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Brattleboro, Vt. 

Brattleboro, Vt. 

Vol. IV No. 1 

Vol. III No. 6 

January 2009 

January 2009 

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VOICES 

NEWS 

tk Repairs 

under way at 

Putney store 

page tk 

THE ARTS page 7 

tk 

Community 

page tk 

keeps talking 

LIFE & WORK 

about race 

tk 

page 10 

page tk 

VOICES 

Working the 

night shift 

page 16 

THE ARTS 

Painter 

Tim Allen 

center spread 

LIFE & WORK 

Breweries 

release 

winter beers 

page 24 

By Dan DeWalt 

The Commons 

DAVID SHAW/THE COMMONS 

Malachi Johnson, one of the volunteers at the overflow shelter, is himself homeless. 

Inset: Signs announce the shelter’s availability to approximately 30 people who live 

on the streets of Brattleboro. 

Volunteers staff shelter at 

time of ‘especially acute’ need 

BRATTLEBORO—Windham 

County residents were subjected 

to a two-day nor’easter to 

mark the advent of winter 2008. 

The two feet of snow fortified by 

single-digit temperatures might 

have set the scene for a Vermont 

perfect holiday tableau, but it 

only made life more difficult for 

the approximately 30 people in 

Brattleboro who are currently 

homeless. 

Morningside, the town’s only 

shelter, is fully occupied by people 

without housing and doesn’t 

have further resources to assist 

others still on the streets. According 

to Melinda Bussino, executive 

director of the Brattleboro 

Drop In Center at 60 South Main 

St., a day service facility for people 

in need, the problem is especially 

acute this year. 

In response, local organizations, 

led by the Drop In Center, 

the First Baptist Church, and 

Brattleboro Interfaith Clergy, 

joined to provide an overflow 

nighttime shelter to all who 

need a safe place to sleep out of 

the cold. The shelter will remain 

open throughout the winter at 

the First Baptist Church. 

In addition, church and community 

groups from the area are 

preparing and serving hot dinners 

every night at the shelter 

from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. Unitarian 

Universalist Reverend Barb Hanson 

coordinated the hot meal efforts. 

Bussino reports that meals 

have been promised for almost 

every night through the end of 

March. 

While some of the volunteers for 

Life on ice 

By Julie Thomson 


More wind 

turbines 

on the 

horizon? 

PSB to rule on plan 

to put 17 turbines 

in federal forest 

By Christian Avard 


SEARSBURG—A decade 

after the construction of 11 

wind turbines in the region, 

an Oregon company is looking 

at the same ridgeline’s 

potential for greater wind 

development, proposing 17 

turbines on adjacent federal 

property. 

Iberdrola Renewables, 

of Portland, Ore., the U.S. 

branch of a worldwide energy 

company in Valencia, 

Spain, is seeking approval to 

build 17 wind turbines that 

will generate 45 megawatts 

(MW) of electricity. 

Iberdrola’s subsidiary, 

Deerfield Wind LLC, has 

proposed a project that consists 

of ten turbines on the 

western ridge in Searsburg, 

with another seven on the 

n see shelter, page 8 n see TURBINES, page 4 

Glimpses from the days that 

followed worst ice storm in ages 

PRSRT STD 

U.S. POSTAGE PAID 

BRATTLEBORO, VT 05301 

PERMIT NO. 24 

Vermont Independent Media 

P.O. Box 1212 

Brattleboro, VT 05302 


Donors to Vermont Independent Media 

receive The Commons in the mail. See page 2. 6. 

Martin Rowe 

Wangari Maathai 

(above), honored in 

a film by Alan Dater 

and Lisa Merton. 

Marlboro couple creates 

award-winning film 

Taking Root profiles efforts of 

first woman Nobel winner from Africa 

By Arlene Distler 


MARLBORO—Traveling 

back and forth between their 

small Vermont town and Kenya, 

filmmakers Lisa Merton 

and Alan Dater together raised 

Roshika Dater-Merton 

funds, directed, produced, 

filmed, edited, and re-edited 

their documentary Taking 

Root: The Vision of Wangari 

Maathai and the Green Belt 

Movement. 

In the film, which documents 

n see TAKING ROOT, page 12 

On this afternoon of 

Dec. 15, in the parking 

lot of Marlboro 

College, surveying the 

damage after the ice storm that 

hit three days earlier, it’s impossible 

to pick out just one tree, 

one sapling even, that hasn’t 

been shredded to bits by the ice 

and wind. 

The story is now poignantly 

familiar to many in southern 

Vermont, not to mention New 

Hampshire and Massachusetts: 

Blackouts and downed lines 

along impassable roads, dead 

phones, days and nights with no 

heat, maybe even the experience 

of living temporarily in a shelter 

or hotel. 

But a disaster also allows heroes 

to emerge from the woodwork 

of daily life, and this storm 

was no exception. 

These heroes ranged from 

the ever-vigilant fire department 

and law enforcement workers, 

cnd david pitkin 

A state mileage marker sign 

encrusted with ice at the Route 

9 overlook in Wilmington. 

to volunteers for the Red Cross, 

line crews who risked life and 

limb to restore power and utilities, 

and business owners who 

donated goods to their stricken 

communities. It cost an estimated 

$1.54 million to clean up 

n see ICE STORM, page 2

2 The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 NEWS 3 

Offering: 

802.257.9411 

888.828.8575 

www.tui.edu 

BrattleboroCenter@tui.edu 

CHRISTIAN AVARD/THE COMMONS 

Union Institute & University 

Study your passion. 

At UI&U you can design your B.A. program around your 

own interests and ideas—to integrate your education into 

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M.A. in Psychology • Psy.D. 

UI&U: 

Brattleboro’s 

Best Kept 

Secret! 

tim wessel/special to the commons 

n Ice storm from page 1 

damage in Bennington and Windham 

counties. 

Like most of Marlboro, the 

college had lost power at the 

onset of the storm. It had also 

made headlines for the faculty’s 

solicitous care of their students, 

which included personally housing 

them. 

In the cafeteria, kitchen staff 

John Hoffman and Gene Sanders 

clean up after lunchtime. 

They had kept the cafeteria up 

and running with a generator, 

and continued to serve not only 

students, but anyone who happened 

to stop by. 

“We just opened up the college 

to anybody who needed it. Food 

service just kept cooking until we 

ran out of food, basically,” Sanders 

says nonchalantly. “You gotta 

open your doors in a small-town 

community. It’s real New England, 

so that’s what people do.” 

The story was similar in hardhit 

Wilmington, where motherand-daughter 

team Tammy and 

Kristi Tanguay have been spending 

inconceivably long hours 

volunteering and preparing 

meals at the Red Cross shelter at 

River Valley High School, which 

tim wessel/special to the commons 

Far left: Green 

Mountain Power 

employees from 

Colchester and 

Montpelier 

tackle power 

line repairs on 

Route 100 in 

Wilmington. 

Above and left: 

In Guilford, 

pine cones and 

grass in ice like 

bugs trapped in 

amber. 

experienced the most traffic of 

any area shelter during the icy 

weekend. The Tanguays served 

117 people on Thursday and 112 

on Friday. 

“We’ve been here for the last 

six days from five in the morning 

to nighttime,” Kristi Tanguay 

says. “I don’t know how I’m still 

ticking!” 

But they had only good things 

to say about the local relief effort, 

especially the contributions from 

small businesses. 

“A lot of donations have been 

pouring in from stores and restaurants,” 

Tammy Tanguay 

notes. “And hotels are still putting 

people up, like Grand Summit 

and the Matterhorn.” 

The Craft Inn, in the heart of 

Wilmington, had also joined in. 

“We were able to open up the inn 

to several people in town at a really 

discounted rate, especially 

the older people,” said general 

manager Alice Richter. 

Even with local solidarity, how 

do people cope with the magnitude 

of the relief effort faced by 

communities? What happens 

when it’s beyond their capability? 

And how do local emergency 

Centered Healing 

services coordinate with interstate 

power line crews and the 

Red Cross, among others? 

At times like these the team 

at Vermont Emergency Management 

(VEM) bursts onto the 

scene. 

As the state’s largest emergency 

coordinating body, the 

agency brought together state 

departments like transportation, 

health and human services, agriculture, 

and public information, 

as well as organizations and interstate 

agencies like the Red Cross 

and National Guard, and then coordinated 

efforts with utility companies 

and emergency directors 

for individual townships. 

VEM’s structure of coordination 

is based on the federal organizational 

hierarchies Incident 

Command System (ICS), and the 

National Incident Management 

System (NIMS). 

“It’s like an orchestra, sort of,” 

VEM Director Barbara Farr explains. 

“You’ve got all these moving 

parts, and our emergency 

operation center is the coordinating 

function.” 

The unsung hero of every major 

state relief effort, Farr paces 

around VEM’s battle-ready operation 

center in Waterbury, reminiscent 

of the war rooms beneath 

Parliament. The center comes 

complete with a disaster management 

software system. 

“We do have a war room!” 

she said, “but I call it the peace 

room.” 

In the days leading up to the 

ice storm, VEM was in constant 

contact with the National 

Weather Service, which relayed 

information to them by way of 

conference calls. In turn, VEM 

distributed this information to 

Vermont Public Service and to 

private utility companies, each 

of which has relief networks in 

place. 

At the height of the storm and 

the ensuing damage, experts and 

state officials gathered physically 

in the emergency operation center 

for face-to-face meetings. As 

for the folks at VEM, they seem 

never to sleep. Two duty officers 

find themselves on duty 24/7 

through state dispatch. 

“If we are ‘fully active’, we are 

all physically in here no matter 

what time of day it is,” Farr 

says. 

This isn’t to say that the storm 

relief effort was flawless. Certainly 

Windham County had 

its fair share of frustrated citizens, 

especially as days went by 

for some without restoration of 

power or heat. 

Line crews were sometimes 

subject to harassment; Green 

Mountain Power and Central 

Vermont Public Service struggled 

to respond to customers as 

they attempted to restore power 

to an estimated 49,000 customers 

statewide. 

“Our repairs are done in a very 

organized fashion. We start with 

the repairs that will [restore] the 

largest number of customers, as 

well as critical customers such as 

hospitals,” CVPS spokesperson 

Christine Rivers explains. 

“As each repair goes down the 

line it turns on [fewer and fewer] 

customers,” Rivers says. 

Perhaps more vehement has 

been the criticism of Governor 

Jim Douglas, whose declaration 

of a state of emergency in Windham 

County on this Dec. 15 came 

too late for some. 

The view from the Route 9 overlook in Wilmington on Dec. 14. 

Such a declaration not only 

grants the use of state resources, 

but also helps to qualify the state 

for federal relief, and even allows 

Canadian line crews to be expedited 

across the border. 

“Let it be known that Jim Douglas 

refused to declare Windham 

County a disaster area because 

there’s too many Democrats 

down here!” said Chris Lovell of 

Marlboro, only half joking, as he 

waited in line at the post office. 

Lewis Sumner, the emergency 

management director for Halifax, 

was also not impressed with 

the delay. 

“It should probably have been 

done by Friday or Saturday at the 

latest. Some people called the 

governor’s office on the weekend 

and got a message saying 

‘call back on Monday.’ 

“But,” he added, “VEM 

was available all through the 

weekend.” 

But Stephen J. Wark, director 

of communications for the governor, 

insists that the declaration 

was not critical to the immediate 

relief effort. 

“The declaration doesn’t actually 

provide any greater relief 

than that which was already being 

provided,” he says. “It’s not 

a game-changer. It’s much more 

important in the long-term, for 

securing federal funds.” 

“Still,” he added, “This disaster 

cnd david pitkin 

adn Mary Alden-Allard 

“This tree came down on the power lines along our road,” says Mary Alden-Allard of Westminster. “It kept us captive for 

about 24 hours too, because driving underneath it was deemed too dangerous. Our power was out for about 14 hours, 

owing to the ice storm.” 

Y 

m 

Z 

was a learning experience like 

any other. We’re always working 

to improve our response.” 

Y 

Amy’s Bakery Arts Cafe 

Delicious Artisan Breads, Cakes & Pastries 

Gourmet Coffee, Daily Lunch Specials 

Enjoy the River View from our Café 

Monday–Saturday 8 a.m.–6 p.m. 

Sunday 9 a.m.–5 p.m. 

Y 

113 Main Street, Brattleboro ( (802) 251-1071 

m

4 NEWS The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 NEWS 5 

n Turbines from page 1 

eastern ridge in Readsboro, all 

within 80 acres of the Green 

Mountain National Forest just 

over the Windham County line 

in Bennington County. 

Iberdrola Renewables is one 

step away from receiving a certificate 

of public good from the 

Vermont Public Services Board, 

a quasi-judicial state entity that 

“supervises the rates, quality 

of service, and overall financial 

management of Vermont’s public 

utilities: cable television, electric, 

gas, telecommunications, water 

and large wastewater companies,” 

according to the board’s 

Web site. 

If approved, each turbine will 

stand more than 400 feet high 

from the base of the tower to the 

tip of the blades and will provide 

electricity for an estimated 14,000 

to 16,000 homes. 

The proposed turbines would 

join 11 198-foot wind turbines, 

owned by Colchester-based 

Green Mountain Power and 

completed in 1997. This current 

Searsburg wind facility provides 

6 MW of electricity to more than 

2,000 southern Vermont households. 

The ridgeline, at an elevation 

of approximately 3,000 feet, 

provides strong and persistent 

winds year round, and the turbines 

are located near existing 

access roads and transmission 

lines. 

Green Mountain Power has 

agreed to purchase 50 percent 

of the energy generated from 

the turbines to offset the potential 

loss of Entergy Nuclear Vermont 

Yankee, whose license is 

set to expire in 2012. 

The company also seeks an alternative 

for hydroelectric power 

leases from HydroQuebec, due 

to expire in 2015, according Ezra 

Hausman, an energy consultant 

from Cambridge, Mass. who testified 

to the Public Service Board 

on behalf of Deerfield Wind. 

“We concluded that Vermont 

utilities and ratepayers will need 

to obtain new fixed-price, longterm 

contracts to support a 

reasonably diversified supply 

portfolio in the future,” Hausman 

testified to the Vermont Public 

Service Board. 

Local opposition 

Gerry DeGray, one of approximately 

100 residents of Searsburg, 

lives on Route 8, where 10 

of the proposed windmills would 

be built on land that borders his 

70 acres. The proposed site of 

one turbine, he said, sits 300 feet 

from his property. 

DeGray, who said he does not 

oppose wind power per se, offers 

several concerns ranging 

from potential noise and shadow 

flicker to ice throw generated by 

the the turning blades. 

“As it stands now, we can hike 

out to the middle of the property 

and enjoy complete silence. If 

this facility were to go in, it would 

be lost,” said DeGray. 

“The fact that [Deerfield Wind] 

is proposing to site it within 300 

feet of my property line and 60 

other properties within threequarters 

of a mile — I view this 

as very irresponsible on the part 

of the wind developer,” DeGray 

said. 

The town of Readsboro voted 

191–31 to approve the Deerfield 

Wind Project at the 2007 Town 

Meeting. In August, the selectboard 

signed a written agreement 

with Iberdrolla Renewables 

for $154,000 in lieu of taxes each 

year the turbines operate. 

Although Searsburg voters 

rejected the project in a 19–7 

non-binding vote in May 2007, a 

majority of voters changed their 

minds at this year’s Town Meeting. 

With a higher voter turnout, 

the town approved the project 

29–16. 

Shortly afterward, the Searsburg 

selectboard voted 2–1 (in 

executive session, with no public 

presentation or discussion) to accept 

Deerfield Wind’s offer to pay 

Brown & Roberts 

Hardware 

Existing turbines on the ridgeline in Searsburg. 

the town an estimated $240,000 

annually in lieu of taxes. 

“The supplemental agreement 

negotiated with Deerfield Wind 

is what turned the town in favor 

of the wind project,” said DeGray. 

“Before that, I would say a 

good majority of the town was 

against it.” 

DeGray is listed in the secretary 

of state’s corporate records 

as the agent of Save Vermont Ridgelines, 

a nonprofit registered 

in November 2007, with Denise 

Foery and Jeanette Lee named 

as officers. Another group, Vermonters 

with Vision, opposed to 

“giant corporate industrial wind” 

projects statewide, strenuously 

opposes the project on its Web 

site, vermonterswithvision.org. 

Effects on tourist 

economy? 

Joining DeGray is the town of 

Wilmington. In December 2007, 

at a Special Town Meeting, voters 

approved a nonbinding resolution 

to oppose the project, 

51–15. As a result, the Wilmington 

selectboard took formal 

action and voted to oppose the 

Deerfield Wind Project, with 

Town Manager Robert Rustin 

and members of the Selectboard 

asserting that the project would 

adversely compromise tourism, 

recreation, and wildlife habitat in 

testimony submitted to the Public 

Service Board. 

Former Wilmington Selectboard 

Chair Robert Wheeler said 

his board reviewed the potential 

pros and cons of the project after 

the town meeting vote. As a result, 

the board determined the 

wind turbines would not contribute 

“to the orderly development 

of the region.” 

Wheeler said the Deerfield 

Wind Project would not produce 

“noticeable amounts of 

electricity given Vermont’s current 

electric supply and demand” 

and “it would negatively affect 

the town’s economy and negatively 

affect the aesthetics of 

the area.” 

He added that while the town 

does not oppose wind power 

conceptually, the selectboard 

opposes 400-foot turbines along 

the ridgelines. 

“In the Board’s opinion, the 

proposed wind turbines will negatively 

affect the tourism industry 

on which the town and region 

so heavily rely,” said Wheeler. 

“The extension of wind turbines 

the length of the ridge is one 

more negative in a collection of 

factors that one takes into consideration 

in deciding whether 

to visit Wilmington and the surrounding 

towns.” 

But some proponents, like 

Bert Wurzberger, believe more 

windmills would benefit tourism, 

and, if approved, the Deerfield 

Wind Project could enhance the 

 

Community College of 

Vermont 

 

 

 

 

 

 

cba Jared and Corin Benedict 

CHRISTIAN AVARD/THE COMMONS 

Real estate appraiser Brian 

DeCesare, of Londonderry, 

testified on behalf of the 

town of Wilmington, which 

has taken an official stand 

opposing the wind project in 

the neighboring town. 

town’s vitality. 

Wurzberger, a lifelong resident 

of Wilmington, studied 

wind development at the New 

Alchemy Institute, a research 

center in Massachusetts on 

Cape Cod which operated from 

1969 to 1991. He disagrees with 

Wheeler’s assessment that the 

windmills would hurt tourism. 

Having worked at the 1836 Country 

Store in downtown Wilmington, 

a business owned by his 

father, Albert, Wurzberger recalls 

the increase in tourism after 

the Searsburg Wind Project 

was established. 

“I’ve recounted [a number 

of] people who came to see the 

windmills, traveled through, 

and heard they existed here,” 

said Wurzberger. “We often 

communicated with customers 

about why they’re here and I’ve 

never heard negative comments 

about the present windmills from 

tourists.” 

In recent years, Wurzberger 

said, the fall foliage tourist business 

“has been in decline.” 

“Local businesses are losing 

sales, and the decline is mostly 

the result of badly damaged foliage 

colors, increased costs of 

maple syrup production,” said 

Wurzberger. “Acid rain is [causing] 

huge damage upon our local 

environment [and economy] 

and to reverse this damage, we 

need to create nontoxic methods 

of energy generation.” 

George 

D. Aiken 

Wilderness 

Area 

B E NNINGTON 

BENNINGTON 

2-story 

house, 30 ft. 

Current 

Searsburg tower 

(1997), 197 ft. 

Effects on property 

values 

Brian DeCesare, of Londonderry, 

a certified residential 

real estate appraiser who 

has assessed several properties 

in the Deerfield Valley, testified 

to the Public Service Board on 

April 22 that of 2,380 sales in the 

Deerfield Valley from 1994 to 

2002, 1,424 were in Wilmington. 

DeCesare said of those properties, 

fewer than 5 percent offered 

direct views of the Searsburg 

windmills. 

On Dec. 10, DeCesare testified 

a second time before the 

PSB on behalf of the town of 

Wilmington. Karen Tyler, attorney 

for the Deerfield Project, 

presented DeCesare with a report 

published by the National 

Association of Realtors describing 

the current state of the real 

estate industry and the effects 

of wind turbine facilities. Tyler 

said that, although research is 

limited, the report shows “wind 

farms appear to have a minimal 

or at most transitory impact on 

real estate.” 

DeCesare testified that he was 

not familiar with the report, but 

his conclusions remained: demographics 

play a significant factor 

in determining real estate value. 

9 

P ropos ed 

Wes tern 

P roject Area 

Statue of Liberty, 

305 ft. 

Northern Access 

O&M F acilities and 

Lay-down Ya rd 

Northern 

S ubstation 

69 kV Tra ns mis s ion Corrid or 

S outhern Access (Alternate) 

S outhern Transmission 

Crosier Cemetery 

8 

Proposed 

Deerfield Wind 

turbine, ~400 ft. 

Wind facilities are not always situated 

in the same areas. While 

they may be beneficial in urban 

or rural settings, such facilities 

don’t always benefit those wanting 

to buy a second home. 

“[Prospective buyers] come 

to Wilmington to buy vacation 

homes with good views,” said 

DeCesare. “I’m not saying [wind] 

is good or bad, but we have data 

showing people buy homes here 

because they are looking for pristine 

settings. In my opinion, it’s 

apples and oranges.” 

Neil Habig, project manager 

for the Deerfield Wind Project, 

could not be reached by press 

time. However, in a September 

2007 interview with The Deerfield 

Valley News, Habig commented 

that wind turbines do not 

affect property values of nearby 

homes. 

“A government-funded scientific 

study conducted in 2003 by 

the Renewable Energy Policy 

Project examined 25,000 real estate 

transactions within five miles 

of 10 wind farms built in the 

United States between 1998 and 

2001. In a majority of cases, properties 

that had a view of wind turbines 

appreciated in real estate 

value more quickly than nearby 

properties without a view,” Habig 

" 

P utna m 

Road 

") 

" 

8 

✕ 

✕ 

✕ 

E xisting ✕ 

✕ 

S ubstation 

P ropos ed 

E as tern 

P roject Area 

✕ 

S leepy Hollow R oad (Trail) 

E xis ting 

GMP 

Windfarm 

0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1 

In Miles 

✕ 

✕ 

READSBORO 

JEFF POTTER/THE COMMONS (Source: www.vermonterswithvision.org/sizecomparison.html, scale adapted for Deerfield Wind project.) 

✕ 

✕ 

✕ 

told the newspaper. 

“A 2006 study conducted by 

Ryan Wiser and Ben Hoen, of the 

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 

also found that data from 

3,638 home sales transactions 

near six communities with wind 

projects in Pennsylvania, New 

York, Iowa, and Illinois indicated 

no effect on sales price from 

proximity to wind projects.” 

Supporting the bears 

Though the U.S. National Forest 

Service stated the project was 

consistent with Green Mountain 

National Forest goals in a Draft 

Environmental Impact Statement 

(DEIS) in September, the state 

Agency of Natural Resources 

responded to the DEIS to oppose 

the project. In particular, 

the ANR was concerned it would 

significantly impact bear habitat 

on the proposed site. 

The forest service statement 

said the project supported the 

goals of maintaining or improving 

air quality; demonstrating 

innovative, scientifically, and 

ecologically sound management 

practices; and providing opportunities 

for renewable energy use 

and development. It also concluded 

the project meets the standards 

and guidelines for diverse 

9 

SEARSBURG 

S E ARS B URG 

RE ADS B ORO 

✕ E xis ting Turbines 

✕ P ropos ed Turbines 

E xis ting GMP Acces s a nd S ervice Road 

New Acces s R oads 

New S ervic e Roads 

E xis ting 69 kV Trans mis s ion L ine 

New S outh Connec tor Trans mis s ion 

Town B oundary 

F ederal/S tate L ands 

jeff potter/the commons. Source: Exhibits from Deerfield Wind petition to Vermont Public Service Board 

Above: A map 

of the Deerfield 

Wind project. 

Left: Comparative 

sizes of the wind 

turbines. 

use in the national forest with a 

“variety in ecology, habitats, and 

silvicultural practices [the practice 

of controlling the establishment, 

composition, and growth 

of trees and recreation].” 

The statement calls the project 

consistent with current and 

future diverse forest use for all 

lands within the project site. 

ANR wildlife biologist Forrest 

Hammond testified before the 

PSB last August that the bear 

population in a significant habitat 

on the western side of the ridge 

could suffer from the wind project. 

Hammond cited a direct correlation 

between the number of 

beech trees and the reproductive 

success of female bears: If the 

significant number of trees along 

the western ridge decreases, so 

will the bears’ birth rate. 

“The area directly affected by 

the western array of turbines, 

access roads, and associated 

stormwater treatment currently 

contains dense concentrations 

of beech trees. The pattern of 

bear-scarring on these trees 

demonstrates that bears have historically 

used and relied on the 

mast from these trees. The project 

seeks to clear these areas of 

necessary black bear habitat that 

are decisive to the survival of the 

species,” said Hammond. 

The ANR believes that area 

should be off limits and proposes 

that development occur only on 

the eastern ridge, where the impact 

would be far less. 

Kristi Ponozzo, public affairs 

officer for Green Mountain and 

Finger Lakes national forests, 

told the Deerfield Valley News that 

the U.S. Forest Service is aware 

of the ANR’s position. As for the 

ANR’s conclusions, “There’s a 

lot of uncertainty in the scientific 

community as to how exactly this 

is going to affect bear habitat,” 

said Ponozzo. 

She added that since 2004 the 

Forest Service has consulted 

with several scientists around 

the region who maintain that 

the Deerfield Wind Project is 

consistent with the U.S. Forest 

Service’s plan. 

“We’ve been working extensively 

with the ANR on this project,” 

said Ponozzo. “We’re very 

respectful of their view on this.” 

The Public Service Board may 

reach a decision on the Deerfield 

Wind Project by late spring 2009, 

with both sides prepared to appeal 

the decision.

6 The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 NEWS 7 

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Narrative Nonfiction 

Monday, Feb. 2 • 7PM 

Brooks Memorial Library 

224 Main St., Brattleboro 

Join veteran magazine journalist Tom Clynes for a free workshop 

covering the nuts and bolts of narrative nonfi ction. This vibrant and 

controversial genre marries the immediacy and factual accuracy of 

journalism with the narrative techniques of literary fi ction. 

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Open to the public — no previous writing or journalism 

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March 2 

brooks Memorial library, 7 p.m. 

april 6 


may 4 

Hooker Dunham conference room 

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July 6 


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MEDia MENtoriNg WorksHops 

upcoMiNg MEDia MENtoriNg WorksHops 

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September — tbA Kate Casa And the beat goes on… 

october 5 


November 2 


December 7, 


Mary Rothschild 

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Luskin 

Peter Seares 

the Media Mentoring project 

The Media Mentoring Project (MMP) 

is in its fourth year promoting media 

literacy and community participation in 

local media. The MMP free workshops 

help Windham County citizens get their 

voices heard in local media—covering 

topics such as constructing an effective 

press release or writing a letter to the 

editor, an opinion piece or a compelling 

lead. Workshops also address general 

journalism or media literacy issues. 

The board of Vermont Independent 

Media (publisher of The Commons) 

and the Media Mentoring Project 

committee are excited about plans to 

expand the reach and effectiveness 

of the program throughout Windham 

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partnerships with our libraries and 

schools. 

The adult program now meets 

once a month for a journalism skills 

workshop, which includes the option of 

an individual follow-up session by e-mail 

with the MMP presenter. 

Telling your story in an informative 

and engaging way 

Peer critique — editing workshop 

Ethics of Journalism 

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By Thomas Anderson 

Bookwalter 


PUTNEY—More than seven 

months after a fire closed the 

Putney General Store, the Ingram 

Construction Corporation 

began cleaning out the debris 

and repairing the roof of the beloved 

landmark. 

The Putney Historical Society, 

which purchased the building 

Nov. 7, has received enormous 

support from the community 

and organizations like the Preservation 

Trust of Vermont for the 

restoration. 

The project is expected to cost 

$240,000, according to Lyssa Papazian, 

a local historical preservation 

consultant and volunteer 

manager of the restoration. 

Since the 1790s, the Putney 

General Store, one of the longest 

continuously running general 

stores in the state, has stood in 

the heart of Putney, serving as a 

center of commerce and social 

activity, supplying groceries, 

hardware, videos, sandwiches, 

coffee, newspapers and countless 

other necessities to community 

members and passers-by alike. 

The people that the store has 

drawn to the center of Putney 

have, in turn, enhanced business 

throughout the community. The 

general store fire was devastating 

to the community. According 

to Papazian, “It’s the heart of the 

town and it was just ripped out — 

and I can’t bear to see it.” 

‘Special affection’ 

After the May 3 fire, Paul 

Bruhn, executive director of the 

Preservation Trust of Vermont, 

was quick to respond. 

Since the late 1970s, when he 

worked as U.S. Senator Patrick 

Leahy’s chief of staff in Washington, 

D.C., Bruhn has held the 

philosophy that “saving historical 

buildings is important to maintaining 

the essential character 

of Vermont,” he said. 

Bruhn helped found the Preservation 

Trust of Vermont in 

1980 and has been a member 

ever since. 

This year, according to Bruhn, 

the Preservation Trust has been 

involved in “300 communitybased 

efforts to save old buildings 

and put them to good use.” 

Bruhn said the Trust has a 

“special affection for village 

stores,” because of the vital 

role they play as a social center 

and a supplier of goods to their 

communities. 

Soon after the Putney General 

Beadnik’s 

Store fire, the Preservation Trust 

hired Bob Stevens of Stevens 

and Associates Engineering to 

assess whether the building was 

salvageable. 

Stevens determined that despite 

considerable water damage 

and the need for a new roof, 

“a lot of the building was left and 

the structure was in good shape,” 

Bruhn said. 

Finding the funds 

In this case, the aesthetic 

choice to preserve the building’s 

character was also the most practical 

one. 

The estimated cost of a brand 

new building would have been 

$150 to $200 per square foot. 

According to Bruhn, “restoration 

would be cheaper, and the 

quality of the building would be 

higher.” 

Papazian then began to work 

with owner Erhan Oge to find a 

way to finance a new roof. 

But as a private business 

owner, Oge found the financial 

burden “overwhelming,” according 

to Papazian. 

On the other hand, a nonprofit 

organization — in particular, 

one legally recognized by 

the Internal Revenue Service 

under section 501(c)3 — often 

qualifies for grants from foundations 

and charities, and contributions 

provide tax write-offs 

to contributors. 

So Papazian presented the situation 

to the nonprofit Putney 

Historical Society (PHS), which 

began exploring the possibility of 

owning a piece of the town’s history 

by creating a task force. 

Other members include PHS 

president Stuart Strothman, vice 

president Tim Ragle, Jeff Shumlin, 

George and Laura Heller, 

Larry Cassidy, Susan McMahon, 

Cor Trowbridge, and Bruhn. 

As project manager, Papazian 

has been deeply involved in the 

acquisition and stabilization of 

the property calling it “the biggest 

project” she’s ever been involved 

in as a volunteer. 

In spite of the huge amount of 

work and responsibility involved 

she is compelled to manage the 

process of acquiring and restoring 

what she calls “our most historic 

building.” 

“Now that I’ve started this 

machine going it has to go forward,” 

Papazian said. “I have 

to keep going. I’ve learned a lot 

and gained a lot doing this and 

it’s very satisfying. This is what 

Putney needs.” 

ReNew 

Salvage 

The Putney General Store under construction in January. 

Community steps up 

A lot of evidence supports Papazian’s 

statements. 

In September and October, 

the PHS received nearly $13,000 

in community donations and 

found local individuals to guarantee 

a loan of $100,000 to buy 

the building. The Preservation 

Trust of Vermont also contributed 

$5,000. 

And at the Historical Society’s 

annual meeting on Sept. 21, community 

support for the project 

was overwhelming. 

According to PHS president 

Stuart Strothman, this enabled 

the organization to purchase the 

building for $105,000 from Oge, 

who “turned away some better 

offers” so that the General Store 

would wind up in the right hands, 

he said. 

Once the PHS owned the building, 

other funds needed to be secured 

to restore it. 

To finance construction, PHS 

has applied for a Vermont Community 

Development Block 

Grant, federal money from the 

Department of Housing and Urban 

Development administered 

through the state Department 

of Housing and Community 

Affairs. 

Randi Ziter, proprietor of the 

Putney Inn, has collected signatures 

from 28 local business 

owners and managers supporting 

the grant. Other local businesses, 

including Putney Paper, 

have sent their own letters of 

support, in many cases citing a 

drop in business since the General 

Store fire. 

The state should respond to 

the application in February. 

In the meantime, a private loan 

of $30,000 has been extended 

to the PHS, backed by all of 

their holdings. A bridge loan of 

$100,000 has been secured by the 

General Store property itself. 

The construction budget was 

pared to $130,000 for a roof without 

shingles and for cleaning the 

building. However, as incidental 

costs add up, $5,000 of additional 

community donations have been 

committed to this effort and a 

$5,000 grant from the Vermont 

Community Foundation has also 

been contributed to the cause. 

Meanwhile $67,000 has come 

in from the Vermont Housing 

and Conservation Board to help 

pay off the loan used to purchase 

the property. This money came 

with the condition that the building 

be preserved and used as a 

general store. 


PUTNEY HISTORICAL SOCIETY 

A.M. Corser’s General Store in the building at the turn of the 

20th century. 

Renovations begin 

As construction began, Papazian 

saw many challenges. 

“There was more fire damage 

than I thought,” she noted. 

On top of that there was also a 

lot of water damage caused by a 

particularly rainy summer. She 

also noticed “a lot of deferred 

maintenance” and cited the need 

for “a little asbestos removal.” 

The support for the ground floor 

was not in good shape. 

However, Papazian was pleased 

that “the second-floor framing 

and beams are in good shape; 

post-and-beam and hand-hewn 

beams will remain. A lot of the 

character will still remain.” 

Due to budgetary restrictions, 

the roof will be replaced with premanufactured 

trusses. “I wish it 

could be hand-hewn post-andbeam,” 

Papazian said. 

However, Papazian said “The 

exterior will look very much like 

it did, especially the main section,” 

The addition to the left of 

the main section might look different, 

but that was modern construction 

already. 

According to Strothman, once 

the building is restored PHS sees 

one of two things happening. One 

possibility is the building could 

be sold to new owners who would 

run their own general store. The 

other option would be to lease 

the space to a store manager, 

in which case PHS would retain 

ownership of the building and 

potentially find permanent space 

for its office, housed in the Town 

Hall since 1959. 

Strothman predicted that the 

store would reopen in about “a 

year and a half.” 

For more info on the Putney 

General Store restoration, visit 

www.putneygeneralstore.org. 

The Putney Historical Society 

can be found online at www. 

putneyhistory.us.



Melinda Bussino, executive director of the Brattleboro Drop 

In Center and one of the organizers of the overflow shelter 

at the First Baptist Church. 

n Shelter from page 1 

night staffing of the shelter found 

their way through their church 

affiliations, others are there because 

not so long ago, they were 

out on the streets themselves, 

and they want to give something 

back. Two volunteers are needed 

to stay awake throughout each 

night at the overflow, which is 

open from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. 

‘I want to help people’ 

One volunteer, Malachi Johnson, 

42 years old, has lived in 

Vermont for eight years. He has 

been homeless for the last nine 

 

FOR 

months. 

While searching for a job, 

Johnson started volunteering as 

an assistant at the Brattleboro 

Drop In Center. His efforts led 

to being offered a paid position: 

he is now the assistant food shelf 

manager and is saving for an 

apartment. 

“In another month or so I’ll 

have enough saved to get a place, 

but the problem around here is 

there aren’t enough places available,” 

Johnson explained at an 

overflow volunteer training session 

held in early December. 

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Printmaking and Collage, 

Teen Portfolio class, 

Homeschooler and 

Tots classes. 

Saturday classes and 

Weekend Workshops 

 

 

 

 

32 Main St. Brattleboro 

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While Johnson saves his 

money, he still sleeps outside. 

“I have lots of wool blankets and 

some sleeping bags, so it’s pretty 

warm,” he said. “It helps me save 

up my money.” 

Besides his day job at Drop In, 

Johnson also volunteers evenings 

at the overflow. When his shift 

ends at 1 a.m., he zips his coat 

and heads back outside to his 

own sleeping spot and bedroll. 

Although he admitted “it’s 

getting colder out there and the 

ground is feeling harder every 

day,” at the moment he still prefers 

the relative privacy of the 

outdoors to the more crowded 

common room of the shelter, 

where on a typical night 15 to 25 

people will find a place to sleep. 

Another volunteer, Paul Kickery, 

used to be homeless but now 

has his own apartment. 

On a Sunday evening he explained 

why he was volunteering. 

“I want to help people. A lot 

of people have helped me and put 

up with my crap. I just want to 

help them now,” Kickery said. 

“I don’t recommend being 

homeless on purpose,” he added. 

COMMUNITY MEALS/FOOD SHELVES 

Location Address Phone Day & Time 

Brattleboro Drop In 

Center 

60 South Main St., 

Brattleboro 

802-257-5415 Monday–Friday, 

8:30 a.m.–5 p.m. 

Putney Community 

Suppers 

Hill Road, Putney 802-387-4102 Second Friday evening of 

month 

Brattleboro Senior 

Meals 

Gibson-Aiken Ctr., 207 

Main St., Brattleboro 


noon 

Immanuel Episcopal 

Church Kitchen & 

Drop-In Center 

4 Island St., 

Bellows Falls 


9 a.m.–5 p.m.; Community 

Supper Monday, 5 p.m. 

Agape Christian 

Fellowship 

Centre 

Congregational — 

Loaves and Fishes 

First Baptist Church 

— Grace’s Kitchen 

Brigid’s Kitchen 

Second 

Congregational 

Church UCC 

Genesis Church of 

the Brethren 

Jamaica/Wardsboro 

Community Food 

Pantry 

Deerfield Valley 

Food Pantry 

30 Canal St., 

Brattleboro 

193 Main St., 

Brattleboro 

190 Main St., 

Brattleboro 

38 Walnut St., 

Brattleboro 

2051 Main St., 

Londonderry 

Kimball Hill Rd., 

Putney 

Methodist Church, 

Wardsboro 

11 Church St., 

Wilmington 

SHELTER 

Location Address Phone Day & Time 

Morningside Shelter 81 Morningside Drive, 802-257-0066 24 hours a day 

Brattleboro 

First Baptist Church 

Overflow Shelter 

190 Main St., 

Brattleboro 

802-257-5415 7 p.m.–7 a.m., when 

Morningside is full 

Music & Movement 

for infants, toddlers & preschoolers 

...and the parents & caregivers 

who love them! 

• Rhythm & Tonal Exploration 

• Large & Small Movement Fun 

• Sing-Alongs & Circle Dances 

• Improvatational Games & Instrument Play-Alongs 

“I may have to do that again myself 

because I’m still not caught 

up on my bills. I’m only working 

32 hours a week, and it’s not 

enough to pay down my debts. 

“I have a bigger vehicle now — 

a 1979 van — and I’m fixing it up 

in case I have to live in it.” 

Although he would be working 

the 1 a.m.-7 a.m. shift, Kickery 

came in several hours early to 

visit with some of the folks who 

would be sleeping over. 

One conversation was with 

21-year-old Alice, who had been 

sleeping under the stairs in 

the town parking garage until 

the overflow shelter opened its 

doors. 

“I’ve been on the streets for 

about a year,” she said. “My parents 

divorced. My mom got the 

house but missed mortgage payments 

and lost the house. Now 

she’s at a boarding house and 

can’t have anyone stay over. I 

was in Burlington for a couple of 

months, but I wanted to be near 

my family.” 

After Alice returned to Brattleboro, 

she worked at Quiznos until 

the sandwich chain closed its 

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Music Together of 

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FREE DEMO CLASSES 

802-257-4069 Saturday, 1:30–3 p.m. 

802-254-4730 Tuesday and Friday, 

noon–1 p.m. (except 

Friday after Thanksgiving) 

802-254-9566 Wednesday, 5:30-6:30 p.m. 

802-254-6800 Monday, Wednesday, 

Thursday, Saturday, 

11:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m. 

802-824-6453 Third Friday, 1–4 p.m. 

802-387-5948 Wednesday, 6 p.m., Friday, 

9 a.m. 

802-896-6544 Last Wednesday of the 

month, 6:30-8 p.m. 

802-464-9675 Third Saturday, 

10 a.m.–noon 

Canal Street franchise. 

“Finding jobs down here is really 

hard,” she said. 

Alice also works as a Drop 

In volunteer. “If you work hard 

enough at the Drop In, the people 

will give you a nice job reference,” 

she said. 

And the shelter had a further 

surprise for her. 

“Last week when the Vernon 

Church brought the dinner — 

the church I grew up in as a 

kid — my boyfriend asked me 

to marry him. In front of everyone!” 

Alice said. “I was very embarrassed, 

but I said yes. We’ve 

set the wedding date and gotten a 

minister. So now we have to find 

work and a place to live.” 

‘We take care of 

each other’ 

Many who use the shelter 

leave their full-time night-shift 

jobs, walking the blocks or miles 

to the overflow, sometimes arriving 

as late as 1:30, just to reach 

the only available safe place to lay 

their head for the night. 

While some enter the shelter 

in some state of inebriation, all 

are cared for and none are turned 

away unless they threaten the 

safety of others. 

But such circumstances are 

rare, and the community that has 

arisen around the shelter keeps 

the environment safe for staff and 

homeless citizens alike. 

Melinda Bussino offered a 

memorable quote from one 

homeless man: “We take care of 

each other. We’re the only family 

we got.” She added, ”I never 

feel safer than I do at the Drop 

In center. These guys would lay 

down their life for me.” 

As to volunteering? To quote 

Malachi Johnson: “Most people 

just want someone to listen to 

them.” 

Calendar 

Friday, January 9 

MUSIC Peppino d’Agostino w/Lissa 

Schneckenburger. Twilight Music 

presents d’Agostino, the 2007 Guitar 

Player Magazine Reader’s Choice 

Awards Best Acoustic Guitarist and 

Brattleboro’s own fiddle phenom, Lissa 

Schneckenburger playing acoustic folk, 

Irish, Italian, Brazilian, flamenco and 

jazz. $15; $13, students and seniors. 

7:30 p.m. Hooker-Dunham Theater 

& Gallery, 139 Main St., Brattleboro. 

Information: (802) 254-9276; www. 

hookerdunham.org; HDTandG@sover. 

net; www.peppinodagostino.com; www. 

lissafiddle.com. 

POTLUCK Artists & Friends. The 

second Friday of each month, a forum 

for artists and friends to get together 

in an unstructured, informal setting to 

talk and eat! Learn about what your colleagues 

are up to and share your own 

ideas. Bring a main dish; drinks, desserts, 

and a setting provided. $2 (free 

for BMAC members), plus a potluck 

dish. 6:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. Brattleboro 

Museum & Art Center, 10 Vernon St, 

Brattleboro. 

FILM SCREENING Taking Root: The 

Vision of Wangari Maathai. Regional 

premiere of award-winning film “Taking 

Root” tells the dramatic story of Kenyan 

Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Wangari 

Maathai whose simple act of planting 

trees grew into a nationwide movement 

to safeguard the environment, protect 

human rights and defend democracy. 

Co-directed/produced by Marlboro 

filmmakers Lisa Merton & Alan Dater. 

Opening night Q&A with reception after 

film. 7 p.m. Latchis Theater, 50 Main 

St, Brattleboro. 

MUSIC Kevin Parry performs every 

Friday through February. Free. 7-10 

p.m. The West Dover Inn, Route 100, 

West Dover. Information: (802) 464- 

5207. 

Saturday, 

January 10 

WORKSHOP RACLT Homeownership 

Center Homebuyer Workshop. 

NeighborWorks HomeOwnership Center 

of Southeastern Vermont is holding 

a homebuyer workshop for people interested 

in homeownership. 8 a.m. – 5 

p.m. in Windsor. Advanced registration 

and a $50 material fee is required. Information: 

Rockingham Area Community 

Land Trust, (802) 885-3220 x 210 or x 

213 for Stephen E. Karvonen, Marketing 

Manager/IT Support, 90 Main St, Suite 

1, Springfield; fax: (802) 885-5811. 

DANCE FUNDRAISER Dance to Love 

Bomb and support the Windham 

County Humane Society. Put on your 

party clothes and dance the night away 

to Love Bomb. Enjoy a performance 

with Belly Dancing Troup “Sahibat,” all 

to support the WCHS. Cash bar, appetizers. 

In advance: $15; $12, students. 

At the door: $20; $15, students. 8 p.m. 

– 12 a.m. Eagles Club of Brattleboro, 

55 Chickering Dr, Brattleboro. Information: 

Send your check to WCHS, P.O. Box 

397, Brattleboro, VT 05302 Attn: Annie/ 

LOVE BOMB. 

Sunday, January 11 

WORKSHOP Post Oil Solutions Seed 

Saving Workshop. An introduction to 

the basics of saving vegetable seeds, addressing 

pollination, isolation, spacing, 

harvesting, cleaning, drying and storage, 

requirements of annuals and biennials, 

and choosing the best varieties to 

start with. The workshop will be led by 

Sylvia Davatz, who has been gardening 

organically for over 25 years and saving 

seed for 16. Light refreshments. Preregistration 

and payment are required. 

$5/$10; no one refused. Contributions 

greatly appreciated. 1-3 p.m. Brattleboro 

Savings & Loan community room (rear 

entrance), 221 Main St, Brattleboro. Information: 

(802) 869-2141. 

CONTRADANCE Steve Zakon-Anderson 

calling, with Ethan Hazzard- 

Watkins, fiddle; Anna Patton, clarinet, 

and Karen Axelrod, piano. Stone Church, 

corner of Main and Grove Streets, Brattleboro. 

Please bring clean, non-marking 

shoes. 7-10 p.m. Information: ethan@ 

ethanhw.com; 802-257-9234. 

Wednesday, 

January 14 

CHILDREN’S BOOK READING Every 

Wednesday in January, kids are invited 

to drop by the Museum for healthy 

snacks provided by the Brattleboro 

Food Co-op and readings of children’s 

books from the Museum’s collection. 

For Ages 5-9. Children must be accompanied 

by an adult caregiver. Free. 3:30 

p.m. - 5 p.m. Brattleboro Museum & Art 

Center, 10 Vernon St, Brattleboro. 

Thursday, 

January 15 

DANCE CLASS Belly Dancing for 

Life. For all ages, shapes, and abilities. 

Six-week classes w/instructors Robin 

(Rabiah) and Dawn Kersula. Thursdays, 

5:30 – 6:30 p.m. Brattleboro Memorial 

Hospital, Belmont Ave, Brattleboro. Information: 

(802) 275-7232; www.shimmies.net. 

LECTURE Slide-lecture on Portraiture. 

Art historian and Marlboro College 

Dean of Faculty Felicity Ratte 

addresses issues in the history of portraiture, 

through a series of case studies 

beginning with that of the Egyptian 

Pharoah Akhenatan and moving chronologically 

to the present. Among the 

issues addressed will be the role of 

memory, identity, history, and historiography 

in the creation, critique, and 

use of portraiture. $4; $3, seniors; $2, 

students; BMAC members, children 6 

and under, free. 7:30 p.m. - 9:00 p.m., 

Brattleboro Museum & Art Center, 10 

Vernon St, Brattleboro. 

SPEAKER “Going Beyond Green: 

The Transcendental Meditation Program 

in the Workplace.” Top U.S. 

green developer Jeffrey Abramson of 

Washington will discuss the role of Transcendental 

Meditation in a stress-free 

workspace and residence. Free. 5:30 

p.m., Robert H. Gibson River Garden, 

153 Main Street, Brattleboro. Information: 

tmbusiness.org; 802-246-1020. 


VIDEO & TALK Seeing is Believing: 

Empowering the Next Generation 

of Human Rights Defenders with 

Video. WITNESS, founded by musician 

and activist Peter Gabriel, uses video 

and online technologies to open the eyes 

of the world to human rights violations. 

Come hear Rebecca Lichtenfeld, WIT- 

NESS’s special projects coordinator, talk 

about using video as an advocacy tool 

and about the organization’s work effecting 

change around the globe. 7:30 

p.m. - 9:30 p.m. Brattleboro Museum & 

Art Center, 10 Vernon St, Brattleboro. 

Information: www.witness.org. 

CONCERT Brattleboro Concert 

Choir, Gretchaninoff “All-Night 

Vigil.” Work from the Slavonic liturgical 

literature: the All-Night Vigil of Alexander 

Gretchaninoff. This unaccompanied 

work makes use of double chorus to 

convey the harmonies of the Russian 

romantic era of sacred music, under the 

direction of Susan Dedell. $15; students, 

$10. 7:30 p.m. Episcopal Cathedral of 

St. Pauls, Burlington. Information and 

tickets: Brattleboro Music Center, (802) 

257-4523, www.bmcvt.org. 

DANCE Echelon Dance Company 

– “Enlighten” Ballet and hip hop. 

Unite with modern and jazz along with 

the masters: Schubert, Chopin, et al. 

7:30 – 9 p.m. Through Sunday. New 

England Youth Theatre, 100 Flat St, 

Brattleboro. 

Saturday, 

January 17 

FARMERS’ MARKET Post Oil Solutions 

Winter Farmers’ Market. 10 

a.m. – 3 p.m. Robert H. Gibson River 

Garden, 153 Main St, Brattleboro. Information: 

www.postoilsolutions.org. 


– “Enlighten.” See Jan 16th listing. 



Brattleboro. 

FILM SCREENING HBO Film “Alive 

Day Memories: Home from Iraq” 

and discussion. Film surveys the 

physical and emotional cost of war 

through the soldiers’ memories of 

their “alive day,” the day they narrowly 

escaped death in Iraq. Following the 

film, Gen. Gordon R. Sullivan, U.S. Army 

(Ret.), former Chief of Staff of the U.S. 

Army under Clinton, will lead a community 

discussion on issues concerning 

the long-term care of injured veterans in 

small communities throughout America. 

7:30 – 10 p.m. Brattleboro Museum & 

Art Center, 10 Vernon St, Brattleboro. 



Vigil.” See Jan 16th listing. $15; students, 

$10. 7:30 p.m., St. Michael’s 

Roman Catholic Church, Brattleboro. 

Information and tickets: Brattleboro 

Music Center, (802) 257-4523, www. 

bmcvt.org. 

L IVE PERFORMANCE Heather Lane 

and Draa Hobbs perform. Draa 

Hobbs of Chicago plays jazz guitar in the 

tradition of Atilla Zoller and Wes Montgomery. 

Philadelphia native Heather 

Lane joins him with vocals infuenced 

by Sarah Vaughan, Elizabeth Fraser, 

and Asha Bhosle. They will perform 

standards by the likes of Rogers and 

Hart, Cole Porter, and George Gershwin. 

7:30 p.m.; doors open at 7 p.m. $12; 

$10 in advance and for students and seniors. 

Boccellis on the Canal, Bellows 

Falls. Information: (802) 869-1520; 

heather@wool.fm. 

Sunday, 

January 18 


– “Enlighten.” See Jan 16th listing. 



Brattleboro. 



Vigil.” See Jan. 16th listing. $15; students, 

$10. 7:30 p.m., St. Michael’s 

Roman Catholic Church, Brattleboro. 

Information and tickets: Brattleboro 

Music Center, (802) 257-4523, www. 

bmcvt.org. 

Wednesday, 

January 21 

CHILDREN’S BOOK READING See 

Jan 7th listing. Free. 3:30 p.m. - 5 p.m. 



FESTIVAL & POTLUCK Lunar New 

Year of China, Korea, and Vietnam. 

The Year of the Ox officially begins on 

Jan. 26, but this annual celebration organized 

by the Asian Cultural Center 

of Vermont will take place, as usual, 

during the nearest weekend. Activities 

for all ages include paper lantern-making, 

Chinese songs, t’ai chi martial arts 

and sword performance, a Vietnamese 

dragon dance, and more! 1-4 p.m. 




BOOK READING Pitch Perfect: The 

Quest for Collegiate A Capella Glory. 

To gain some hilarious, if somewhat disturbing, 

perspective on the whole collegiate 

a cappella phenomenon, come 

hear Mickey Rapkin read from his acclaimed 

new book. 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. 



Saturday, 

January 24 

CONCERT Gabriel Alegria, Afro-Peruvian 

Sextet. Gabriel Alegria, one of 

the most influential figures in Peru’s jazz 

scene, will perform with some of Peru’s 

finest musicians, including master percussionists 

Hugo Alcazar and Huevito 

Lobaton. Their unique Afro-Peruvian 

jazz music combines the common African 

roots found in American Jazz music 

with Afro-Peruvian music from the 

coast of Peru. 8 p.m., The Vermont Jazz 

Center, 72 Cotton Mill Hill #222, Brattleboro. 

Information and reservations 

(suggested): (802) 254-9088. 

FESTIVAL & POTLUCK Lunar New 

Year of China, Korea, and Vietnam See 

Jan 21st listing. 1-4 p.m. Brattleboro 

Museum & Art Center, 10 Vernon St, 

Brattleboro. 

Sunday, 

January 25 

CONCERT “BRATTLEBORO! Listen 

Local.” Windham Orchestra, under 

the direction of David Runnion, presents 

“BRATTLEBORO! Listen Local,” 

featuring new works by local composers 

including; Festival Overture by 

Zeke Hecker; Selections from Monadnock 

Tales by Lawrence Siegel; a new 

work by David Tasgal and featuring the 

Brattleboro Music Center’s three student 

orchestras, playing along with the 

Windham Orchestra. Also, two pieces 

by Eugene Friesen, featuring the composer 

as cello soloist. $15; $10, students. 

3-5 p.m. 50 Main St, Latchis Theatre, 

Brattleboro. Information: www.bmcvt. 

org, www.windhamorchestra.net; (802) 

257-4523. 

Wednesday, 

January 28 

CHILDREN’S BOOK READING See 

Jan 14th listing. Free. 3:30 p.m. - 5 p.m. 



Saturday, 

January 31 

PANEL DISCUSSION Starting Over, 

Settling In: Southern Vermont in 

the 1960s. Slide show and panel discussion 

about the social change generated 

in the 1960s by the cross-pollination 

between migrants to Windham County 

and their neighbors. Participants include 

Jerry Levy, Don McLean, Faith 

Pepe, Howard Prussack, and moderator 

Verandah Porche. 5:30–7:30 p.m. 



MUSIC FESTIVAL Northern Roots 

Traditional Music Festival. The Brattleboro 

Music Center’s second annual 

Northern Roots Festival brings together 

local and regional musicians representing 

the best of various northern musical 

traditions including Irish, Scottish, 

English, and French Canadian. A day 

of participant workshops, sessions, and 

mini-concerts followed by an evening 

performance with Becky Tracy, Keith 

Murphy, Matt and Shannon Heaton, 

Tony Barrand, Andy Davis, Mary Cay 

Brass, Lissa Schneckenburger, Corey 

Dimario, George Wilson, Naomi Morse, 

Colin Lindsay, Dan Gurney, Anadama 

(Bethany Waickman, Amelia Mason, 

Emily Troll). 1 p.m.–5:30 p.m., 7:30 pm. 

Advance ticket purchase recommended: 

combination day/evening, $25; daytime 

only, $15; evening only, $18; student combination 

day/evening, $10. 100 Flat St, 

NEYT, Brattleboro. Information and tickets: 

www.bmcvt.org; (802) 257-4523. 

Weddings 

Barbecues 

Family Gatherings Green 

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Tent sizes 10’x10’ to 40’x100’ 

Tent 

We set up dance floors, 

portable stages, Rentals tables, 

chairs, lighting, portable 

toilets and sinks. 

Contact John Evans at 

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Tent Rentals 

Townshend Park 

Townshend, VT 

802-365-7839 

800-691-8368 

gmtents@svcable.net 

www.greenmtntents.com 

Granger Real Estate


Community 

confronts 

racism 

In the aftermath of last 

spring’s racial incidents, 

organizations look toward 

a meaningful, long-term 

understanding of the issues 

By Clara Rose Thornton 


BRATTLEBORO—Since the 

past spring and early summer, 

several organizations have initiated 

events and programs to 

address and confront an undercurrent 

of racial tension in the 

region. 

A group of youths calling 

themselves the Nigger Hanging 

Redneck Association (NHRA) 

showed signs of activity in Vernon, 

Guilford, and Brattleboro 

and at the Brattleboro Union 

High School (BUHS). Three minors 

were linked to the NHRA 

in an incident involving harassment 

of a group of ethnic minorities 

at the Brattleboro Transit 

Center in June [The Commons, 

July 2008]. 

The issue has been given 

heightened attention with positive, 

ardent efforts on the part 

of various organizations and individual 

citizens. In the six months 

since the events, Alana Community 

Organization, Youth Services, 

United Way, and Guilford 

Community Church have spearheaded 

efforts, with Windham 

Southeast Supervisory Union 

(WSESU) and BUHS administrators 

acting as representation 

from the school districts within 

the endeavor. 

Though a slew of initiatives 

emerged from the administrative 

and managerial sector of 

these and other organizations 

in the community, some have 

questioned whether this activity 

actually affected the problem and 

benefitted ethnic minorities. 

Racial confrontations 

According to police reports, 

Guilford resident Larry C. Pratt, 

then 17, accompanied by two 

other young people from that 

town, continually shouted racial 

epithets from his car at a group of 

minorities standing on the street 

near the Transit Center June 18. 

Pratt then threatened to shoot 

one woman, age 18, in the face. 

When one of the victims spit on 

his car, Pratt brandished a shotgun. 

No one was injured. 

Pratt and his cohorts were 

described in court documents 

as members of the NHRA, and 

all the youths involved — perpetrators 

and victims — were 

enrolled in BUHS at the time of 

the incident. Pratt was charged 

with stalking with a deadly 

weapon, disorderly conduct, 

giving false information to a law 

enforcement officer, and reckless 

endangerment. 

The penalties for the first two 

charges were enhanced by the 

state’s hate crime statutes, which 

kick in when the conduct in question 

is alleged to be “maliciously 

motivated by the victim’s actual 

or perceived race or color.” 

Pratt pleaded guilty to the 

charges Nov. 12 and is serving 

two years of probation. Among 

other conditions, he is required 

to attend diversity counseling 

and to speak to a group or assembly 

approved by his probation 

officer about the events of 

his case, according to Windham 

County State’s Attorney Tracy 

K. Shriver. 

Also in June, a bicyclist found 

wooden signs along a dirt road 

in Vernon spray-painted with the 

letters “NHRA” on the front and 

“KKK” on the back. Next to one 

of these signs was a crate holding 

nine plastic milk jugs filled with 

urine, described at the time by 

Vernon Police Chief Kevin Turnley 

as “possible racist-motivated 

material.” The incident is still under 

investigation, Turnley said. 

“Southern Vermont has a history 

of racially inspired incidents 

over the years. This is just one 

in a series that has taken place,” 

said Curtiss Reed Jr., executive 

director of Alana. 

“Obviously what’s disturbing 

about this particular incident is 

the name: ‘Nigger Hanging Redneck 

Association.’ There was an 

implicit attempt to do harm,” 

Reed said. 

The perceived severity of this 

crime has forced community 

members not to treat it as an isolated 

event, Reed feels, but rather 

to examine what can be done in 

terms of long-term healing and 

solutions to ignorance. 

“There’s been a qualitatively 

better and different response 

relative to this incident—a response 

from community organizations 

that is more broadly 

based than narrow,” explained 

Reed, who called the response 

from community organizations, 

politicians, and businesses “a 

paradigm shift.” 

“We want to be put on the map 

not as the town with the NHRA, 

but the town that rallied its resources 

to ensure another NHRA 

doesn’t emerge,” Reed said. 

Shela Linton, advocate for social 

justice for Alana, reiterated 

this point. “We’re not just saying, 

‘That’s a person-of-color issue 

and they are being discriminated 

against.’ We’re now realizing how 

racism, whether an individual is 


Henry “Junie” Pereira, standing, and Mike Szostak lead a community discussion in the 

aftermath of racial tension in the community last June. 

white, black, brown or yellow, is 

impacting all of us. And citizens 

want to get involved and make a 

change.” 

Linton describes Alana as an 

organization which works to 

“strengthen fairness and diversity 

in Vermont communities 

by eliminating prejudice and 

discrimination of all kinds. It 

is dedicated to educating community 

members about the realities, 

challenges, and skills 

needed to thrive in a world of 

differences.” 

The nonprofit has partnered 

with Guilford Community 

Church in organizing several 

discussions on the topic of race, 

first held at the church, then 

moved to larger venues such as 

BUHS and the Boys & Girls Club 

in Brattleboro. 

In one discussion group, minority 

teens sat in the middle of 

a circle at the Boys & Girls Club 

and non-minority community 

members in the “outer circle,” 

where they could ask questions 

about race. (“What is it like to 

grow up in Brattleboro as a minority?” 

or “What challenges 

have you faced?” for example.) 

Creating safe 

environments 

Linton, who has facilitated 

such discussions with Guilford 

Community Church Pastor Lise 

Sparrow, described the groups 

as “proactive in providing the 

community as well as the school 

district with the tools and skills 

needed to help create a more safe 

environment for our children.” 

“As an individual who was 

born and raised in this community, 

and who has endured a lot 

of racism since I was 5 years old, 

this is the first time that I have 

felt a movement of understanding 

of ‘yes, this [problem] exists’,” 

Linton said. 

“Before the NHRA came out, 

many of us were adverse; many 

of us were in denial, even the people 

of color wanted to pretend it 

didn’t exist sometimes,” she said. 

“They may have thought, Well, it 

happens everywhere. We want to 

minimize the situation because 

for so long, many of us have been 

marginalized and we don’t see an 

end [to it].” 

“The thing that’s more specific 

to Larry Pratt is that there’s been 

some funding given to Youth Services, 

the Boys & Girls Club, and 


Curtiss Reed Jr., executive director of the Alana Community 

Organization, calls the community’s response to the NHRA 

issue last year “qualitatively better and different.” 

Guilford Church for overcoming 

violence. The money is funneled 

through the Guilford Church 

because those young men are 

from Guilford, to create what are 

called circles of support and accountability,” 

or COSAs, “for students 

who commit violent acts,” 

said Sparrow, whose church began 

the first high-profile public 

response to Pratt and the NHRA 

through these discussions. 

These COSAs, modelled after 

the program the Center for Restorative 

Justice has put in place 

for people leaving prison in Vermont, 

are “intended to encourage 

in the perpetrators a deeper 

appreciation for the impact of 

their harmful actions, to give 

them new ways to understand 

their own circumstances and 

those of others and to establish 

ways of expressing remorse and 

reconciling with those they have 

harmed,” Sparrow said. 

“We have a Thursday evening 

social event going on where 

teens can gather at the Boys 

& Girls Club in more positive 

activity,” Sparrow continued. 

“Also, we’re working on getting 

transportation from Guilford to 

Brattleboro so that teens can 

take advantage of things going 

on there.” 

Guilford teens tend to be very 

isolated, Sparrow added. “That 

factor is part of the same issue 

of poverty and isolation that contributes 

to some of the frustration 

and anger that builds up in these 

kids. They have a lot of struggles, 

and they may take it out on people 

of color, unfortunately.” 

On Sept. 24, one of the Guilford 

teens apologized for his actions 

in an anonymous letter to 

the community that appeared in 

the Brattleboro Reformer. The 

newspaper confirmed the letter’s 

authenticity. 

“It has been four months since 

this happened, and it has been 

difficult. I am not allowed to leave 

my house or do anything. I have 

to stay out of town. I feel like I 

shouldn’t be accepted because 

of the stupid stuff I did. I should 

have never gotten myself into 

this mess,” the teen wrote. 

“Since then, I have hung out 

with African-Americans and got 

along with them. I have been going 

to meetings with the school, 

trying to help out in any way, because 

I think the town really deserves 

it. I have so much more to 

work on, like my education and 

my family, and so much more.” 

Other initiatives 

In addition to providing discussion 

forums to explore issues of 

hate crime victimization and possible 

roots of racist behavior, organizers 

cite other initiatives put 

in place last summer. 

The Future Search Conference 

will convene 64 regional 

policymakers and influential figures 

from all sectors of society 

to decide what should be done 

to sustain a prolonged battle to 

eradicate racism. The representatives, 

many of whom have already 

been chosen, will meet 

for three days in February and 

include representatives from 

WSESU, Families First, United 

Way, Alana and the faith community, 

and the town manager 

of Brattleboro. 

Also on board is Diana Wahle, 

whose Racial Issues Planning 

Team, a response to last spring’s 

events, began planning the Future 

Search, a conference structured 

on an international model 

for bringing together diverse 

groups to envision common 

goals for a community and develop 

strategies to achieve those 

goals. 

“Future Search moves us 

quickly into the development 

of a long-term plan to address 

the roots of discrimination and 

prejudice in our community,” 

Wahle said. 

“The process begins by putting 

the whole community system 

into a room to discover and discuss 

common ground and future 

focus,” Wahle said. “At the completion 

of the conference, action 

groups initiate incentives, and finally 

action incentives are given 

support and follow-up reviews. 

Future Search maintains a global 

context with local actions; it depends 

upon public responsibility 

and self-management.” 

In No Bystander Movement, 

a program designed by Youth 

Services, hundreds of people in 

the community sign their vows, 

pledging to intervene anytime 

they see racial prejudice, to ensure 

the safety of the youth involved, 

and to recruit others to 

do the same. The symbolic effort 

aims to put the issue of hate directly 

in front of people, and ask 

them to promise to be part of the 

solution. 

“I wouldn’t say the NHRA 

Diana Wahle is one of a 

number of people working on 

a forthcoming Future Search 

conference to address racial 

issues. 

incident blew the top off [of 

awareness of racism], but it put 

things in perspective,” said Allyson 

Villars, executive director of 

Youth Services, which operates a 

host of social-service programs 

directed toward youth and their 

families. 

“There were racial tensions, 

and maybe we needed to do 

more than deal with individual 

incidents and look at race as an 

issue. I don’t know that anybody 

thought they had the answer 

but everybody felt we needed to 

spend more attention and time 

on it,” Villars said, calling the No 

Bystander Movement an indication 

“that people have decided to 

not let this go.” 

 

Concrete actions 

What happened to the NHRA 

perpetrators and Pratt in particular, 

as well as how the BUHS 

school community is faring, 

might serve as a better barometer 

of progress than events that 

revolve primarily around talking 

and symbolism. 

“The internal discipline that 

occurred included suspensions 

and a restorative justice process 

for those students to re-enter 

the school, or, if it was deemed 

that the students were inappropriate 

to continue at the school, 

then that was the case,” WSESU 

Superintendent of Schools Ron 

Stahley said. 

When asked to elaborate, 

Stahley stated, “I’m not going 

to speak too much about that.” 

BUHS Principal Jim Day was unavailable 

for comment as well. 

Sparrow worked directly with 

the school in handling some aspects 

of retribution and was able 

to provide firsthand comment on 

what was done. 

“I sat in with each kid on the 

process that the school was using. 

Each young man is in a very 

different situation,” she said. 

Sparrow describes restorative 

justice as “a reflective process 

where [perpetrators] are asked 

to reflect on the impact of their 

behavior on the community, and 

asked to think about how they 

might make restitution and show 

remorse to the specific people 

who were harmed. One of the 

young men wrote a public letter 

to the community showing remorse 

and apologizing.” 

Sparrow described the conditions 

that the perpetrators must 

Greetings from Bentley Commons! I feel silly 

writing to you when you are only a few miles 

away, but I just had to drop you a line to tell 

you what a great time I’m having. Bentley is 

like living at a luxury, cozy hotel and I have 

met the nicest people. Have to run to a workshop…see 

you soon! 

Fondly, 

Mother 

 

 

 

 

 

meet before being allowed to return 

to BUHS as “strict gates,” 

but “courts were ultimately responsible 

for what the youths’ 

punishment was,” said Reed. 

“Was the spirit the letter of 

the law? There might be minor 

changes needed in the way that 

[the high school] responded. 

Particularly they might have 

wanted to find parents sooner 

than they did in this particular 

case. But in terms of their decisions 

about discipline, they exercised 

their responsibilities very 

judiciously. Obviously they can’t 

place a judge in a court of law.” 

Looking ahead 

Two other measures at BUHS 

have addressed some of the racial 

issues. 

Alana’s Strategies to Thrive 

program has brought speakers of 

color to BUHS like Latina novelist 

Ann Hagman Cardinal of Morrisville 

and Wes Holloway, a black 

American and vice president of 

diversity for the Golub Corporation, 

which owns the Price Chopper 

supermarket chain 

“The dual purpose of the program 

is to a) expose students, 

particularly minority students, 

to non-traditional careers as one 

means to encourage them to set 

goals and remain committed to 

completing high school and continuing 

onto college and b) break 

the negative stereotypes white 

students have of ethnic and racial 

minorities,” Reed said. 

Several workshops have taken 

place under the umbrella of a voluntary 

diversity training program 

for white staff members, including 

school administrators. Reed 

TO: 

Mr. Robert Kincaid 

22 Barrington Lane 

Jaffrey, NH 03452 

said that the school system independently 

uses a consultant, 

Mary Gannon, who is also affiliated 

with Alana. 

Henry “Junie” Pereira, a special 

education teacher at BUHS 

who recently began to chair Alana’s 

governing board, served as 

one of two organizers of a June 

26 “circle of understanding” that 

drew more than 100 people to 

BUHS to discuss race, racism, 

and the response of the community 

to the NHRA and the ensuing 

racial incidents. 

Pereira said there is still a long 

way to go to achieve concrete 

results and posed some questions 

for the community to debate: 

“What is prejudice? What 

prejudices do we hold? How 

does white privilege permeate 

through every individual existence, 

especially the Caucasian 

population?” 

Pereira said the community’s 

response to the incidents 

has shown “people are feeling 

like they want to explore” those 

questions. 

“And the next couple of years 

we will continue to see events 

and activities addressing that,” 

he said. “We are setting goals 

on how the community can address 

these issues — not just 

this year or the next, but the 

next five years or so. It’s a work 

in progress.” 

Jeff Potter contributed to this 

story. Disclosure: Alana Executive 

Director Curtiss Reed Jr. 

serves on the board of directors 

of Vermont Independent Media, 

publisher of The Commons. 

Bentley Commons 

AN INDEPENDENT SENIOR LIVING COMMUNITY 

 

42 

USA

12 The Commons • January 2009 

The Commons • January 2009 THE ARTS 13 

The Arts 

during one of the filmed interviews, 

an associate in the movement 

recalled that Maathai “had 

nothing to lose,” believing the 

event gave Maathai the courage 

to stand up to the tyrannical rulers 

of her country. 

Award-winning children’s author 

releases new historical novel 

n Taking Root from page 1 

the work of Wangari Maathai, 

the first African woman to earn 

the Nobel Peace Prize, Maathai’s 

presence fills the screen with 

her outsized personality, intelligence, 

and a passion to help 

her people. 

The film will be shown in its 

completed form for the first time 

in the area at the Latchis Theater 

in Brattleboro for a week beginning 

Jan. 9. 

The challenges of getting an 

independent film made and then 

into international film festivals 

and to corners of the world that 

need desperately to hear its message 

have been business-as-usual 

for the couple over the past six 

years. 

‘Overwhelming 

but amazing’ 

In their very cozy home/studio/office 

in a rustic abode off 

a dirt road, Merton and Dater 

described how they and their 

company, Marlboro Productions, 

came to be involved in this 

project. 

Dater breathed deeply and 

began. “In 2002 I was asked to 

make a 15-minute fundraising 

film for the Marion Foundation 

– they helped to fund the Green 

Belt Movement founded by Wangari 

Maathai, which has enlisted 

thousands of women in the cause 

of planting trees all over Kenya,” 

he said. 

“Lisa and I went to Yale University 

to get archival footage of the 

movement and to meet Wangari, 

who was teaching there for a semester 

in the school of forestry,” 

he continued. 

“At first [the film] was going 

to be about the Green Belt 

Movement only, but when we 

met Wangari we knew our film 

had to be about her — she was 

such an amazing presence, and 

her story was too big not to,” 

Dater said. 

“The minute we met her, we 

hit it off,” Merton said. “I was so 

moved I wrote a poem.” 

Since that fateful meeting, Taking 

Root has taken over the couple’s 

lives. 

“We haven’t just been making 

a film,” Merton explained, 

“It’s come into everything we 

do. Sometimes it’s been overwhelming 

– but it’s also been 

amazing.” 

Planting trees — literally 

and symbolically 

Merton said she comes to the 

film “as an activist at heart,” with 

a highly attuned sense of injustice 

in her bones, in her DNA. 

“My grandfather was rounded 

up on Krystalnacht,” she explained. 

“He survived. My father 

had escaped from Nazi Germany 

a few years earlier and fled to 

South Africa.” 

Merton was born in Cape 

Town, South Africa, where her 

parents lived during the institution 

of the pass laws, designed to 

segregate the population during 

the apartheid era there. 

“When all their children were 

old enough to travel, they left for 

America,” Merton said of her parents. 

“They didn’t want to raise 

us under apartheid. But they saw 

injustice to blacks in this country, 

too.” 

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802-254-8160 

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Daily Hot Bar 

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Everyone’s Books 

EVERYONE’S 

BOOKS 

for Social Justice & The Earth 

books 

tapes/cds 

periodicals 

t-shirts 

buttons 

bumper stickers 

cards 

Open 7 days a week 

Mon: 9:30 – 5:30 

Tues: 9:30 – 6 

Wed: 9:30 – 6 

Thurs: 9:30 – 6 

Fri: 9:30 – 8 

Sat: 9:30 – 7 

Sun: 11 – 5 

Ariel Poster/courtesy Marlboro Productions 

A scene filmed at Green Belt Movement tree nursery in Tumutumu Hills, Kenya. 

The film starts out with lyrical 

words and images of Maathai’s 

beloved fig tree that grew near 

her childhood home, a “tree of 

God.” The film goes on to record, 

through interviews and archival 

footage, the events — political 

and personal — that fueled 

Maathai’s mission to plant trees 

in her native Kenya. 

The movement grew through 

civic and environmental workshops 

called, in her tribal Kikuyu 

language, Wemenye (“Look at 

Yourself”). Besides the practical 

question of how to plant a tree, 

these workshops evolved into a 

way to change the consciousness 

of village women, who would 

complain to Maathai that they 

didn’t have enough firewood or 

water to fetch. 

While pointing out the legacy 

of colonialism, the workshops 

seek to show the women how 

they can get past fear to quite 

literally take their lives in their 

own hands. It is a retraining in 

attitude. 

Awards and honors 

First seen in a not-quite-complete 

version at the Brattleboro 

Women’s Film Festival in 2007 

(and winning the Best of the Fest 

award), the film has since been 

re-edited and footage added. 

The film now also features original 

music by Samite, a Uganda 

musician who escaped from Idi 

Amin’s dictatorship and ended 

up in a refugee camp in Kenya. 

Samite, who now lives in Ithaca, 

N.Y., and who played at the 

Latchis Theater in August, adds 

a subtle, rhythmic thread to the 

film with his musical score. 

“The film now has a life of 

its own,” said Dater, a wellseasoned 

and award-winning 

cinematographer. 

“It got its lift-off from Full 

Frame,” which Dater described 

as “a premier documentary film 

festival,” where the film won the 

Women in Leadership award last 

April. 

“Taking Root has also gotten 

into some of the most prestigious 

international festivals, including 

Hot Docs, the documentary film 

festival,” he said; Taking Root 

won the Audience Award at the 

Canadian festival. It has garnered 

eight other awards, among 

them “Best Feature Length Film 

Directed or Co-Directed by a 

Woman” at Nashville, and the 

Amnesty International Durban 

Human Rights Award at the Durban 

International Film Festival in 

South Africa. 

Recently at the Recontres Internationales 

du Documentaire 

de Montreal (RIDM) Taking Root 

won both audience award (prix 

du public) and the award for an 

ecologically themed film (prix 

eccocamera). 

The film will be shown on Independent 

Lens, an independent 

documentary film program, 

Tuesday, April 14 on most PBS 

stations. 

Maathai’s bond 

The filmmakers believe the 

strength of the bond they feel 

with Maathai is about the land. 

They both have deep connections 

to the natural world since 

childhood. 

Dater grew up on his family’s 

farm in Cummington, Mass. He 

milked cows and worked with his 

parents to grow the food that sustained 

them, while Merton grew 

up in rural Vermont with plenty 

of land, a cow, horseback riding, 

and lots of trees. 

“We share her understanding 

of the rhythms of the natural 

world,” Merton said. “The Kenyans 

always had their close connection 

to the land, but Wangari 

has kept it.” 

“It is the source of her 

power,” she added with great 

conviction. 

For Wangari Maathai, a long 

and difficult road led to her accomplishments 

and the high regard 

in which she is now held. 

After coming to the United 

States with a hand-picked group 

of Kenya’s best and brightest 

to go to college through the Joseph 

P. Kennedy Foundation 

— President-elect Obama’s father 

had come a year earlier — 

Maathai eventually returned to 

face her country’s future and 

confront its colonial past. 

A big part of that past was the 

removal of the tribal peoples 

from their land by the British. 

As a consequence, their culture, 

so steeped in nature, was taken 

from them as well. 

An awareness of this consequence 

is at the heart of Taking 

Root. 

The power of 

stubbornness 

“She has connected the dots 

between environmental degradation 

and economic and social injustice 

-- it is all around us, in this 

country too,” Merton said. 

This truism may be seen, Merton 

points out, in the fact that 

poorer states have the most polluting 

plants and factories, and 

consequent poor health. 

The desire to do something 

about the corruption and depleted 

environment that was 

making life miserable for her 

people brought Maathai — who 

describes herself as “stubborn” 

— up against the entrenched 

powers time and again. 

In 1977, already a public figure, 

she made headlines and 

was jailed for standing up for her 

rights as a woman in divorce proceedings, 

calling the judge “incompetent 

or corrupt.” 

In 1989, following actions to 

keep trees in Uhuru Park in Nairobi, 

Kenya from being cut for a 

corporate skyscraper, she was 

publicly chastised by the country’s 

leader, Daniel Arap Moi. 

One of the more disturbing 

pieces of archival footage in 

the film shows Moi addressing 

the crowd: “Along comes this 

woman. Can’t you women control 

one of your own who has 

crossed the line?” Moi asked the 

thousands of women assembled 

for his speech. 

Facing derision from even her 

friends, Maathai called the rebuke 

“a low point in my life.” But 

The help of many 

Taking Root, the film, shares 

something with the Green Belt 

Movement, its subject: Both 

have depended on the help of 

many working toward a common 

goal. 

“So many people from right 

here in Marlboro helped us,” 

Merton said — from writing 

proposals, to raising funds, to 

looking at clips, to giving their 

daughter “a home when we had 

to travel.” 

“We literally couldn’t have 

made this film without the community,” 

she added. 

Merton and Dater have high 

hopes for the film’s future. 

“We want to make this an educational 

tool,” Merton said. “People 

working in the deforested 

parts of the world need it -- and 

want it.” 

Taking Root is slated to be 

shown in Bali and throughout 

Indonesia in a dubbed version. 

In Montreal, at the RIDM film 

festival, Merton and Dater made 

the acquaintance of Nadine Dominique, 

the daughter of radio 

personality and agronomist Jean 

Dominique, who was murdered 

for speaking out against the regime 

of Jean-Claude Duvalier 

in Haiti. 

Merton called that country the 

“holy grail” of the environmental 

movement because all the issues 

are in bold face, and any actions 

taken can have a strong impact. 

“Environmental justice, economic 

justice, and social justice 

are all wrapped into one tight 

knot…it is where I wanted the 

film to end, with the Green Belt 

Movement coming into Haiti,” 

she said. And in fact, a “chapter” 

of the Movement started 

last autumn. 

Through Nadine Dominique, 

a dubbed version of Taking Root 

will soon be shown throughout 

Haiti. 

No longer scoffing 

When Merton and Dater 

started their film they could not 

have possibly known what a gigantic 

labor of love it was destined 

to become. Nor could they 

imagine Wangari Maathai would 

receive the Nobel Peace Prize 

two years into their acquaintance, 

midway through finishing 

their film. 

“When we would tell funders 

about her and compare her to 

[Nelson] Mandela or Martin Luther 

King, they’d scoff,” Merton 

said. “They no longer do.” 

“It has taken over 30 years, but 

her voice, and the cause it serves, 

has been heard by the world,” 

the filmmaker added. “This 

film will provide an understanding 

of the depth of Maathai’s 

accomplishment.” 

Taking Root will be shown at 

the Latchis Theater, 50 Main 

St., Brattleboro from Friday, 

Jan. 9 through Thursday, Jan. 

15. Opening night will feature 

a question-and-answer session 

with Merton and Dater. DVDs 

will be offered for sale opening 

night as well — the only opportunity 

to buy the film until May. 

By Nell Curley 


BRATTLEBORO—Karen 

Hesse says that it usually takes 

her eight months to a year of research 

before she even writes a 

word of her historical novels. 

“I read every word about it that 

I can find — fiction and nonfiction 

[…] I exhaust primary and 

secondary sources,” the author 

says of the thorough research 

that pays off well for her preteen 

readers. 

In her latest novel, Brooklyn 

Bridge, set in 1903, Hesse, author 

of Out of the Dust, Letters 

from Rifka, and Music of the 

Dolphins, chronicles the life of 

young Joseph Michtom, son of 

Russian immigrants in Brooklyn 

who have invented the first 

teddy bear and have turned their 

novelty candy store into a bearmaking 

factory. 

Joseph considers himself far 

more “lucky” than some children 

in his neighborhood, but the 

new business has changed the 

relationship the Michtoms have 

with their friends and neighbors. 

Now Joseph has to deal with an 

added workload and the coldness 

of his friends, who think he’s too 

good for them due to his family’s 

“lucky break.” 

Joseph Michtom, the narrator, 

is a serious and introspective 

character who loves his family, 

but wishes he were treated 

as more of an adult. His dream 

is to visit Coney Island, but instead 

he is made to work long 

hours at home and look after his 

younger siblings. His burdens 

are like having his own “bear” 

that he must carry around, like 

his brother who has clung to 

the very first teddy bear since 

infancy. 

Hesse was inspired to write 

this book after reading The 

Way Everyday Things Are Made, 

which she purchased from another 

author while at a conference. 

That book features the true 

story of the Michtom family and 

their invention of the teddy bear, 

named after Teddy Roosevelt 

and inspired by a bear cub he 

famously refused to shoot. 

Hesse was intrigued by how 

the Michtoms had “escaped the 

political bear in Russia, only to 

come to the United States and 

discover their fortune through 

the teddy bear,” she says. “It was 

a story I could understand and 

could tell.” 

Hesse was even able to interview 

the granddaughter of Emily 

Michtom, Joseph’s younger 

sister, as part of her research 

for Bridge. 

“I followed the lead backwards 

for this story,” she says. “I built 

the characters from who they 

became as adults.” 

Witness and Aleutian Sparrow 

are two other examples of 

Hesse’s research skills, which do 

much to make the stories come 

alive and sound contemporary, 

even when set in 1930s South or 

in World War II Alaska. 

In Bridge, Hesse intersperses 

actual quotations from The New 

York Times, describing the attractions 

of the then-brand-new Coney 

Island, where Joseph dreams 

of going. 

When it comes to the protagonists 

and narrators of her books, 

including Bridge, Hesse never 

ventures outside the age range 

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14 THE ARTS The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 THE ARTS 15 

“Fantasy in Three,” 2008. Oil on birch panel. 28” x 76”. 

“Autumn Fugue,” 2007. Oil on birch panel. 52” x 80”. 

Simple beauty and artistic challenge 

For Tim Allen, painting trees connects 

inner creativity with engaging the 

public in artistic expression 

By Alexander Gutterman 


WESTMINSTER WEST—A 

tangle of intertwined vegetation 

fills a reporter’s field of vision, 

light pouring in through gaps between 

leaves and branches. 

The setting is not in the midst 

of some deep, sunlit forest, but 

rather in front of local painter 

Tim Allen’s most recent work, a 

triptych, “Fantasy in Three.” 

A slim, intense, and introspective 

44-year-old painter from 

Westminster West, Allen recently 

shared his process and the creation 

of a new work with the public 

at the Windham Art Gallery 

in Brattleboro. 

Visible through the gallery’s 

pane glass, Allen chatted with 

visitors while applying daubs 

of paint to the gradually emerging 

image of a tree. Finished 

canvasses of colorful, carefully 

rendered trees covered the gallery 

walls. 

“Totem,” 

2008. 

Oil on Dibond 

aluminum panel. 

33” x 60”. 

Allen hasn’t always made trees 

the main focus of his artwork. In 

fact, his career path has been, arguably, 

as sinuous and branching 

as the subject matter of his 

recent artistic efforts. 

An artistic youth 

“I started painting when I was 

nine, and drawing quite a bit before 

that,” Allen said. “I grew up 

in suburban Florida where there 

wasn’t much opportunity for exposure 

to art, but I managed 

to get away to do some college 

courses in New York and elsewhere. 

My parents weren’t very 

cultured, so I had to teach myself 

about all this.” 

While Allen’s contemporary 

work blends elements of mystery 

and technical realism, his 

initial approach to drawing and 

painting emphasized technique 

and precision. 

“I was pretty accomplished 

at very fine detail work when I 

was in high school, so when I 

went to college at the Rhode Island 

School of Design I decided 

I wanted to be a medical illustrator,” 

he said. 

But soon after, “I realized that 

I didn’t want to limit myself in 

that way,” Allen recalled. “I got 

inspired by 3D design work and 

switched to industrial design, but 

I lost interest in that as well.” 

Simple emphasis on 

natural beauty 

Following 2½ years at the 

Rhode Island School of Design, 

Allen retreated from painting, 

earning a massage certificate 

and making his living as a massage 

therapist in the Boston area 

for 15 years. 

Only recently, in 2001, did he 

made his way north to Vermont, 

where he once again took up the 

paintbrush. That was when the 

current phase of tree paintings 

began taking shape. 

“Totem,” painted looking upward 

from the base of a single 

birch tree, shows evidence of 

the foundation of technical skill 

Allen gained in his early years of 

study. A slim, elegantly painted, 

bi-color trunk reaches into a flawless 

sky, leaves spreading in autumnal 

hues overhead, conjuring 

the classic feel of a mid-fall high 

afternoon, warmth in the sun 

but with winter clearly waiting 

in the wings. 

Why trees? Well, there are a 

lot of them in this area, and a lot 

of them are quite lovely. 

For Allen, however, this recent 

focus on the arboreal also 

reflects something other than 

a simple emphasis on natural 

beauty. He is drawn to trees partially 

because of the technical 

challenges and opportunities 

they provide, and partially by 

more intangible factors. 

“When I first started painting 

again, I had been looking a lot at 

trees, and became interested in 

their character, their spirit,” he 

said. “I was fascinated as well 

by how they are grouped, their 

patterns. I found myself wanting 

to create an experience of someone 

looking out their window into 

that environment.” 

Then came the inevitable 

technical challenges and 

developments. 

“It can be almost like doing 

stained glass. I can see the trees 

as the bits in between and the 

air or sky as the glass,” Allen 

said. “I’m very interested in what 

happens at the edges, between 

the object and the surrounding 

atmosphere.” 

Allen also appreciates the mathematical 

aspects of vegetation. 

“I like the balance trees provide 

us between regular patterns 

and randomness, and I work 

to create a sense of this in my 

paintings.” 

Allen’s own creative process 

does not necessarily include 

much explicit investigation into 

what the focus on trees may 

reveal about his personal landscape. 

“It’s a bit of a mystery 

to me,” he reflected. “I’m sure 

someone more well versed in 

psychology would have lots to 

say about it.” 

COURTESY TIM ALLEN 

Tim Allen works publicly at the Windham Art Gallery. 

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A new and fresh 

experiment 

The artist’s most recent triptych, 

rich with complex, multiple 

layers of fantastically intertwining, 

verdant plant life, represents 

a significant move into the realm 

of the subjective. 

“It started as a completely 

stream-of-consciousness work,” 

Allen recalled. “I had been experimenting 

with drawing and 

painting with my left hand, to let 

something else come through.” 

Something new and fresh did 

indeed emerge from the process. 

“I had some idea that it would 

be about trees in some way, and 

I worked on it for a year and a 

half,” Allen said. “I ended up 

making the whole thing about 

a hybrid birch that looks like an 

oak tree.” 

The artist called the work “risk 

taking” and “a breakthrough 

painting for me.” 

“It’s a lot less literal than my 

previous paintings. I wasn’t trying 

to capture something I had 

seen in nature, but rather something 

from my imagination,” he 

said. 

Looking within 

and without 

Allen does have a clear picture 

of some of the factors that 

prompt him to enjoy life as an 

artist, as well as some of the fundamental 

spiritual realities of the 

artist’s life. 

“I think that a lot of my 

motivation as a young artist revolved 

around wanting attention,” 

he said. “I was fairly insecure and 

got a lot of positive attention for 

the art I created. That became 

my way to identify myself in the 

world.” 

But over time, Allen found himself 

“working for and desiring 

more of a connection” with his 

inner being. 

“I think I had created something 

of a façade around my external 

being and left my heart 

behind because initially I didn’t 

know how to do both [the technical 

and the inner work],” he 

said. 

Art bridges worlds 

In moving toward a harmony 

of the inward and technical, Allen 

has achieved what many artists 

would consider external success. 

He lives entirely supported by 

his work, showing regionally, 

and selling pieces regularly at 

four-digit price tags. 

Art, he notes, can bridge the 

universal contradiction between 

individual human solitude and 

the connectedness of the human 

family. 

“We’re all alone. It’s our existential 

condition,” Allen reflected. 

“But we fill our lives with company, 

people, and distractions. 

As a massage therapist, my work 

had interface with another human 

being, the client. When I 

returned to painting, I really had 

to show up for myself.” 

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“I believe that we’re all connected,” 

he mused. “That connection 

is reinforced and validated 

when I share my vision and people 

relate to it.” 

Positive attention helps, too. 

“When people are loving my 

work, they’re loving me,” he 

says. “And I’m sharing something 

of myself with them. We 

all thrive a little bit on being 

admired.” 

Sharing the creative process 

in an art gallery window creates 

connections between the 

artist and the rest of the world 

— sometimes in less-than-positive 

ways. 

What’s most unkind thing 

anyone has said to Allen about 

his work? 

The artist chuckled. “Someone 

said to me once: ‘Well, I really 

like the frame.’” 

Has he heard any memorably 

positive words about his paintings 

lately? 

“The kindest thing?” Allen 

smiled, paused, and 

contemplated. 

“Recently, someone said that 

they stood in front of one of my 

paintings and thought it was one 

of the most beautiful things they 

had ever seen.” 

“And to top that off, they said 

they had to buy it,” Allen added. 

“And they did!” 

Tim Allen’s work can be seen 

on the Web at www.timallenart. 

com. 

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16 The Commons • January 2009 

The Commons • January 2009 VOICES 17 

Voices 

VIEWPOINTS, ESSAYS, AND PERSONAL PERSPECTIVES 

BY, FOR, AND ABOUT THE CITIZENS OF WINDHAM COUNTY 

Day 1 

As I type into 

the terminal at 

the warehouse “job center,” I file 

my electronic application form 

for “selector” and go home, but 

not before taking a look around 

the room. What catches my eye 

is a prominent sign warning prospective 

employees that fighting 

is grounds for dismissal, unless 

the other guy starts it. 

I had reviewed the descriptions 

of available jobs and I decided 

against “slot cleaner,” 

mainly because it sounds like 

some kind of degraded sex 

slave. I also decided that it isn’t 

worth working at –20 degrees F 

in the freezer warehouse for an 

extra 25 cents an hour. So “grocery 

selector” it was. 

A couple days later I get a 

call from human resources, and 

when I arrive at the job center, 

there are three other guys waiting. 

A young guy with a crew cut 

and bad skin, sitting near me, 

announces to the room that it’s 

uncomfortable waiting in here. 

He speaks in a slow, thick monotone, 

gazing straight ahead. 

“I hope I get this job. I’m 

technically homeless. I got no 

money.” 

I meet his gaze when he 

glances my way, and the monologue 

is directed mainly at me. 

Chuck last had a job when he 

was 19; he was fired for stealing 

beer. He had been through 

MEMOIR 

On the 

night shift 

Behind the scenes at a 

grocery warehouse in a job 

that few will endure for long 

Brattleboro 

Most sleep experts say adjusting fully to being active at 

night and asleep during the day is not entirely possible, 

and night-shift work is correlated with certain cancers 

and with depression and other mental illness, as well as with sleep 

disorders. Most Americans are now sleep-deprived, but night workers 

are more so, by an hour and a half on average, as they are often 

unable to sleep more than a few hours at a time when they are off 

duty. 

Sleep deprivation piles up over the course of a string of night 

shifts, with increasing cumulative effect on mood, attention, and 

stress level. Some people are better able to cope with an upsidedown 

schedule than others. And some people prefer to work at 

night, citing the typically lower level of supervision and formality. 

But for most people, the night shift is a struggle against their 

nature, a bargain made with necessity. The hours of the day are 

not alike and interchangeable; night, research suggests, cannot be 

traded with day without a cost. 

a “faith-based teen drug and alcohol 

recovery program” three 

or four times, but wasn’t getting 

much out of it. Somewhere 

along the way he served 18 

months in jail for “burglary, larceny, 

arson — little stuff.” 

Someone had asked me recently 

if I thought I was too good 

for work such as the job I was 

seeking at the warehouse. No, I 

explained, it’s not that I think I’m 

too good. I think everyone is too 

good. Chuck was tempting me 

to reconsider my position. 

After a substantial wait, we are 

each brought individually into 

the HR office for an initial interview. 

Soon it is time to put on an 

orange vest and go on a tour of 

the warehouse with the other 

applicants, after which we will 

have a second interview, with a 

supervisor. 

The route to the warehouse 

takes us through concrete-block 

corridors lined with disheveled, 

windowless rooms, some with 

a chair or a table, some empty. I 

feel like I am entering some CIA 

black site for interrogation. 

The warehouse itself, though, 

is awe-inspiring, in an otherworldly, 

sci-fi way: 450,000 

square feet, with palletized grocery 

items of all kinds stacked 

ten or 12 tiers high. What light 

there is filters down through 

space from the distant ceiling, 

cold and bluish. 

The Reluctant Bat — the pseudonym for one of our regular 

contributors — worked for 43 days on the night shift some time 

in the not-so-distant past in a local grocery warehouse and kept 

this diary. Although The Commons maintains a policy of publishing 

commentary under a contributor’s real name, we make an 

exception here to give readers a glimpse of this difficult job and the 

variety of people who undertake it. The names have been changed 

out of courtesy to the Bat’s former co-workers. 

It is something like being on 

the floor of a rain forest, where 

the sun’s rays scarcely reach the 

earth — or it would be if rainforests 

were made of steel racks, 

the earth were concrete, and 

the sun were a fluorescent tube. 

Eight- or ten-foot-long motorized 

pallet jacks zip past us, honking, 

most driven by young men who 

are either serious or just tired. 

They lean into the curves, traveling 

at surprising speed. 

It is tough work, Bob, our 

guide, told us, and we can expect 

to lift 1,500 cases per shift. 

After our training period, if we 

are fast, we can earn a little 

more per hour. 

After the second interview, 

Bob congratulates me and says 

he is able to offer me a job, provisionally, 

contingent on my 

passing a drug test and physical 

screening, for which I must return 

the following day. 

The adventure is afoot. 

Day 4 

I hate to be a 

wuss, but I’m a 

little worried about the sleep cycle 

disruption. It has been a long 

time since I have stayed up late 

with any frequency. My shift will 

be 7 p.m. to 5:30 a.m., or maybe 

later if the warehouse is busy. 

These hours will at least allow 

me to see my wife and one-yearold 

daughter for an early dinner 

and then, when I get home from 

work, to see them off to work 

and daycare. After that, I’ll need 

to sleep. 

It’s not just sleep that worries 

me, though. If I do sleep eight 

hours out of the 24, work 10 and 

commute about two, that will 

leave me just three hours, during 

which I’ll need to eat dinner 

and sometimes prepare it, 

take care of any housework that 

needs doing, pay some attention 

to our dog, or anything else 

there is to do. Maybe even get 

outside for some fresh air and 

wholesome exercise. 

My concern is less the dearth 

of free time than the subjective 

sense I anticipate having that 

almost the whole of the day is 

taken up with a highly repetitive, 

essentially meaningless job. I’m 

afraid I’ll get very depressed. 

There’s another thing: I’ve 

always worked for very small 

operations, and usually ones 

that I considered in a way contributing 

to the sort of world I 

want to live in. I’m used to being 

friendly with the bosses (usually), 

being known as an individual, 

and enjoying a minimum of 

bureaucracy. 

I think the warehouse will be 

different. The company has dozens 

of locations, with 1,200 employed 

at the warehouse where 

I’ll be working. I’m going to be 

a small cog in a large machine. 

I’ve been psyching myself up 

for the experience by viewing it 

as a research opportunity — research 

into industrial work, circadian 

rhythms, class, and pallet 

jack technique. 

Day 5 

NAME WITHHELD/THE COMMONS 

(the first night 

on the job): 

Watching a really good pallet 

jack operator gives the same 

kind of pleasure as watching a 

skillful ice skater. There is the 

same ease, efficiency, and grace. 

Watching me use a pallet jack, 

on the other hand, is more like 

watching somebody wobble and 

jerk on skates — you just hope 

nobody gets hurt. 

But let’s back up a bit. When I 

arrived at the warehouse to begin 

orientation, nobody I had 

interviewed with had returned, 

not even Chuck. There were 

eight other guys, all between 

perhaps 18 and late 20s, making 

me, at almost 40, the old man of 

the group. 

We watched a safety movie, in 

which I learned the meaning of 

the huge banner hanging in the 

warehouse, which reads “Slam 

the job.” As every industrial 

safety educator knows, acronyms 

are the key to avoiding injuries 

and the resulting worker’s 

comp claims and lost productivity. 

In this case, it’s “SLAM”: 

Stop, Look, Assess and Manage. 

The goal of SLAM? ALARP: 

As Little As Reasonably Possible. 

Uh, as little what? As little 

danger, apparently, or injury. 

Watching a surveillance camera 

video of a forklift catching on 

one of the steel racks and falling 

down with its forks raised 

high drives the point home: with 

all the heavy equipment rolling 

around in there, it is very 

possible to get hurt. 

When we were interviewed, 

we were told we’d have to wear 

steel-toed boots, and were given 

a sheet, telling us that without 

them, we wouldn’t be allowed 

to start work. After the movie, 

the night shift manager told us 

about checking to make sure 

new hires have “steels.” 

He asked if we were all wearing 

steels. Everyone nodded. He 

said in just about every group of 

new people there’s somebody 

who doesn’t have them, and 

asked again if we all did. Everyone 

said yes. 

So again, the manager asked 

us all if we were wearing steels. 

Again, everyone said yes. We 

proceeded out of the conference 

room and down a long stairway, 

at the bottom of which he had 

us each pause on the last step, 

where he tested our boots with 

a press of his thumb. One guy 

wasn’t wearing steel-toed boots. 

Jesus Christ.He made a trip to 

Wal-Mart and came back. 

At last it was time to get into 

the warehouse and get started 

learning how to drive pallet 

jacks. After not really teaching 

us how to go through the required 

nightly equipment check, 

our instructor went on to not tell 

us how to operate the jacks, after 

which we each individually 

tried to negotiate a figure eight 

around some cardboard tubes 

in an empty area of the shipping 

dock. It was a little like learning 

an arcade game that doesn’t provide 

instructions — you just fool 

around until you start to get the 

idea. 

Too sharp a twist on the 

throttle, and the jack can lurch 

abruptly. Some of us got the 

hang of it more quickly than others. 

I was clearly among the less 

gifted in the group. It was a bit 

like learning to drive a car with 

a bunch of spectators on hand 

— embarrassing. 

The rest of the evening we 

spent cruising around the warehouse 

at random, up and down 

the aisles, getting a feel for the 

machines and starting to get 

acquainted with the building’s 

layout. 

Partway through the night 

we reconvened for a tour of the 

freezer warehouse, where three 

of the nine of us would be working. 

Although it is a separate 

building, it is connected by a 

long enclosed ramp with switchbacks, 

which we drove in convoy 

on our jacks. The freezer 

warehouse is a lot like the regular 

grocery warehouse, except 

for one crucial difference: it’s 

cold. It’s really f—ing cold. Entering 

it, I immediately felt like 

I had progressed toward one of 

the inner circles of hell, where 

everyone is grimmer, more desperate, 

toiling in a state of resigned 

misery. On the other 

hand, the freezer guys make an 

extra 25 cents an hour. That’s 

enough for a gumball. 

Day 14 

It seems I was 

right to be 

concerned about sleep. On night 

two, the first shift that I worked 

until 5:30 a.m., exhaustion hit 

me like a wall at 2 a.m. It wasn’t 

bodily exhaustion — I’ve pushed 

my body much harder plenty of 

times — but the wearing down 

of consciousness. 

Suddenly it overtook me, 

transforming me from kind 

of draggy to stupified in a moment. 

I found it hard to read the 

numbers on my list of cases to 

pick up, and even had to make 

a deliberate effort to discern 

whether I was holding it right 

side up or not. I became disoriented, 

unable to remember what 

part of the warehouse I was in 

and which way to go next. (Fortunately, 

it is about as difficult to 

get truly lost in as Manhattan, 

since it is a mostly orderly numbered 

grid system.) 

My feet grew heavy, and I 

stumbled. It was after I got 

home that things happened that 

made me realize how impaired I 

really was, though. After spending 

a few minutes with my wife 

and daughter, I went to bed and 

was soon sleeping heavily. But 

not for long — four hours and 

I was awake again, unable to 

sleep, although still thoroughly 

tired. 

I heated my coffee. When I 

opened the microwave, there 

was milk splattered around the 

inside of it, and a mug with a little 

milk and no coffee. 

It disturbs me that this kind 

of exhaustion is routine among 

medical residents, who are in 

a position to make worse mistakes 

than forgetting to pour 

coffee along with milk. It’s also 

no comfort to know how many 

people — like me — are driving 

while operating in such a subpar 

condition. 

Tiredness is said to be comparable 

to inebriation in its effect 

on judgment and reflexes. I 

know in my state of fatigue I was 

no more able to will myself into 

real alertness than I could will 

myself sober after getting hammered. 

Happily, the worst seems 

to be over. I am somewhat accustomed 

to being up all night 

now, and I haven’t experienced 

that intense fatigue again. 

But my success at sleeping 

enough during the day is mixed. 

However much I sleep, I don’t 

feel fully rested. Undoubtedly 

this is partly because I am still 

sick (and undoubtedly I am still 

sick partly because I am not getting 

fully rested), but I suspect 

that the irregular daytime sleep 

I get simply isn’t as restful as 

routine nighttime sleep. The two 

days I have had off from work 

so far were mostly consumed 

with recovering from the preceding 

days, and my main preoccupation 

whenever I am not 

in the warehouse is trying to get 

enough rest. 

Day 29 

The job is 

straightforward: 

drive around the warehouse 

collecting cases to fill 

orders, loading them onto pallets, 

and staging the pallets on 

the shipping dock to be put onto 

trucks. 

Mostly it’s a matter of getting 

a feel for it. Stacking a proper 

load on a pallet has been the 

main concern of my group’s 

trainer, Matt, who is our supervisor 

during the two-month training 

period. 

“Building a pallet,” as it is 

called, is something like building 

a stone wall, in that the goal 

is to use gravity to hold a pile of 

irregular objects together into 

an orderly formation. As with 

walling, corners are critical, and 

it is important to try to keep everything 

level. 

Of course, boxes are more 

regular than stones, but they 

come in a remarkable array of 

sizes and shapes and packaging. 

Ordinarily, a selector heads out 

with two pallets on his jack and 

fills both to a height of somewhere 

between four and six feet. 

The solidity of the load on the 

back pallet is most important; 

the items on the back are most 

likely to fly off when one goes 

around corners, and the front 

pallet has the advantage of being 

sandwiched between the 

load rack and the back pallet. 

Bigger, heavier items go on the 

back; small things and stuff that 

doesn’t stack neatly go on the 

front. 

It is desirable not to handle a 

case more than once. Steps between 

the pallets and the driving 

platform of the jack add up over 

a shift, another reason to put 

small items on the front pallet. 

A load tends to become less 

orderly and stable as it develops; 

having to pile a number of large, 

heavy cases on top of a wobbly 

pile of assorted-size boxes is difficult, 

and best avoided by putting 

those cases on the bottom. 

As Barbara Ehrenreich observed 

of low-status, low-wage 

jobs in her book Nickled and 

Dimed, work that is usually considered 

“unskilled” often, in fact, 

demands considerable skill, as 

well as sheer effort, to do well. 

That’s the case with building a 

good pallet. Building a bad pallet 

can result in having half the load 

abruptly distributed across the 

floor when one turns, stops, or 

starts suddenly — as I have experienced 

repeatedly. 

If one could look at the list 

and quickly discern which items 

should be picked out of sequence 

and where in the load 

they should go, it would be a 

great help. Matt has an uncanny 

ability to do this. 

There are, I think, about 

28,000 different items in the 

warehouse. How in God’s name 

could Matt remember what any 

given three-number sequence 

refers to? But a list of numbers 

that are to me totally meaningless 

are to him, apparently, readable 

as specific known items in 

certain locations. 

Another time, before sending 

me out, Matt told me to pick a 

number of items first, because 

they are all in the same size 

boxes. Then he pointed out another 

item, which he said was 

slightly taller, good to include 

with the others, but put in a 

corner, because it is desirable 

for corners to be higher than the 

rest of the load. 

Somehow Matt was able to 

recall the relative size of the 

boxes with such precision that 

he could warn me of a difference 

of a half-inch or so. And on 

one occasion, when I returned 

to the dock with loaded pallets, 

he noticed one box and said, “So 

that’s what size that one is,” and 

seemed to gaze intently at it to 

fix its dimensions in his mind. 

He was genuinely interested in 

the case, and appeared to fully 

intend to remember it. 

Building pallets has been likened 

to playing Tetris in three 

dimensions, which seems very 

apt. I asked Matt, who seems 

to genuinely take pleasure in 

arranging cases on pallets, 

whether he is good at Tetris. He 

said he is, and used to play it a 

lot. 

Day 31 

During this 

two-month 

training period, I’m paid hourly 

— $12, plus 25 cents for working 

the night shift. But after 60 

days, grocery selectors are paid 

on a piecework basis, per case, 

with an adjustment for accuracy. 

The rate is about 11 cents a case 

to start with, but is decreased 

to 8.25 cents if a selector makes 

too many mistakes. From time 

to time, a truck load of pallets is 

audited. 

Picking cases is essentially 

solitary work, and there’s no 

feeling of everyone being part 

of a single project. The usual 

courtesies of trying not to get 

in people’s way are colored, on 

one hand, by the knowledge that 

if you hold somebody up you’re 

costing him money, and on the 

other by the awareness that 

if you try too hard not to hold 

other people up, you’re cutting 

into your own pay. 

People are, however, organized 

into “teams” that work on 

the same truckload of stuff, under 

the supervision of a person 

who is organizing that load. Being 

on a team doesn’t affect a 

worker much, except that the 

company cuts the pay of everyone 

on a team (for two weeks) 

if anyone on the team picks too 

many wrong cases. The company 

has a strong interest in fast 

work, since a given worker’s 

NAME WITHHELD/THE COMMONS 

benefits cost the same whether 

he picks 500 cases in a shift or 

2,000. And the worker can go 

from making pretty lousy money 

to doing pretty well, if he can really 

move a lot of cases. 

During our training period, 

although we’re not working 

“on incentive,” we have a quota 

to meet, which increases each 

week. I picked an average of 

650 cases per shift in my second 

week, which just barely met this 

quota. (If I were being paid on a 

piecework basis, I’d be making 

about $8 an hour.) By the end 

of the 60 days, we’re supposed 

to be picking about 1,500 cases, 

and anyone who doesn’t will either 

be kept on as a “trainee,” 

still making $12.50, or told to 

move on. 

Hurrying, then, is fundamental 

to the job. And guys 

who are picking at a high rate 

do move fast, throwing themselves 

up into the racks to reach 

high items at the back of a pallet, 

ducking under racks to get 

bottom-slot cases, tossing boxes 

onto their pallets and jumping 

back onto the jack to move 

onto the next thing. Wrapping 

finished pallets with the Saran 

Wrap–like film used to bind 

them together, they run in circles 

around the pallets, first upright, 

then bent at the waist with 

their heads pointed to the floor 

as they wind the film to the bottom 

of the pallet. 

Federal law allows for two 

15-minute breaks in a 10-hour 

shift, but unlike the 30-minute 

lunch break also mandated, we 

don’t clock out for them, so it is 

possible to skip them in order to 

increase the case-per-hour rate, 

and people often do. Many factors 

beyond a selector’s control 

can lower the pick rate: having 

to get a new battery for the jack; 

getting stuck behind forklifts 

in the aisles a lot; or most common, 

just getting an order that 

requires a lot of travel around 

the warehouse for relatively few 

items. 

Other slowdowns, more 

within a worker’s control, include 

losing part of a load due to 

excess speed and/or bad stacking, 

and cleaning up spills when 

something gets broken. The 

only way to keep the pick rate up 

in the face of such adversities is, 

n see RELUCTANT BAT, page 18

18 VOICES The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 VOICES 19 

Brattleboro 

The Brattleboro 

Selectboard announced 

today a one-time $30 

fee that will apply to all nonresidents 

of Vermont who have 

never been to Brattleboro or 

have even thought about visiting 

the town. To implement this 

new plan, the chairman of the 

Selectboard has instructed the 

town finance director to select 

any out-of-state phone books of 

his choosing and send invoices 

to all the names listed in the 

phone book. 

“Difficult times means difficult 

decisions,” said the chairman. 

“We have looked at every 

single line item in the town budget. 

We have no other options 

available. 

“We hope that all Americans 

will cooperate in our efforts to 

help shift the cost of Brattleboro 

town government onto the 

backs of randomly chosen nonresidents 

who have no intention 

of ever visiting Brattleboro, 

much less living here because 

of our property tax burden. Our 

actions are the reality of the 

current economic climate. We 

have no choice because we have 

looked at every individual line 

item in the budget.” 

When asked by a part-time, 

undocumented Dingville Deformer 

reporter about what 

Brattleboro will do with this 

new source of revenue, “just the 

other day an application for a 

new Discover card was received 

by the town manager,” the selectboard 

chairman responded. 

“According to our legal counsel, 

who recently ruled that an 

appraisal is not an appraisal but 

a data-gathering process that 

will become an appraisal after 

the grand list is established, 

the credit card offer from Discover 

is in fact a legally binding 

contract,” the chairman added. 

“Therefore, the issue can be discussed 

during executive session 

— which we did.” 

According to the credit-card 

flyer, “no principal or interest 

payments are due for 24 

months.” 

“The board has decided to 

take a cash advance from the 

Discover card to pay for badly 

needed paving and sidewalk repairs,” 

the chairman said. “Removing 

this line item from the 

budget will allow us to continue 

the town policy of annual automatic 

pay raises without increasing 

the overall tax rate,” he 

added. 

“To ensure the credit card bill 

is paid when due in 2011, the 

town has borrowed from our 

credit line at TD Banknorth that 

we use in lieu of unpaid property 

taxes to secure a surety bond 

issued by a Mr. Bernard Madoff 

in New York City, who has 

never lost money,” the chairman 

noted. 

“The residents of Brattleboro 

have to understand that as a selectboard, 

we have the fiduciary 

responsibility to look at every 

SATIRE 

In ‘Brattleborrow,’ 

(board) membership 

has its privileges 

Richard L. Elkins is 

a lifelong Brattleboro resident 

and a frequent contributor to 

iBrattleboro.com, where this 

piece first appeared. 

line item in the budget. During 

this process we uncovered 

the fact that 99.9 percent of this 

year’s budget is either fixed expenses 

or negotiated contracts, 

which no one can do anything 

about — including us as your 

elected officials,” he said. 

“I cannot repeat it enough. We 

have looked at every line item in 

the budget. What is it about that 

statement that residents do not 

understand? What is your problem? 

We have looked at every 

line item in this budget!” 

When asked by the Deformer 

reporter, who recently moved 

to Brattleboro because of all 

the subsidized housing in town, 

which has nothing to do with 

either the Grand List or property-tax 

rate, if the issue of randomly 

selecting people to pay 

for Brattleboro’s dilapidated infrastructure 

will be voted on at 

Town Meeting, the chairman responded, 

“Absolutely not.” 

“Town Meeting this year 

will continue its eighth annual 

n Reluctant Bat from page 17 

of course, to hurry more. 

There are no banners urging 

workers to move faster, but the 

language of money speaks more 

eloquently than these safety 

messages, and the importance 

of speed eclipses caution for the 

most part. Officially unsafe and 

forbidden practices all are a constant 

part of the job. 

A selector caught his leg between 

the railing and his jack 

and suffered a broken femur 

and a gash from hip to knee. Another 

guy’s hand was crushed. 

The guy with the mangled 

leg, if he returns to work, will 

have his pay cut. Preventable accidents, 

along with inaccurate 

picking, absences, and some 

other misdeeds, are among the 

things the company punishes 

workers for by cutting their percase 

rate. 

I have felt some desire to do 

this job well, which is to say 

quickly, but I soon resigned myself 

to failing in this regard. For 

one thing, a 20-year-old may be 

able to get away with throwing 

his body around at a 1,500-caseper-shift 

pace, but I can’t. 

For another, one of the few 

truths I think I understand about 

life is that, in the absence of a 

true emergency, hurrying is almost 

always a mistake. I would 

feel like a sucker if I were driving 

myself at the pace the company 

wants. So I work at a fairly 

quick but humane and dignified 

pace that, if I stick around long 

enough, will get me fired. 

tradition of impeaching former 

President Bush and Vice President 

Cheney; issuing a nonbinding 

resolution condemning 

man’s inhumanity to man; voting 

to shut down Entergy Nuclear 

Vermont Yankee; and, most importantly, 

taking a public oath to 

be sensitive whenever we see insensitivity,” 

he explained. 

“Here in Brattleboro, Representative 

Town Meeting understands 

its proper role with 

respect to town government. 

Representatives do not have to 

look at every line item in the 

budget because that is what we 

were elected to do.” 

“If residents are serious about 

Day 35 

One of the 

guys in my 

training group just got out of 

prison in New Hampshire. I 

think he might be living at the 

warehouse, because when we 

get off our shift he doesn’t leave 

— he sits in the waiting room 

outside the HR office. There’s a 

bathroom there, and just down 

the hall a number of unused offices 

a person could probably 

sleep in without being noticed. 

Another fellow recently 

moved to Vermont from a small 

town. Two seem like college students 

and don’t look like their 

situations are dire enough to explain 

working at the warehouse 

— they have nice clothes, probably 

bought by someone else, and 

they seem fresh and innocent. 

In another training group 

there’s an incredibly sweet black 

guy (noteworthy in a place as 

white as Vermont), a fat kid (I 

would bet a large sum he won’t 

last), and a fellow who is saving 

money to get the hell out of New 

England and move out West as 

soon as he can. 

A selector who has been at it 

for ten months or so told me that 

if I stick around, most likely I’ll 

be the only one in my group who 

does. In his tenure at the warehouse, 

he said, he’s seen hundreds 

of people come through 

and leave. 

The old hands, then, are an 

elite of sorts. You could look at 

them as those who are unable 

to find better work and so are 

stuck, and maybe there’s truth 

in that. But I suspect the few 

reducing property taxes,” said 

the chairman, “then everyone 

should attend the annual Brattleboro 

Union High School school 

board meeting in February, 

where teachers vote on whether 

or not to accept their automatic 

annual 15-percent pay raise.” 

In response to this comment, 

the chairman of the 

BUHS School Committee issued 

a public statement reiterating 

the school board’s position 

that the real reason why 80 percent 

of the BUHS junior class 

flunked the No Child Left Behind 

Achievement Test in February 

of 2007 was the fault of the 

who stay on for any length of 

time have found they can pick 

groceries and build pallets fast 

enough to make decent money, 

and those who work at night 

may be among the rare breed 

who actually like it. Most are a 

little older than most trainees 

— late 20s, perhaps — and they 

seem serious and focused. 

One of the shift supervisors 

told me he tried daytime work, 

at a desk job with the company, 

but he didn’t like dressing up 

(shirts with buttons) or the 

schedule. His wife didn’t like 

having him around the house 

when she was home, and he 

missed having the house to himself 

after work. So he’s back on 

nights in the warehouse, for the 

long haul. 

People like Matt, who have 

graduated to supervising the orders 

for truckloads and moving 

pallets onto the trucks, seem to 

be older still than the long-term 

selectors. They’re the sergeants 

of the warehouse command 

structure, close to the action on 

the ground but definitely a step 

above their squad members. 

One looks like a hippie, with 

his flowing hair, unkempt beard 

and Mexican coarse-cotton 

hoodie, but apparently missed 

the peaceful flower-child part of 

the orientation. He likes hearing 

himself bellow obscenities and 

death threats, and boasts of his 

many appearances in front of a 

judge for his misbehavior. 

Incentive selectors each have 

a jack of their own, and the more 

committed among them usually 

pimp them out with stickers (”I 

kill people like you” is one I’ve 

seen on more than one jack) and 

test and not the curriculum. 

Furthermore, to relieve any 

anxiety parents have about sending 

their children to BUHS, 

a new “get tough” policy has 

been adopted, one that clearly 

states that if your child arrives at 

school wearing a hooded white 

sheet and is carrying both a 

knife and hand grenade, then 

rest assured the principal will 

write a very stern letter to the 

child’s parents. 

When asked by the Dingville 

Deformer reporter about the 

proposed 7-percent increase 

in the BUHS budget,“The residents 

of Brattleboro have to understand 

that as a school board 

we have the fiduciary responsibility 

to look at every line item 

in the budget,” the school board 

chairman replied. 

“During this process we uncovered 

the fact that 99.9 percent 

of this year’s budget is 

either fixed expenses or negotiated 

contracts which no one 

can do anything about — including 

us as your elected officials. 

I cannot repeat it enough. We 

have looked at every line item in 

the budget. What is it about that 

statement that residents do not 

understand? What is your problem? 

We have looked at every 

line item in this budget!” 

According to the Brattleboro 

town manager, sometime in late 

January the selectboard will 

meet with corporate representatives 

from Master Card, Visa, 

and American Express to discuss 

the potential of using their 

credit card services to pay for 

a new police station, fire station, 

and waste treatment facility. 

This meeting will not be open to 

the public. 

n 

especially with stereos, which 

they build themselves to run off 

the 24-volt batteries that power 

the jacks. 

I’ve heard a variety of music 

amid the cacophony of competing 

stereos, including Elvis Presley 

and old-time Delta blues and 

stand-up comedy recordings. 

But the most popular genres 

seem to be thrash metal, hardcore, 

and hip hop — sounds that 

express rage and bad-ass posturing. 

It’s incongruous to hear 

the threatening approach of a 

jack playing what sounds like 

the soundtrack to hell and then 

see its typically mild-mannered 

driver. 

Day 43 

I was not fated 

to be among 

the elite who last for any length 

of time at the warehouse. The 

personal cost was too high. Although 

I got sufficiently adjusted 

to nocturnal life to be 

alert at work, I showed no signs 

of being able to function normally 

outside of work. If I wasn’t 

working or sleeping, I wished 

I were sleeping. Days off were 

mainly about recovering from 

days on. 

When my wife encouraged 

me to quit, despite the lack of 

a ready alternative, it became 

very clear that it was hard for 

her, too. Too hard. Like being a 

single parent living with a wraith 

who appeared once in a while. 

So I gave notice at the shipping 

office and was told that I 

might as well make that night 

my last. I bade farewell to Matt 

and clocked out. 

n 

Re-engaging in the process 

of politics — and liking it 

Williamsville 

It was in the dim light of a 

December afternoon back 

in 2003 that I first heard the 

news of torture at the military 

prison in Abu Ghraib. I remember 

deliberately turning off the 

car radio. For almost five years, 

I stopped seeking out the news. 

I was hardly surprised by the 

torture. I’d come to expect the 

worst from a political regime 

hell-bent on war. I’m familiar 

with studies that quantify the 

damage war has on those we 

ask to carry out the fighting, so 

it didn’t really surprise me that 

American soldiers were torturing 

Iraqis, both insurgents and 

civilians, their moral compasses 

having become unglued. 

Nor did the chain of deniability 

come as any surprise. Given 

the nature of war in general, and 

this war in particular, it made 

perfect sense that the privates 

photographed humiliating and 

torturing prisoners were acting 

on the lawlessness implied by 

the behavior of the military intelligence 

operatives, who most 

probably had direct orders from 

higher up. 

I found it easy to believe that 

a government willing to fake information 

to justify a war of aggression 

would also ignore the 

Geneva Conventions regarding 

the humane treatment of war 

prisoners. I was not feeling very 

proud to be an American, and I 

didn’t want to hear about it. 

I already lived without 

television, but I stopped listening 

to news entirely. Even so, 

I still had a pretty good idea of 

current events. In our media-saturated 

culture, it’s hard to avoid 

the news — or what passes for 

news. 

A lot of what is “reported,” 

especially during the seemingly 

interminable presidential 

campaign, is unhelpful. If newscasters 

aren’t hyping what a candidate 

is expected to say in the 

future, they are simply repeating 

sound bytes of what the candidates 

said that day, and often 

out of context. Without making 

a formidable effort to read detailed 

position papers, it’s difficult 

to know the truth of a 

candidate’s position. I didn’t try. 

I survived the two years of 

campaigning if not exactly in 

blissful ignorance, then at least 

with cynical disregard. Not until 

the Red Sox were in the playoffs 

did I even see a campaign ad. I 

was at my local bar, watching the 

game along with some regulars, 

including a woman who was sipping 

her beer and doing a crossword, 

seemingly inattentive to 

what was happening on TV. But 

as soon as the political campaign 

ad came on, she looked up and 

said for all to hear, “I’m so sick of 

them,” waving her hand toward 

the politicians on the screen. 

There were back-to-back ads, 

one for McCain and one for 

Obama, essentially each calling 

the other a liar, who, if elected, 

would bring the nation to its 

knees. Neither was informative, 

helpful, or even horrifying, 

as the inescapable coverage of 

cd SEIU INTERNATIONAL 

President-elect Barack Obama, smiling on the campaign 

trail. 

DEBORAH 

LEE 

LUSKIN 

Sarah Palin was. My kids forwarded 

me clips of Tina Fey 

as Palin, feeding my full-blown 

cynicism. 

As the election approached, 

I continued to attempt ignoring 

the pundits and pollsters. I’m 

still unclear why polls play such 

an important role in politics, as 

if elections were seventh-grade 

popularity contests rather than 

choices based on policy and 

character. Right up to election 

night, I disbelieved the numbers, 

unwilling to set myself up 

for what could only be a crushing 

disappointment, especially if 

voting irregularities and systematic 

disenfranchisement again 

determined the outcome. 

I was at a meeting on election 

night, and we were kept up to 

date with election returns. I still 

didn’t allow myself to be hopeful. 

Even after I returned home 

and tapped into the Internet with 

my husband, I tried to keep my 

interest in check. I was seriously 

jaded. So jaded, I went to bed before 

eleven. 

But at 11:01, the phone rang. 

Our oldest daughter, who had 

cast her first presidential vote, 

called to say that Obama had 

been declared. As soon as we 

hung up, our other new voter 

called. Shortly after that, our 

17-year-old called with the news. 

Who needs broadcast media 

when you have spawned engaged 

citizens in the world? 

Well, I do, it turns out. I gave 

up trying to sleep at about 4:30 

and watched Obama’s acceptance 

speech on the Internet. 

He was about a paragraph into it 

when I started crying. I watched 

McCain’s concession with charity 

— and relief. 

And then I started to investigate 

what I’d missed. I watched 

Michelle Obama’s speech last 

summer in Denver, at the Democratic 

National Convention. I 

surfed through the big speeches 

of the campaign, suddenly intensely 

interested. 

And the interest continues. 

I find myself logging onto 

The New York Times Web site every 

morning before I start work; 

I’m again glad for the company 

of the radio when I prepare dinner. 

A few times, I’ve simply 

lucked into one of the presidentelect’s 

press conferences; other 

times, I’ve clicked on the videos 

of them after the fact, still a bit 

dazed by the intellect and eloquence 

of the government that 

will take over this month. 

More than I like to admit, 

I’m pleased by the number of 

women nominated to cabinet 

positions — and recognize that 

in the world of gender politics, 

these appointments may in fact 

be more effective than a woman 

as either president or vice-president. 

But more than any tally 

of gender and ethnicity, I’m 

delighted by the professional 

(rather than strictly political) 

qualifications of the proposed 

cabinet. 

I do realize that nationally our 

economy is on the ropes and 

globally our national reputation 

is in the trash; nevertheless, I’m 

hopeful. I’ve been skeptical for 

so long now — including about 

Obama, who I suspect is more 

conservative than I would like 

— that the relief of this new administration 

makes me giddy 

with hope. 

We have yet to see how the 

much-promised political change 

will play out in the new administration, 

but for me, there has 

already been profound, personal 

change: I’m willing — even eager 

— to tune back in. n 

Deborah Lee Luskin (deb_ 

luskin@commonsnews.org) 

contributes regularly to The 

Commons. 

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Please send to editor@commonsnews.org or drop a note to P.O. Box 1212, Brattleboro, VT 05302.

20 VOICES The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 VOICES 21 

Women of color reflect on Obama win 

Saxtons River 

In a post-election 

statement, Marian Wright 

Edelman, president of the 

Children’s Defense Fund and a 

leader in the civil rights movement, 

recalled a 1960s cartoon 

that depicted a black boy saying 

to a white boy, “I’ll sell you 

my chance to be president of 

the United States for a nickel.” 

When the cartoon appeared, 

Edelman said, Barack Obama 

was a toddler. There were five 

black members of Congress 

and about 300 black elected officials 

nationwide. 

“Barack Obama’s road to the 

White House has led Americans 

from all walks of life to embrace 

a new hope for national 

unity, and this transformational 

election offers the promise of 

moving the country in a new direction,” 

Edelman continued. 

“The election was a reminder 

that the United States is still a 

place of bold ideas and a beacon 

of hope. It says to every child of 

color that you belong too, and 

you do have a future.” 

Similar sentiments resounded 

across the country as black 

leaders expressed pride and 

hope when the country learned 

that Obama would be our 44th 

president. 

Bernice King, daughter of 

Martin Luther King Jr., said her 

father would be proud. “This 

means that the work my father 

and my mother sacrificed 

for was not in vain. A new day 

is born in America,” she said. 

Washington, D.C.’s congressional 

delegate, Eleanor Holmes 

Norton, reflected on the political 

meaning of the Obama win. 

“He’s changed the electoral 

map,” she said. 

According to the Institute for 

Women’s Policy Research, African-American 

women voted in 

larger numbers than ever before 

and helped put Obama over the 

top, especially in battleground 

states. In North Carolina, for 

example, an estimated 100 percent 

of them voted for Obama. 

Latina women also joined as an 

important voting bloc, making 

a crucial difference in formerly 

Republican states like New 

Mexico. 

The response to Obama’s 

victory among women of color 

bears noting as the glow of the 

election continues. To Shanique 

Lee, a high school senior 

in Ithaca, N.Y., Obama’s victory 

was “a very big deal” that symbolized 

a “step toward equality. 

It’s about more than just race,” 

she said. “It’s important for all 

people when it comes to issues 

like minority rights. It’s about 

unity.” 

Koritha Mitchell, assistant 

professor of English at Ohio 

State University, agrees. “Literally 

stunned” by election results, 

she sees Obama as someone capable 

of moving the country beyond 

“what one might call ‘black 

issues’.” 

Mitchell believes the president-elect 

“is completely devoted 

to the dream of a post-race 

society.” She recognizes that it 

won’t be easy to move beyond 

institutionalized racism, which 

ELAYNE 

CLIFT 

she says “has not magically disappeared 

with his election.” 

Mitchell is also excited by the 

prospect of Michelle Obama 

as First Lady and sees having 

a black woman in that position 

as important to the feminist 

movement. “I was constantly 

frustrated by white feminists’ 

suggestion that black women’s 

support of Barack Obama represented 

some kind of blind spot 

in terms of feminism,” she said. 

“It seemed to me that they 

couldn’t see what it would mean 

to have as first lady a strong 

woman like Michelle Obama 

who, among other things, is 

a lawyer like Hillary Clinton,” 

Mitchell continued. “For [white 

women] not to consider this as 

part of black women’s enthusiasm 

for Obama’s candidacy 

shows their limited [understanding] 

of what it means for 

‘women’ to make progress.” 

For Jamaican American 

Yvonne Stennett, a New York 

City community organizer, “going 

into the voting booth was a 

truly emotional moment.” She 

says she “pulled the lever for 

myself but also for my mother, 

for Martin Luther King, for Sojourner 

Truth, for Gandhi. I 

pulled it with hope of change 

that could really happen.” 

Diana Abath, a career development 

specialist in Brattleboro, 

woke up the day after the election 

crying. “Change is going to 

come!” she told her white husband. 

“I had a sense of pride, not 

about race only, it transcended 

that. Here was a black person 

bringing together these multitudes 

of people from these different 

cultures.” 

Shannon Sport, a human resources 

consultant in Richmond, 

Va., says she too “cried 

like a baby” when Obama won. 

“I was moved because of stories 

my parents had told me about 

what they went through having 

lived in a very confederate atmosphere 

in the sixties and seventies,” 

she says. “There were 

restaurants they couldn’t go into 

and they were afraid to stop by 

the side of the road. Now I am 

proud to be black.” 

Many women speak of a 

spiritual dimension to the election 

outcome. Yvonne Stennett 

says she was “spiritually overwhelmed.” 

She thinks the election 

presents a challenge to 

everyone “to become more godlike, 

to lift the spiritual in all of 

us in this call to transcend racism 

and hatred.” 

Koritha Mitchell agrees. “The 

clear spiritual element is the 

God-confidence that Obama exudes,” 

she says. “His calm, collected 

demeanor, his discipline 

and consistency suggest that the 

hand of God is on his life.” 

Some also see Barack 

Obama’s safety in God’s 

hands as whispers about the 

threats against him continue to 

circulate. 

Shanique Lee was shocked by 

blatant racist remarks uttered 

at her school following the election. 

Shannon Sport admits she 

is worried. Diana Abath says 

simply, “We blacks pray for his 

safety. Prayer circles surround 

him.” 

A contagion on our land 

Putney 

Eight years of the 

Bush administration 

has promulgated a contagion 

on our land that won’t 

soon be excised. 

Thanks to the voters the Republican 

right wing, by virtue 

of self-interest and manifest 

corruption, has been forced to 

crawl back under the stinking 

rock from whence it came. It will 

no doubt fester in the darkness, 

gathering simpleton adherents 

until their numbers once again 

tip the scales in favor of evil. 

Other than that they have done 

pretty well. 

Does it surprise you that the 

right wing has been talking 

trash about Obama before he 

even says, “I do” on Inauguration 

Day? Sean Hannity was on 

television the other day with 

breaking news. Someone unearthed 

a picture of Obama 

wearing a hat and smoking a 

cigarette. 

“Why was this picture suppressed?” 

he fulminated, eyes 

bulging like organ stops. Once 

again, he postured, the liberal 

media refused to release a photo 

that could have been vital to Mc- 

Cain’s campaign. 

Yup, that was the difference 

all right. A funny hat and a 

cigarette. 

I’ve got news for him. The media 

was kind to McCain also. 

They refused to publish a daguerreotype 

of John swilling 

bathtub gin with flappers “before” 

the repeal of the Volstead 

Act. 

Other slime merchants 

have been desperately trying to 

link Obama with Illinois lunatic 

governor Rod Blagojevich. 

JIM 

AUSTIN 

Was Barack going to get a cut 

from the sale of his Senate seat? 

Did they get together at the Chicago 

Hilton and snort coke with 

Marion Barry and Boy George? 

Only time will tell. 

George Bush spent some time 

sneaking over to Baghdad a 

few weeks ago under the cover 

of darkness. While he was at a 

news conference giving another 

version of his “Mission Accomplished” 

speech, an Iraqi reporter 

screamed at him, called 

him a “dog,” and threw a pair of 

shoes at him. 

Other than defaming dogs, 

the world over and the citizenry 

of Iraq pretty much agreed with 

his sentiments. They hit the 

streets shortly afterwards begging 

for the reporter’s release 

from custody. 

Republican spin doctors were 

working overtime in the days 

following the footwear incident. 

They discarded the notion that 

the reporter noticed that Bush’s 

footwear seemed down at the 

heels and was presenting him 

with some L.L. Bean desert 

boots as a gift. In the end they 

decided that this was a case of 

“shoeshank redemption.” 

The incident showed, they 

said, that thanks to George and 

his policies, Iraq was now a democracy 

and people felt free to 

voice their displeasure just like 

citizens of America. Wow. Talk 

about making a silk purse out 

of a sow’s ear. Instead of throwing 

flowers and gratitude the 

reporter threw footwear. Same 

idea, different culture. 

Sarah Palin’s little problem 

in her hometown of Wasilla will 

similarly require some industrial-strength 

spinning. Her future 

son-in-law’s mom has been 

charged with several counts of 

drug dealing and hard-core painkiller 

possession. 

Ouch! This is 

worse than her revelation 

that Africa is 

a “country” or than 

when she claimed 

foreign policy experience 

by her ability 

to see Vladivostok 

from her back 

porch. 

So far Sarah hasn’t 

commented on the 

charges. Maybe the 

woman was a Democrat 

and the painkillers were a 

legitimate remedy for being associated 

with Sarah. Or perhaps 

Levi’s mom was just following in 

the footsteps of Republican altar 

boy Rush Limbaugh, whose love 

of Oxycontin is second only to 

his hatred of Barack. 

Whichever story emerges, 

don’t expect the media to let it 

go. Sarah is just too hot a commodity 

when it comes to selling 

magazines. Did you know that 

Time picked her as runner-up 

for Person of the Year? Winkwink, 

golly! 

Lest you think I’m smearing 

a whole tube of lipstick on Republican 

pigs, we’ll visit an interesting 

Democratic ruminant. 

Caroline Kennedy, daughter 

Many women believe that 

now Americans must accept personal 

responsibility to move the 

agenda forward. 

“This is about what we can 

do so that we don’t fail,” says 

Yvonne Stennett. “We must be 

accountable for our own actions, 

complimenting what Barack 

Obama brings to the table.” 

Adds Koritha Mitchell, 

“What’s most important is that 

he got so many people engaged 

in the process. That is the beginning 

of an important shift. 

Obama reminds us that achieving 

change requires commitment. 

And people will do it.” 

As Marian Wright Edelman 

put it, “President-elect Obama 

cannot do the job alone. Now the 

real hard work begins. It’s a new 

day in America. It is time for all 

of us to step forward.” n 

Elayne Clift (elayne_clift@ 

commonsnews.org), a regular 

contributor to The Commons, 

writes about women, politics, 

and social issues. For more 

information visit www.elayneclift.com. 

of martyred assassinee John F. 

Kennedy, has thrown her hat in 

the ring with hopes of being chosen 

for Hillary’s vacated New 

York senate seat. 

Clearly, she figures that if a 

geographically handicapped 

mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, can 

qualify as a potential vice president 

of the USA, surely another 

woman with no significant experience 

can make a splash in 

the senate. There is no question 

that we all know who she is, but 

what she could bring to the table 

The media was kind to 

McCain also. They refused 

to publish a daguerreotype 

of John swilling bathtub gin 

with flappers “before” the 

repeal of the Volstead Act. 

is a little fuzzy. My father was a 

pretty good dentist but you sure 

wouldn’t want me to give you a 

root canal. 

Winston Churchill said that 

democracy was a lousy system 

but it was the best that humankind 

has come up with so far. 

He also said “Americans could 

always be counted on to do the 

right thing, after they had tried 

everything else.” 

In the past decade I think we 

have pretty much covered “everything 

else.” 

n 

Jim Austin (jim_austin@ 

commonsnews.org) contributes 

regularly to The Commons. 

Contact legislators about 

‘ill-advised project’ 

Last spring, an attorney with 

the Vermont Department 

of Public Service (DPS) confided 

to me that “there are lessthan-honorable 

motivations for 

building the Coolidge Connector.” 

What this professional 

knew — and what other DPS 

staff, consultants, and expert 

witnesses knew — is that the 

Central Vermont Public Service/Velco 

power line plan is 

a flawed, outdated design that 

will raise electric rates and 

put Vermont at a technological 

disadvantage. 

Unfortunately for Vermonters, 

money spoke louder than 

logic. DPS head David O’Brien 

overruled his own experts and 

put the interests of Governor 

Jim Douglas’s campaign donors 

over Vermont citizens, 

electricity consumers, and the 

environment. 

O’Brien ignored the expert’s 

recommendations and 

endorsed CVPS/Velco’s plan 

to pocket millions of Vermont 

ratepayers’ dollars by taking 

advantage of a provision in 

the Bush/Cheney Energy Act 

of 2005. This provision allows 

transmission providers to pass 

along to electric customers 

much of the costs of building 

and maintaining power lines, 

even if they are built primarily 

to ship bulk power to customers 

in other states. 

Now, time grows short. 

The Public Service Board 

could issue its ruling any time. 

The PSB has the opportunity 

launch the new year with a surprise 

gift — a gift for our children 

and grandchildren, not 

just politicians and power companies 

— by denying the certificate 

of public good for this 

cynical, ill-advised project. 

We aren’t optimistic. 

Throughout this process, the 

state agencies charged with 

protecting Vermonters’ interests 

have dropped the ball, in 

some cases not even showing 

up for hearings. Many Vermont 

citizens commented during 

the public comment period, 

but according to the PSB, it is 

actually illegal for the PSB to 

consider your opinion in making 

their final decision. 

We need our legislature to 

act now! You can find your 

state senators’ and representatives’ 

contact information at 

www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/ 

findmember2.cfm. 

Please ask the legislature 

to: 

• Pass a two-year moratorium 

on construction of new 

power lines so that policy makers 

can evaluate up-to-date 

solutions that will not saddle 

future generations with outdated 

and unreliable technology, 

degraded landscapes, and 

higher-than-necessary electric 

rates. 

• Fix the PSB structure 

and procedure so that politics 

and special interests are not 

favored over citizens and the 

environment. 

• Make sure Vermont builds 

smart, modern grids that enable 

efficiency and renewable 

power, rather than locking in 

more 1950s technology that 

will put our state at a disadvantage 

in the new energy 

economy. 

Please make our message 

heard. Once you have called 

or e-mailed your representative, 

please call or e-mail three 

friends in Vermont and ask 

them to get involved. 

Tom Clynes 

Brookline 

The writer represents the Southern 

Loop Awareness Project 

(www.southernloopawareness. 

com). 

Editorial substituted 

pat rhetoric for perspicacity 

The slant within the editorial 

“Plenty of blame” [The Commons, 

December 2008] caught 

me by surprise, as it did not seem 

to fit with the publication’s usual 

perspicacity. 

It was easy to read that independent 

gubernatorial candidate 

Anthony Pollina “might have 

built a coalition with the Democratic 

Party” as a resentment that 

he never tried. He did try and 

was rejected. That point should 

have been made clear. 

Then you go on to suggest with 

the phrase “mutually assured 

destruction” that both Symington 

and Pollina were themselves 

responsible for the highly negative 

distractions of tax returns 

(Symington) and campaign 

contributions (Pollina). Symington 

herself chose to do her 

tax returns as she did and thus 

clearly invited scrutiny. Pollina, 

in accepting contributions as 

he did, followed the rules. The 

unsupportable charges of not 

following the rules were out of 

his control. 

And then you state that both 

“left-of-center candidates spent 

precious time and money fighting 

each other in the general 

election.” I have no recollection 

of Pollina spending any time 

whatsoever disparaging or “fighting” 

Symington. In fact, he made 

it a point to run a clean and positive 

campaign. 

I feel the editorial was far too 

full of pat and often baseless rhetoric 

and not indicative of good 

journalism. I have not yet come 

across a useful analysis of the 

gubernatorial election and look 

forward to reading in The Commons 

the kind of thoughtful, mature 

and professional review that 

regularly sets it apart from other 

publications. 

Spoon Agave 

Brattleboro 

am one of the people who 

I have been marching on Friday 

afternoons in Brattleboro to 

call for accountability in government 

and an end to the occupation 

in Iraq. 

To the many of you who have 

expressed your support, I thank 

you. It was our hope that we 

would inspire others to join us so 

that we could send a clear message 

to the world and our elected 

“representatives” that we want 

this devastating, illegal war to 

end. It has been difficult to keep 

our numbers up, however, as 

people have not joined us. 

Yet the war goes on, and just 

because Barack Obama has been 

elected does not mean that it will 

end. In fact, it is more important 

than ever that we keep the pressure 

on. 

There are still 150,000 troops 

and 75 major U.S. military bases 

in Iraq. More veterans are committing 

suicide — 1,000 attempt 

to do so every month — than 

are dying in combat. More than 

20,000 U.S. troops have been 

wounded, and half of them return 

permanently disabled. 

How are the Iraqi people doing? 

Unemployment rates are as 

high as 60 percent. Four million 

Iraqis have been displaced from 

their homes. The water supply 

is contaminated, and Baghdad 

has electricity for only four hours 

each day. Corruption and waste 

in the use of private non-Iraqi 

 

 

contractors have resulted in incomplete 

and shoddy construction 

projects. 

The Friday marchers have decided 

that it is counterproductive 

to march every week with such 

small numbers, but we can’t let 

the Iraqi people and our soldiers 

think that we have forgotten 

them. We have decided instead 

to now march in solidarity with 

the Iraq Moratorium, a nationwide 

movement that invites people 

to take any kind of action on 

the third Friday of each month 

to voice opposition to the war 

and affirmation for peace and 

healing. 

We meet at the Brattleboro 

Food Cooperative’s parking lot 

The Brattleboro Planning 

Commission is looking for 

volunteers to serve on the new 

Town Plan Advisory Group. The 

advisory group will assist the 

Planning Commission in identifying 

major issues and goals for the 

new Town Plan to address, assist 

with public outreach, and review 

draft chapters of the plan. 

The Advisory Group consists 

of 12 to 15 people, and will meet 

approximately every two months 

over the coming two years. 

This is an exciting opportunity 

to help create Brattleboro’s future. 

If you are interested, please 

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LETTERS FROM READERS 

Come and march with us, but less often 

 

r 20, 2008 

 

 

 

Jan. 24,8 

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refunds if requirements are met. 

at 4 p.m., this month on Jan. 16. 

We’ll drum our way through 

downtown Brattleboro (which 

is actually a lot of fun), reminding 

people that citizens have an 

obligation to speak out about 

atrocious policies being enacted 

supposedly in our names. 

Please march with us. Bring a 

drum or a sign, or use one of our 

signs. And please, if you see us 

on the street, join us, even if it’s 

only for a block. 

Marcia Hylan 

Newfane 

For more about the nationwide 

Iraq Moratorium, visit www. 

iraqmoratorium.com. 

Advisory group needs members 

submit a letter of interest to the 

Planning Commission. 

For more information about 

what to include in the letter, 

please visit www.brattleboro.org 

and click on “Planning Commission.” 

You can also call me in the 

planning services department at 

251-8112 or send e-mail to sbrennan@brattleboro.org. 

Sarah Brennan 

Brattleboro 

The writer works as assistant 

planner for the town of Brattleboro. 

 

 

 

5 

 

 

 

 

BSL1086_checking646x846.indd 1 

8/29/07 10:41:13 AM

22 VOICES The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 23 

The 

C ommons 

An independent, nonprofit newspaper providing news and views 

for, by, and about Windham County, Vermont 

Jeff Potter, Editor and Graphic Designer 

Kristen Woetzel, Intern 

Barbara S. Evans, Vincent Panella, Dan DeWalt, Editorial Committee 

Ellen Kaye, Henry Zacchini, Advertising Sales 

Vermont Independent Media, Inc. Board of Directors, Publisher 

Ice storm observations 

Given the extent of the damage 

and the inherent danger 

in fallen wires, it is nothing 

short of a miracle that nobody 

injured or killed themselves in 

the ice storm that hit the area 

in December. 

With the sheer number of 

trees in the county damaged, 

the storm ended up as a danger 

to life and limb. Literally. 

When multiple thousands 

of homes lose power, who gets 

theirs repaired first? Central 

Vermont Public Service explained 

that the lines serving 

the greatest number of people 

got top priority. 

That means, of course, that 

too many people in the farthest 

reaches of the county 

were the last to get their 

power restored. 

Somehow, that seems discriminatory. 

Could there be 

a better way? 

Brown & Roberts Hardware 

reported off-the-charts sales 

of generators, batteries, and 

light fixtures with non-electrical 

power sources. We all 

should have such items on 

hand before the next storm 

hits. 

If Mother Nature continues 

to deliver this weather 

throughout the rest of the winter, 

kids might well see themselves 

returning to school as 

they go out the door for summer 

vacation. 

Is it wrong of us to observe 

that for several days after the 

storm subsided, the countryside 

turned into an ethereal, 

otherworldly parallel universe 

of breathtaking beauty? Can 

we admire that beauty without 

losing sight of the damage the 

storm caused and the danger 

in which some of our neighbors 

found themselves? 

However much the winter 

weather might have harmed 

This issue of The Commons is brought to you by the hard work and generosity of: 

Director of photography: David Shaw 

Comics editor: Jade Harmon 

Editorial and proofreading support: Vincent Panella, Lee Stookey, 

Bethany Knowles, Kim Noble, Nancy Crompton, Sarah Perry, 

Shoshana Rihn, Jane Michaud, Bob Rottenberg. 

Technical/logistical support: Simi Berman, Trevor Snorek‐Yates, 

Chris Wesolowski, Diana Bingham, Jim Maxwell, Bill Pearson, 

Shana Frank, Roberta Martin, Janet Schwarz, Bill Lax, Doug Grob, Mary 

Rothschild, Susan Odegard, Menda Waters, Richard Davis, Mamadou Sesi. 

EDITORIALS 

local businesses during one of 

the most critical weekends in 

the retailing cycle, other sectors 

in the economy certainly 

benefitted from a lift: hotels, 

motels, and restaurants probably 

made out well, says Jerry 

Goldberg, executive director 

of the Brattleboro Area Chamber 

of Commerce. 

Every now and then it’s 

helpful for a community to 

undergo a shared experience 

like that of the ice storm. 

The storm gave neighbors 

new opportunities to meet one 

another and help one another. 

It gave us all an opportunity to 

emerge from the storm better 

people than we were before. 

However much the property 

damage from the storm 

cost, the value of those opportunities 

to give of ourselves 

could well be an opportunity 

of incalculable value. 

the drawing board 

Lee Sanderson (www.leesanderson.com), a freelance cartoonist, regularly contributes to 

the Brattleboro Reformer and a number of other newspaper editorial pages throughout northern 

New England. 

Puzzlemaster: Connie Evans 

Published by 

Vermont Independent Media, Inc. 

139 Main St., P.O. Box 1212 

Brattleboro, VT 05302 

(802) 246-NEWS 


Without the support of all our 

volunteers, this paper would still 

live only in our imaginations. 

New Year’s resolution 

As we begin a new year, we think of opportunities forfresh 

starts. We point out the cost of the war in Iraq, as 

we have done in almost every single issue of The Commons 

for a year now, measured simply by the yardstick 

of how many lives have been immeasurably altered or 

lost prematurely. 

As we go to press this issue, 4,221 U.S. military personnel 

have died in Iraq since 2003, and 30,634 have been injured, 

according to the Web site icasualties.org. 

In Iraq, 8,832 military deaths have been reported since 

2003. The site reports that 44,194 wounded since 2005. 

The United States could well find itself on the cusp of 

major change when it comes to implementing this costly, 

reckless, and misguided war. 

However you feel about the war and the politics that 

brought us to Iraq, we hope you will join us in our thoughts 

for the safety and well-being of our military personnel there. 

Let us all hope for a stable Iraq and measures to prevent such 

a preventable folly from ever happening again. 

VIEWPOINT 

Marlboro volunteers 

coped with the ice storm 

I 

Marlboro 

was very pleased with the 

support of the residents of 

Marlboro during the ice 

storm and the hard work, day 

after day, that they put in. Our 

fire and rescue volunteers were 

right there, helping out, and 

jumping on the many emergency 

calls we had while power 

was out, phones were down, 

and many roads were nearly 

impassable. The members of 

our selectboard spent countless 

hours helping out. Our road 

crew was spectacular, working 

long hours for the entire week 

to ensure that emergency vehicles 

could get through and 

getting our town back up and 

running. 

Because we are such a small 

town, many people wear several 

hats. I have been concerned 

about this in the past, because 

there is a fair amount of overlap 

between who is on our Emergency 

Management Committee 

(EMC), the Marlboro Volunteer 

Fire and Rescue Company, and 

our town road crew. 

What happens when all of 

those groups need to be working 

at once, and each person has 

to fill two or three roles? 

Well, it turns out that it 

worked well this time. For example, 

road foreman (and fire chief, 

and member of the EMC) David 

Elliott appreciated having the 

Emergency Operations Center 

open and the base radio staffed: 

“We were able to communicate 

with each other out on the various 

roads via the base radio; it 

was very efficient,” he said. “We 

also knew that there was a good 

Allison Turner serves 

as rescue chief for Marlboro Volunteer 

Fire Co. and individual 

needs coordinator for Marlboro 

Emergency Management. 

crew of people taking care of 

the emergency fire and medical 

calls, so we could keep working 

on the roads.” 

Power was out for many residents 

for seven days, which 

could have caused some very serious 

problems. My biggest concern 

was the lack of telephone 

service in Marlboro during this 

crisis. Cell phones get service 

only in a few locations out here, 

and I estimate that 50 percent 

of residents’ land lines were not 

operating for the four to seven 

days that they were without 

power. This is a huge safety hazard: 

what if any one of those people 

without a phone had needed 

to call 911? 

Fortunately, we had identified 

residents who might have 

needed assistance in just such 

an emergency. We dedicated 

several people to the task of visiting 

those residents who we 

thought might need help when 

we were unable reach them on 

the phone. But we couldn’t possibly 

do that for every residence 

in town, and I was unable to obtain 

information from FairPoint 

about whose phones were inoperative. 

It is critical that we 

implement efficient and accurate 

communication systems 

between the phone and power 

utilities and emergency personnel 

before the next largescale 

emergency. 

n 

Life & Work 

Nonprofit 

works for 

expansion 

ReNew finds new markets 

in down economy with 

salvaged building supplies 

By George Harvey 


BRATTLEBORO—In an age 

when New York banks and Detroit 

auto manufacturers seek 

corporate handouts, one small 

company joins the lists of those 

asking for help. 

There are big differences between 

those corporate giants 

and that local business, however. 

While the big corporations exist 

to make money, often pursuing 

ecologically or economically 

questionable practices, the nonprofit 

ReNew Building Materials 

and Salvage, Inc. provides 

for both its community and the 

environment. 

And while big businesses are 

seeking help because of mismanagement 

and failure, ReNew 

is asking for the community’s 

assistance because of its rapid 

success. 

“The wise paradigm of waste 

is reduce, reuse, and recycle,” 

Brattleboro ecological engineer 

Tad Montomery says. 

ReNew, in the business of salvaging 

building materials and 

selling them for reuse, describes 

its mission “to contribute to and 

encourage the preservation and 

renewal of the Earth’s natural 

resources and to support low-income 

families to build, remodel 

and repair their homes,” according 

to the company’s Web site. 

Building materials have been 

salvaged and resold for a very 

long time, but green-thinking 

people have started doing so 

systematically. 

“Our mission is to reduce 

waste – keep it out of the landfill,” 

ReNew Executive Director 

Erich Kruger explains. 

Deconstruction 

ReNew deconstructs buildings, 

partially or completely, an 

average of one building every six 

weeks. Trained personnel take 

from a building anything that 

can be salvaged and rendered 

saleable. Handrails, windows, 

lumber, roofing, doors, and anything 

else that might be of interest 

are inspected, removed, and 

worked over. ReNew sells these 

items in the company’s store at 

16 Town Crier Dr. at rates substantially 

lower than their new 

counterparts. 

One can buy a used door, 

sink, light fixture or lumber at 

very low cost, or one can donate 

such objects if they’re no longer 

needed to keep them out of 

the landfill. ReNew carries just 

about anything architectural, 

and in addition sells many other 

things such as appliances, compact 

fluorescent light bulbs, and 

tools, depending on what has 

been donated. 

New inventory shows up on 

the company’s Web site regularly. 

One recent week’s listing 

included electric dryers, 4.5- 

inch claw-foot tubs, arched Victorian 

filagree, a 5-foot corner 

Jacuzzi jet tub, 4-inch bath wall 

tile, a vinyl-clad bow window, 24- 

inch propane ranges, a pedestal 

sink, and some cabinet hardware 

and pulls. 

Not everything can be reused, 

with the company’s staff taking 

care to deal appropriately with 

things having such poisons as 

lead paint on them. Anything that 

is broken, rotted, or rusted might 

have to be treated as waste. Some 

items end up free for the taking 

via Freecycle, a network for individuals 

and nonprofits to give 

away and find objects. 

Some items that seem perfectly 

good cannot be taken because 

they cannot be sold, others 

because they meet obsolete standards, 

and others simply because 

people resist buying that particular 

item — store inventory space 

is dear and cannot be devoted to 

things no one wants. 

Similarly, staff ensures that all 

potential donations work. ReNew 

has no facility to deal with items 

made of cloth, so anything upholstered 

should go elsewhere. 

And other items are simply overstocked, 

such as shutters, full 

flush toilets, and certain types 

of bathroom sinks. 

After basic inspection and removal, 

many things work before 

they are sold. In particular, 

nails have to be removed from 

every piece of used lumber Re- 

New sells. 

In 2007, the company saved 

458 tons of materials from going 

to landfills, more than would fit 

in 150 dumpster loads. 

Much of what is in the store is 

donated; other building materials, 

some new, come from manufacturers 

or contractors who 

have them as overruns, seconds, 

or remainders. 

The store also offers contractors 

and businesses a place to 


Erich Kruger, executive director of Renew Building Materials & Salvage, Inc., with an 

architect’s rendering of the nonprofit corporation’s new warehouse. Kruger hopes to break 

ground in the fall for the project, which will give ReNew space to match the demand for 

recycled and surplus building supplies. 

find items that match the style 

of older buildings, and where 

special features may be found 

for new ones. 

“They might want a door that 

is unique and be willing to put 

in the extra work for the effect,” 

Kruger says. 

ReNew offers a testimonial 

from satisfied customers Bob 

and Eileen Parks of Brattleboro, 

who offered Kruger their thanks 

for selling them their “cool retro 

sink” and before-and-after photos 

of a shiny white porcelain 

fixture and the Formica vanity 

it replaced. 

Business values 

The company’s policies are 

not just aimed at protecting the 

environment. 

Kruger takes particular pride 

in ReNew’s efforts to seek homeless 

people as workers. “We actually 

got the names and tracked 

the people down,” he says. 

ReNew employs 10 full-time 

employees — three former retirees, 

one formerly homeless, 

and one a teen — and eight parttimers. 

The business provides 

job skills training, pays above 

minimum wage, and, although 

it cannot afford to provide medical 

insurance, provides a fund 

to help employees with medical 

costs. 

ReNew also appreciates volunteers, 

of whom there are a number 

of regulars, and can offer 

training for marketable skills in 

return for their time. The company 

also donates a respectable 

portion of its net receipts to other 

nonprofit organizations. 

The price of success 

In our current economy, Re- 

New has been attracting new customers 

to its customer list, which 

now includes 4,000 businesses, 

owners, and individuals. 

ReNew started with its first ads 

for donations in December 2004, 

and the store opened the following 

September. The company 

needed new quarters almost 

immediately, and it moved to 

its current location, the former 

headquarters of the Town Crier, 

off Putney Road, in the middle 

of 2006. 

With the help of a $1 million 

grant from the U.S. Department 

of Agriculture last June, ReNew 

bought its existing building and 

land. Some $200,000 from that 

grant has been set aside for building 

expenses. 

In 2008, the space in the 

warehouse ran out, and the company 

now seeks tax-deductible 

donations to build a new warehouse 

and hire new people at its 

current site. 

In October, ReNew made public 

plans for the 10,000-squarefoot 

new facility and announced 

its goal of $600,000 and a goal of 

breaking ground in the fall. 

For more information or to donate, 

visit www.renewsalvage. 

org. 

COURTESY RENEW BUILDING MATERIALS AND SALVAGE, INC. 

A variety of complete stair risers in hardwood, pressure 

treated, and softwood lumber on the ReNew grounds. 

Verde

24 LIFE & WORK The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 LIFE & WORK 25 

Breweries release seasonal varieties 

Williamsville 

In the middle of May, 

1659, the General Court of 

the Massachusetts Bay Colony 

issued the following order: 

“For preventing disorders, 

arising in several places within 

this jurisdiction by reason of 

some still observing such festivals 

as were superstitiously 

kept in other communities, to 

the great dishonor of God and 

offense of others: it is therefore 

ordered by this court and the 

authority thereof that whosoever 

shall be found observing 

any such day as Christmas or 

the like, either by forbearing of 

labor, feasting, or any other way, 

upon any such account as aforesaid, 

every such person so offending 

shall pay for every such 

offence five shillings as a fine to 

the county.” 

The Puritans were concerned 

that the more bacchanalian aspects 

of medieval winter solstice 

celebrations were besmirching 

the Lord’s birthday, and it 

would be best to nip it all in the 

bud. The specter of the motherland, 

where Christmas revelers 

were wassailing — drinking 

spiced ales, mulled ciders, and 

the like — wouldn’t do in the 

New World. 

Luckily, it didn’t work, although 

the order — amazingly 

— stayed in effect until 1681. (If 

it were the law of the land today, 

the sheer volume of 5-shilling 

fines would probably eliminate 

the federal debt.) 

Whether the solstice, Christmas, 

Chanukah, or New Year’s, 

we like to celebrate, and the 

beer world is ready to oblige. 

The proliferating number of holiday 

ales and winter warmers is 

up to the task of keeping everyone’s 

nose as red as a cherry. 

Santa is not partial only to 

cookies and milk. In his tasty 

little volume, Christmas Beers 

(Universe Publishing, $19.95), 

author Don Russell unearths a 

1959 letter to the big man found 

in the Rutland Santa Claus mailbox: 

“Dear Santa: I’ll leave you a 

glass of ginger ale, and if you’re 

still thirsty, I could leave you two 

quarts of beer. Remember, my 

house is the one with the beer. 

Love, Cindy.” 

TOM 

BEDELL 

Bedell on 

Beer 

Cindy would now be old 

enough to have joined a recent 

tasting of holiday ales I led at 

Windham Wines in Brattleboro, 

appropriately enough on the day 

after the 75th anniversary of the 

21st Amendment, repealing Prohibition 

(the 18th Amendment). 

I didn’t see her, but another 

home-study course for the scholarly 

is at hand, since many of 

these beers will remain available 

through January. 

Our Special Ale (34th edition), 

Anchor Brewing, San 

Francisco: Actually, this one is 

pretty much gone from area 

stores already — and wasn’t 

available for the tasting, either 

— but it needs be mentioned 

since Fritz Maytag again set the 

ball rolling when he harkened 

back to the almost-bygone tradition 

of creating a special beer 

for the holidays in the mid-’70s, 

without much of a model to go 

on. 

He created a hoppy ale that 

later became the regularly available 

Liberty Ale. But for some 

time now Anchor’s seasonal offering 

has been a spiced ale, this 

year’s a dark-brown-to-black 

elixir with a spruce nose and flavor, 

and a mix of spices (cinnamon? 

cardamom?) that Maytag 

won’t reveal, other than to emphatically 

deny there’s any clove 

involved. 

At 5.5-percent ABV (alcohol 

by volume), Anchor’s Special 

Ale is a forceful beer by normal 

standards, but not by holiday 

standards, which tend toward 

the hearty. But the extra flavoring 

element is characteristic. 

As more brewers began experimenting 

with holiday ales, 

there was a period when they all 

tasted like pumpkin pies — not 

necessarily a bad thing — but 

the flavor spectrum is all over 

the map now. 

Two other Anchor 

Swirl 

Turn It Up 

innovations: a different recipe 

every year, and a different label 

every year featuring a different 

tree (a Jeffrey Pine this year). 

Other brewers are more 

naughty, when you have beers 

like Santa’s Butt or Rude Elf’s 

Reserve on hand. I saw one label 

showing Santa more or less 

standing over a fire and a tagline 

about there being nothing 

like the smell of toasted nuts at 

Christmastime. 

• Santa’s Private Reserve, 

Rogue Brewery, Newport, Ore.: 

The rebellious attitude that 

Rogue has maintained in its adventurous 

beers since 1988 is 

always captured with a character 

on the label with a raised fist. 

So it is with Santa on this bottle, 

with the bonus of snowflakes 

that, if properly exposed to light, 

will glow in the dark. 

The ale glows reddish, its 

toasty malt flavor from six different 

malts, with a double-hopped 

spruce finish and theoretically a 

secret hop called Rudolph. 

• Celebration Ale, Sierra Nevada 

Brewing Co., Chico, Calif.: 

This is the most ubiquitous 

holiday ale available, and that’s 

a reason to celebrate, since it’s 

consistently one of the best, an 

IPA that is a hop extravaganza, 

often with experimental hops, 

but always with Sierra’s signature 

citrusy Cascade hop aroma. 

Buy it by the case. 

• Winter Welcome, Samuel 

Smith Old Brewery, Tadcaster, 

England: It wasn’t until 1990 

that the first imported winter 

ale arrived on our shores, and 

this is it, still a welcome annual 

sight indeed, a rich amber ale 

of 6-percent ABV, with a floral, 

grassy nose, and toffee-like palate. 

Its label is a varying riot of 

invention. 

• Home for the Holidays, 

High and Mighty Beer Company, 

Holyoke, Mass.: Will 

Shelton, who with his brothers 

established the Shelton Bros. 

beer importing company in Massachusetts, 

has set up a new 

beer company with the products 

being contract-brewed at the Paper 

City Brewery in Holyoke, 

Mass. 

And Shelton has something 

of a new idea in that the label for 

this Strong Brown Ale (7-percent 

ABV) is a social comment 

Silver 

Forest 

BcdnJONATHAN CAVES 

The label of Samuel Smith’s Winter Welcome Ale is a varying 

riot of invention. 

and commitment. Home for the 

Holidays means more than one 

thing here — since it shows a 

wreath in the shape of a peace 

symbol — and is subtitled “a 

hopeful winter ale,” and some of 

the proceeds go to Iraq war veterans 

groups. 

The beer itself is a malty, 

warming brown ale, with hints 

of chocolate and perhaps prune, 

but with a bit of a medicinal finish 

to it. 

• Pugsley’s Signature Series 

Barleywine Style Ale, 

Shipyard Brewing Co., Portland, 

Maine: A barleywine-style ale is 

not a wine at all, but a beer style 

sometimes also called Old Ale, 

usually a very big beer in its fullbore 

malt profile and hefty alcohol 

levels, best consumed while 

ensconced in a comfy fireside 

chair. 

Named after Shipyard’s master 

brewer, Alan Pugsley, who 

hails from Hampshire, England 

but has been in the U.S. 

since 1986, this brand new beer 

makes an auspicious debut 

at 8.5-percent ABV, with a full 

charge of six different malts and 

three English hop styles. Reddish, 

with a complex fruity nose, 

full-bodied and pleasingly dry. 

• Delirium Noel, Huyghe 

Brewery, Melle/Ghent, Belgium: 

From the makers of Delirium 

Tremens and Delirium 

Nocturnum comes the completion 

of the trilogy, a 10-percent 

ABV dark ale that is typically 

Belgium, which is to say idiosyncratic 

from the interactions of 

three different yeasts in the fermentation, 

producing a peppery 

yet fruity punchbowl of a beer. 

• Old Stock Ale, North Coast 

Brewing, Fort Bragg, Calif.: I 

thought this was the standout in 

our tasting, an old ale as hardy 

as a bottle of wine at 12.5-percent 

ABV, and with a port-like 

quality. Actually designed to be 

cellared, Old Stock should improve 

with age (probably up to 

five years or so), mellowing and 

rounding out in time, although 

it is already silky smooth, sweet 

but not cloying. 

Meanwhile, as author Don 

Russell points out, what was 

once a trickle of holiday ales has 

become a virtual flood, all the 

more reason for merriment. And 

it needn’t be confined to Christmas 

celebrants. The Shmaltz 

Brewing company’s annual Chanukah 

beer, Jewbulation, is from 

all accounts a powerhouse of a 

beer, but I haven’t been able to 

light one up yet. 

Nor have I found the beer 

modeled after a Scottish suet 

fruit pudding from the Orkney 

Brewery, Clootie Dumpling. But 

there’s always next year. n 

Tom Bedell (beer@commonsnews.org) 

leaves his Christmas 

tree up as long as he can in 

Williamsville. He’ll probably 

sneak a barleywine or two 

into a forthcoming tasting at 

Windham Wines Saturday, 

Feb. 7, “Turn to the Dark Side,” 

as well as provide other useful 

ways to combat winter’s chill — 

like porters, schwartzbiers, and 

stouts. (Information: 802-246- 

0877.) 

Sister needs more support 

than one person can give 

Dummerston 

Dear Mary Ellen: 

About two years ago, 

you answered my 

question about my sister’s 

depression. She started 

to recover after meeting a 

kind man last spring. They 

established a long-distance 

relationship and spent occasional 

weekends together. 

She was ecstatic. However, 

after about six months, he 

broke off the fling and she 

regressed. 

Last summer, he accompanied 

her to a distant 

place, where she purchased 

a house. (This was part of 

her long-term plans.) They 

were to return on Labor 

Day with the intention of 

furnishing it so she could 

move in at end of September. 

After the breakup, she 

postponed the move to November 

and now January. 

The problem is she wants 

me to go with her to stay. 

My take is that she’s never 

been on her own and is 

frightened. She is having 

physical problems: bad 

knees, bad back, severe arthritic 

pain, which she refuses 

to address medically. 

She does need assistance, 

but I feel it can best be provided 

by someone skilled in 

the business. She says she 

needs me. I say she needs 

someone, but she wants me. 

Money is no object. 

I have had my own problems, 

but I have been able 

(with help) to overcome 

them. I am happy with my 

life, still have my health, 

and don’t want to make 

changes. She is becoming 

extremely angry with my response: 

I had promised to 

help her if she needs me. I 

don’t think that time has arrived 

yet. 

She gets abusive, calling 

me selfish and bringing up 

all sorts of things from the 

past, most of which she distorts. 

Our last conversation 

was a disaster. I hung up, 

and she continued to call 

me, harassing me with at 

least seven phone calls after 

midnight. In one of the 

messages she indicated she 

would talk with me and a 

mental health professional 

in a conference call. 

What role, if any, can you 

play in helping to resolve 

this dilemma? —Perturbed 

Dear Perturbed: It is always 

dangerous when your recovery 

is dependent on one other person. 

That is not a fair burden to 

mary 

ellen 

copeland 

Commonsense 

put on anyone. 

Your sister sounds like she 

might be very needy, and one of 

the reasons the relationship you 

mention might not have worked 

out for her is because her partner 

got worn out. It is not pleasant 

to be the only supporter for 

another person. 

Everyone needs a circle of 

supporters, especially a person 

who has difficulty with depression 

or is in recovery. I think five 

people in this circle is a minimum 

number. A person who 

counts on fewer people than that 

is in danger of wearing supporters 

out. And they need to treat 

their supporters well. They need 

to be grateful for any help their 

supporters can provide, understand 

when they can’t be helpful, 

help them out when they need 

help, and always treat their supporters 

with dignity and respect. 

When your sister called you 

seven times in one night after 

midnight, it was not OK. This 

was really rude. There is no excuse 

for that kind of behavior. If 

she had a medical emergency 

she should call 911. Otherwise, 

one call in the morning would 

suffice. 

You can tell your sister that 

she can call you only between 

certain hours, say 9 a.m. and 7 

p.m. You can also tell her how 

many times you determine it is 

Fielding 

Banjos 

WILL FIELDING • 802.464.3260 

www.fieldingbanjos.com 

OK to call you in a day, or even 

how many calls are OK in a 

week. Caller ID can help with 

this. If she calls more than she is 

supposed to, don’t answer. You 

can even turn off your ringer. 

You can also refuse to be part 

of any conversation where your 

sister is abusive. Warn her that 

if she treats you badly, you will 

hang up. Then, if she does, do it. 

Every time. 

There is only one role I can 

play in helping you to resolve 

this dilemma. I can occasionally 

give you advice through this column. 

I am retired and no longer 

do any counseling or consulting. 

I am glad that my column on depression 

was helpful to you. 

However, there are many excellent 

counselors, therapists, 

and mental health professionals 

in the Brattleboro area. You 

could contact one of them. Most 

of them have sliding-scale fees 

or are covered by insurance. I 

have gotten the best referrals 

for counselors from others who 

have concerns that are similar 

to mine. 

n 

Mary Ellen Copeland, a 

national mental health educator 

and author of mental 

health recovery resources, 

will answer questions through 

this column. Responses are 

not a substitute for treatment, 

professional consultation, 

exceptional self-care, and support 

from family and friends. 

Address questions to CommonSense, 

c/o The Commons, 

P.O. Box 1212, Brattleboro, 

VT 05302. E-mail questions to 

info@commonsnews.org. 

Compass 

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26 The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • January 2009 COMICS 27 

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on number of sites. Please contact Betsy at 

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For sale 

Vintage wooden doors, mostly 

4-panel; vintage knobs & hinges available. 

Pella insulated sliding glass door in 74” 

x 83” frame; includes stationary door & 

sliding screen; insulated Andersen picture 

window 38.5” x 51.5”; old wooden shutters. 

No reasonable offers refused. jboard@ 

svcable.net. 

Plow truck. 1996 Dodge Ram Heavy half 

ton. 8 foot minute mount plow. Studded 

snow tires. New transmission. Low miles. 

Needs minor work. $2800 obo. call 387- 

4347 (work) and leave message. 

Drawer tracks: 8 pairs Grant 30” full 

extension, 50 Lb. load capacity- $15. a pr. 

7 pairs Accuride 22” full extension, 100 Lb. 

load capacity- $10 a pr. Still in their original 

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licensing symbols are immediately available for 

anyone’s use subject to certain restrictions. 

Ab By attribution 

d No derivative works 

n \Noncommercial 

FOR SALE 

TOO MANY TOMATOES? Never! Charming 

short story includes fabulous recipe for 

homemade spaghetti sauce. Send $2 plus 

stamped, self-addressed envelope to: 

Colleen’s Collectible Recipes, 23 South 

Main St., #111, Brattleboro, VT 05301. 

Hospital bED in good working condition. 

Need the space. $65.00 Contact: 802- 

254-6819. 

Toyota Pick-up Truck V6 with Extra 

Cab, 1995, 4 wheel drive, ladder rack, 4 

extra studded snow tires, new clutch, ball 

joints, rear end, recent shocks and radiator. 

asking $4995 obo. please call 802-387-4347 

leave message. 

Futon Mattress, new. 36” X 70” White 

cotton cover. $45. Call Joan at 254-1246. 

1968 12” Japanese Geisha doll for sale. In 

perfect condition, kept in storage in original 

plastic case since it was given to me as a 

gift. I can email a photo if interested. $150. 

Call Paula at 464-5179 or email pj.sage@ 

yahoo.com. 

garrett metal detector. Model 

ACO 250. Six months old, used three 

times. Paid $350; $200 or best offer. Chet, 

254-8638. 

Local organic, pasture-raised chicken 

and pork. Call Elizabeth at 254-2531 

FOR RENT 

SHARE A COTTAGE in Marlboro with one 

other person (neat, health-oriented). 

One or two rooms of your own ($300- 

$450). Includes heat and electricity. Lovely 

surroundings with large yard and fields, 

woods, trails. Call 254-2406. Available 

12/22/08. 

COME FARM OUR LAND: Want to farm 

or homestead but don’t have land? We 

have a small homestead on a lot of land 12 

miles from Brattleboro and would like to 

collaborate with you. Rolling landscape with 

potential for vegetables, pasture, sugaring, 

and/or other enterprises. Contact Small 

Hands Farm, P.O. Box 6183, Brattleboro, 

VT 05302, or tdr3k@yahoo.com. 

Room in farmhousE at working farm in 

Guilford. Rent includes all utilities and wi-fi, 

two shared kitchens, two baths, garden 

space, too much to list. Porches, hammock, 

cows and forest. Miles of hiking trails, 

heavenly setting and laid-back atmosphere. 

No pets. vttimber@sover.net for details. 

$475/mo. 

Full service 

independent bookstore — 

a great place to browse! 

Special areas: Children's, 

Young Adult & Teen 

Sections, plus Toys & 

American Girl clothes & 

books; Poetry, Writing & 

Arts & Crafts area. 

www.villagesquarebooks.com 

Check out our website — it’s filled with 

event info & book suggestions! 

p Public domain 

s Share 

r Remix 

For more information, visit www.creativecommons.org 

FOR KIDS 

HOUSE FOR RENT — PUTNEY: New 2 

bedroom, 1½ baths single home with large 

living room, many windows throughout, 

garage with storage space, and a five-star 

energy-efficiency rating. Minimum one-year 

lease. Part of Putney Commons, a six-home 

community, located off Main Street, Putney. 

$1,300/month plus heat and electricity. Joan 

Benneyan, 254-1246. 

FOR KIDS 

Music Together — music and movement 

classes. Ages birth – 4 years. Rhythmic 

games, chants, tonal exploration, vocal play, 

instrument play, large and small movement 

activities, with special jam session each 

week. Help your child grow musically in 

these opportune years! Demo a free class 

anytime. Info: (802) 275-7478. 

STORYtime For Toddlers & Pre-School 

Age. Moore Free Library, 23 West Street, 

Newfane. Thursdays, 10:30 a.m. Information: 

(802) 365-7369. 

FREE 

Two Yorkshire TerriEr puppies re 

homing: ACK home raised vaccine and 

health guarantee. If interested kindly contact 

me on revtonybrown@gmail.com. 

INSTRUCTION 

PIANO LESSONS: Also acoustic guitar and 

5-string banjo lessons. Adults and children; 

beginning and intermediate. Taught in the 

West Dummerston Community Center. 

Please call to arrange for one free trial 

lesson. 802-258-2454. 

DRUM LESSONS available: focusing on 

correct posture, rudiments, rhythmic 

structure, tuning, and most importantly — 

having fun! All levels and styles. For more 

info Benjamin Carr, 802.258.2671. 

BREAK THROUGH ACTION BLOCKS: Get 

out of stuck patterns; discover a new way 

to deal with the challenges of relationship 

through Experiential Focusing. Special offer: 

Series of three guided sessions at $40/ 

session. Facilitated by a Focusing trainer 

certified in 1998 by The Focusing Institute 

in New York. Call 802-257-3099 or e-mail 

genovefa@sover.net. 

Drum LeSSONS for All Ages: Teacher with 

over 25 years of experience now accepting 

new students. Learn rock, latin and jazz in 

a fun, relaxed environment. Will teach at 

my home or yours. First lesson is free! Call 

Henry @ 257-4185. 

Kripalu YogaDance (KYD) returns 

to Brattleboro! Fridays at 10:30 am, 

1/9-2/13/09. Register at the Gibson-Aiken 

Center. 6 week Session $50; Drop-in $12; 

Non-Resident fees apply. For more info, 

contact the Brat. Rec. Dept at 254-5808 

or www.brattleboro.org or Kelly Salasin 

at 802-254-7724 (kel@sover.net, www. 

kellysalasin.blogspot.com). 

The Third Road with Kelly Salasin. 

Utilizing the coaching approach to empower 

individuals, families and businesses. Rates 

$125-175 for a three-step package or 

$75 for a one-time session. Call for a 

complimentary consultation, 802-254-7724 

kel@sover.net. 

‘Music Together’ Welcomes 

Winter! Please join us as we begin another 

wonderful session of musical fun and 

development for infants, toddlers, and 

pre-school age children, along with the 

grown-ups who love them! Registration has 

begun for returning families and newcomers 

to Music Together. Putney, Brattleboro, 

Wilmington. Please call to reserve a space, 

and come experience the joy of making 

music together in a relaxed, playful, nonperformance-oriented 

setting where 

each child will be supported in their 

own creative musical process. Help your 

child grow musically in these opportune 

years! Ongoing classes will begin the week 

of January 5th. For more information and full 

schedule, Call (802) 275-7478; MusicKidz@ 

aol.com. 

resources 

Northern New England Poison 

Center is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a 

week at 1-800-222-1222 to answer poison 

prevention questions or poison emergency 

questions. 

services 

AVAILABLE TO CAre for pets, children, 

elderly. Days, overnight, weekends. All 

requests considered. Mature, experienced. 

References. 802-463-2132. Please leave 

message for Mirror. 

Send your ad to 

 

classifieds@ 

 

commonsnews.org 

 

!"!#$ 

%& SUDOKU &'()" 

" &*"# " & 

The object of a Sudoku puzzle is to fill in the blank squares 

so that each of the numbers 1 through 9 appears in every 

column, row, and 9-square box. There is only one solution. Do 

not guess what numbers go where. You will find the answer by 

using logic. Solution inverted at the bottom of the page. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SERVICES 

 

MATH TUTOR: Algebra, geometry, middle 

school, college lessons for homeschoolers 

and students who need support. 

Experienced, compassionate teacher. 

Reasonable rates, flexible times. Info: Shana 

Frank, 802-722-4359. 

Are You Hungry?: Let me make your 

workshop, seminar, camp or retreat a 

delicious one! On-site catering for groups 

large and small. I cook a wide array of 

diverse and delectable whole foods, using 

fresh local produce whenever possible. 

Experienced in meeting a wide range of 

dietary needs and making the most of 

your budget, I will work with you to meet 

the unique needs of your group. Glowing 

references available on request. Contact me 

via email, at daliashevin@hotmail.com. 

Environmentally friendly house and 

business cleaning. Bellows Falls, Westminster 

West, Saxtons River, Putney, Brattleboro. 

Contact Emily Boslun (802) 463- 3111 

PAINTING: interior/exterior, restorations 

and revitalizing, best price, reliable, Miles 

Levesque, 802-869-4222, Rockingham/ 

Walpole area. 

Stud For Hire: AKC Registered - Yellow 

Labrador - OFA - Woodys Haven Kennels. 

254-2455. 

FULL SERVICE TREE CARE: Call All Seasons 

Tree Service at 802-722-3008 for free 

estimates for tree removals, pruning and 

a full range of tree care service. 30 years 

of experience. 

MAGICAL ENTERTAINMENT: The Great Scot, 

Bardic Magician, will make your party, festival, 

organization or special occasion unique and 

fun. Will travel, testimonials available. Info: 

802-463-1954, greatscot@greatscotmagic. 

com, www.greatscotmagic.com. 

RENAISSANCE ARTIST: veda Crewe Joseph, 

calligraphy, illumination, illustration, graphic 

artist, historical costumes, custom sewing 

and design. Samples, pictures, testimonials 

available. Info: 802-463-2054, veda@ 

renaissance-artist.com, www.renaissanceartist.com. 

Tarot Card and Astrology ReadingS 

for women. The readings promote increased 

clarity, self-awareness, and empowerment 

and offer positive, practical advice. $30 for 

 

a 20-minute reading. Phone consultations 

available MC/VISA. www.ameliashea.com 

603-924-0056. 

Wellness Consultations — healing 

through the use of foods, herbal remedies, 

nutritional supplements and lifestyle 

approaches to improve energy, restful sleep 

and overall health while reducing pain and 

chronic dis-ease. For more information or 

to schedule an appointment, please visit 

www.wisdomofhealing.com or call Cindy 

at (603) 997-2222. 

+ # 

CALLIGRAPHY — Yes, there are thousands 

of computer-generated fonts and logos, 

but nothing compares with the unique 

and timeless beauty, the artistic symmetry 

achieved through hand-rendered, custom 

calligraphy. Anything from invitations, 

announcements, and stationery to ads, 

flyers, and posters: give them that personal 

touch at reasonable rates. (802) 275-7572 

for info or to make an appointment, and 

ask for Colleen. 

CHAIR CANING (WEAVING) SERVICE. 

Restore your woven furniture to its original 

beauty and durability! All projects and 

patterns considered. Seat, Canoe and Chairback 

reweaving available with traditional 

hand cane, prefabricated cane, woven rush, 

and splint. Pick-up and delivery possible in 

the greater Brattleboro area. Email Juniper. 

vt@gmail.com with the type and size of your 

project and I will get back to you promptly 

with pricing and a time-frame. 

APPLE COMPUTER TUTOR: All things 

Macintosh/applications and troubleshooting. 

Patient educator. Sliding scale — you decide 

hourly rate. John @ 802-380-2663. 

volunteers needed 

Volunteers needed for store help and 

weekly recycling runs (must have pick-up and 

be physically strong) at Experienced Goods 

Thrift Shop for Brattleboro Area Hospice. 

Hours: Monday - Thursday & Saturday 10-5, 

Fridays 10-7. Donations Monday-Saturday; 

no donations on Wednesdays. Contact 

Dana at 254-5200 x105. 

WANTED 

WANTED: African drummers interested 

in collaborating with me to hold a Sanskrit 

chanting class. The yoga of devotion. Please 

call Amy at 579-9511 to discuss possibilities. 

Namaste. 

35MM Cameras: If you have come to rely 

on your digital camera and don’t know 

what to do with your perfectly good 35mm, 

The In-Sight Photography Project would 

love to have it. Insight teaches kids new 

perspectives through the lens of a camera, 

teaching communication skills and building 

self-esteem. Visit www.insight-photography. 

org, then contact Program Director Eric 

Maxen, In-Sight Photography Project, 

Inc., 45 Flat Street Suite 1, Brattleboro 

VT 05301. 

Antique / Vintage BicycleS. Single 

speed. Schwinn, Elgin, Dayton, Colson, 

etc. 1890’s thru 1950’s Balloon Tire Bikes. 

Any condition. Make room in your barn or 

basement. Top dollar paid!!! Please Call J.C. 

or Jackie 802-365-4297. 

Old guitars, amps, mandolins, basses, hi-fi 

stuff wanted. Also looking for tube powered 

hifi equipment. Call 802-257-5835. 

SpInnInG WORLd By Colin Tedford dRIFTWOOd By Morgan Pielli 

THE ICE STORm OF 2008 

nORTHmInSTER nORTH 

BuTTERCup FESTIVAL 

www.colintedford.com 

By Marek Bennett 

www.marekbennett.com 

By Jade Harmon 

jadecrystal.livejournal.com 

By David Troupes 

www.buttercupfestival.com 

VERmOnT CHEddAR 

By Silvio Graci 

vtcheddar@gmail.com

28 The Commons • January 2009 The Commons • A 

The Brattleboro Food Co-op’s 

OF 

THE 

True North Granola Brattleboro, Vermont 

Ingrid and Franklin Chrisco of True North Granola 

By day Ingrid Chrisco and her husband Franklin are both dedicated educators. Ingrid is the 

principal at Brattleboro Area Middle School. But at night she switches capes and becomes a selfavowed 

foodie and creator of True North Granola. Her granola is created with baked oats, nuts, 

dried fruits, in assorted recipes. Ingrid has perfected seven great granola flavors: Go Nuts, Wholly 

Granola, Pomagrapple, Granola Blues, Pumpkin, Choco Granola, and her certified Gluten-Free, 

dairy-free flavor made with certified gluten-free oats. 

When Ingrid talks about food and particularly about granola she talks with passion. The 

one word that kept coming up in connection with her granola recipes was: wholesomeness. It’s 

true too. All her granolas are lightly sweetened and use natural whole raw ingredients like oats, 

almonds, coconut, dried cranberries, dried blueberries, pepita seeds, and sunflower seeds. For 

those who need a gluten-free product her Gluten-Free is delicious and includes Turkish apricots 

and Macadamia nuts. 

Granola has always been part of the Chrisco family food scene and Ingrid has been making 

fresh granola for at least thirty years. About three years ago she decided she would like to make 

a go of creating a granola company. Like everything she does great care went into creating her 

small local family run business. Her friends, Chris Triebert and Carol Ross and their company 

Rock River Editions, created the colorful and distinctive package design. And the name? Ingrid’s 

sister Martha likened Ingrid’s quality granola as finding the true north of granola – nothing less 

will do. Ingrid and Franklin hope that one of their sons will soon join the company. 

You can find True North 

Granola in our bulk bins at the 

Co-op, or in our new local section 

by the front entrance, or at the 

Brattleboro Area Farmers’ Market 

and Winter Farmers’ Market. 

All her granolas are lightly sweetened 

and use natural whole raw ingredients 

like oats, almonds, coconut, dried 

cranberries, dried blueberries, pepita 

seeds, and sunflower seeds. 

Meet Ingrid and 

Franklin Chrisco at 

the Co-op 

Saturday, January 10, 

2-6 p.m. and sample 

their granola. 

product photo: Chris Triebert, Rock River Editions 

co-opcalendar January 2009 

YOGA 

Every Wednesday, 12-1 p.m. $3 

Prakriti Yoga Studio, 139 Main St., #701 

Yoga with Dante 

Free to Co-op members 

Every Wednesday 5:30–7p.m. 

Prakriti Yoga Studio, 139 Main St., #701 

Meet & Greet 

Saturday, January 10, 2-6 p.m. 

Meet Ingrid and Franklin Chrisco 

producers of True North Granola 

from Brattleboro, Vermont 

Fair Trade Sampling 

Thursday, January 15, 4-7 

Intro to Detoxification 

by Cindy Hebbard 

Tuesday, January 13, 6-8pm 

Co-op Community Room 

No Charge for this class 

Optimal health is established when we combine nutritionally 

rich foods, a healthy lifestyle and regular detoxification 

of the accumulated toxins in our organs and 

cells. There are many healing foods and safe herbs that 

effectively help to rid the body of the toxic overload 

believed to lead to chronic illness disease and premature 

aging. In this class, you will learn about using foods, 

herbal remedies and everyday life choices for disease 

prevention, release of chronic pain and a lifetime of 

more vibrant health. 

Back to Basics Food Fair 

Friday, January 23, 11 to 5 pm 

Samplings of inexpensive & easy to prepare foods, live 

music, drawing for a $200 Co-op Shopping Spree, and 

more. 

Wine Tasting at the Co-op 

Friday, January 23, 3 to 7 pm 

Cooking with Love taught by Haley Felker 

Wednesday, January 28, 6-8pm, 

Co-op Community Room, $10.00 per student 

This class demonstrates whole food vegetarian cooking, 

touching on basic Ayurvedic principles. Participants will 

enjoy a five coarse meal and hands-on preparation of 

three dishes. Verbal and written instructions on basic 

spicing, traditional Indian flat breads (chapattis), lentil 

soup (dahl), chutney and mild curry will give participants 

a basic understanding of how to incorporate mindful 

cooking into their lives. 

Haley Felker graduated from the Institute of Integrative 

Nutrition. She has been a practicing student of vegetarianism 

and healthy living for 6 years and has worked 

in the Omega Institute kitchen, been a cook at a Hawaiian 

elementary school and has cooked for various local 

functions. Enrollment is limited. Please pay instructor at 

time of class. 

Story-n-Snack 

Story Time at the Co-op 

Who: Children birth to five and their caregivers 

When: Fridays in October from 10:30-11 

Where: The Kids’ Room at the Co-op 

Monday–Saturday 8-9 • Sunday 9-9 • 2 Main St., Brattleboro, Vermont • 802 257-0236 • www.brattleborofoodcoop.com

voices - The Commons

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