vojin became the sole owner. By 2009, the bakery was housed in a 20,000-square-foot space on Hinckley Road, near Hyannis Airport, and Vojin decided to add a café/restaurant.

Meanwhile, Matt Tropeano had left Massachusetts to make his way in the

kitchens of Manhattan. “I knew that I wanted to work there and experience all the classic French restaurants I’d read about,” Matt says. “I worked one night at La Grenouille and thought, ‘This is it.’” Under La Grenouille’s legendary owner, Charles Masson, Matt rose from line cook to executive chef in eight years. He earned three stars from Sam Sifton in the New York Time s. It was time for another challenge. His next project, a modern French restaurant in Hell’s Kitchen, was lauded for its food but was poorly located and awkwardly designed; it closed after a short time.

bring both families together. Matt prepared the lobster, salads, and steamed potatoes, and everyone feasted and recounted the twists and turns that had led them here, to this unexpected life. Vojin’s mother, visiting from Serbia, joined in the fun.

Since taking over the kitchen, Matt has expanded the restaurant’s local sourcing so that up to 75 percent of the produce comes from area farms in season. Cynthia Cole of Wanna Bee Farm in Barnstable credits Pain D’Avignon with keeping her operation in business. “We sit down in January and go through her seed catalogue and pick out what she’ll grow for us,” Matt says. Andrea laughs: “Matt’s become a farmer since we moved up here.”

“My buddies in New York think, ‘Okay, now he’s a hermit,’” Matt says. “And in a way, I’m kinda doing that. On the Cape, people love good food and they haven’t had it, so we get to create our own standards. I think I’m cooking the best food I’ve ever cooked before. We’re not using tweezers and doing amuse-bouches, but we’re doing some complex flavors and simple, delicious food.”

Meanwhile, Matt and his wife, Andrea, were still coming to Falmouth every summer to see his parents and to let their kids run free on the beach. “In the back of our minds, we thought, ‘There’s an opportunity here,’” Matt says. He’d long known of Pain D’Avignon from his La Grenouille days—they served Vojin’s bread there—and when he heard that they were looking for a chef, all the pieces came together.

“Vojin and Diana are great,” Matt says. “They have similar backgrounds, similar attitudes toward life and love of travel.” It’s rare for all four friends to have time off during the busy summer season, let alone all at the same time, but on the day of our visit, we were lucky to

That same philosophy applies to the recipes you’ll find here. Nothing froufrou, but familiar ingredients combined in new ways: tomato and watermelon together in a salad, potatoes and spicy sausage steamed in white wine, and a “clambake” you can cook in a lobster pot. It’ll inspire you to revisit classic New England cooking with fresh eyes. As Matt says, “Sometimes you have to go away from things and then come back and see them differently.”

Pain D’Avignon, 15 Hinckley Road, Hyannis, MA. 508-778-8588; paindavignon.com. For photos of a traditional seaside feast: YankeeMagazine.com/Clambake

(recipes begin on p. 66)

ABOVE : The bakery/café opened in 1992 in Hyannis; today it offers lunch and dinner menus as well. OPPOSITE , FROM TOP : From left, Diana Vujosevic, Andrea and Matt Tropeano, Vojin Vujosevic; the view from the deck of the Vujosevics’ home on Cape Cod.

TOMATO SALAD WITH WATERMELON & MOZZARELLA

TOTAL TIME : 35 MINUTES ;

HANDS- ON TIME : 35 MINUTES

Here’s a salad that eats like a meal, a delicious, substantial celebration of summer flavors that requires just a handful of ingredients and minimal prep time, yet looks sophisticated enough to pass as restaurant fare.

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons sherry vinegar

3 cups red or multicolored cherry tomatoes, stemmed and halved

1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion

1/4 cup firmly packed chopped fresh basil, divided

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

2 cups cubed seedless watermelon (1-inch cubes)

2 cups firmly packed baby arugula

2 balls fresh mozzarella (8 ounces each), sliced

Whisk together the olive oil and sherry vinegar in a medium-size bowl. Add the tomatoes, red onion, and half the basil; toss to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste, and let sit 15 minutes. Add the watermelon, arugula, mozzarella, and remaining basil to the tomato mixture and toss gently just till combined. Check the seasoning and add more salt and pepper as needed. Divide the salad evenly among plates and serve immediately. Yield: 6 servings

ANDOUILLE STEAMED POTATOES

TOTAL TIME : 40 MINUTES ; HANDS- ON TIME : 30 MINUTES

Until Matt Tropeano shared this recipe, we’d never tried steaming potatoes with wine. This technique imparts so much flavor that it’s now our favorite way to jazz up spuds. Spicy sausage and fresh herbs take the dish to intensely flavorful heights.

Note: You may substitute fresh chorizo or linguiça for the dry sausage by simply precooking the links in a skillet over medium heat. Once browned and cooked through, cut them into 1-inch pieces as directed below and proceed with the recipe as written.

1 tablespoon plus 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 1/4 pounds cured (dry) chorizo, linguiça, or other spicy sausage, halved lengthwise and cut into 1-inch lengths (see “Note,” above)

5 cloves garlic, minced

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 medium-size tomato, diced

3 pounds fingerling potatoes, unpeeled, halved lengthwise

2 cups dry white wine

2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme

Garnish: 1 tablespoon fresh oregano leaves

Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat; then add the sausage and garlic and stir until the garlic is translucent and fragrant. Add the salt, pepper, and diced tomato, and cook, stirring, 2 minutes.

Add the potatoes and pour the wine over all. Stir; then bring the wine to a simmer. Reduce the heat to low, cover, and steam the potatoes until they’re fork-tender, 15 to 18 minutes. Stir in the thyme.

Transfer to a serving platter, drizzle with the remaining olive oil, and garnish with the oregano.

Yield: 8 to 10 servings

STOVETOP CLAMBAKE

TOTAL TIME : 40 MINUTES ; HANDS- ON TIME : 40 MINUTES

A traditional beachfront clambake is a signature New England experience, but it’s an effort reserved for only the most special occasions (unless you’re in possession of a stretch of private beach and ample free time to dig a pit and build a fire). You can, however, reproduce the flavors of a clambake at home—all you need is a large pot, some seafood, and aromatics like fennel and lemons.

1 fennel bulb, with stalk

1 bottle (750ml) dry white wine, such as Pinot Grigio

4 celery stalks, cut into 1-inch lengths

2 lemons, halved lengthwise, then thinly sliced

STOVETOP CLAMBAKE STEP-BY-STEP: It’s all about easy layering. (1) Add the fennel, white wine, celery, lemons, garlic, leeks, and seasonings to 4 quarts of water. Bring to a boil; then add the lobsters, followed by the clams and seaweed. (2) After the lobsters and clams have cooked 6 minutes, add the mussels. (3) Six more minutes of cooking: The shellfish should open and the lobster’s done.

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1 head of garlic, cloves separated

2 leeks, white parts only, finely diced

1 1/2 tablespoons kosher or sea salt

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon chili powder

½ teaspoon cayenne pepper

8 live lobsters, about 1 1/4 pounds each

4 pounds littleneck clams

Fresh seaweed (optional)

2 pounds mussels, scrubbed and debearded

1 cup melted salted butter

Remove the stalk and fronds from the fennel bulb and chop roughly. Cut the bulb into ½-inch-thick rings. Put the chopped fennel and fennel rings into a lobster pot with 4 quarts of water. Add the wine, celery, lemons, garlic, leeks, salt, paprika, chili powder, and cayenne. Bring to a boil.

Add the lobsters and clams to the pot with the seaweed, if using. Cover

and cook 6 minutes. Add the mussels and continue cooking 6 more minutes. When all the shellfish is open, the lobsters will be done. Remove the seafood from the pot and serve hot with the cooking liquid and melted butter.

Yield: 8 servings

CORN & TOMATO SALAD

TOTAL TIME : 40 MINUTES ;

HANDS- ON TIME : 30 MINUTES

Matt Tropeano takes this recipe firmly into summer with tomatoes, corn, and fresh herbs, putting the dish somewhere between a light stew and a hearty salad.

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 small onion, diced

1/2 large red bell pepper, diced

1 tablespoon minced garlic

4 cups fresh corn kernels, cut from 4 to 5 large ears

2 cups halved cherry tomatoes

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1 cup reduced-sodium chicken stock

1 cup lima beans, edamame, or shelled and cooked fava beans

2 cups chopped green beans (2-inch lengths)

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro

1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil

Garnish: basil flowers (optional)

Set a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the olive oil; then add the onion, bell pepper, and garlic, and cook, stirring, 3 minutes. Add the corn, tomatoes, and paprika. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cook 3 more minutes. Add the chicken stock and simmer 8 minutes. Add the lima beans (or edamame or fava beans); then add the green beans and all the herbs. Check the seasoning and add more salt or pepper to taste. Cook 3 minutes; then serve hot or at room temperature. Garnish with basil flowers if you like.

Yield: 8 or 10 servings

BLACKBERRY–ALMOND TART

TOTAL TIME : 1½ HOURS ,

PLUS AT LEAST 2 HOURS CHILLING ; HANDS- ON TIME : 1 HOUR

This is a streamlined take on the blackberryalmond tarts that executive pastry chef Elsie Rhodes makes at Pain D’Avignon. The combination of inky berries and sweet almond make this a showstopper dessert.

FOR THE CRUST:

15 tablespoons (1 7/8 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

3/4 cup confectioners’ sugar

1 large egg

1 1/2 cups pastry flour (plus extra for work surface)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/3 teaspoon table salt

FOR THE FILLING:

6 ounces almond paste

BLACKBERRY–ALMOND TART

8 tablespoons (1 stick) salted butter, at room temperature

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 large eggs

2/3 cup all-purpose flour

1 1/2 pints blackberries

1/4 cup sliced almonds

Confectioners’ sugar (for dusting)

First, make the crust: Using a standing or handheld electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar together at medium speed until pale in color, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat well. Add the flour, vanilla, and salt, and mix until combined. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured counter and knead 2 or 3 times; then form into a disk and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate at least 2 hours and up to overnight.

Once the dough is chilled, roll it out on a lightly floured counter into a circle about ¼ inch thick. Transfer the dough to a 9-inch tart pan with removable rim and press it into the sides of the pan. Run a rolling pin over the edges to trim any excess dough. Refrigerate the crust while you prepare the filling.

Preheat your oven to 350° and set a rack to the bottom position. To make the filling, use a standing or handheld mixer to cream the almond paste with the butter and sugar at medium speed until light and fluffy, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each. Scrape down the sides of the bowl periodically. With the mixer on low speed, add the flour and beat just until blended.

Pour the filling into the prepared shell and use an offset spatula to smooth the top. Press the black berries down into the filling, distributing them evenly throughout. Top with the sliced almonds.

Put the tart on a rimmed baking sheet and transfer to the oven. Bake until golden brown on top, 35 to 40 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack; then remove the rim of the tart pan and serve warm or at room temperature, garnished with a light dusting of confectioners’ sugar. Yield: 8 to 10 servings

Fresh Maine lobster and seafood is the perfect way to enjoy

England style!

Kimball Farm

In a small New Hampshire town, there’s ice cream worth traveling for, by air or by car.

BY AMY TRAVERSO

n the Northeast, there’s a diffuse community of recreational pilots who think nothing of gassing up a Cessna and flying a few hundred miles to Kimball Farm in southern New Hampshire for a hot-fudge sundae or a lobster roll. It helps that there’s an airport next door, with a path—stenciled with ice-cream cones—running between them. But these pilots, who could make it to the coast in another 15 minutes and hop a cab to the ocean, choose to stop in landlocked Jaffrey.

The pilots, in turn, attract families, because what kid wouldn’t want to eat ice cream and watch airplanes take off? Add the old-car enthusiasts, who line up their kit vehicles and ’46 Fords every Wednesday night, June through September, and you have something like a country fair. Kimball’s is the social center of this small town best known as a trailhead for Mount Monadnock. (Less well known: Author Willa Cather’s grave is in the old cemetery behind the Jaffrey Center Meeting House.) An after-work swim in one of the many local lakes and ponds followed by dinner at Kimball’s is one of the great pleasures of summer.

But to credit planes and automobiles for Kimball’s success is to do a disservice to the ice cream, which comes in old-fashioned flavors you may have forgotten or believed extinct:

PHOTOGRAPHS BY

MELISSA DiPALMA

LEFT : A giant Kimball Special sundae. OPPOSITE, TOP, FROM LEFT : This cherry-red 1955 Chevy Bel Air is a big attentiongetter on cruise nights; for the taste of summer, you can’t beat Kimball’s tender fried clams and onion rings; a plane takes off from Silver Ranch Airpark next door.

Use the Yankee Connect app to learn how to make the perfect Kimball’s banana split.

buttercrunch, Grape-Nut, maple walnut, rum raisin, and frozen pudding, an old New England flavor that tastes a bit like fruitcake. For the kids, there’s cookie dough and Oreo and bubblegum. Pumpkin shows up just as the goldenrod begins to bloom at the edges of the woodlands. And servings are huge. A “kiddie” cone can easily feed two; the banana split borders on the obscene. Kimball’s food is made to be shared.

On Thursday evenings, the Monadnock Oldies Car Club gathers just across the street at the edge of a large field, which rises steeply behind the cars and where spectators can take in the scene. The air smells pleasantly of fresh-cut grass and gasoline, and a DJ plays the hits of the ’50s and ’60s. At the end of a long row of cars, Leighford

“Leggy” Rines is showing off his brightyellow ’64 Mercury Comet Caliente convertible. “Wanna sit in it?” he asks a towheaded little boy who has wandered over with his mom. At her nod, the boy climbs in and wiggles the wheel back and forth, craning his neck up to see over the dash. “It makes you feel young when you have an old car,” Leggy says.

Sometimes Leggy and his wife, Lucille (who recently retired from Yankee ), drive down to bigger car-club gatherings at the other Kimball Farm location in Lancaster, Massachusetts. (The small chain also extends to Carlisle and Westford, Massachusetts, which is where Jack and Clara Kimball opened their first ice-cream shop in 1939.) But he and Lucille are happy to come to their local spot, to see friends and have a burger or a fish sandwich, both of which are very good and come with a wedge of watermelon and some waffle fries. If they’re feeling decadent, there are excellent onion rings, which boast a thin, crisp batter that flakes like tree bark— and they’re big fans of Kimball’s blackraspberry ice cream, too.

“A plane!” A little girl in a blue dress is pointing to the sky. A yellow prop plane is gaining altitude overhead, zooming into the sunset, headed back to New York or Massachusetts. A quick jaunt for a pilot. A sweet memory for a child.

Want to try making ice cream at home? Here’s our recipe for a favorite New England flavor: YankeeMagazine.com/grapenuticecream

158 Turnpike Road (Route 124), Jaffrey, NH. 603-532-5765; kimballfarm.com

Each issue, we profile an iconic New England eatery in our “Local Flavor” column. We’re looking for venues with great stories that capture the spirit of a place. Got a favorite you’d like to share? E-mail editors@yankeepub.com and put “Local Flavor” in the subject heading.

JAFFREY

KIMBALL FARM

An after-work swim in one of the local lakes followed by dinner at Kimball’s is one of the great pleasures of summer.

In Celebration of Succotash

BY AIMEE SEAVEY

o meal in American history is more famous than the “first Thanksgiving” at Plymouth, Massachusetts, but despite its notoriety, most of the actual menu remains a mystery. The Pilgrims and Wampanoags certainly didn’t tuck into buttery mashed potatoes or mile-high apple pie in 1621, but most historians agree that succotash is a likely candidate. A simple, hearty concoction of corn and beans (fresh in summer or dried in winter), plus a little meat or fish, succotash was a nourishing Native American staple, a thick stew, that could (and did) feed a crowd. It’s also a lot of fun to say (it’s from the Wampanoag msíckquatash, meaning “boiled corn kernels”).

Learning from the Wampanoags, the English settlers soon prized the dish for its yearround accessibility, affordability, and sustenance when other food was scarce. During the Depression, World War II, and other times of economic crisis, hungry Americans of the future would do the same.

Today, nearly all succotash recipes maintain the marriage of corn and beans, but the original tough field corn and native shell beans (typically cranberry beans in New England) have largely been replaced by sweet corn and lima beans. In its many adaptations, corned beef, salt pork, potatoes, tomatoes, okra, and peppers have all made their way into the succotash pot, along with butter, fresh herbs, and sometimes even a splash of cream. A batch of succotash is a lot like a batch of baked beans, another pot-bound New England favorite. It’s likely you’ll never be served the same bowl twice, and no recipe is wrong—at least according to the chef.

Why you should stop sufferin’ and start feastin’ on this simple yet hearty New England dish.

Use the Yankee Connect app to get a second helping with step-by-step photos.

PHOTOGRAPHED AND STYLED BY AIMEE SEAVEY

But don’t wait for Thanksgiving! Take advantage of the region’s sweet summer bounty of fresh corn and native cranberry beans to enjoy an easy and (mostly) authentic version of this Early American classic. Here we’ve made it a meal topped with seared scallops, but it’s also excellent on its own or as a side.

SUMMER SUCCOTASH WITH SEARED SCALLOPS

TOTAL TIME : 60 TO 80 MINUTES

HANDS- ON TIME : 30 TO 35 MINUTES

Note: If you can’t find fresh cranberry beans, the dried variety is available yearround from Bob’s Red Mill Natural Foods (store list at: bobsredmill.com). Or you may also substitute equal amounts of fresh or frozen lima beans. For fresh, reduce the cooking time to 20 minutes and check for tenderness. For frozen, cook 5 minutes.

2 pounds fresh cranberry beans in pods or 2/3 cup dried, totaling 2 cups cooked (see “Note,” above)

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided

3 ounces salt pork, cut into large pieces

1/2 cup diced onion

1 medium-size garlic clove, minced

2 cups fresh or thawed frozen corn kernels, from 2 to 3 large ears

1 tablespoon cider vinegar, plus more to taste

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1/2 cup chopped fresh herbs, such as basil or parsley (optional)

1 pound (about 16) dry sea scallops

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

If you’re using fresh beans, shell them and add them to a pot of salted boiling water. Cook, stirring occasionally, until just tender, about 25 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water; then set aside. For dried beans, cover with water and soak overnight. Drain; then transfer to a pot and cover with 2 inches of water. Cover and bring to a boil; then reduce heat to medium-low and

cook (still covered), stirring occasionally, until just tender, 35 to 45 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water; then set aside.

Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the salt pork, diced onion, and garlic, and cook until fragrant and golden but not browned. Add the beans and corn and continue cooking, stirring gently to combine, until heated throughout, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and discard the salt pork. Add the cider vinegar; then season with salt, pepper, and additional cider vinegar to taste. Add the herbs if you’re using them. Keep the mixture warm while you cook the scallops.

Remove the small side muscle, if present, from each scallop and discard; then rinse with cold water, pat dry, and season all over with salt and pepper. Heat the olive oil and remaining tablespoon of butter in a large skillet on a

medium-high settng until very hot but not smoking. Arrange the scallops in an even layer without touching (separate them into batches if necessary), and sear until the bottoms are a deep golden brown, about 2 minutes. Carefully flip them with a metal spatula and repeat on the other side until the scallops are opaque. (Be careful not to overcook.) When they’re done, transfer them to a plate. Ladle the succotash onto 4 plates (about 1 cup per serving) and top with scallops, about 4 per plate. Serve immediately.

Yield: 4 main servings (or 6 sides)

More traditional New England dishes: YankeeMagazine.com/Classic-Recipes

We’re looking for time-honored New England family recipes, each with a little story about the person behind it. Got a favorite you’d like to share? E-mail editors@yankeepub.com and put “Recipe With a History” in the subject heading.

THE BOY WHO DIDN’T LIKE SUMMER CAMP

While thousands of youngsters cherished their memories of a boys’ camp along a Maine lake, the owners’ son couldn’t wait to get away. Then years later he came back.

BY JON MARCUS

CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHS BY STEPHEN SHEFFIELD

OLD-LINE SUMMER CAMPS WERE, AND STILL ARE, ORGANIZED

VERY EARLY EVERY SUMMER MORNING, the tinny timbre of an amplified bugle slices through the fresh air of the New England woods along the shores of countless crystal lakes. Before the final notes can fade away, they’re swallowed up by disembodied voices rousing sleepy campers with impossible enthusiasm over scratchy public-address systems.

“Another beautiful morning!” the voices exclaim, even if it’s cold and raining. Then they launch into a rundown of what’s coming up that day with such excitement and anticipation that it takes real strength of will to roll over for a few more minutes’ rest before flag raising.

It’s a ritual remembered with misty nostalgia by generations of New England summer campers, for whom a trumpet playing “Reveille” still evokes the smell of evergreens and breakfast,

of the year my grandparents dubiously chose to start a boys’ camp in some distant woods beside a lake in central Maine. A few alumni to whom these quiet acres evidently mattered much more than I thought they did to me had spent the winter tracking down their childhood friends and bunkmates—

the feeling of a cool, crisp morning, and the promise of another epic day.

My experience was different. The voice over the P.A. system every morning at the boys’ camp I attended was my father’s.

I had to go to summer camp.

I had no choice.

I was the owners’ kid.

That made camp, for me, the opposite of what made it so memorable for everybody else: time away from home. A taste of independence. Fun.

I was the boy who didn’t like summer camp. But because my family was in the business, I returned reluctantly as an adult. And it was then, one night under a star-filled sky, that I would finally come to understand the special place held by this peculiarly American—and particularly New England—institution. And the good fortune of the boy I’d once been.

That moment would arrive on the surprisingly epochal 50th anniversary

every single one of them, across generations, who had ever gone there—and encouraged them to mark this halfcentury milestone by coming back for a reunion.

I was one of the countless former campers who received the unexpected invitation. And wondered whether any of the others, now grown men with children of their own, would actually show up.

Summer camps are a huge but largely invisible presence, hidden as they are at distant ends of rural roads through thick woods on remote lakes. You almost never see them. Yet there are 7,000 overnight camps and 5,000 day camps in America, enrolling some 11 million campers. New Hampshire alone has 177; Maine, about 200. Uniquely American conventions, they’re among the last vestiges of the independent family business, passed down through generations. More than

70 percent remain family-owned. Corporate America has little interest in the camping industry. Summer camps, on the whole, make lousy businesses, with high labor costs and insurance expenses on facilities in use for only weeks each year. When I was a kid, there were six on our lake, including a girls’ camp that dated back to 1912, two coed camps, and a Jewish camp incessantly broadcasting announcements in Hebrew. “Hachshevu, hachshevu ,” they began, loud enough for us to hear.

“Attention, attention!” All except our boys’ camp and its sister camp have closed. So have uncounted dozens of other New England summer camps. There’s nothing sadder than an empty camp. The ones that close sell off their furniture and fittings before being subdivided into lots for summer cottages or, in some cases, left abandoned to the weeds and winters. We would often be among the bidders for the rowboats, sports equipment, pots and pans,

LIKE MILITARY ONES, RIGHT DOWN TO THE BUGLE CALLS.

ABOVE : Manitou campers Rob Schlackman, Jeff Shapiro, and author Jon Marcus on East Pond in Oakland, Maine (the Belgrade Lakes area), 1968.

OPPOSITE , CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT : A cabin at Camp Manitou today; bunk beds; the dining hall’s walls are decorated with camp memorabilia.

PREVIOUS SPREAD : Jon with parents Myles and Sue Marcus and baby sister Julie, 1964.

and tractors offered up for sale as redeyed owners watched like foreclosed farmers. Almost always, off to one side, waiting to be hauled away, were piles of dusty, fading photographs of each year’s smiling crop of campers, hard-won trophies, and generations of insults and initials carved into wooden walls and bedsteads. The last physical vestiges of immeasurable memories, these weren’t considered worth enough to sell.

Even in their heyday, summer camps were iffy propositions. But there was nothing like a long shot to tempt my grandfather, who had the gleam in his eye (and, in general, the luck) of Arthur Miller’s Willy Loman. Egged on by other relatives who had returned from World War II with unlikely nostalgia for camp life, he and my grandmother made the curious leap into the camping business when they overheard the guests of the small summer seaside hotel they ran longing for a separate place to send their kids.

Though organized American summer camping had begun in 1861 with a pair of headmasters shepherding a flock of schoolboys into the Connecticut woods, my family’s camp, like a rush of others, opened when the

the stakes, to the campers, seemed just as high.

prosperity and postwar baby boom of the late 1940s collided with the glut of those returning veterans. That’s why so many old-line summer camps were, and still are, organized like military ones, right down to the bugle calls. Just back from history’s greatest lifeor-death struggle, the earliest counselors and directors created places where the war was on the ballfield, not the battlefield, and between Maroon and Gray, not good and evil—but where

My family’s camp was long established by the time I showed up as an infant with my parents, who were the directors then. A few years later, in a uniform so small it had to have been custom-made, I was moved unceremoniously into a cabin with the youngest boys. I was 4. My cabinmates were older and wealthier than I was—it was a comparatively expensive camp—and came from towns where many of them went to school together. Summer camps rely on word of mouth for much of their recruiting; friends tend to go to camp with friends, and I didn’t know anybody.

Including, you might have thought, my parents. They had little time for me. Running a summer camp is a 24-houra-day, 7-day-a-week ordeal. There were orders to place, repairs to make, fields to groom, employees to manage, anxious mothers and fathers to soothe, activities to plan, accreditations to prepare for, and kids to nurse through swimmer’s ear and homesickness. I know now that

my family kept its distance from me so as not to give an impression of favoritism (fat chance), but that didn’t matter to my fellow campers, who assumed I got it anyway, or my counselors, who seemed to believe that I was wired for sound. (It’s also why I didn’t win any of the camp awards, which went to the paying campers, though my sister— sent across the lake to relatives who ran the girls’ camp—won “best all-around athlete” twice and, to my even greater annoyance, “most congenial.”)

Unlike my sister, my father, my uncles, my cousins, and most of the boys who chose our camp for its thensingular emphasis on sports, I wasn’t an athlete. My memories of summer camp consisted largely of being picked last.

The question that 50th summer was: How would everybody else remember it?

Real life doesn’t intrude on summer camp. That, too, is its charm, and it left us free to devote ourselves with every fiber of our beings to such allconsuming questions as which team was

THIS PAGE , FROM TOP : Manitou campers with counselor Arnie Biederman, 1952; the camp’s community values. OPPOSITE : Manitou cabins on the water. The camp was founded in 1947 and today offers a wide range of activities, from sports and adventure experiences to culinary arts, theatre, and yoga.

winning Color War and what was for dessert. The Boston newspapers came by mail, two days late. There was no cable or satellite service; the TV showed mostly static. With few exceptions, we were blithely ignorant of what was happening beyond the gates. Once, in the 1950s, long before my time, some summer campers stayed well into September to avoid traveling home during a polio epidemic. In the 1960s, counselors’ hair grew longer and they fretted about the draft. My earliest memory is of being awakened in the middle of the night at camp and herded in front of the lone TV, which had been dragged outside so we could watch the first man walk on the moon. Looking up from the static on the television screen, above the tops of the towering pines, we could see the moon itself in the ultimate high definition.

The same summer as the moon landing, the camp dining hall burned down. It was a beautiful building made of logs planed smooth on the inside, and it was full of history. All of it went up in flames so high they could be seen for miles. That is my second-earliest mem-

ory. My grandfather never made a lot of money, but we learned that night that he had made a lot of friends. Unasked, local businesses arrived to help. The other camps sent food and tools. The high school loaned us folding tables, and a crew of volunteers built a kitchen on the back of the gymnasium by dinnertime. We never missed a meal.

At camp, we mostly entertained ourselves. Without TV, we had conversa-

tions in the cool breeze of the evenings on the screened-in porches of our cabins until lights out. We looked forward eagerly to the occasional dances with the girls from our sister camp, then stood shyly on one side of the room while they stood on the other. On talent nights, my cousin Max would transform into “the 2,000-year-old camper.” In caveman days, he’d tell us, campers mostly spent their time running around and trying not to be devoured. The earliest activity, Max would say, was track. We’d howl with laughter, no matter how many times we’d heard this. It was also Max’s job to hold his hand over the lens of the 16-millimeter camera during racy scenes on movie nights, risking an artillery barrage of pistachio shells.

Like many camps, ours was based on Native American lore—surprisingly respectfully, considering the times. The name of the camp translated from the Algonquin language as “Great Spirit.” When we assembled on rows of logs in a clearing in the woods, Chief Manitou would beckon the

(continued on p. 112)

LOOKING UP FROM THE STATIC ON THE TELEVISION SCREEN, ABOVE THE TOPS OF THE TOWERING PINES, WE COULD SEE THE MOON ITSELF IN THE ULTIMATE HIGH DEFINITION.

In Old Lyme, Connecticut, where one of America’s most famous artists’ colonies once thrived, the landscape still has the power to move those who stop to admire it.

BY JUSTIN SHATWELL

A PLACE JUST WAITING TO BE PAINTED

ON THE BANKS OF THE LIEUTENANT R IVER, THE light can change in an instant. One moment the river’s thick bed of reeds is a field of gold, backlit and brilliant. The next, a passing cloud drapes it in shadow and the tone mellows to earthy hues of green and brown.

Beneath the shade of an elm tree, several families attempt to capture the scene. One mother, in a speckled smock, frenetically mixes her paints in a vain attempt to match Mother Nature’s shifting palette. Her young daughter opts for a less-elusive subject, filling her canvas instead with a single crimson bird standing proudly in profile.

It’s a simple thing—just a fun activity to fill a Sunday afternoon—but this family’s dabblings have placed them in vaunted company. For almost 40 years at the beginning of the 20th century, legions of artists spread their easels here along this lazy river (perhaps even under this same elm) and tried their hand at capturing the idyllic peacefulness of Old Lyme, Connecticut.

At the time, American art collectors couldn’t get enough of New England. Disenchanted with the soot and congestion of industrial America, they became enthralled by the country’s colonial past and would pay handsomely for images that captured the essence of that simpler age. Artists flocked to New England like miners to a gold rush, scouring every seaside hamlet in search of that one perfect village that time had forgotten. When they found Old Lyme, they stopped.

Shannon Chapman captures a bend in the Lieutenant River as it flows past the grounds of the Florence Griswold Museum, once a private estate that a century ago hosted many of America’s early Tonalists and Impressionists.

photographs by SARA GRAY

Inside the museum, former home of the Griswold family, a portrait of Miss Florence by Alphonse Jongers graces the hallway. Jongers spent the summers between 1900 and 1904 in Old Lyme. Period clothing dates to the art colony’s heyday, c. 1910. The Chinese chair came from Boxwood, the Old Lyme home of Miss Florence’s family.

It offered landscape painters a little bit of everything: the seacoast, the Connecticut River estuary, and seemingly boundless cattle fields studded with old-growth trees and rocky outcroppings that looked as though they’d been arranged by some giant still-life painter. In a letter to his agent, Henry Ward Ranger, who “discovered” Old Lyme in 1899, gushed over the “knarled [sic] oaks” and “low rolling country” and declared the village a place “just waiting to be painted.”

He returned the following summer with a cadre of his friends and set up shop at the home of Florence Griswold, an aging, unwed Connecticut aristocrat whose family fortune had long since vanished. Her tattered estate became the unlikely home of one of the most storied art colonies of the era. For the next 36 years, as many as 15 artists could be found living under her roof at any given time. The likes of Willard Metcalf, Bruce Crane, and Matilda Browne would spend their days painting in Griswold’s fields and then pass their evenings sharing ideas at her dinner table and drinks in her parlor. Sometimes the evenings would descend into rollicking sing-alongs, and Griswold would be right there with them, banging out melodies on the piano. Childe Hassam, possibly America’s most accomplished Impressionist, remembered the colony as “just the place for high thinking and low living.”

Today, the halls are much quieter. Docents at what is now the Florence Griswold Museum greet visitors at the door as Miss Florence once did, recounting tales of the colony’s glory days as they stroll through the house. Upstairs, the artists’ bunks have long since been removed, replaced by galleries of their works. One painting, a snowy image of some of Griswold’s barns, hangs play-

Florence Griswold’s tattered estate became the unlikely home of one of the most storied art colonies of the era.

Many of the artists took their meals on the side porch in warm weather, calling themselves the “Hot Air Club.” This vintage shot was taken c. 1903.

COURTESY OF FLORENCE GRISWOLD MUSEUM, OLD LYME, CT

Charles Harold Davis (1856–1933), born in Amesbury, Mass., was known for his astonishing depictions of light, air, and sky. The Connecticut River at sunset is as glorious today as it was at the turn of the last century; here, from a vantage point along Smith Neck Road in Old Lyme, the photographer captures a lone boat at rest on the water.

fully beside the window where Edward Gregory Smith must have sat while creating it. With the slightest turn of the head, you can shift your view from the present to 100 years ago and back again, and so little has changed that you have a momentary sense that time has stopped.

But unfortunately that moment passes all too quickly. Outside, the peace of Griswold’s gardens is disturbed by the drone of I-95, no more than a quarter-mile away. Across the Lieutenant River, the rear of a shopping complex peeks rudely through the trees. And all around Old Lyme, the picturesque cattle fields have been swallowed by resurgent forests. The “knarled” oaks and rocky outcroppings that first captured Ranger’s imagination are now hidden behind thick curtains of new-growth pine. But rather than mourn what has been lost, the museum encourages visitors to take a more philosophical view.

“We’re not promising time travel,” says Jeffrey Andersen, the museum’s longtime director, explaining that most of the scenes captured by those long-ago artists have vanished. But that doesn’t mean that the spirit of their work is gone.

Twlight Over the Water, by Charles Harold Davis, 1892. Oil on canvas, 21x13 inches.

COURTESY OF FLORENCE GRISWOLD MUSEUM, OLD LYME, CT; GIFT OF THE HARTFORD STEAM BOILER INSPECTION AND INSURANCE COMPANY

The Tonalist and Impressionist artists who flocked to Old Lyme were keenly aware of how fleeting beauty could be. Wind, weather, the angle of the sun—the elements can combine in infinite variations. The way the light plays across a field on one gorgeous afternoon may never occur in exactly the same way again. So the artists painted en plein air, which is just a fancy way of saying “outside.” They lugged their canvases into the landscape in search of the perfect vista, to record not just what it looked like, but also how it felt to be there in that moment.

The museum is designed to impart similar revelations. “I love to think that this is a place where people can lose themselves in thought,” Andersen says. He and his staff are always coming up with programs to funnel visitors out of their galleries and onto the well-kept grounds, where they can lounge beneath a tree or stroll the gentle slope to the river, and maybe, just maybe, experience a moment in which art, history, and nature combine to show them something amazing. It may not be the land-

A Family of Birches , by Willard Leroy Metcalf, 1907. Oil on canvas, 26x29 inches.

COURTESY OF SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM, WASHINGTON, DC/ART RESOURCE, NY

Willard Leroy Metcalf (1858–1925), born in Lowell, Mass., was renowned for his landscapes. At the confluence of two rivers, Old Lyme offered abundant inspiration, then as now; here, from an overlook in Old Lyme, the Connecticut River stretches away toward the horizon.

Visitors can stroll the gentle slope to the river and maybe, just maybe, experience a moment in which art, history, and nature combine to show them something amazing.

Edward C. Volkert (1871–1935), originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, became famous for his paintings of the cows and oxen in the fields around Old Lyme. Today some farms still remain in this area; here, a dairy herd relaxes in the pasture at nearby Tiffany Farm after early-morning milking.

scape the masters painted, but it still has the power to move those who stop to admire it. The beauty of the past has ceded to the beauty of the present.

And should you be holding a paintbrush when inspiration strikes, all the better. Every Sunday the museum passes out free paints and canvases to its visitors and encourages them to step into the shoes of the artists who came before. It doesn’t matter whether you produce a masterpiece or not. It’s simply an invitation to be still, open your eyes, and chase the beauty of a moment passing.

For more on the museum, visit: flogris.org.

More photos at:

YankeeMagazine.com/OldLyme

Along the Road by Edward Charles Volkert. Oil on canvas, 33x36 inches.

COURTESY OF FLORENCE GRISWOLD MUSEUM, OLD LYME, CT; GIFT OF THE HARTFORD STEAM BOILER INSPECTION AND INSURANCE COMPANY

Yankee contributing editor Justin Shatwell is a freelance journalist whose work explores New England’s unique history, culture, and art. His recent stories for Yankee include “The Right Home” (Jan./Feb. 2015), “We Are Still Here” (July/Aug. 2014) , and “A Journey to New England’s Seventh State” (May/June 2014). justinshatwell.com

Trapping the Moon

Eighty years ago this summer, Eastport, Maine, thought it was on the cusp of prosperity and fame as work began on history’s most ambitious tidal project.

by WAYNE CURTIS

WHEN VIEWED FROM A KAYAK A HUNDRED YARDS OFFSHORE, THE TINY CITY OF Eastport has the faux, overly tidy appearance of an HO-scale railway village. Two- and three-story Italianate brick buildings edge the harbor; on the hills above rise wood-framed houses, most painted white. At low tide, muddy flats emerge near coves, sometimes revealing the rotting-teeth-like stubs of old piers. Eastport, Maine, can lay claim to several superlatives. For instance, it’s the easternmost city in the United States (although it may not pass muster in your definition of “city,” as it has just 1,300 residents). It was once the sardine capital of New England, home of the nation’s first sardine cannery and at one point the world’s largest, until over the decades storms and tides and shifting American tastes destroyed the canneries one by one.

Eastport also has some of the most formidable tides in America. Topography meets the moon in this part of Maine. Craggy Cobscook Bay lies just off equally indented Passamaquoddy Bay, which itself is sort of a natural suburb of the Bay of Fundy.

The Bay of Fundy, as almost everyone learned in geography class, has the highest tides in the world. It’s shaped like a tremendous funnel, and this amplifies the rise and fall. As Rachel Carson put it in her classic The Sea Around Us, at Fundy “the narrowing and shallowing of the bay in its upper reaches [compel] the huge masses of water to crowd into a constantly diminishing area.” Far up the funnel, near Truro, Nova Scotia, tides can exceed 50 feet. Around Eastport, closer to Fundy’s mouth, tides range from 12 to 26 feet and average about 18 feet. It’s still enough to make the fishing boats in Eastport’s harbor disappear from view twice each day.

And twice each day the tides wend their way into coves and inlets far inland, which requires crowding past several choke points, including Falls Island and Shackford Head, which impede the smooth flow of tidal waters. So it takes an extra hour for all that water to move in and fill the natural embayments, and then an hour for it to drain out again.

When all that water backs up and starts to spill through these narrows, it creates formidable currents. Indeed, some 70 billion cubic feet of seawater— weighing roughly 2 billion tons—flow in and out of Passamaquoddy Bay nearly twice each day, or what it takes the mighty Mississippi River two weeks to convey.

I lived in Eastport for four years—or, as I tend to remember it, four winters—and it was there that I learned a lot about the oddities of local tides, especially when out in my kayak. Paddling across a wide fetch, I’d sometimes hear something like a staticky, white noise gaining on me, then look behind and see an inexplicable frothy chop moving rapidly across the bay on an otherwise perfectly calm day, like something from a Stephen King novel. The chop would then sweep past me, batting my kayak around like a cat with string.

Or out near Dog Island, just north of downtown, I’d suddenly hear a noise that sounded like somebody finishing a large milkshake through a fat straw. Small, slurping whirlpools would then start rising from the deep. They were treacherous, because putting my paddle into one of them was like dipping into a vacuum, the paddle suddenly offering no resistance and nearly sending me upside down. Paddling through whirlpools is like tightrope walking: Every

stroke takes full concentration. Passamaquoddy Bay, I learned, can be like a Newfoundland puppy—big and playful, but cheerfully unaware of its ability to do damage.

For centuries, humans have traveled Cobscook and Passamaquoddy bays to witness the phenomenon of the tides, especially Reversing Falls in Whiting Bay, and the Old Sow, the largest whirlpool in the Western Hemisphere, which periodically forms between Eastport and Deer Island in New Brunswick. In the world of tides, these are the freak shows.

Still others—those of a more pragmatic mindset—contemplate the shifting tides and think that, yes, these are all quite fascinating, but nature’s leaving quite a bit on the table here. If you could harness all the natural power pent up twice daily in the bay, if you could put it to work, you could probably generate a lot of energy.

Many engineers have made forays here, seeking to tap the tides of Passamaquoddy Bay and its environs. But no one had quite figured out how to make it work. Until rather recently, the kingdom of tides has proven essentially unconquerable.

“I have great faith in the laws of physics,” Chris Sauer told me. “I was sure it

was going to work, but just not how well it was going to work.”

Sauer is a founder of Ocean Renewable Power Company (ORPC), which is based in Portland and has an office in downtown Eastport. Sauer was trained as an engineer. He designed cogeneration and recycling plants, and for a time was president of a company that manufactured fluorescent lighting. A little over a decade ago he was living in Tampa, Florida, when he started thinking about sea currents. In particular, he thought about the Gulf Stream, which flowed offshore and up the Eastern Seaboard at a mean average velocity of three knots. That steady flow, combined with the fact that 70 percent of

all Americans live near a coast, planted within Sauer’s mind the seeds of an idea.

“We started the company with the idea that we’d focus on the Florida current,” Sauer explains. “But we had no technology. Nobody had a system we could buy, because those systems didn’t exist.”

Sauer made a cold call to a U.S. Navy research facility in Florida that employs 5,000 scientists responsible for just about any naval equipment that comes in contact with water. “And when I met with them, they became very interested in what we wanted to do,” Sauer says. ORPC and the Navy signed an agreement; the Navy would essentially help out as consultants, advising on the development of technology to harvest energy from currents both slow and deep. “And with their guidance,” he notes, “we arrived at the design concept that we still have today.”

Along the way, Sauer came to another conclusion: Placing and maintaining turbines 18 miles offshore and more than 1,000 feet underwater would be fraught with engineering challenges, not to mention costs. “It would be much easier to be a stone’s throw off the shore, and in maybe 100 feet of water,” Sauer says. “And you could do that if you were doing tidal.”

So Sauer abandoned the Gulf Stream and began looking at places where powerful tides could be found. He learned that the two best tidal flows

NOVA SCOTIA

BayofFundy

Atlantic Ocean

Grand Manan

Campobello Island

EASTPORT

Passamaquoddy Bay

Cobscook Bay

Mount Desert Island

A quarry on Carlow Island in Passamaquoddy Bay furnished rock for the proposed Pleasant Point Dam, a vital segment of the 1935–36 tidal project.

in North America are at Cooks Inlet in Alaska and, on the East Coast, the Bay of Fundy. He’d owned a summer home in Maine for years, so that made his decision easier. In the dead of winter 2004, he and his staff packed up their Florida office and relocated to a pier in Portland. “People said, ‘Either you’re committed or you should be committed,’” he recalls.

But now the team had easy access to the tides of Cobscook and Passamaquoddy bays, just four hours up the coast. They could begin to take their ideas and create demonstration projects to test the technology in real-world conditions that were far harsher than in any laboratory.

“We decided to do a demo project in Eastport,” Sauer says. “And when we first applied, we weren’t even familiar with the Roosevelt project.”

The Roosevelt project: It was to tidal energy what John F. Kennedy’s decision to put a man on the moon was to space exploration. It was the largest and most ambitious of all the projects that have been proposed to harness the Fundy tides. The proposed dam triggered a flood of engineers, construction workers, and support staff into Depressionera Eastport, all in order to convert a big idea into useful energy.

It had all started with a man named Dexter P. Cooper.

Cooper was born in Minnesota in 1880, the son of a bridge builder. He studied in Germany and worked on river dams in Brazil, Chile, Alabama,

and Iowa. He married the daughter of a Boston doctor, whose family happened to have a cottage on fashionable Campobello Island, which forms one barrier at the edge of Passamaquoddy Bay. In 1919, spending time at the cottage as he recuperated from an appendectomy, out of curiosity he installed a tide gauge on a dock. He began to think about tidal power more seriously. In 1924, he bought his own house on the island and

moved there. He became a crusader for tapping the tides.

Cooper wasn’t the first to grasp the potential. The ancient Romans dabbled in it, and since the 18th century tides had been domesticated in small ways all along the North American coast. Mills were constructed atop dams that could trap the high tide within creeks and inlets, and then use the falling water to power waterwheels. In Maine, tide

LEFT : Chris Sauer, head of Ocean Renewable Power Company, with a model of the firm’s TideGen underwater turbine system, also shown in the schematic, BOTTOM

OPPOSITE , TOP : Passamaquoddy Bay, between the U.S. and Canadian mainlands, is an inlet of the Bay of Fundy and experiences a dramatic tidal range.

mills crushed gypsum in Lubec, sawed timber in East Boothbay, ground corn in Harpswell, and milled grain in Kennebunkport. Tide mills were more reliable than stream-powered mills, which suffered from diminished flow in the autumn and were subject to droughts. Still, they had their disadvantages: The time of high tide shifted day by day, so millhands would have to rise and work at 2:00 in the morning if that’s what the moon decreed.

At the dawn of the electric and turbine age, more-ambitious schemes surfaced. In 1910, the first plan to harness the Fundy tides was put forth by W. R. Turnbull, an engineer and inventor who lived in Rothesay, New Brunswick. His idea went nowhere. It wasn’t until Cooper crafted his Passamaquoddy tidal-power plan in 1920 that concept finally met concrete.

Cooper’s plan was astoundingly vast in scope. You can see just how vast in a storefront on Water Street in Eastport, where the intricate, room-size model for the dam, built to sway skeptics, is displayed at the Border Historical Society.

Cooper’s original notion called for damming both Passamaquoddy and

to let water flow, plus navigational canals to let fishing and cargo boats pass. Dams, some of them a mile long, would link islands and the mainland between the United States and Canada, creating two vast tidal pools, which would be released in turn to power turbines that would generate some three billion kilowatt hours a year. (The Hoover Dam generates about four billion kilowatt hours.) Companies like General Electric, Boston Electric, and Midwest Utilities signed on as backers. The state of Maine signed off on the plan in 1925; the day the state legislature approved it, the bells of Eastport’s churches rang until midnight.

Yet before construction could start, the project hit a snag: The stock market cratered and the Great Depression followed. Backers stopped returning phone calls. The Canadians, who were never as keen on the project as the Americans,

it expired a couple of years later, citing new studies that the dam would harm sardine fisheries. The Passamaquoddy Dam, it appeared, was dead.

Save for one circumstance of fate. In 1883 Franklin D. Roosevelt’s parents bought a summer house on Campobello Island, and there the future president witnessed the power of the tides.

CREATIVE (PORTS); ROBERT F. BUKATY/AP PHOTO (MARKER);

ABOVE : On a cliff overlooking the Western Passage of Passamaquoddy Bay, this marker indicates the U.S./Canada border. In the background across the water is Campobello Island (New Brunswick). BOTTOM : Ports on the Bay of Fundy along the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia coasts experience the greatest tidal range in the world. Some 115 billion tons of water flow in and out of Fundy in a 12-hour period.

Roosevelt mentioned Cooper’s plan in speeches as early as 1920, but after he defeated Hoover in 1932, he was finally in a position to launch an ambitious building program nationwide to put Americans back to work. The Passamaquoddy Dam project moved up his New Deal list and was eventually granted $10 million for the first year’s work (the equivalent of about $630 million in today’s dollars). Army engineers would oversee the project. The project had been scaled back—the revised plan would involve only Cobscook Bay on the American side—and would generate only about a third of the power that Cooper had originally envisioned.

When word came down that the dam had been approved in the U.S. Congress, Lubec and Eastport celebrated anew with fireworks, concerts, parades, school closings, and (in Lubec)

free beer. Eastport’s mayor announced, “This ends the Depression in Maine.”

The construction of one of the most ambitious energy projects was about to get under way.

“You have to look at it from their viewpoint,” says Chris Sauer, referring to the small army of regulators who had to approve his tidal electric project some 70 years later. “They have to legally approve an unknown technology in a resource that’s never been studied. Initially, they didn’t even know what they should be concerned about.”

When ORPC arrived in Eastport, Sauer and his staff brought with them not much more than a broad concept: Drop an underwater turbine into a part of the bay with powerful currents and generate electricity on both the ebb and the flow.

The devil, of course, was in the details.

Working with Navy engineers, ORPC had earlier looked at every tidal design concept in play around the world. Simply put, there are two types of tidal power: those that use a dam and those that don’t. A dam creates two pools at different heights, then exploits that differential. But a dam comes with complications: more silting, and more blocking of fish and boats from traditional routes into coves and estuaries.

The alternatives—in-stream generators—are all but invisible. They’re placed on a seabed where tidal currents naturally occur, avoiding most environmental disturbances. But not without economic cost: The blades powering the turbines move less energetically and thus produce less power. It’s a trade-off.

ORPC went with the latter, designing cross-flow turbines outfitted with magnet generators. Think of the paddles on a sternwheeler steamship, or a hand-pushed rotary lawnmower anchored to the bottom of the bay. When the tidal current comes in, the blades start spinning, stop at slack tide, and then resume spinning in the same direction when the tide begins to flow in the other direction.

“It’s just like an airplane wing— think lift,” Sauer says. (“People either get it instantly,” he says, “or you can explain it until you’re blue in the face.”) The cross-flow turbines also had the benefit of being fairly simple and possessed of few moving parts—helpful in a punishing marine environment like the bottom of a bay. Windmill blades and generators are often damaged by stiff winds; consider that water has about 800 times the density of air, and you get an idea of the potential problems at the bottom of the sea.

Getting technology from drafting board to ocean floor was one challenge.

(continued on p. 114)

When word came down that FDR’s dam had been approved in the U.S. Congress, Lubec and Eastport celebrated with fireworks and (in Lubec) free beer. Eastport’s mayor announced, “This ends the Depression in Maine.”

President Franklin D. Roosevelt surveys a working scale model of the Quoddy Tidal Power Project in Eastport, July 1936. Congress would eliminate the project’s funding later that year. The model is now on display at Eastport’s Quoddy Dam Museum.

The Hardest Deadline

WHEN HORRIFIC VIOLENCE CAME TO A SMALL NEW HAMPSHIRE TOWN, THE STAFF OF THE WEEKLY NEWSPAPER HAD TO SOMEHOW GET THE ISSUE OUT AND LET THE COMMUNITY KNOW WHAT HAD HAPPENED, EVEN THOUGH THEIR EDITOR AND CLOSE FRIENDS WERE DEAD.

By Richard Adams Carey

The public account of a murder, its story, typically begins in a newspaper. But on August 19, 1997, in the little North Country town of Colebrook, New Hampshire, the story began also on the very ground on which two murders had just taken place. It was a Tuesday, the day on which each week’s issue is put to bed at Colebrook’s News and Sentinel newspaper. John Harrigan— the Sentinel ’s owner and publisher, and one of New England’s best-known outdoors writers— had been called away on business to Lancaster. Before leaving that morning, Harrigan had said goodbye to Vickie Bunnell, the lawyer who kept her office in the Sentinel building. Their longrunning love affair had cooled, but Harrigan, at 52, had hopes of rekindling that romance.

Later that afternoon, New Hampshire state trooper Scott Phillips followed a pickup truck belonging to Carl Drega into a supermarket parking lot. For 25 years Drega, a 62-year-old carpenter, had been waging various propertyrights disputes with local authorities. Vickie Bunnell had been caught up in those during her tenure as a town selectman. Phillips intended to speak to Drega about recent public threats against Vickie’s life.

That conversation never began. Drega climbed out of his pickup with a loaded AR-15 assault rifle. He murdered Phillips, and then a second trooper, Les Lord, who had pulled into the lot without knowing that a shooting was in progress. Drega climbed into Phillips’s cruiser

OPPOSITE: In Colebrook, New Hampshire, the News and Sentinel door is draped in black following the shooting there in August 1997. Attorney and part-time judge Vickie Bunnell, one of the victims, had an office in the same building. (photograph courtesyofthe CoösCountyDemocrat, Lancaster,NH) ABOVE: Vickie Bunnell and Sentinel owner John Harrigan on vacation in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in the 1980s. (photograph courtesy ofCharlie Jordan)

ABOVE: In the Sentinel newsroom, editor Dennis Joos interviews

Republican presidential hopeful Pat Buchanan and his wife during the 1992 New Hampshire primary. Joos was shot and killed during Carl Drega’s rampage in 1997 as he struggled with the gunman. (photograph courtesy of Charlie Jordan)

BELOW: Drega’s driver’s-license photo. (photograph courtesy of the NH Attorney General’s Office)

OPPOSITE: The front page of the Colebrook paper, carrying the story of the previous afternoon’s shooting (photograph courtesy of the News and Sentinel, Colebrook,NH)

and drove to the News and Sentinel . There he shot and killed not only Vickie but also Sentinel editor Dennis Joos. A pacifist and former Franciscan novice, Joos had tackled Drega in a vain attempt to wrest the rifle away from him. Then Drega fled into the Vermont woods. He would die that evening in a shootout with police.

Harrigan arrived half an hour after the murders to find the woman he loved still lying in the parking lot behind the building. Joos had been taken to a hospital, and had died there. Members of the newspaper staff—dazed, incredulous, grieving—had lingered. Charlie Jordan, a fellow journalist and friend to Harrigan, had been at the Colebrook public library when he heard gunfire from across the street. He arrived at the scene just after Drega had fled, and had taken photos of the shooting’s aftermath.

Harrigan didn’t know if it was grief, rage, or the newspaper ink running in his veins that shook him out of his own daze when Jordan said, “I’ve got pictures.” The Sentinel was due out on the street the next morning. The issue they had prepared would have to be blown up and redone. Would that be possible in one night, in the midst of this very crime scene, with

a shell-shocked skeleton staff? Harrigan deputized Jordan as editor in Joos’s place and asked him to collect people for a meeting. The story would begin at ground zero.

John Harrigan stood in the newsroom of the News and Sentinel with the newspaper’s pasteboards, cross-hatched with the stories originally planned for tomorrow’s edition, reared up behind him. “This is what we do,” he said.

It was somewhere around 4:30 p.m. Charlie Jordan and Sentinel photographer Leith Jones were in the darkroom watching—with the hair prickling on the backs of their necks—the prints of Charlie’s black-and-white photos rise like fever dreams out of their chemical baths.

Kenn Stransky, the Sentinel court reporter in Vermont’s Essex County, had been posted to the front door to answer the phones and keep the out-of-town reporters from bursting in. Ad designer Chandra Coviello had fled straight home after taking shelter next door in Ducret’s Sporting Goods. Reporter Claire Lynch said she had gotten a phone call from Jana Riley, who ran the front desk. Jana was safe with some friends at a hair salon on Main Street, Claire

NO ONE SAT IN THE EMPTY CHAIR BEFORE DENNIS’S DESK.

“WE’VE LOST HIM,” JOHN SAID. THE ANNOUNCEMENT STRUCK LIKE ONE MORE LASH OF A WHIP.

said, but she wasn’t coming back. And coeditor Susan Zizza had gone to Dennis’s home in Stewartstown to tell his wife, Polly, what had happened.

The rest, for whatever reason, had not left, and were still here—now ranged around John in chairs at the press table or in front of the desks that lined the room: Claire, shivering as she recalled the forebodings that had haunted her that morning; compositor Jeannette Ellingwood, an exuberant woman in her seventies who had no truck with forebodings, who had been blindsided today like the rest; the gentle typesetter Vivien Towle, who was being held up, almost literally, by her boyfriend, Monty Montplaiser, an off-duty U.S. Customs officer; and the courtly bookkeeper

STATE TROOPERS AND

the news to Claire and Gil. The announcement struck the rest like one more lash of a whip.

John sighed and groped for the right words in getting around to what he really wanted to say. Eventually he found phrases to the effect that state troopers and municipal cops, emergencyroom doctors and EMTs, all shared something in common with journalists: They had to be there, sometimes, at the worst moments in people’s lives. And sometimes those suffering people—especially in a small town—were colleagues, near neighbors, family members: “People you know, people you love.”

A muttered curse—or was it a moan?— came from the darkroom. Claire couldn’t tell if it was Leith or Charlie. John looked down at the floor, rubbed his eyes. “But, you know, they

EMERGENCY-ROOM DOCTORS AND EMTS,

WITH JOURNALISTS: THEY HAD TO BE THERE, SOMETIMES, AT THE WORST MOMENTS IN PEOPLE’S LIVES.

Gil Short, who had no bookkeeping to do, but who couldn’t find it in himself to walk out the door just then.

No one sat in the empty chair before Dennis’s desk. “We’ve lost him,” John had said a moment before. He had learned as much from a nurse at the Upper Connecticut Valley Hospital. Kenn Stransky, just back from the hospital, also knew that, and by then had whispered

keep doing their jobs,” he said. “They’re dying inside, but they keep at it. And today it’s been our turn for something like that. And reporting—yeah, this is what we do.”

John knew that every daily in the Northeast had someone out on Bridge Street, or on their way there. He knew that down at the Coös County Democrat, Gene Ehlert, with his bigger staff, was dispatching reporters to the IGA, to Bloomfield, to Drega’s house, to wherever else the story had gone—as John would want him to. In an industry where the reporting done by weekly newspapers was often discounted, even held in contempt, at least one of John’s weeklies would have a good accounting of a story that involved the gunshot murder of a weekly’s editor. This paper, though, the one robbed of that editor, was uniquely positioned, an industry analyst might say, to tell the story. Or was it just the grief that John wanted to scream aloud?

Claire remembered how exasperated John usually got when a big story broke on Tuesday afternoon, on press day. Well, there are big stories, and then there are nuclear bombs. Jeannette was biting her lower lip, trying to keep from breaking into pieces in her seat.

“I don’t know—it’s like a meteor dropped on us from outer space,” John said. “But some of us are still standing, crawling out of the crater—to tell the story, to say what happened and write down who these people, these friends of ours,

MUNICIPAL COPS,

ALL SHARED SOMETHING IN COMMON

Reporter and editor Charlie Jordan, here pasting up an issue of Coos Magazine in the 1990s. Following the Colebrook shooting, Sentinel publisher John Harrigan designated him the paper’s acting editor. With Harrigan writing the lead story and editorial, and Jordan handling content selection and layout, the staff spent the night redoing the mechanicals on deadline for the next morning’s edition. (photograph courtesy of Charlie Jordan).

were. Well, okay—that’s all I’ve got. What do you think?”

“You know how to do paste-up?” Jeannette Ellingwood was speaking to Charlie Jordan as if she had just learned he could speak Aramaic.

“I do,” Charlie said. “So where exactly are you in the process here?”

Jeannette and most of the other staffers didn’t know Charlie, had no idea he had once worked for John at the Democrat . Now he’d been deputized as this newspaper’s acting editor while John locked himself away to write the feature story and a new editorial.

“Just give me an hour,” John had told him. “When you tear up the front page, leave a couple of Claire’s stories there, about a third of the page—I don’t want the whole front page to be about this. And you can rip all the sports stories. We’ll need that space for jump pages for the feature.”

Jeannette took Charlie through the finished content in the newsroom, the stories printed in two-inch columns and cut into long strips by Jeannette’s scissors or X-Acto knife, then run through the roller of the hot-wax machine, then pressed with a burnishing roller onto the pasteboards. Now it would be Charlie’s task to cut all this into pieces and puzzle the stories and graphics on to sticky art boards, each of which would be one page of the newspaper. Twentyfour art boards made a complete issue, what was called a mechanical. That, and photo negatives taken by Leith Jones of each board, would go this very night to John’s Coös Junction Press in Lancaster, where the image of each page would be etched into an aluminum roller and printed.

Charlie saw that the original content of the issue had been nearing completion: features, the editorial, letters to the editor, the locals, obituaries, sports. He noticed the headline piece among the features, a story by Dennis about the town manager’s resignation. Big news until this afternoon, Charlie thought. He’d keep it, but he’d have to move it back to page three or five. Page four would be staked out as usual for John’s editorial and readers’ letters.

Also among the features was Dennis’s piece about the lost 45th parallel sign that Charlie and his wife had found in an outbuilding at the Lancaster Historical Society. “It’s nice to be in the middle of things, and Clarksville is once again taking note of its place in the center of the Northern Hemisphere,” Dennis had written. “Last week Charlie and Donna Jordan erected an original 45th parallel sign on Route 145 near the old Clarksville School.” Charlie and Donna

had lived in that school building for years, had made a good house out of it. Charlie remembered the day Dennis had knocked on its door in 1975. Dennis had just written a profile of J. C. Kenneth Poore, a 90-year-old hill farmer who had also done some newspaper work. Poore was of the opinion that any young writer should go meet Charlie, who was publishing pieces in Yankee Magazine then. Dennis and Charlie

continued on p. 120

FROM TOP: New Hampshire State Trooper Scott Phillips, 32, was shot and killed after stopping Carl Drega in a supermarket parking lot; Trooper Leslie Lord, 45, was shot and killed as he arrived on the scene to assist Trooper Phillips. (photographscourtesy of NH Department of Safety)

“GOD HELP US DEAL WITH WHAT HAS HAPPENED, AND REMEMBER THESE CHERISHED FACES, AND THEIR SMILES.”

A view of the town’s River District takes in the restored Littleton Grist Mill, built in 1797, and the area’s newest covered bridge, constructed in 2004 over the Ammonoosuc River.

LEFT, FROM TOP : Chutters candy store, boasting 112 feet of heavenly sweets; the Bad Art Gallery, home of “eclectic and affordable art for the masses”; Echo Lake, at the foot of Cannon Mountain in Franconia Notch State Park; Dan Salomon of Northern Lights Music, a mecca for serious guitarists.

LITTLETON, NEW HAMPSHIRE SETTLED: 1770 POPULATION: 5,928

Use the Yankee Connect app to meet more of the people and places in Littleton.

LITTLETON

BY ANNIE GRAVES

PHOTOGRAPHS BY MATT KALINOWSKI

“North of the Notch” is a White Mountains town where being happy is part of local lore.

oute 93, scampering up the spine of New Hampshire, is a pleasant drive until you reach the White Mountains. Suddenly they yawn and drop away, and the distance shimmers with peaks veiled in pale-blue silk. As you twist past landmarks like the Flume and the memory of the Old Man of the Mountain, crumbled to a rock pile in 2003, all distraction ceases to exist. With a plunge into Franconia Notch, the landscape grabs for drama. Cannon Mountain looms, and mountain-fed Echo Lake spreads out below, its beach speckled with brightly colored swimsuits.

It’s a mountain world, walled in by peaks, with its own wild language of notches, elevations, and some of the most romantically challenging terrain in New England. Just east, Tuckerman Ravine is a magnet for extreme skiers; legendary Mount Washington juts 6,288 boulder-strewn feet into the air,

Claims to Fame

Eleanor H. Porter’s optimistic heroine, Pollyanna, added a new noun to our vocabulary, but the book was also translated into film, most notably Walt Disney’s 1960 version starring Hayley Mills.

Bette Davis had a summer home in Sugar Hill and shopped regularly in Littleton. When the town decided to throw a gala birthday party for her in 1941, she responded by premiering The Great Lie there at the same time.

with the “worst weather” in the world. The Presidentials rise all around; the Appalachian Trail meanders through.

Just off I-93, at exit 41, the pretty town of Littleton straddles the Ammonoosuc River, close to all that this region offers. “North of the Notch” is how it’s described, meaning Franconia Notch, but it’s north of Crawford Notch, too, and almost parallel with Jefferson Notch. Nestled in a valley,

this town of almost 6,000 (4,400 in the town center), settled in 1770, is the commercial hub of the region, and has been ever since it first harnessed the river in the l790s, setting up sawmills and gristmills. Today its vibrant Main Street hums with locals and tourists ducking into cafés, gift shops, clothing boutiques, the family-run market, and a first-run movie theatre. A dynamic revitalization of the waterfront, with its 2004 covered bridge, makes the river a focal point, with a new brewpub, a lively farmers’ market, and invitingly flat rocks where you can sit in the river’s flow and cool your heels.

It’s hard to miss the “Be Glad” banners hanging from lampposts all over town—this is where Eleanor Porter, author of the best-selling children’s book Pollyanna , was born, and the

The Littleton Public Library, built in 1906 with Carnegie funding, is home to a bronze statue of Pollyanna, sculpted by Emile B irch in 2002, honoring the legacy of children’s author Eleanor H. Porter (1868–1920).

LITTLETON

theme of “gladness” is everywhere, including the annual Pollyanna Glad Day in June, and even in the random pianos plunked along Main Street, where people often sit and spontaneously play. All this town spirit hasn’t gone unnoticed. Outside magazine named Littleton one of “America’s 10 Best Towns”; the National Main Street Program lists it as one of the “Top 10 Small Towns in America”; and Fodor’s Travel conferred “Best Main Street” status in 2014. In the spirit of Pollyanna, let’s take a closer look.

The Setting

Some of New Hampshire’s most dramatic scenery is just outside town, in White Mountain National Forest. In town, you’ll have to climb to the higher neighborhoods to glimpse the mountains, but the rolling Ammonoosuc is a vivid presence. A Riverwalk stroll incorporates the 300-footlong covered bridge across the water, plus an Indiana Jones–style suspension bridge farther downriver, crossing back into town. North of town, the Connecticut River is restrained by Moore Reservoir Dam, with a tranquil swimming beach off Route 18. Local hikes? Ask Marlene Gallinelli at the Littleton Information Booth on Main Street; she’s lived here since 1957. “Take ’em all,” she says. “They’re all grand. Twin Mountain has the most beautiful blueberries. Nothing grander than just sitting in a patch eating blueberries.”

Social Scene

Dan and Moocho Salomon’s extraordinary store, Northern Lights Music, draws customers from Ottawa, Boston, and Portland, plus “acts as a networking place for musicians,” says Moocho. The two met at Franconia

“It’s peaceful and friendly. No one’s trying to keep up with the Joneses.”

College. “Talk about having an influence on an area,” she says of the progressive school. It closed the year they set up shop, but alumni-formed organizations such as WREN (Women’s Rural Entrepreneurial Network), in Bethlehem, are still going strong, and serve as great social places to meet. The Sunday farmers’ market, too, injects a lively note. “You won’t become a millionaire, but the people are so nice,” says French Canadian vendor Marcel, as Johanna hands me a meltingly good Nutella crêpe. “It’s peaceful and friendly,” agrees Marlene Gallinelli. “No one’s trying to keep up with the Joneses. If you want to fit in or make friends, volunteer at the hospital, food pantry, or Meals on Wheels.”

Eating Out

Miller’s Café & Bakery gets raves from the Food Network, which claimed it made one of the “50 Best Sandwiches in the USA” with choices such as “Grilled Catamount Turkey & Bacon,” but nothing beats the deck view cantilevered over the Ammonoosuc. Next door, beer nerds are ecstatic over the European-style brews (Erastus Tripel?) at Schilling Beer Co., in a former 18thcentury mill, but you had us at gourmet pizza—thin, crackly, and oozing

with prosciutto, pear, and arugula, and sizzled in a wood-fired oven. The landmark Polly’s Pancake Parlor is 10 miles away in Sugar Hill, with a mountain view that will take your breath away, but not your appetite.

Shopping

The oldest ski shop in the U.S.— Lahout’s—has been here since 1920, selling “country” clothing and gear, and its 91-year-old patriarch, Joe, still lives over the original store. Just down the street, Chutters boasts the world’s longest candy counter—112 feet of kid heaven—the effects of which can be counteracted by actual food from family-run Porfido’s Market & Deli across the street, or the Littleton Food Co-op. Lots of fun shops dot Main Street, but for imaginative gifts, Juliette Ains worth’s Travel Bug sells whimsical treasures, such as the solar-powered butterflies that her mother brings back from France. “I tell her a few things that I want—like soaps and piggy banks— and the rest is a surprise,” she smiles.

FROM TOP : Schilling Beer Co. crafts artisanal European-style brews in the historic Littleton Grist Mill; the Jax Jr. cinema opened in 1951 on the site of the old Premiere Theatre; Lance Williamson’s Just L “modern antiques” store specializes in fine midcentury décor.

How did Juliette end up here? “I like the mountains, wanted an area that wasn’t too populated; it’s close to Quebec and only seven hours from Paris!”

Real Estate

The average sales price of a singlefamily home in Littleton is around $160,765, says Kerri Dufour, vice president of Coldwell Banker Linwood Real Estate. “Styles include farmhouses, Victorians, Cape Cods, Colonials, and ranches,” she notes; more than 35 percent were built before 1940. For views, try Manns Hill Road; across the river, South Street (off Cottage Street) has lovely Victorians. A well-maintained three-bedroom New Englander on Cottage Street, with enclosed front and back porches, was listed at $149,900. A newer development on Rock Strain Drive offers nice gardens, pretty ranches, and Capes—a well-tended touch of suburbia surrounded by woods.

Getting Your Bearings

Since 1843, the historic Thayers Inn has welcomed presidents and travelers, including Ulysses S. Grant, Henry Ford, and Robert E. Peary, to the heart of downtown. 111 Main St. 800-634-8179; thayersinn.com

More photos: YankeeMagazine.com/ Littleton

Resident Perk

Littleton’s proximity to area attractions makes for easy outings. Here’s a sampling:

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Combining Two Hartland, Vermont, Dairy Farms Equals One Community

Today, the 23 property owners share 270 acres. And a lot more …

e pulled into a parking spot near a huge red barn and silo. Perched along a couple of rows on the hill beyond were a series of attractive houses, one after another clustered together. It was like entering a beautiful Alpine village. We were arriving at what’s known today as Cobb Hill in Hartland, Vermont, a remarkable community created in the 1990s by the late Donella Meadows (and others), who, among her many lifetime accomplishments, authored The Limits to Growth, a book that made headlines around the world. Today, Cobb Hill, combined from two large dairy farms, consists of 23 households occupied by about 60 people ranging in age from infancy to the elderly.

The first and largest of the hillside houses was obviously the Common House, which was where we’d arranged to meet the owners of the one home at Cobb Hill that was for sale at the time we visited. (Price: $375,000. One rental apartment was also available.) Sure enough, Jay Mead and his wife, Edie Farwell, were waiting for us as we entered the mudroom, where we changed from our shoes to slippers. Then we proceeded to pad to a comfortable sitting room, where we briefly settled ourselves next to a huge stone fireplace, which Jay indicated that he’d help build. Over the next half-hour we learned that Edie had founded the Donella Meadows Leadership Fellows Program and has been a leader in international environmental and social-justice work, while Jay is a teacher at The Sharon Academy in nearby Sharon, Vermont, and is also a sculptor, builder, and carpenter. In fact, he helped

OPPOSITE , TOP : Homeowners Edie Farwell and Jay Mead. BELOW AND INSET : Their eight-room home is one of 23 on the Cobb Hill property. ABOVE : The dairy farm is operated by members of the community.

WILL MOSES

House for Sale | THE YANKEE MOSEYER

build most of the homes at Cobb Hill during the early 1990s, including their own. They’re both Dartmouth graduates, classes of ’81 and ’82, and have two sons who are old enough to soon render them “empty nesters,” which has precipitated new planning for the years ahead—thus contributing to their recent decision to sell.

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Our tour with Jay through the Common House was next on our agenda. We started with the sunshine-filled kitchen and spacious dining room (residents often gather for meals) and then climbed stairs to the so-called “meeting room,” which is as large as most highschool gymnasiums. There, members of the community meet once a month (there are also monthly “work days”) and gather for movies, concerts, dances, art exhibits, book discussions, and so forth. While the adults are participating in those sorts of activities, they can look through an interior window to their kids having a ball in the well-equipped playroom. There are also a library, a root cellar, a laundry, three nice apartments, and a cold room containing more cheese wheels than we’ve ever seen in one place. (Cobb Hill cheese is sold throughout the country.) Speaking of Cobb Hill enterprises—all separate businesses run and owned by individual community members on the Cobb Hill property—there are many others besides the cheese, including frozen yogurt, maple syrup, honey, and laying hens.

A large presence at Cobb Hill is the organic farm and dairy we passed on our way in. It’s operated by two community members who are professional farmers, but the entire community enjoys having all those lovely Jersey cows around; the four handsome draft horses, too. Actually owned by everyone in the community are the Common House and those beautiful 270 acres of woods and open fields, including a lovely pond for swimming and skating.

Finally, it was time to walk up the hill, past all the houses, to Jay and Edie’s eight-room home, perched up there above them all. On our way we stopped

by a large shed filled with split firewood and two gigantic wood furnaces that, believe it or not, heat all 23 homes on the property. Yes, during cold weather, someone needs to throw wood into these monsters about every three hours. Residents sign up for that on a rotational basis.

As to the house, we loved it. Surrounded by gardens, it’s a sunny home with four bedrooms, two baths (one with a gorgeous, mosaic-lined shower),

a large, bright living room with lots of three-paned windows, a well-equipped kitchen, a finished basement, a community well, a mudroom, and, like all the super-energy-efficient houses at Cobb Hill, its own composting toilet. There’s also an outdoor patio, plus a covered back deck overlooking a field where, on the day we visited, a half-dozen sheep were grazing. It all seemed so idyllic. And most surprising of all, it apparently really is!

Of course, living at Cobb Hill wouldn’t be for everyone. But if you love people and would truly enjoy sharing the art of living sustainably with others of a like mind, then purchasing Jay and Edie’s house could be opening a door into your own earthly paradise.

On the other hand, if you’re a sour ol’ grump, forget it …

For details, contact Edie Farwell: 802-291-2896; ediefarwell@gmail .com. Read classic HFS stories from our archives at: YankeeMagazine .com/house-for-sale

If you’d enjoy sharing the art of sustainable living, then the house at Cobb Hill could be a door to your own earthly paradise.

SUMMER CAMP

(continued from p. 79)

Brave of Sportsmanship and the Brave of Cleanliness, and then counselors in loincloths, occasionally accessorized with eyeglasses and wristwatches, would award feathers to deserving campers. No one would take this seriously now. But we all secretly prayed to the Great Spirit to be worthy of a feather. Eventually, changes in the world pervaded even this tradition. Chief Manitou, at the insistence of the camp wives, got a wife. She was named Princess Hachshevu.

I left the camp the first chance I got, taking a job and staying in a neighbor’s basement when my family drove off to Maine. I was 17. It was disorienting to find that people went about their regular routines and lived outside the woods between the day that school let out each spring and the day that it resumed each fall. It was an existence I’d never known.

I got used to it. It was 13 years before I set foot again in camp for a brief visit. By then, my father’s brother was in charge. Like me, he’d been born into the business. He’d enlarged the camp significantly and expanded the market from which it drew, to survive tough economic times when all those other camps were forced to close. Now there were campers from 26 states and 6 countries, a Little League–size replica of Fenway Park, a climbing tower, and a ropes course. Since, like me, an increasing number of these new kids weren’t principally athletes, there was now a theatre with a costume shop and a set designer, plus a radio station, a TV studio, scuba diving, an animation program, and photography.

Conventional summer camps, to thrive in an era of specialty and specialneeds camps, are compelled today to offer endless menus of activities and to cope with the new-millennium alphabet of WiFi and iPads and ADHD. Nor are those the only ways the world has changed. When Walmart opened in our town, the local businesses that had shown up unsolicited to help us when our dining hall burned down went under. And the dances with the sister camp are now no more reserved than a Rihanna video.

Other things, however, stubbornly remained the same. The smell of a crackling campfire and the call of loons. The bonds between counselors and campers. The night sky full of stars. The peace and seclusion from the outside world. The chance for kids so overscheduled at home to live independently and make decisions for themselves.

The welcome I received on my visit was characteristic of camp. I was set upon by campers curious about camp history and how certain traditions had come to be. I became an honorary coun-

Since the day my family’s summer camp opened, the people who came there took their fun as seriously as they took their competition. Away from the daily pressures of the outside world, in an environment without the distraction of girls, they laughed and joked and played elaborate pranks on one another. Summer camp, I ultimately came to understand, is one big, happy, inside joke. Campers’ flaws become their trademarks and their nicknames, and, after a while, not flaws at all but points of pride. It’s the ultimate recognition to be made good-natured fun of by an adult at summer camp—even better if you can sling a good comeback.

selor and returned again in subsequent summers when I could. Popular culture has struggled, mostly unsuccessfully, to capture what makes summer camps so special. But one thing it gets right, I learned on my return, is that as much fun as the campers have, camp is even more fun for the adults.

The year our camp turned 50, 1996, was, as many of us who came back for it would later be convinced, the summer by which other summers should be judged. There seemed to be an extra pride—a feeling of connection to the people who’d gone before, their names inscribed on all those plaques and trophies—that made this summer stand out in especially sharp focus, even among boys who normally had little consciousness of history. They appeared to hear a special call to store away the memories of camp meetings and talent shows, and barbecues with cabinmates at summer dusks, just before the sunsets turned the sky above the lake from blue to gold.

That may seem like a simple insight, but it took me much of my life to reach it. Summer camp is an exceptionally hard thing to explain. Just ask any camper. It’s a cultural curiosity, a shared secret. In these safe and peaceful throwbacks to another time, isolated behind tall stands of trees in far-flung towns, friendships are fast and abiding. Learning comes unconsciously, about such things as leadership and teamwork—how to win, and how to lose. Free of parents, campers find the confidence to try new things. They know that they’re among friends who’ll cheer them on no matter what.

I spent more time than usual at camp during that 50th summer, which was among the hardest to allow to end. As if to prolong it, no one slept much on the last few nights. It was a weary bunch of counselors and directors who loaded exhausted campers onto predawn flights and weepy bus trips home. But there was another, massive job ahead: The alumni were coming. At least, we hoped they were. We didn’t have time to worry, though. With only hours to prepare, there were towels and sheets to wash, beds to make, a banquet to prepare. And then, of all things, a limousine rolled up the dirt road to the office. In it was a former camper who’d become a high-powered Hollywood agent. As he emerged, a second car arrived. Its driver and the agent stared. They smiled. They laughed. And then they hugged. All of us around them stopped what we were doing. And smiled, too. This was going to be good.

SUMMER CAMP IS AN EXCEPTIONALLY HARD THING TO EXPLAIN. JUST ASK ANY CAMPER. IT’S A CULTURAL CURIOSITY, A SHARED SECRET.

Soon there was a steady stream; hundreds of former campers returned to celebrate this place together. Many had remained close friends; others hadn’t seen each other since their childhoods, but picked up right where they’d left off. Former-camper fathers came with former-camper sons. They told stories. They sang songs by the lake. They played baseball under the lights in the replica of Fenway Park. They told more stories. Cousin Max reprised the 2,000-year-old camper, commenting on the irony that many of the people in the room were much closer to actually being 2,000 years old than they’d been when he’d débuted it.

Late that night, and well into the wee hours of the morning, many of us gathered around a campfire. We went around the circle, sharing our memories of camp. Some of these alumni, who’d left their workaday worlds for this reunion, were surprised to find that in this little stretch of tall trees on the quiet lake, some athletic feat or epic prank had made them legends among young campers they’d never met.

I was the last to share my thoughts that night beside the fire. Almost all of these people knew me, and had since I’d been born. They were family. I realized I was among friends who would cheer me on no matter what. They remembered my ambivalence about growing up as the owners’ kid. I re introduced myself anyway. I’d been at camp forever, I said, to laughter. Then I paused for effect. After all, I’d learned my comic timing here, at camp. It was only one of the things, it turned out, that I’d picked up in that place. Including on that night, beneath the stars.

“And all this,” I finally said, “could have been mine.”

More photos at: YankeeMagazine.com/ SummerCamp

Jon Marcus is a travel writer, regular Yankee and Boston Globe contributor and cofounder of MySecretBoston.com His books include Unknown New England and The Complete Illustrated Guidebook to Boston’s Public Parks and Gardens.

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TRAPPING THE MOON (continued from p. 95)

But so too was financing it all, which Sauer says took up about half of his time. (ORPC eventually secured an initial $10 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy aimed at jumpstarting an emerging technology, along with additional capital from private investors.) At the same time, he and his team had to navigate a thorny regulatory environment while winning over a remote, often mistrustful, community of scallopers and fishermen.

They took the same tack with both: approach potential adversaries as collaborators. With regulators, they began the process early on, meeting with officials from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the state to talk through their plans. Nearly 30 state and federal agencies had some jurisdiction over them, although the vast majority of their dealings were with a half-dozen agencies. Officials were generally supportive, Sauer says, making for a relatively straightforward process—or as straightforward as something requiring a 4,000-page federal pilot-project application can be.

“We developed a good rapport,” Sauer remembers. “Our approach to regulators is the same as our approach to the community: collaborate, get in early, work together.”

Residents of this part of the coast have a deep-seated wariness of outsiders. “Eastport has this history of big projects being proposed, and people become very cynical about them because so often they haven’t materialized, or people start to realize the drawbacks,” explains Ed French, an Eastport native and the longtime editor of the biweekly Quoddy Tides newspaper. “In this case, they didn’t make any big promises. They proceeded cautiously and have tried to work with the community, which I think is a real difference between the Quoddy Dam project and today.”

ORPC set up an office downtown and hired local people to do office work, pilot boats to sites, and construct components—including a woodworker who crafted prototype turbine

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blades. With the help of Will Hopkins, executive director of the Cobscook Bay Resource Center, a nonprofit dedicated to sustainable management of the local waters, they reached out to fishermen, who were understandably wary about losing access to a productive ocean bottom that is home to lobster, scallops, and urchins. Hopkins says that when ORPC initially approached him, they said they’d developed some technology but didn’t know anything about area currents, conditions for anchoring, or local fishing grounds.

Hopkins appreciated their humility. As it happens, Hopkins knew a lot about those things; his center had recently teamed up with the Electric Power Research Institute to analyze the region’s tidal potential, and he had lots of connections among local fishermen. “Before they started selecting sites, I thought it might be good if they sat down with the fishermen and got to know each other,” Hopkins says. “That way, if a conflict came up, they had a little bit of history that they could reach back and count on.”

Sauer agreed, and he and ORPC staffers started attending lots of meetings. “Fishermen are the most independent group of people I’ve come across,” Sauer says. But in the process, they worked through potential obstacles, mostly about where the turbines might be sited. The fishermen suggested that ORPC look at one area off Goose Island, where, they said, currents were so strong that lobster traps would be swept away. What the fishermen couldn’t use, ORPC could.

Permits and local approval in place, ORPC installed a test turbine in March 2010. The results after a year were encouraging. The blades would start moving on their own when the current picked up. Seals left the machinery alone. Environmental studies concluded that smaller fish could swim through the slowly rotating blades without harm, and larger fish avoided the contraption altogether. Early fears of the blades’ becoming a Cuisinart and turning Cobscook Bay into chowder went unrealized.

The test unit was pulled up, and ORPC threw a retirement party for

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it. The vast streams of data that it had provided about life in the deep were crunched and fed into the final design of the production unit that they hoped could feed electricity into the national grid.

On July 4, 1935, Vice President John Garner pressed a telegraph key in Washington, D.C., setting off 600 pounds of dynamite in Eastport. An explosion filled the air, cheered on by a crowd of some 15,000. Construction crews moved in as the rubble settled, and began erecting a village to house some 5,000 workers sent there to design and build the new dam. Up went 120 houses, two apartment buildings, a dormitory, a hospital, a dining hall, a theatre, and a fire station. By January 1936, in the space of a few months, Eastport’s population had nearly tripled, and work began on history’s most ambitious tidal project.

Pleasant Point was connected by causeway to Carlow Island, then Carlow to Moose Island, blocking off Half Moon Cove and forcing the tides to enter and exit via Shackford Head, several miles south. Various types of concrete were poured on Treat Island to test its durability in an arduous marine environment.

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But no sooner had building started than it slowed, then stopped. The Quoddy Dam and other projects, like the Florida Ship Canal, became easy targets, attacked in Washington by fiscal conservatives as being too expensive and yielding too little in benefits. “There is nothing technically wrong with the indefatigable Mr. Cooper’s vision of making the moon and the sun work for us through the tides,” the New York Times chimed in. “Neither is there anything technically wrong with making bathroom fixtures of platinum.”

Congress trimmed funding sharply; layoffs began. The dam’s workforce was chopped by four-fifths, to 1,000 workers by July 1936, and to 350 by December. Dam construction was soon abandoned. The newly built and now largely abandoned village was handed over to the National Youth Administration, which set up a vocational training school for young men.

(When World War II broke out, trades like radio communications and riveting were taught, and Seabees were also housed and trained here.)

In February 1938, Dexter Cooper, the driving force behind the international dam, died and was buried on a hill on Campobello Island, overlooking the bay. “The tides of Fundy will long be a moving monument to Dexter Cooper,” his obituary read. “Someday they may be put to work.”

Yet the idea of harnessing the tides of Passamquoddy Bay never really died, despite the best efforts of Congress to drive a stake through its heart. Roosevelt kept the notion alive, and in 1939 tried to resurrect a joint project with Canada. In 1947, President Harry Truman agreed that the concept merited study. President Dwight Eisenhower supported a $3 million feasibility study, and President John F. Kennedy asked the International Joint Commission to review it in 1961. Kennedy called the Quoddy Dam (paired with a proposed hydroelectric dam on the border at the St. John River) “one of the most astonishing and beneficial joint enterprises that the people of the United States have ever taken.”

All these proposals foundered.

Then the price of oil spiked in the 1970s and ushered in another round of eager talk about cheap power, but damming the bay remained an idea essentially on life support. (Headline in the Ellsworth American : “Passamaquoddy: The Dream That Won’t Die.”) As Popular Mechanics magazine summarized it in 1977: “There is a lot of modern thinking about tide power, but the problem is that it mainly stops right there—at thinking, not doing.”

But by the late 20th century, the doing slowly started to catch up with the thinking around the globe, in modest projects in small rivers and coves, particularly in Europe. In 1966, a nearly half-mile dam with 24 generators was constructed across the tidal Rance River in France at a cost of $100 million; it produces about 240 megawatts at peak tides and hasn’t missed a tide since it opened. On the eastern side of the Bay of Fundy, in Nova Scotia, a prototype tidal-power plant was built on

the Annapolis River in 1986, capturing the tide behind a dam and generating a modest 20 megawatts of electricity on the ebb. More recently, the province created the Fundy Ocean Research Centre for Energy (FORCE), with the aim of establishing partnerships and building more tidal-power facilities. It hopes to aid the province in meeting its lofty goal of producing 40 percent of its electricity from renewable resources by 2020.

It marked the first moment that tidal power in America had made its way from the bay into homes and businesses and the electric grid that keeps the nation humming, and a long-term contract with utilities had been signed.

That wasn’t the end, of course. The moon has its cycles, as does technological progress. After producing power for a couple of months, the generator was pulled out for inspection, and ORPC found problems. Vibrations had loosened some bolts, and “electromagnetic noise” was compromising some of the data. The unit was repaired and resubmerged, but then taken out again the following year, taken apart, and analyzed; ORPC used the data gathered to design a more efficient generator, which the team now plans to install in Cobscook Bay in 2016; additional generators based on the improved design will go into nearby Western Passage in 2017.

Also toward that end, in 2010, a $10 million, 400-ton turbine, about the size of a six-story building, was lowered into the Bay of Fundy. It was owned by Nova Scotia Power and OpenHydro (an Irish company). Reflecting the unknown unknowns that persist in tidal-power generation, it stopped working after a week. Recovering the unit—two blades of which had snapped off—took several more weeks.

On a foggy and overcast day in July 2012, Chris Sauer stood before several dozen people near a boat ramp on Eastport’s west side. An outsized American flag luffed in wet winds, thunder sounded from above, and the new underwater turbine stood nearby, the colorful base adding a splash of yellow to the gray day. “Tidal energy has arrived in America!” Sauer shouted, and the small crowd clapped.

Two months later, a switch was flipped and power generated from tidal currents pulsed through a cable into a small gray building on the shores of Seward Neck, where it connected to another cable, and the electricity continued onward, feeding into a grid that powers Maine and the rest of the U.S.

The news went around the globe: America had at last harvested the moon.

Meanwhile, tidal power has been gaining steam. Other companies have entered the market. And ORPC has been experimenting with a second tidal-generator design, this one created to float while being moored on the ocean floor. More significantly, the group has moved forward with river projects, looking for ways to economically harvest freshwater currents. In 2014, the team installed submerged generators in a river at remote Igiugig, Alaska, a small village that had previously depended on flying in barrels of diesel to make electricity. Sauer says that it makes sense to focus on “remote areas that are off the grid and where the cost of energy is very high.”

He continues to gaze at horizons that most of us find too far off to be of much interest. Harvesting the moon—efficiently and economically—has been a challenge for generations, and may be so for generations to come.

But taming the moon now seems within reach.

Wayne Curtis is a regular contributor to Yankee

His previous features on Down East and North Country traditions include “Why the Maine Guide Still Matters” (March/April 2012) and “Art of the Trail” (May/June 2011).

wayne-curtis.squarespace.com

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(continued from p. 101)

became friends. Two decades later, Dennis had loved the feel-good quirkiness of this 45th parallel story. Now Charlie had to finish it for him.

The Colebrook police log, assembled by Claire, had a sweet poignancy to it: a car off the road on Vermont 102 after it swerved for a deer, for example, or the theft of a picnic table from the Route 3 rest area. That was what they’d had to worry about yesterday.

Charlie saw in the obituaries that a joint memorial service for Dr. Herbert Gifford and Dr. Marjorie Parsons— Doc Gifford and Parsie, husband and

Kenn Stransky never saw the Sentinel ’s newsroom that night because the three telephone lines at Jana Riley’s desk were constantly lit up. “When reporters called, I tried to keep my statements down to thirty seconds,” he said later. “I told them as much as I knew was true from what people at the Sentinel had told me, what Claire was finding out on her trips back and forth between us and Town Hall and the police department, and what was coming over the scanner.”

One call came from a TV station in Texas. The voice on the line said, “Hold on just a minute while I get somebody to talk to you.”

“Sorry, I don’t have even a minute,” Kenn said. “If you want any information, it’s now or never.”

That meant even the Union Leader, the state’s biggest daily. “The publisher down there called,” Kenn said. “He was not polite, and he demanded to speak to John. I said, ‘You’re obviously not his daughter,’ and hung up on him. He called right back, reamed me out, and I hung up again.”

The Union Leader was granted favors, though. There were photos that Charlie Jordan had already agreed to share. Then the Union Leader ’s North Country correspondent, and only she, was allowed into the building to take some shots of Charlie doing paste-up, to ask a few questions.

She didn’t see John, though, and neither did New Hampshire Attorney General Philip McLaughlin when he visited at 6:00 with several other state officials and Colebrook police chief

wife, physicians to the whole town— was planned for Saturday afternoon at the Colebrook Village Cemetery. Most likely the family would want to postpone that; Charlie would have to check. Many of the ads in the newspaper had to do with sales, offers, or events connected to the Moose Festival next week. What the hell was the town going to do about that?

And what about the photos to accompany John’s lead story? Leith was still in the darkroom, hanging wet prints on clothesline strung from the ceiling. Charlie would have to talk to John about which ones to use. That would be a tough call.

Claire had run out the door to learn what else had happened. Jeannette and Vivien—with pitch-in help from Leith, Gil, and Monty—were proofing, printing, and waxing whatever hadn’t made it to the pasteboards yet. Charlie went back to where the features were posted, to what would have been the front page. He stood where people had run for their lives two hours before and went to work, pulling columns of text off the boards.

Kenn wasn’t surprised that the calls were coming from all over the country, given that in this event “all three points of the triangle,” he said, were represented in terms of people whom civil societies most need to protect: cops, judges, and journalists. Of course a lot of the calls were local. Many thought that the editor killed at the Sentinel had been John Harrigan. Some wanted to talk to John, but that wasn’t possible.

John was in and out of his office, but not taking calls. Twice he went to see Vickie’s parents, who were at their son Earl’s house, just down the street. Both times he paused to talk to the out-of-town reporters outside the building, all of whom were barred from entering while John’s staff was at work. Otherwise the reporters made do with Kenn’s periodic updates. John went back to the newsroom once to see how production was going, and disappeared once into the darkroom with Charlie Jordan. But his instructions to Kenn were explicit: no calls unless it was from his daughter Karen, who was driving up from Newmarket in southern New Hampshire.

Mike Sielicki. They came in through the rear door, lingered for five minutes, and left through the back again. They paused in the parking lot where Vickie still lay where she had fallen, covered by a blanket within the lot’s perimeter of yellow tape.

For the most part, John’s improvised staff was disturbed only by the lingering presence of Vickie beneath that blanket. “It was sad—and unsettling,” Kenn said. “We’re all saying that they’ve got to do something with that body. Somebody told me that there were a lot of crime scenes, a lot of bodies, and that it was just going to take time before the Crime Lab people could get here from Concord and take care of all the stuff like that. We tried not to think about it, but that was hard, too.”

Calls came from householders around the region, from people who said they were watching this on TV, and Kenn realized that things were different from when he’d moved to the North Country from New York City in 1993, when on a clear day he might pull in one network channel on his aerial antenna, when he’d had to ask

CHARLIE STOOD WHERE PEOPLE HAD RUN FOR THEIR LIVES TWO HOURS BEFORE AND WENT TO WORK, PULLING COLUMNS OF TEXT OFF THE BOARDS.

his parents in Kansas to tape and mail him episodes of Melrose Place. “Now, via CNN and WMUR and all these satellite dishes,” he said, “this terror was being beamed into every home out there, or a good number of them.”

Kenn would leave journalism in 1998, but that night, while he was still a reporter, he wept with other reporters. “I was outside at one point, talking to the press, and I saw an AP reporter from Concord with tears running down her face, and that’s when I lost it as well,” he said. “It was one of those weird moments, when suddenly it smacks you in the head that we’re all in this together. It happened again the next morning. I was being interviewed by Fredricka Whitfield of CNN—I’d watched her for years on TV in New York—and she was crying, and again I felt this, I don’t know, blood-brother connection to other people in the media, and through Fredricka to people all over the country.”

John Harrigan and Charlie Jordan had wrestled with this before when they had worked together at the Democrat : how to choose photographs—of a motor vehicle accident, say—that honestly told a shocking story without being in and of themselves shocking. It was always hard, but never so hard as this.

In the green, ashen light of the darkroom, John—who had already rejected a dozen images—stared at a photo of Dennis, his friend and editor, whose face was obscured, strapped into a gurney and being wheeled by several people to the curb of Bridge Street as a pair of EMTs bent over him. In the background were the hanging sign for the News and Sentinel, a parked car on the street, Collins’s camera shop on the corner of Main, and a motorcyclist heading unperturbed for the intersection. Dennis had only moments to live, and the episode seemed to unfold against a museum diorama. “Well, okay, we’ll use this one,” John said.

“You think it’s okay?” Charlie asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t know—I think so.”

“So just one photo on the front page?”

John shook his head. “I don’t know about that either. That would suggest Dennis was the only victim—or the more important victim.”

But the photos of Vickie were more problematic. Charlie had waited until she was covered, but even so … “Maybe this one?” Charlie said.

In black-and-white, the camopattern blanket that Dave Robidas had laid over Vickie looked like leopard skin. Paul Nugent was standing over the body and looking back over his shoulder at Robidas and John Brunault, both of whom stood stunned, fifteen or twenty feet distant. The pool of blood that trailed toward Brunault seemed to reflect his face and shoulders.

John was straining at the seams as he looked at this, and Charlie was suf-

scenes at both the IGA supermarket and the News and Sentinel.

Champagne arrived on Bridge Street as Norm Brown, director of the Coös County jail, and some civilians were stringing tape around the area. He went on to the IGA, where a state trooper was interviewing witnesses and a Colebrook cop was keeping a log. So that scene was already secure. Champagne returned to the Sentinel.

With his badge and ID on a chain around his neck, and bitter about not being part of the manhunt, Champagne began taking photos of the scene —and stopped short when Brown showed him five bullet casings scattered like cigarette butts near the back door of the building. “So shots were fired right here,” Champagne said.

“That’s right,” Brown replied.

“Have you gone through there yet? Checked it out?”

“Talk to John.”

Suddenly Leith Jones was at the back door, and Champagne nearly took a bite out of him. Then Champagne’s conversation with John went off the rails within its first few words. “You’ve got your job, and you’re doing it,” John said. “And we’ve got our job— and we’re doing it, no matter what you say. There is no way in hell we’re leaving.”

Champagne emphasized the importance of protecting a crime scene, the uselessness in court of mishandled or contaminated evidence. “Crime scene?” John cried. “This is a dead scene—four people are dead. The crime’s been done. Why aren’t you out chasing this guy?”

fering as well. “People need to see what happened,” Charlie said eventually. “They need to see what it looked like, at least in some way. It’s part of the story.”

“Yeah—I suppose.”

“And, you know, the story in these photos, either one of them, isn’t people dying—it’s people helping, or trying to help. Doing their best.”

John sucked in a long, empty breath. “Okay—we’ll use this one. Yeah, okay.”

They went on to pick out photos to send to the Union Leader, but they chose to share none of Vickie with the Union Leader or any other press organization. That part of the story was just for Colebrook.

Late that afternoon, John Harrigan nearly got arrested—along with everybody else in the Sentinel building.

State police corporal Scott Champagne was in an unmarked car and doing undercover narcotics work in Littleton—specifically, trailing a suspected pot dealer. Then Champagne got a call on his cell phone ordering him to Colebrook to secure crime

“How many gunmen?”

“I’m pretty sure there was just the one.”

“Were there any shots fired inside the building?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well …”

At precisely that moment, John burst through the door, skipped over the casings, and rushed to fetch something—he can’t remember what— from a vehicle in the parking lot. He hastened back into the building past an open-mouthed Champagne. “Who was that?”

“That’s John Harrigan. He owns the newspaper—and the building.”

“So there are people in there?”

“Yes, there are.”

“And what the hell are they doing?”

“Putting out a newspaper, it looks like.”

“In the middle of a crime scene? Where this lawyer had her office? No, I don’t think so.”

“Well, you’d better have a word with Mr. Harrigan.”

That touched a nerve. “I can shut you down, Mr. Harrigan.”

“You do that, and you’ll have to live with the consequences—if you can figure out how to stop me, or anybody else who wants to stay. You want to try that?”

That was exactly what Champagne wanted to try. But he took a step back and considered: the whole town in chaos, one or more perpetrators still at large. He conferred out of earshot with Brown, who said he was nearly certain that no shots had been fired in the building. “But I can take a look around,” Brown promised, “talk to people while they work.”

In his report, Champagne would ascribe John’s “poor attitude” to “the shock of the circumstances that were unfolding.” He added that “there was no time or available resources that permitted this writer to argue with or arrest these people.” Instead he went back to John and proposed a deal: Everyone could stay in the building so long as no one went out the back door, where the shell casings lay, or into the

“PEOPLE NEED TO SEE WHAT HAPPENED,” CHARLIE SAID EVENTUALLY. “THEY NEED TO SEE WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE, AT LEAST IN SOME WAY. IT’S PART OF THE STORY.”

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parking lot. John agreed—grudgingly, still angry. The problem with the front door was all those other reporters gathered in front of it. Half an hour later—when Monty and Vivien said they needed something from Vivien’s car—John sent them out the back.

That was just as Champagne was explaining his handling of the situation to a skeptical Sergeant Guy Kimball of the state police. Kimball marched into the building and assured John that the newspaper would indeed be shut down, and he arrested, with another instance of traffic through that door.

John can’t remember who called shortly after 7:00 p.m. to tell him that Carl Drega had been shot and

one of our all-time favorite troopers, cowlick and all, taken from his wife and kids and the town that he loved, and loved him? Les Lord, a great guy with a landmark laugh who was about the most likeable guy around, shot down in cold blood?”

Each question mark was a spike of incredulity. “Yes, it happened here. Yes, these wonderful people are gone. It is a nightmare from which there is no waking up. God love these people as their families and their town did— and God help us all deal with what has happened, and remember these fine and cherished faces, and their smiles.”

The column ended with an account of what was happening as John was writing the piece, as his staff—“Some

John hadn’t quite finished his editorial when his children Karen and Mike arrived at 8:30. They had to tap on John’s office window, since the front door was locked and the back door taped off. Kenn Stransky let them in, and soon Karen settled into helping Kenn on the phone lines.

She found that some people were still calling to ask if her father was dead. Then Karen—herself a reporter at the Union Leader —couldn’t help getting angry at a reporter calling from the Philadelphia Inquirer. “What are you doing at the newspaper now?” the woman asked. “Are people standing around in groups, hugging and crying?”

“No, we’re not, and you need to think about how you phrase your ques-

killed in the Vermont woods. With that, his headline story had a beginning—albeit a mystifying one; all this from a traffic stop?—a middle, and an end. John was a first-draft writer anyway, and it was one of those leads that nearly writes itself: “It was a crime of unbelievable proportions, that left at least five people dead, a newspaper and a police fraternity in shock, and a community stunned to its core.”

The editorial was tougher. Here John eschewed mentioning the “deranged gunman” by name—indeed John would vow to never utter Carl Drega’s name again—and he punctuated the fate of each victim with question marks: “Dennis Joos, this paper’s co-editor, a newspaperman’s newspaperman who loved rural and smalltown life, gunned down as he tried to stop a madman? Vickie Bunnell, a small-town lawyer in the classic sense of the term, who kept her dog in her office and saved the lives of everyone else in the building by shouting out a warning with her last words, lying dead in the parking lot? Scott Phillips,

had narrowly escaped the volley that killed Vickie Bunnell,” he wrote, without hyperbole—put it all together. “We left the photos and stories and bylines that Dennis did this week in the paper,” John continued. “It was, after all, his last work, and he put his best into everything that he did. We’ll do a better job with the loss and what this has all meant in next week’s paper. Right now it’s just too much, and getting this paper out is all we can manage.”

In the newsroom, Charlie Jordan pasted in a headline in a font size much larger than the Sentinel ’s usual: “Four Gunned Down in Colebrook; Editor, Lawyer, Two Officers Dead.” His photos of Dennis on the gurney and Vickie beneath her blanket rested above brief articles by Claire Lynch about petty vandalism at the post office and two runaway kids from Camp E-Toh-Anee. There was also a Leith Jones photo from the West Stewartstown Old Home Day parade: two folks on a float with their arms around a docile black calf.

tions,” Karen snapped. “We’re busy getting the paper out.”

By 7:30 the next morning, every copy of the News and Sentinel had been cleaned out of the building and grabbed off the newsstands. John had to call down to the Coös Junction Press to rush a second printing.

At the same time, he conducted what amounted to a running, all-day news conference, from one end of the building to the other, for the out-oftown reporters he had allowed to come in for the day. In his answers to all the questions, he began to find themes that he would return to as the questions were repeated, repeated again. So how is Colebrook different today than it was just yesterday?

“The Shangri-La factor,” he replied. “It’s been lost. It seemed like something like this couldn’t happen here.”

Reporters asked him to explain it all, to offer some rationale for why this happened here. “This guy was just a piece of space junk who happened to

“WE’LL DO A BETTER JOB WITH THE LOSS AND WHAT THIS HAS ALL MEANT IN NEXT WEEK’S PAPER. RIGHT NOW IT’S JUST TOO MUCH, AND GETTING THIS PAPER OUT IS ALL WE CAN MANAGE.”

get us,” John told the New York Times. “It was our turn.”

Elsewhere in the building, the city reporters moved as though inside a church, speaking in whispers and approaching John’s staffers circumspectly. Nonetheless, people were edgy as they started work on next Wednesday’s issue. Karen Harrigan had been filmed that morning as she helped bundle newspapers. She had felt odd about that, and decided not to take interview requests.

Claire Lynch had dressed up in a sleek dress and high heels for the day, but she ended up fleeing the building, glad of the excuse to pass out sidewalk flyers announcing Scott’s and Les’s calling hours. There, however, a film crew found her and prevailed upon her to walk up the Town Hall

Jana explained that no, actually they weren’t, and provided the years of their deaths.

In the afternoon, as rain began to fall, Jana admitted to herself that there was another reason she needed to come to work today: her resolve not to let someone like this Carl Drega change her life, or who she was. But as the afternoon wore on, she felt herself getting wound up tight, a little bit anxious. She didn’t like it that she had never seen the killer’s corpse, that she had to take it on faith that Drega had died in the woods last night. She didn’t know any more than the rest of the world why all hell had broken loose yesterday. She wondered if Vickie was just unlucky, if she or Jeannette or anyone else might have just as easily been a target, and if the story about Drega’s

had not been nominated, as was the case with all the competition in that category. Why had just the publisher been singled out?

Susan Zizza, in her shame, had a theory. She wondered if it was because the newspaper staff, before they returned to work, had run away, had scattered into the parking lot as Drega was approaching and as Vickie was gunned down; if it was because only Dennis, who had fought and died, and John, who had been absent, were felt to be clean of that stain.

That wouldn’t have been it, certainly. John couldn’t explain it himself, but he understood the nomination’s injustice. “If I won, I was going to make it right at the podium,” he said. “I was going to emphasize that it was a team effort, that everybody pitched in,

steps for them. They held a microphone down low to catch the clicking of her heels as she flushed in embarrassment.

Around midmorning, Karen took a call from a woman down in the Seacoast region, at the other end of the state. “Yes—I ordered a classified ad for this week’s issue,” the woman said with brittle politeness. “And I paid with a credit card, but the ad’s not in there. I can’t find it.”

“Ma’am, did you read any of that issue?” Karen said. “Or have you watched any news on TV?”

“No, I went straight to the classifieds, but …”

“Uh-huh. We’ve had a little incident here.”

“Oh—really? What …” Karen heard a newspaper rustling in the background. “Oh, my.”

“Yeah—we’ll credit your account.”

A few moments later, Jana Riley took a call from someone hoping to be reassured that Fred and Esther Harrigan, John’s parents and the previous owners of the Sentinel , were all right.

death might be one of those facts that newspapers get wrong sometimes, if instead he might still be on the prowl. In the years to come, she would wake at night crazed by the same nightmare: being chased by a man in camouflage pants and wielding a rifle, but with no face, just a yawning fleshy whiteness.

That day she reached a breaking point when another strange reporter asked her—yet again—how she and her colleagues were feeling today. “Well, how do you expect us to feel?” she spat. She stomped into John’s office, ready to quit, until John promised she’d be left alone.

Five months later, in February 1998, John was astonished when an Associated Press reporter called, asking for comment about his nomination for a 1998 Pulitzer in journalism, in the category of Breaking News Reporting. His staff at the Sentinel was no less surprised, and pleased—recognition like this, for a small-town weekly— though some couldn’t help wondering why the whole newspaper and its staff

that I was accepting only on behalf of the whole newspaper.”

But it didn’t make any difference. In April, the Pulitzer was awarded to the Los Angeles Times for its coverage of a botched bank robbery and police shoot-out in North Hollywood.

“Congratulations,” John told his staff the next morning. “You lost to a newspaper with a hundred people in the newsroom.’”

Excerpted from In the Evil Day: Violence Comes to One Small Town , by Richard Adams Carey, forthcoming from ForeEdge, an imprint of University Press of New England.

Richard Adams Carey is the assistant director of the MFA in Fiction and Nonfiction program at Southern New Hampshire University and a staff writer at the Holderness School. His previous books include The Philosopher Fish: Sturgeon, Caviar, and the Geography of Desire ; Against the Tide: The Fate of the New England Fisherman; and Raven’s Children: An Alaskan Culture at Twilight

“YES, IT HAPPENED HERE. YES, THESE WONDERFUL PEOPLE ARE GONE. IT IS A NIGHTMARE FROM WHICH THERE IS NO WAKING UP.”

Calendar of EVENTS

CONNECTICUT

THROUGH SEPT.: FALLS VILLAGE, Music Mountain Summer Chamber Music Festival . Music Mountain plays host to some of the country’s best, most intimate chamber concerts on Saturday evenings (with optional dinner) and Sunday afternoons. 860-824-7126; music mountain.org

JULY 4: MYSTIC, Independence Day Celebration

Step back to 1876 to celebrate America’s centennial at Mystic Seaport; boat races, military exercises with the 27th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry, and even a spelling bee. Picnic along the parade route, churn some ice cream, and enjoy music, lawn games, and theatrical performances by the Mystic Seaport TaleMakers. 860-572-0711; mysticseaport.org

JULY 9–12: NORTH STONINGTON, North Stonington Agricultural Fair. There’ll be family entertainment, good food, and fun at the fairgrounds on Wyassup Road. Watch tractor and oxen pulls, view beautiful arts and crafts, learn about farm life, and try out the midway rides. 860-535-3956; northstoningtonfair.org

JULY 18–19: WESTPORT, 42nd Fine Arts Festival. Downtown, along the picturesque Saugatuck River, more than 140 juried artists pre sent oils, ceramics, photography, sculpture, jewelry, and more. Enjoy the live music and street performances, while the kids delve into hands-on craft activities. 203-505-8716; westportfineartsfestival.com

JULY 24–25: OLD LYME, Old Lyme Midsummer Festival . Now in its third decade, this event celebrates the town’s rich artistic heritage with open houses, live music, dancing, book signings, and more (including meetand-greet with local farm animals). oldlyme midsummerfestival.org

AUG. 7–9: GOSHEN, 20th Litchfield Jazz Festival Sway to the music all weekend long as the fairgrounds welcome a lineup of “by popular demand” return performances by favorite

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

AUGUST 15

Peach Festival

Middlefield, Connecticut

Lyman Orchards is the place to be for sweet, tree-ripened peaches. Pick your own or sample from the various displays while enjoying live music on the deck. Put your navigation skills to the test in the sunflower maze, or hop a ride on a horse-drawn wagon. Plus pony rides for the kids and tasty treats galore. 860-349-1793; lymanorchards.com

musicians from the event’s first two decades. With activities for the kids, arts and crafts for sale, delicious food, and more. litchfieldjazz fest.com

AUG. 15–16: HARTFORD, Riverfront Dragon Boat & Asian Festival . The capital’s waterfront is recognized as one of the premier dragon-boat venues in the country; more than 70 teams will be racing traditional vessels this year. Enjoy authentic Asian music, dance, and food, too. dragonboathartford.com

AUG. 27–30: BROOKLYN, Brooklyn Fair. The food, the animals, the midway, the entertainment, the arts and crafts, the contests—it’s all here at the area’s oldest agricultural festival. 860-779-0012; brooklynfair.org

AUG. 29–30: MASHANTUCKET, Schemitzun: Green Corn Pow Wow . A short shuttle ride from the Mashantucket Pequot Museum,

events at the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation Cultural Grounds will take you back to 17th-century woodland village life, with authentic dances, food, arts, and crafts. 860396-2136; schemitzun.com

MAINE

JULY 3: ROCKLAND, Great Schooner Race . The Maine Windjammer Association hosts this big annual celebration of traditional sail. Whether you’re on the water or watching from shore, the sight of 20-plus tall ships racing on Penobscot Bay is really something to see. greatschoonerrace.com

JULY 11–19: FORT FAIRFIELD, Potato Blossom Festival . When the spuds are in full bloom, it’s time to celebrate! Road races, river races, arts and crafts exhibits and sales, a parade,

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

JULY

11–12

North Atlantic Blues Festival Rockland, Maine

Long recognized as one of the most prestigious festivals on the East Coast, this event has brought a who’s who of blues musicians to the stage at the Public Landing, overlooking beautiful Rockland

Harbor. James Cotton, Dexter Allen, and Eddie Shaw are among this year’s headliners. 207-596-6055; northatlanticbluesfestival.com

fireworks, mashed-potato wrestling, and an antique-tractor pull are just some of the highlights. 207-472-3802; fortfairfield.org

JULY 12: PORTLAND, Hidden Gardens of Munjoy Hill . Unusual little gardens are the stars of the day during this walking tour of Portland’s quaint Munjoy Hill neighborhood, but plan to set aside a little extra time for a stroll of the Olmstead-designed gardens of Eastern Promenade Park, too. easternpromenade.org

JULY 17–19: BELFAST, Maine Celtic Celebration. Scottish bagpipes, Highland games, a Celtic breeds dog show, and the wacky “Cheese Rolling Championships” highlight these family-oriented festivities on the waterfront. 207-338-2692; mainecelticcelebration.com

JULY 23–26: SOUTH HIRAM, Ossipee Valley Music Festival . A premier family bluegrass gathering, featuring top bands, the New England Flatpicking Championship, the New England Songwriting Championship, contests, workshops, dances, jam sessions, and more, all at Ossipee Valley Fairgrounds. 207-6258656; ossipeevalley.com

JULY 29–AUG. 2: ROCKLAND, Maine Lobster Festival. Harbor Park plays host to five days of feasting and fun. More than 20,000 pounds of lobster will be consumed, so come ready to do your part. In between meals, take in the coronation of the sea goddess, a parade, live entertainment, Navy ship tours, cooking contests, and plenty more. 207-596-0376; mainelobster festival.com

AUG. 7–9: UNION, Maine Antiques Festival

Vintage items are all the rage at the state’s largest antiques event, featuring more than 200 dealers at Union Fairgrounds. Discover jewelry, maps, prints, folk art, furnishings, ceramics, paintings, and much more. 207221-3108; maineantiquefest.com

AUG. 14–15: MACHIAS, 40th Wild Blueberry Festival. Centre Street Congregational Church hosts a weekend of family fun, with contests, a quilt raffle, live music, performances, a parade, and kids’ activities, plus an array of crafters, artisans, and food vendors. 207-2556665; machiasblueberry.com

AUG. 27–30: PRESQUE ISLE, Crown of Maine Balloon Fest. Now in its 12th year, this festival at Norhern Maine Fairgrounds fills the skies over Aroostook County with some amazing

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and colorful flying machines. Take photos, sit back and admire the view, or sign on for a ride. Plus a craft fair, a city-wide yard sale, and music, too. 207-764-6561; crownofmaine balloonfest.org

AUG. 28–30: BANGOR, American Folk Festival

In addition to four stages highlighting a procession of outstanding performing groups, don’t miss the craft demonstrations, the Taste of Maine market, various ethnic food offerings, kids’ games and activities, and more, all on the waterfront. 207-992-2630; american folkfestival.com

MASSACHUSETTS

JULY 3–4: BOSTON, Boston Pops Fireworks Spectacular. One of America’s premier Independence Day celebrations takes place on the banks of the Charles River. The Boston Pops Orchestra’s rendition of Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture , with firing cannons and ringing church bells, sets the stage for the nationally televised fireworks finale. july4th.org

JULY 3–5: STURBRIDGE, Independence Day Celebration. In addition to a spectacular fireworks display, Old Sturbridge Village’s holiday festivities include games of 1830s-style “baseball,” live music, a magic show, daily games, and a giant Declaration of Independence that visitors can sign. 508-347-0323; osv.org

JULY 14–19: BRIMFIELD, Brimfield Antique Show. If it’s out there, you’ll find it here, at the largest outdoor antiques show around. More than 6,000 dealers commandeer a one-mile stretch of Route 20, creating a true treasure hunter’s mecca. brimfieldshow.com

JULY 20–26: BARNSTABLE, County Fair. A Cape Cod tradition since 1844, this classic New England fair features animal shows, a petting zoo, 4-H demonstrations, horticultural displays, live music, arts and crafts, and carnival rides and food. barnstablecountyfair.org

JULY 24–26: LOWELL, Folk Festival . Enjoy plenty of ethnic food, craft shows, and kids’ activities, while listening to performances by some of the world’s best traditional-music artists, all at Dutton Street Dance Pavilion and Boarding House Park. Don’t miss the parade on Friday. 978-970-5000; lowellfolkfestival.org

St. George’s School

Middletown, Rhode Island

To benefit the Newport Historical Society and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Newport County

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JULY 25–AUG. 1: WOODS HOLE, 24th Woods Hole Film Festival . This eight-day showcase of independent film features daily screenings, workshops, panel discussions, staged readings, special events, parties, an awards ceremony, and more. 508-495-3456; woodshole filmfestival.org

AUG. 14–15: STOCKBRIDGE, 24th Summer Arts & Crafts Show . Visit Bidwell Park to enjoy the offerings of more than 80 juried artists and crafters, from paintings to ceramics, fiberware to glass, and most everything in between. stockbridgechamber.org

AUG. 21–30: MARSHFIELD, 148th Marshfield Fair. Enjoy agricultural and horticultural demonstrations, seminars, crafts, a midway, livestock, contests, and more. 781-834-6629; marshfieldfair.org

AUG. 22: LENOX, John Williams Film Night at Tanglewood . Don’t miss this much-loved summer tradition, as one of the greatest filmscore composers of all time is joined by guest conductor David Newman for a signature event of the season. 888-266-1200; bso.org

NEW HAMPSHIRE

JUNE 28–AUG. 30: CORNISH, Sunday Concerts at Saint-Gaudens Historic Site. As if the lovely grounds and preserved home of the renowned sculptor weren’t reason enough to visit, these Sunday-afternoon concerts feature outstanding woodwind, piano, and jazz musicians. nps.gov/saga

JULY 4–5: GILFORD, Gunstock Craft Festival . Gunstock Mountain Resort hosts more than 100 exhibitors of fine jewelry, wearable art, wooden crafts, quilts and quilted home décor, gourmet foods, glass art, and more. Plus live music and family activities. 603-528-4014; joycescraftshows.com

JULY 11–12: ALTON, Craft Fair at the Bay. Enjoy the beautiful waterfront setting of this gathering of juried artists and crafters, now in its 26th year, featuring one-of-a-kind jewelry, pottery, glasswork, food, photography, folk art, and clothing items. 603-332-6316; castle berryfairs.com

JULY 16–19: STRATHAM, 48th Stratham Fair Stratham Hill Park is the setting for this longtime traditional county fair, complete with

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

AUGUST 28–30

St. Anthony’s Feast

Boston, Massachusetts

Stroll the colorfully decorated streets of the North End while sampling delicious Italian fare served up by nearly 100 push-cart vendors: sausage (with peppers and onions), quahogs, calamari, pizza, pasta, zeppole, cannoli, and gelato—amid parades, strolling singers, live entertainment, contests, and more. stanthonysfeast.com

live entertainment, 4-H exhibits and activities, midway rides, arts and crafts, and the crowning of Miss Stratham Fair. 603-7724977; strathamfair.com

JULY 25: CANTERBURY, Canterbury Fair. An old-fashioned day of family fun, featuring games on the green, farm animals, an antiques market, juried crafters, demonstrations, a dunking booth, road races, and more, all in the town center. canterburyfair.com

JULY 30–AUG. 2: THORNTON, Pemi Valley Bluegrass Festival. Music rings through the mountains at Sugar Shack Campground, as a bevy of performers, including the award-winning Gibson Brothers, take the stage and offer workshops for both kids and adults. 603-7263471; pemivalleybluegrass.com

AUG. 6–8: MANCHESTER, 58th Annual New Hampshire Antiques Show. More than 60 dealers take over rooms at the Radisson Hotel, displaying country and formal furniture, clocks, folk art, paintings and prints, textiles, woodenware, glassware, pottery and ceramics, early lighting, and much more. 603-8764080; nhada.org

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

AUGUST 9

MacDowell Colony Medal Day

Peterborough, New Hampshire

The nation’s oldest and largest artists’ colony opens its grounds to the public for just one day each year. Tour studios and meet artists in residence, picnic on the grounds, and celebrate the contributions of composer Gunther Schuller, this year’s recipient of the Edward MacDowell Medal for achievement in the arts. 603-924-3886; macdowellcolony.org

AUG. 15–16: HILLSBOROUGH, Living History Event. This action-packed two-day event will take you back in time. Try your hand at panning for real gold, throw a pot on the wheel, listen and learn in a real 1800s schoolhouse, cast a pewter spoon, or press cider. Watch the reenactors, too: Witness a battle in the woods and meet a variety of historical figures. living historyeventnh.com

AUG. 21–23: CORNISH, 65th Annual Cornish Fair. This family-oriented agricultural fair is held on Town House Road. The 4-Hers compete with sheep, ponies, llamas, rabbits, and more, plus you’ll find flea and farmers’ markets, an art show, helicopter rides, a midway, music, and the largest dairy-cow show in the state. 603-675-5714; cornishnhfair.com

AUG. 22: STEWARTSTOWN, Music, Arts & Homesteading Festival. Great music, talented artists and craftspeople, and an authentic 19th-century dwelling make for a classic day at Poore Family Homestead Historic Farm Museum. 603-237-5500; poorefarm.org

AUG. 28–30: COLEBROOK, North Country Moose Festival . The area pays homage to a giant of the northern forest with a classic car show, moose-calling contests, moose burgers, and more. 603-237-8939; northcountrychamber.org

RHODE ISLAND

JUNE 24–JULY 18: MATUNUK, “My Fair Lady.” Historic Theatre by the Sea presents this alltime musical classic, with Charles Shaughnessy of TV’s The Nanny in the role of Professor Henry Higgins, working to transform Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle. 401782-8587; theatrebythesea.com

JULY 4: BRISTOL, Annual Bristol Fourth of July Parade. The country’s oldest continual Independence Day celebration draws a crowd to the historic downtown, so arrive early for a key spot along the route. The parade steps off from the corner of Chestnut and Hope streets at 10:30 a.m. july4thbristolri.com

JULY 4: GLOCESTER, 89th Annual Ancients & Horribles Parade. Nothing is sacred, as local and national politics come in for a merciless spoofing at this annual event, which was first held in Chepachet in 1926. glocesterri.org/parade.htm

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

JULY 12

Hearthside House Celebrates the 1904 Worlds Fair Lincoln, Rhode Island

Visit the historic “house that love built” for a tour presented by guides in period costume, an exhibit of images and mementos, and food, music, and games harkening back to the 1904 event. The Rhode Island building at the 1904 fair was modeled after Hearthside, considered one of the best examples of 19th-century Federal-style architecture in the state. 401-726-0597; hearthsidehouse.org

JULY 16–19: NEWPORT, Black Ships Festival

Celebrate the friendship between sister cities Newport and Shimoda, Japan, with a variety of events emphasizing Japanese culture. Foreign ships, or “black ships,” had been banned from Japan for 200 years when Commodore Perry negotiated the Treaty of Kanagawa in 1854, bringing our two nations together as trading partners. 401-846-2720; blackships festival.com

JULY 27–30: NEWPORT, Newport Bridgefest

Created to bridge the gap between Newport’s fabled Folk and Jazz festivals, Bridgefest has become a tradition in its own right, combining live performances and educational music events. newportbridgefest.com

AUG. 4–9: PROVIDENCE/NEWPORT, Rhode Island International Film Festival. At varying locations, the festival offers gala celebrations, premiere screenings, VIP guest appearances, seminars, educational programs, and award ceremonies. 401-861-4445; rifilmfest.org

AUG. 7–9: CHARLESTOWN, 31st Annual Seafood Festival. A gastronomic extravaganza at Ninigret Park highlights the state’s best seafood: lobsters, steamers, chowder, fish and chips, clam cakes, a raw bar, and more. Plus amusement rides, a car show, a petting zoo, raffles, and music to keep you entertained when you just can’t eat another bite. 401-364-3878; charlestownrichamber.com

AUG. 8: WESTERLY, River Glow. Three dozen floating bonfires illuminate the Pawcatuck River and create a beautiful setting for hayrides through town, live music events, kids’ games, shopping, and more. 401-596-7761; westerlychamber.org

AUG. 21–23: PAWTUCKET, Grecian Festival. The best of Greece is right here at Assumption of the Virgin Mary Greek Orthodox Church. Sample classic Greek foods and pastries, shop the indoor agora, dance to live music, and enjoy performances by a traditional dance troupe. 401-725-3127; greekfestivalri.com

AUG. 29: PROVIDENCE, Brew at the Zoo. Sample more than 100 craft beers while touring the exhibits at Roger Williams Zoo. Proceeds benefit animal care, education, and conservation programs. 401-785-3510; rwpzoobrew.org

VERMONT

JULY 4: WOODSTOCK, Old Vermont 4th. Celebrate our nation’s Independence Day at Billings Farm & Museum, where the patriotic family fun includes the reading of the Declaration of Independence, historic debates, wagon rides, the making of 1890s-era flags, spelling bees, an egg toss, and more. 802-4572355; billingsfarm.org

JULY 9–12: BRANDON, 21st Basin Bluegrass Festival . Bluegrass pickin’ and the rolling green hills of Vermont just go together. Secure a day or weekend ticket, bring the family, and immerse yourself in music on Basin Road. basinbluegrassfestival.com

JULY 11: CRAFTSBURY, 45th Annual Antiques & Uniques Festival . More than 100 vendors set up on the picturesque town common, while live folk music and roaming buskers add to the ambience. Expect plenty of antique cars, interesting specialty foods, and a great day of shopping, socializing, and picnicking. 802586-2823; townofcraftsbury.com

JULY 17–18: BURLINGTON, Vermont Brewers Festival. Plan to visit scenic Waterfront Park for views of Lake Champlain and the Adirondacks—and to raise your glass to the talented craft-beer makers offering samples for your enjoyment. Purchase tickets in advance. 877725-8849; vtbrewfest.com

JULY 17–19: KILLINGTON, 14th Wine Festival . Enjoy a fine summer’s weekend sampling more than 500 wines from around the world, with Killington Peak and the Green Mountains serving as a scenic backdrop. killington chamber.com

JULY 25–26: WINDSOR, Harpoon Championships of New England Barbecue. Celebrate the best of summer with great beer, music, and more than 40 BBQ competitors at Harpoon Brewery. harpoonbrewery.com

JULY 30–AUG. 2: HIGHGATE, 40th Franklin County Field Days . What would summer be without a classic country fair? Airport Road is the place to be for 4-H exhibits, tractor pulls, lumberjack demos, music, midway rides, and other lively competitions, including the ladies’ skillet toss. franklincountyfielddays.org

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Our advertisers support Yankee Magazine, so please support them.

1785 Inn & Restaurant ..............................................139

Above the Bay at Thornton Adams..........................139

Acorn Stairlifts ...........................................................117

Advanced Refinishing, Inc.........................................136

American Cruise Lines ..................................................5

Anderson Manufacturing, Co. ..................................133

Angela Moore, Inc .....................................................135

Aquacide Company ..................................................137

Art of Robert Sexton ....................................................27

Asset Marketing Services, Inc. ............................57, 125

Attean Lake Lodge......................................................51

Aw Shucks .................................................................137

The Barn Yard & Great Country .................................11

Bear Spring Camps......................................................51

Bennington Potters ....................................................115

Best Western White Mountain Inn..............................50

Betty Lampen ............................................................136

Cape Cod Braided Rug Co........................................107

Cape Cod Cupola Inc................................................135

Casablanca Motel .......................................................33

Castle In the Clouds ....................................................46

Central NY B&B Association ....................................139

Christmas Tree Shops, Inc. .......................................119

Country Carpenters .....................................................59

Country Home Products............................................135

Cranberry Jewelers .....................................................114

Cross Jewelers 7, 59, 115, 116, 121, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137

Droll Yankees .............................................................107

Ed Monti Stone Sculpture..................................107, 134

Gosnold Arms Inc ................................................51, 139

Gunstock Mountain Resort .........................................69

Hampton Beach Village District .................................33

Harraseeket Inn ...........................................................32

Hartstone Inn and Hideaway ......................................33

HarvestRight ................................................................13

Hickory Ridge House...................................................67

Highland Green ...........................................................29

Hitchcock Shoes Inc ..................................................133

The Inn at Hastings Park.............................................32

Interstate Navigation Co. ............................................51

Johnny Appleseed Trail Assoc. ...................................46

Kenyon International, Inc. .........................................105

Klein Design ...............................................................107

Lake Sunapee Region Chamber of Commerce .........43

League of NH Craftsmen ...........................................45

Leon Levin .................................................................135

LobsterShirt.net .........................................................137

Madison Beach Hotel..................................................51

Maine Line Products..................................................138

Maine Lobster Direct ...................................................69

Maine Maritime Museum ........................................7, 39

Manchester Wood .....................................................105

Maximum Instruments ..............................................105

Maine Office of Tourism ...............................................2

Micron Corporation ...................................................133

Monarch Products Co., Inc. ......................................133

Mountain Lake Cottages ............................................51

Mountain Top Inn ........................................................67

Mrs. Nelson’s Candy House .....................................136

Mt. Nebo Gallery .......................................................110

The Music Hall ..........................................................114

New England Inns & Resorts.....................................116

Neutronic Ear .............................................................123

New Geneva Stoneware Co. .....................................133

New Hampshire Public Television.............................121

Newman’s Own, Inc. ................................................Cvr4

Newport Antiques Show............................................129

Newport Restoration Foundation................................51

New Hampshire Bed & Breakfast Association.........139

New Hampshire Division of Travel & Tourism . Cvr2-pg1

New Hampshire Liquor Commission ..........................47

The New World Tavern ...............................................33

Nonantum Resort ........................................................33

Norman Rockwell Museum .....................................7, 45

Nova Star Cruises Ltd. ................................................47

Oakland House Cottages by the Side of the Sea ......50

OceanView at Falmouth ...........................................111

Ogunquit Chamber of Commerce ..............................51

Okemo Valley Chamber of Commerce ......................67

Pearl Seas Cruises, Inc...................................................9

Pickity Place .................................................................32

Piper Shores .................................................................17

Plimoth Plantation .......................................................33

Presidents and Patriots Tours ....................................127

Quarry Hill Retirement ...............................................111

Quechee Inn at Marshland .........................................67

Red Clover Inn .............................................................67

Red Lion Inn...............................................................129

The Reggio Register Co. ...........................................137

Research Products .....................................................113

Rhode Island PBS ......................................................113

RMR Restorations, Inc...............................................136

Russell Orchards, Inc ...................................................51

Salmon Falls Stoneware ..............................................33

Sandwich Lantern ......................................................134

Sebasco Harbor Resort ...............................................39

Shuttercraft ................................................................107

Slack Mop Company .................................................137

South County Hospital - Healthcare System ..........Cvr3

Southgate at Shrewsbury, Inc. ..................................111

Springfield Museums ...................................................32

Squam River Landing ................................................131

Stoneware Candle Houses........................................138

Thornton Oaks Retirement Co..................................111

Timber Frames by R.A.Krouse ..................................134

Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound ..................................136

Vineyard Harbor Motel................................................33

Vermont Cheese Council ............................................73

Vermont Dept. of Tourism ..........................................67

Wildlife Control Supplies............................................137

Wolf Cove Inn ..............................................................32

York Harbor Inn ...........................................................50

WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

JULY 19

Vermont Cheesemakers Festival Shelburne, Vermont

Per capita, Vermont has more cheesemakers than any other state. More than 40 of them will be on hand to present, discuss, and, most important, share their wares at Shelburne Farms. Plus educational seminars and workshops,

cooking and cheesemaking demonstrations, and hundreds of local cheese, wine, beer, and food products to discover. 866-261-8595; vtcheesefest.com

JULY 31–AUG. 2: BURLINGTON, Festival of Fools

Featuring the best street performers from around the globe, this free, curated, familyfriendly festival celebrates circus arts, music, and comedy, all centered around Church Street Marketplace and City Hall Park. 802865-7166; vermontfestivaloffools.com

AUG. 8–9: RUTLAND, Summer Art in the Park Festival. Rain or shine, Main Street Park will be bustling with more than 100 juried artists and craftsmen, as well as food vendors, craft demonstrations, kids’ activities, and music. 802-775-0356; chaffeeartcenter.org

AUG. 14–15: WAITSFIELD, The Great Vermont Plein Air Paint-Out . Come rain or shine, artists from all over the region will gather to draw, sketch, or paint the beautiful scenery of Waitsfield Village—from the historic covered bridge and iconic church steeple to the meandering Mad River and majestic mountains— then gather for Saturday evening’s sidewalk show and sale downtown. vermontartfest.com

AUG. 15–16: BRIDGEWATER, 7th Annual Naked Table Project . This unique event offers the opportunity to build a solid maple dining table, and then eat off it, too! Work with furniture makers from ShackletonThomas and the chefs of the Woodstock Farmers’ Market. Limited to 20 participants, so sign up early. 802-672-5175; nakedtable.com

AUG. 22: QUECHEE, 43rd Annual Scottish Festival & Celtic Fair. Kilts are optional but fun is mandatory as Quechee Polo Field offers a day of Celtic celebration. Enjoy fine music and microbrewed beer, sheepdog trials, a pipeband competition, Highland athletic events, a dance contest, kids’ games, Scottish and American foods, and more. 802-295-5351; quecheescottishfestival.com

Corrections

the featured booth is Vivant Vintage. is in South Thomaston (not Thomaston).

July Ritual

Call ahead to confirm dates, times, and possible admission fees.

To submit an event online, go to: YankeeMagazine.com/submitevent

To find more events in your area, visit: YankeeMagazine.com/events

Ancient uniforms are starched

Expressly to be worn and marched

Down Main Street, decorous and proud, Old Glory rippling through the crowd. —D.A.W.

EnergAire continuously purifies up to 4,000 cubic feet (a large room) of air and makes it breathable and invigorating. Restores natural ion balance to unhealthy environments caused by industrial pollution, automobile exhaust, central airconditioning, and heating, smoke, dust, pollen, animal fur. . . removes microscopic pollution particles not removed by any other method of air purification. EnergAire was rated Number One for speed of removal of cigarette smoke by the leading U.S. consumer protection magazine. It has no noisy fan, no costly filter, and requires no maintenance. Uses less than 2 watts. 9" high. 3" diameter. Weighs less than 1 pound. $59.95

RODAR is the super-powerful professional ultrasonic pest repeller with up to 60 or more times the power of other devices — and power is what makes RODAR so effective. RODAR ultrasound equals a jet engine — noise unbearable to pests but at frequencies humans and pets cannot hear. RODAR units are completely safe. RODAR drives pests out and keeps them from getting in. Handsome simulated walnut cabinet 5-5/8" high. Weight 1-1/2 pounds. Uses less than 5 watts. $89.95

Y5172

Your pets

Your dog (and cat) will feel closer to nature drinking from these granite water basins. Ideal for enhancing your backyard or garden. Individually hand-sculpted water bowls are repurposed from historic New England cobblestones. Approximate size: 9" x 6" x 4".

Lighthouse Sea Glass

Pendant and Earrings

The light, pure silver Sweeping, reaching into the night.

These are real Maine sea glass, collected by a mom and her two young sons. Cut, polished, and assembeled by the dad right here in Maine.

Sky-blue top, medium-blue sea, living green and rich earth below. Sterling silver

Pendant............X3093 $235.00

Earrings..........X3094 $375.00

www.CrossJewelers.com

570 Congress St., Portland, Maine 1-800-433-2988

Blueberries ‘n Granite

This is a hoot! It’s fun, playful, and such a surprise.When we discovered this new stone we knew we just had to have it. It’s a salt and pepper granite with little blue azurite spheres nestled within.

Cut and polished, the blueberries appear scattered beautifully across the surface as only nature can do… we’ve never seen quite anything like it. Set in sterling silver with 18" chain.

Necklaces...... $200.00 - $650.00

Earrings $450.00 - $650.00 Every piece is different. Choose on-line or visit our store.

Cross Jewelers

www.CrossJewelers.com

1-800-433-2988

Cape

Y5168 www.mainetimberframes.com

Racing Star Symbol of Freedom…

Cross Jewelers

Compass Rose

The compass rose is a reminder …we are not merely travelers but are the navigators of our destiny.

The compass rose has appeared beautifully illustrated on maps since the 1300s. The term “rose” comes from the layered compass points resembling the petals of the well-known flower.

Signal Flags

Have

Cross Jewelers

Jewelers

You can have it all. This is the gathering, the sweep, the curl, the crest, and the moment the wave speaks.

It’s all here in this perfect wave of blue sapphires and white gold. It’s your endless Maine summer to be with you always.

white gold, 18" chain. Shown actual size. Your Endless Summer/ Perfect Wave Necklace

Maine Coast Bracelet

Barefoot…jeans rolled up, late August, a warm breeze, a slow walk on a beach between two rocky headlands. You’ve collected a handful of pebbles, glistening in the sun, the colors in their simplicity are beautiful together. Summer is fleeting. We understand how you feel about your special places on the Maine coast. 6 stones - 7 1/8" length

Maine Coast Bracelets

Sterling Silver ..........#X2333........$385.00

14K yellow gold ........#X2322....$1,450.00

Cross Jewelers

570 Congress St. Portland, Maine CrossJewelers.com

1-800-433-2988 ©

BRASS NAMEPLATES

CUSTOM ENGRAVED BRASS NAMEPLATES. Many styles to choose from. Online ordering available. Visit our website: www.USBrassShop.com

CHINA CRYSTAL SILVER

CHINA, CRYSTAL, SILVER, COLLECTIBLES

World’s largest inventory; vintage and new patterns. FREE item lists. Replacements, Ltd.

HELPFUL AIDS

STAIRLIFTS, RESIDENTIAL ELEVATORS, DUMBWAITERS, PLATFORM LIFTS. Free in-home evaluation available. Freedom Lifts. 888-665-4387; www.freedomliftsonline.com

REAL ESTATE

A COTTAGE BY THE SEA. 2BR-1BA Spectacular sunsets of Front Beach, Bay, Creek, Saquish. Live off the Grid. Spend days swimming, fishing, boating, walking, Details: $350,000. 508-245-4570 Arthur@tarantinorealestate.com

ROQUE BLUFFS, ME CUSTOM BUILT OCEANFRONT

COTTAGE on quiet cove. 1 acre + water frontage. 2BDR/1BA, loft. 1,036 sq + 847 sq unfinished space. For more information:

Email: patandposie@gmail.com Call: 407-359-5594

SEBASTIAN, FL

Beautiful 55+ community. Voted 2012 “Best of Sebastian.” Manufactured Home Community. New homes starting at $84,900. 4 mi to the ocean.

EXETER, NH, $595,000 21+/- acres, beautiful prime property. Open rolling fields and conservation land. Equestrian/estate setting. Vibrant equestrian community. Minutes to downtown Exeter, 50 minutes to downtown Boston. 617-721-9002 or e-mail: britt@post.harvard.edu

BOOTHBAY HARBOR, ME TRADITIONAL NE HOME. Waterview. 3/4 BR, 2.5 BA, Stdy, Fam Rm, open LR/DR, FP, Garg. Includes 1 BR Guest Cottage. $379,700 Pottle Rlty

207-633-2222 MLS 1002317

NORTH CONWAY, NH $329,000

Vibrant 2+ acres, great 3 BR 2 BA cottage. Deck, tree house, historic granite bridge! Private brook with otters. 1 mi to village. Borders park. Ski, climb, bike, rent out. 203-832-3948, info@nanonoggin.com

BLAIRSTOWN, NJ TURNKEY

GENTLEMAN’S FARMSTEAD

Solid brick ranch. 4 BR-4 BA, 9 acres. Prepper Ready, Raising 85 percent of food. Multi heat, solar, barn, fenced, fruit trees, artisan well and pond, private setting. 50 miles from NYC $585 ,000. Details/Photo/Email: vicmedore1@yahoo.com

RECORD COLLECTORS

TRANSFER TO CD

your collection of 45’s/33’s/78’s, cassettes and reel-to-reel tapes. Call Alex at 603-905-9123 for pricing.

RETIREMENT LIVING

in beautiful Lenox, MA. Independent, assisted living, memory care, and skilled nursing care. Spacious apartments, fine dining, numerous amenities, and quality health care. Refundable entrance fees. Come visit Kimball Farms in the Berkshires. Call for our free brochure:

SHUTTERS

COLONIAL SHUTTERS, interior and exterior, raised-panel and louvered. Custom storm/ screen doors. Free brochure. Colonial Shutterworks, Mattapoisett, Ma. 888-295-0732; www.colonialshutterworks.com

SLIPCOVERS

CUSTOM AND READY SLIPCOVERS

For furniture, daybeds, chairs, futons, ottomans, fabrics, cushions, pet covers. All shapes. Made in USA!

To advertise please call Bernie Gallagher at 203-263-7171

COUNTRY INNS BED AND BREAKFASTS

2014 Yankee Magazine Editors Choice for Lodging

“Best View from an Inn”

TRAVEL & RESORTS

KIAWAH ISLAND, SOUTH CAROLINA. Select 1- to 10-bedroom accommodations. Pam Harrington Exclusives. Call 800-8456966 for a complimentary brochure; or visit www.kiawahexclusives.com

MAINE LAKE/MOUNTAINS.

Modern cabins on Lake Kennebago. Includes 3 hearty meals. Perfect family vacation. Swimming, fishing, boating, nature hikes. Pets welcome. 800-633-4815

VACATION RENTALS

HISTORIC VACATION RENTALS

in Southeast Vermont. Stay in Rudyard Kipling’s home or one of our other four properties and rediscover bird calls, jump in a swimming hole, or explore forest trails with your kids, disconnect.

Contact: Landmark Trust USA 802-254-6868

www.landmarktrustusa.org

PLEASE NOTE CHATHAM, CAPE COD

9-Bedroom Estate. Sleeps 18. Ocean Views. Great for Weddings, Friends & Family Reunions. Booking Now! Available year-round. Call John: 617-799-5818 e-mail: john@oldeforgerealty.com

AUTHENTIC NH VACATIONS

New Hampshire’s Lakes Region For Over 35 Years!

Private Vacation Homes

Cottages - Condos - Camps Free brochure available.

Preferred Vacation Rentals 34 Whittier Hwy.

Moultonborough, NH 03254 877-525-3764

www.PreferredRentals.com

VACATION/SALE/REAL ESTATE

Quaint country inn nestled in the White Mountains of NH and well-known for its spectacular mountain views, cozy pub, friendly service, comfortable lodging rooms, and reasonable rates. www.the1785inn.com • 603-356-9025

WANTED TO BUY

BUYING OLD Hi-Fi & Stereo tube audio amplifiers made by Scott, Fisher,Marantz, Mcintosh, Dynakit, Heathkit, etc. Need vacuum tubes, Old microphones, and Western Electric/Bell System items. 203-272-6030 or email: Larry2942@cox.net

WANTED TO BUY cont.

Visits your home...

Traveling New England, paying highest prices for entire collections of coins, stamps, paper money, gold, silver, fine jewelry, and Tiffany. Complete privacy and safety of your own home.

Payment in full on the spot. Call Anthony’s: 800-427-9897

Established 1958

SO. CAROLINA/LAKE MARION

SO. CAROLINA/LAKE MARION

There may be OLD POSTCARD TREASURES in that dusty shoe box. Avid POSTCARD COLLECTORS can’t get enough of them! Phone Dick @ 508-875-3697, 2-9 pm. Let’s turn New England Treasures into cash.

Vacation Rentals/Real Estate Sales

Waterfront Properties / Gated Community / Golf Course Homes Call: 803-433-7355

or Visit: www.rmaxbythelake.com

Vacation Rentals/Real Estate Sales Waterfront Properties / Gated Community / Golf Course Homes Call: 803-433-7355 or Visit: www.remaxbythelake.com

SOUTHERN YANKEE AD REP

If you are an Ad Sales Rep, love Yankee Magazine and have retired to the warmer weather, but would like to continue to sell – give us a call. 646-221-4169

Sun, Surf, and Sand

New Hampshire’s premier summer playground has always offered something for the kid in all of us.

t’s the essence of summer vacation: the light dancing on the waves, the tang of salt air, that wide stretch of sand just waiting for you to throw down your blankets and towels. But that’s just the opening act of the Hampton Beach experience. Hospitality has been a community tradition here for some 300 years and counting. The humble lodgings that were home to seasonal fishermen in the 1700s gradually gave way to the boardinghouses, hotels, and resorts that would serve a new clientele, the seaside vacationers of the 19th century. By the turn of the 20th, seafood shacks, souvenir shops, a roller rink, and the famous Casino—with its theatre, restaurant, billiards hall, bowling alley, penny arcade, baseball field, and tennis courts—had all sprung up to serve the recreational needs of Hampton’s summer crowds. Dances at the Casino’s ballroom, built in 1927, attracted 20,000 people a week. Harry James, Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington, Count Basie—all the big bands—played the Casino in the ’30s and ’40s. Over by the water, cruises, yacht races, Wednesday-night fireworks

(a tradition that continues today), and concerts at the open-air bandstand kept beachgoers entertained. Among the performers was Bill Elliot, Hampton’s handsome “Singing Cop,” who often took the stage in uniform to serenade his fans.

In 1933 the town ceded the beach to the care of the New Hampshire government, and a state park was born. In time the bandstand was replaced by the Seashell complex; giant sand sculptures now wow the kids (and their parents, too); and across the street, today’s Casino Ballroom hosts stars like Pat Benatar and Keb’ Mo’. But the spirit of this place remains as simple as it was all those years ago. Hampton Beach still rocks to the rhythm of the season: just the sun, the surf, the sand, and long, carefree days and nights of summer at the shore. —Eileen

Terrill

Historic New England is now the keeper of a collection of more than 2,000 images of New England life, mostly glass-plate negatives, amassed by Yankee founder Robb Sagendorph in the 1960s and donated in 1994. Many of the images are attributed to photojournalist Alton H. Blackington (1893–1963) and landscape photographer Martha Hale Harvey (1862–1949). See more shots at: historicnewengland.org

Hampton Beach, New Hampshire, 1933

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The finest ingredients.

Deliciously tangy flavor. And all our profits go to charity.

The perfect way to take your salad (and your generosity) to the next level.