Stowe Guide & Magazine Summer/Fall 2020 by Stowe Guide & Magazine

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CONTENTS s u m m e r

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features

A little of Johannes, a lot of von Trapps by Robert Kiener

Bierhall and brewery. First cross-country ski center in the U.S. Seeing a new future after a devastating fire and loss. Real estate growth and land conservation. For 50 years, the vision of Johannes von Trapp has shaped his family’s legacy.

Remembering Ken Strong

by Mike Verillo

“Clocks were blasted with a shotgun. A horse stopped in. A Christmas tree was mounted to the ceiling one year.” The times. The stories. The Shed.

100 years: Stowe Community Church by Josh O’Gorman

One of New England’s most famous landmarks—the people’s church— celebrates a centennial.

68 36 hours in the Kingdom by Julia Shipley

CLOCKWISE FROM BOTTOM LEFT: COURTESY; STOWE REPORTER ARCHIVES, GLENN CALLAHAN; PAUL ROGERS; DERRICK BARRETT

The Common. Caspian Lake. Giant puppets, blueberries, a chapel to the dogs, Albert Bierstadt ... all in a day and a half.

Casting a brush with David Pound by Kate Carter

Artist finds inspiration in fly fishing, wildlife, nature, and his adopted New England surroundings.

Seth Yacovone by Tommy Gardner

Blues. Rock. The Grateful Dead ... COVID-19 gives the hardest working man around—he’s logged 1,500-plus shows in the last five years—a welcome respite. But that doesn’t mean the music stopped.

118

Peony power by Rob Kiener

Accidental farmers rescue one man’s magnificent obsession.

130

Mountain modern: A dramatic reimagining

130

by Rob Kiener

Couple adds drama, lots of outdoor living—and views galore—to tired Colonial.

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CONTENTS /

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251 Club

Cady Hill Forest

48 ON OUR COVER

departments 8

Contributors

From the editor First person: COVID-19 Rural route

14 18 38 40 42 44 46 48 84

126

Spotlight: Builder Donnie Blake

148

Real estate: What $750k buys

board, 16"x20", by Stowe artist David Pound, who we also profile in this edition. (See story, p.74) The English-born artist has always been keenly interested in wildlife, but growing up in London limited his connection to nature to borrowed books and photographs. But a trip to New England two decades ago changed all of that.

Fish story: Leaf peep and fish! Trail journal: 4 great Stowe hikes Artisans gallery: Borealis Studios

110

Our cover painting this summer is Stowe Church, Summer, oil on

Stowe people: Trail for Jake Stowe people: Snowboard pioneer Q&A: Rachel Fussell On mountain: Bouldering

Dispatches: Naked and Afraid Found in Vermont: Shopping list Cool things: 251 Club Edibles: What’s cooking

“I was drawn to Vermont for the crisp and clear landscapes and the abundance of wildlife. My inspiration for my art comes from the nature around me. Living in Vermont provides me with unlimited visual references for my paintings,” says Pound. “The countryside influences my choice of colors, themes, and backgrounds. I aim to express, through my paintings, what I witness everyday in this wonderful state.”

GETTING AROUND

GETTING OUTDOORS

SHOPPING & GALLERIES

RESTAURANTS & LODGING

116

REAL ESTATE & HOMES

152

BUSINESSES & SERVICES

160

INDEX TO ADVERTISERS

Jerilyn Virden, Borealis Studios

Pound worked, very successfully, in graphic design for many years, but his interest in fine-art painting never wavered. See Pound’s work at Robert Paul Galleries in Stowe, and online at davidpound.com or @davidpoundart.

FROM TOP LEFT: COURTESY; KEVIN WALSH; KAREN GOWEN PHOTOGRAPHY

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CONTRIBUTORS

GUIDE & MAGAZINE

Robert M. Miller

Gregory J. Popa

Michael Duran, Lou Kiernan, Bryan Meszkat, and Lisa Stearns

Gregory J. Popa

Thomas Kearney, Kate Carter, Robert Kiener, and Tommy Gardner

Leslie Lafountain

Mitzi Savage

Gordon Miller and Glenn Callahan

Katerina Hrdlicka, Kristen Braley, Bev Mullaney, and Joslyn Richardson

Stuart Bertland, Kate Carter, Orah Moore, Paul Rogers, Kevin Walsh

JULIA SHIPLEY

KATE CARTER

IN THIS ISSUE: 36 hours in the Kingdom, p.68

IN THIS ISSUE: Casting a brush, p.74

Most memorable takeaway: What I love about

Behind the scenes: David Pound and I worked togeth-

Vermont, and what I especially love about the Northeast Kingdom, are all the ways that culture and agricultural landscapes and community are beautifully entwined. to Yankee Magazine and contributing writer for Seven Days newspaper. Her work can also be found in the Old Farmer’s Almanac, as well as the New Farmer’s Almanac. She was recently awarded the Nona

er on marketing accounts in the past, but it wasn’t until our biggest account dried up and we both moved on to other projects that I learned, much to my surprise, that David’s true calling is fine art painting. When I saw his work I was so impressed I knew I wanted to write about him. I also had no idea he is a fly fisherman, and it turns out fishing is where he derives many of his ideas and much of the inspiration that he applies to the canvas.

Balakian Prize for literary journalism.

Currently: Kate is a freelance writer and photograph-

ROB KIENER

er, and when she’s not researching stories, she’s photographing real estate for Vermont Realtors, hiking with her dogs, and cultivating food and flowers.

Currently: Julia Shipley is a contributing editor

IN THIS ISSUE: Johannes von Trapp, p.50 Most memorable takeaway: A bit of advice. Don’t

ask Johannes von Trapp what his favorite song is from “The Sound of Music.” As he explains, “It’s not that I hate ‘Do-Re-Mi,’ or ‘The Lonely Goatherd.’ It’s just that I have heard them a million times.” Indeed, he has had a longstanding deal with the Trapp Family Lodge piano player to never play “Do-Re-Mi” in his presence. “If he were playing it and I walked in, he’d immediately shift into playing ‘Desperado,’ my favorite song.” Currently: Kiener, a frequent contributor to the Stowe Guide & Magazine, has been an editor and staff writer with Reader’s Digest in Asia, Europe, and Canada, and now writes for the magazine and other publications from his base in Stowe. More at robertkiener.com.

Mark Aiken, Kate Carter, Evan Chismark, Caleigh Cross, Nancy Crowe, Willy Dietrich, Elinor Earle, Tommy Gardner, Robert Kiener, Brian Lindner, Hannah Normandeau, Andrew Martin, Peter Miller, Mike Mulhern, David Rocchio, Julia Shipley, Nancy Wolfe Stead, Kevin Walsh

Stowe Guide & Magazine & Stowe-Smugglers’ Guide & Magazine are published twice a year:

Winter/Spring & Summer/Fall Vermont Community Newspaper Group LLC P.O. Box 489, Stowe VT 05672 Website: stowetoday.com, vtcng.com Editorial inquiries: gpopa@myfairpoint.net

TOMMY GARDNER

Ad submission: ads@stowereporter.com Phone: (802) 253-2101 Fax: (802) 253-8332

IN THIS ISSUE: Seth Yacovone, p.98 Behind the scenes: I first saw Seth Yacovone perform at First Night in Burlington in the Edmunds Middle School gymnasium, on an incredibly frigid New Year’s Eve, before I could buy beer legally and before Yac had his driver’s license. He tells me now that it was his second show, and yet everyone came walking out of that gym knowing we had just seen the coming of something really big.

Currently: News editor for the Stowe Reporter and

Subscriptions are $15 per year. Check or money order to Stowe Guide, P.O. Box 489, Stowe, 05672

News & Citizen newspapers who knows way fewer

than three chords and the truth.

Editorial submissions are welcome: Vermont Community Newspaper Group P.O. Box 489, Stowe VT 05672 Publication is not guaranteed. Enclose SASE for return.

Advertising inquiries are welcome. Best Niche Publication, New England Newspaper & Press Association 2010 through 2018

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FROM THE EDITOR

GORDON MILLER

BATTLE STATIONS Cashiers at Shaw’s Supermarket in Stowe mask up to stay safe as the store prepares to open for the day. The cashiers are Shyanne Allard, Lauren Roff, Greer Southhall, Paige Moulton, and Radek Dvorak.

Let’s keep everyone safe, wear a mask, keep your distance It’s been 100 years since the last time in human history that every human being on the planet directly faced the same, shared experience. COVID-19. Unless you’re an indigenous person in an extremely remote place, likely your life has been touched by the novel coronavirus. School is shut down; suddenly, you’re a teacher. Doors to favorite restaurants and retail shops—and your gym and therapist—are locked. It’s zoom here, zoom there, zoom this, zoom that. Did I remember my mask? Why is that person not respecting my space? Grandma, dad, son die and no one can officially mourn them. What could possibly happen next? Who knows, but trust the experts, scientists, civil servants, and medical professionals, and follow those few simple rules—masks, distancing, hand-washing—and let’s keep everyone safe. Our governor, Phil Scott, exhibited decisive leadership on the pandemic, and he continues a careful approach. The state’s been shuttered since mid-March, just like where you live, but Vermont’s return to “normal” has been slower than many states. Thank you, by the way, for coming this summer, and hopefully, this fall. But can we humbly suggest a few tips? • The Stowe Select Board, the body that governs the functioning of our government, requires that everyone in Stowe wear a face mask in the presence of others. That means in the grocery store, on the hiking trail, biking on the rec path, picking up takeout. So far, local folks seem to agree with the edict, but just like in your town, there are outliers. But those mandatory masks and keeping a respectful distance from others just might help to keep Stowe open for the long haul, by keeping new cases at a minimum. Save a vaccine, it’s the best way to ensure the health and safety

of the community—employers and employees, residents and visitors—and just possibly keep the economy functioning. The order expires June 30 and even if town officials allow it to expire—please don’t—just keep wearing your masks, whenever possible. Eating and drinking, clearly, are exceptions, but still practice other distancing measures and cultivate an awareness of those around you. • Do tip a little extra. The hard-working service sector has been especially hard hit. Waiters and waitresses, hosts, bartenders, chambermaids, taxi drivers, and others. • Cooking in your rental kitchen or Airbnb? Great, but buy from a local farmers market (Stowe’s is Sunday) and spring for a meal out an extra night or two. • Buy local. Grab a few extra birthday gifts or something for a special anniversary or holiday from one of our local retailers. Help us keep everyone here safe, and we’ll return the favor. —Greg Popa

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FIRST PERSON

I â&#x20AC;&#x2122; D LOVE TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE FOR A WHILE , BUT WHAT ELSE IS THERE ? AS THE WEATHER WARMS AND THE NEWS ROARS ON , FRUSTRATION WILL WIN OVER CAUTION , AND THEN WHO KNOWS ? ESSAY BY

/ David M. Rocchio

ILLUSTRATION

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Stowe Resort Homes

A COVID WORLD Warily, we welcome the hope that warmth brings On a fine Saturday morning in May, the fire in the woodstove snuffed itself out. The day rolled in, warm and bright. It continued through a hot Sunday as well. The sun warmed our bones. Sure, it may get cold again, but we’ll take that early May warming. Spring is locked in now, unstoppable. At our COVID-19 lockdown last weekend, we worked outside burning and mowing and composting and planting. We moved around, busy and dirty, not a mask in sight. The warmth was more than solar radiation. It blew life into everything and made the world feel at least a bit more normal. We did venture out to a friend’s house the other night, but did not go inside. Sat by a roaring fire in a light, cold rain drinking rye whiskey, all of us talking like auctioneers, excited to have someone across a fire to talk to. I have also now twice sat in a friend’s barn—hoop house, really. The plastic walls arch right over the top, making the framed end-walls give the place a cathedral feel. The hoop house is church to what grows in long rows inside. We sat more than 6 feet apart, masks off so we could sip cold cans of cream puff, feeling good about supporting a local brewery. We had music on the Spotify, were well sheltered in that place. Could have sat there all night. We will do it again, for sure. Beyond that, I remain pretty cautious. As for meeting up with people, I won’t go beyond these few visits for now. We all know everything and nothing about this thing roaring through the world. The news is the same, all day, every day. The science of discovery of what this infection is and does evolves chaotically. We are like a group of people running through a room in the dark, trying

FIRST PERSON not to hit our shins against coffee tables or trip over toys lying on the floor, and the news reports on every stumble and start. I’d love to talk about something else for a while, but what else is there? As the weather warms and the news roars on, frustration will win over caution, and then who knows? In the grocery store the other night, I saw a range of opinions on the virus spread out throughout the store. Some people wore masks, glasses, gloves. Others were uncovered and seemed to challenge the virus to just try to touch them (or pass from them to others, which is more likely). Running into friends in the aisles, some wanted distance (I’m in that group), and others came in for a chat. God knows what to do. The coronavirus and COVID-19 tests us, scares us, makes us step up (or not). An old friend is stepping up. He is a doctor in a rural hospital (not here). We talk now and then, and this thing is tougher on him than it is on me. He talks about intubating and, now and then, extubating patients. Extubating is the good part. He talks about stripping down in the garage when he gets home. Washing everything before going into a room with other people.

Sleeping like the dead. Rinse and repeat. I know nurses and doctors and carers of all stripes, grocery store clerks and loggers, cops and EMTs, all facing up to the virus each and every day. Like spring, they bring hope. They help us push the thing back, get life back to some level of normal. I return to thoughts of my doctor friend. I told him I think he has been preparing for this thing his whole life. We met freshman year at UVM and he is a great guy; always good for a conversation, thinks the best of things and people, knows his craft, likes to laugh, is a good listener, and a great doctor. He decided to go into medicine late. A calling, I guess. Glad he heard it. Glad he took the call. During this past incredible summer-like weekend, as the sun started to fall, I took a text from my doctor buddy. He was having a downer day. He’d lost three patients and was sitting at home listening to John Prine, himself recently felled by the virus. Now, I sure love John Prine, and I’ve been playing a ton of the troubadour’s music too. But I suggested to my bud that he might consider something else after a day on the front lines of this communal nightmare. I thought maybe The Traveling Wilburys “Margarita.”

“I was in Pittsburgh late one night/I lost my hat, got into a fight/I rolled and tumbled ’til I saw the light/Went to the Big Apple where I took a bite.” A song from before the virus, for sure, uplifting and full of life. My pal made the change, and I put on the Wilburys too. My bud and I texted back and forth. I shared my theory he’d been building to this time his whole life, to be the guy taking care of those of us hit hardest by this bug. He didn’t reply directly to that, but did tell me, “At least I got to hold the phone for a patient while he said goodbye to his brother.” There’s that, at least. There’s that. The burning hot sun will be back. Within a week or two, the buds on the hills all around us will open up to a bold green. The seeds in my garden will sprout. The world will start spinning again. Maybe on a late, light June night we’ll set a few tables out back and share a meal with friends, and we’ll start to put this thing behind us. ■

David M. Rocchio lives, works, and writes in Stowe. He is the founder and president of Stowe Story Labs.

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GLENN CALLAHAN

RURAL ROUTE

It happens every year, and some years are worse—or better?—than others. Two years ago, Smugglers Notch—the narrow, winding mountain pass between Stowe and Cambridge—hadn’t been open for a month and two tractor-trailers had gotten stuck. Route 108 through Smugglers Notch is closed every winter because it’s impossible to deal with the rugged weather at 2,160 feet. The Notch road reopens once the ice is gone; this year, it opened May 14. On average, seven tractor-trailer trucks get stuck in Smugglers Notch every year, said Ernie Patnoe, maintenance transportation administrator for the Vermont Agency of Transportation, which oversees Route 108. In 2016, nearly a dozen vehicles got stuck. Between 2009 and 2017, more than 50 trucks

 MAIL BAG

Story made me look good To the editor: Just saw my story in the magazine, “Art for history’s sake,” by Jasmine Bigelow. (Stowe Guide & Magazine, Winter / Spring 2019-2020) My sincerest thanks for such a wonderful article. Jasmine really understood my art and mission and put it into a beautifully crafted

tried and failed to worm their way through. Rescuing those vehicles takes hours away from the other things that Vermont State Police and Stowe police could be doing, and it’s a huge inconvenience when an oversized vehicle clogs the Notch. Drivers of regular vehicles not only can’t get through the Notch, but they have to get out of the way while a tractor-trailer truck tries to back down the mountain. Fines can be up to $2,000 for truckers who venture into the Notch despite signs warning them the route isn’t passable for vehicles that large. Two years ago, VTrans discussed putting in a chicane—a maze-like structure that only cars and pickup trucks can get through—in an attempt to keep trucks from attempting the Notch, but Patnoe says those discussions stalled because the area is too small to install one. “The chicane was a good idea until we start realizing the amount of property it would take to put it in. You would have to put in a chicane and then a go-around,” Patnoe said, and there just isn’t room, particularly on the Cambridge side of Smugglers Notch, which is where Stowe Police Chief Don Hull says most trucks get stuck. Only about a quarter-mile of Smugglers Notch is in Stowe. “At this point in time, we just can’t drive for these folks. The signage is there; there’s just no way they can say they didn’t see it,” he said. “No Tractor Trailers” is also painted directly onto Route 108 on both sides of the Notch. —Stowe Guide staff story. Bravo! Many thanks for making me look good. Jim Westphalen, Shelburne, Vt.

Handled with care To the editor: I have been meaning to write to you about the article “The Valedictorian,” (Stowe Guide &

Magazine, Summer / Fall 2019). With clear and precise prose, Julia Shipley wrote about a charged subject in such a way that I almost felt like I was Opal Savoy. No judgments, no sentimentality—amazing. The story really opened a door to understanding this dear person and others like them. In the photos she looks like an angel. Diane Swan, Barre, Vt.

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GORDON MILLER

RURAL ROUTE

n Mondays and Saturdays, the Rev. Rick Swanson takes a break from his duties as rector of St. John’s in the Mountains Episcopal Church in Stowe. Instead, he heads to The Ice Center in Waterbury, where he operates the Zamboni machine that keeps the ice nice and smooth. In one way, it’s an extension of his love for winter sports; in another way, he’s engaged in a Christian tradition that dates back more than 1,600 years. “I don’t know the formal title, but you can call me the ‘Zamboni Man,’ ” said Swanson, who is one of eight people who operates the machine for The Ice Center. Swanson has a long history of being on the ice; his father played hockey for the University of Minnesota’s Golden Gophers in a region that loves its college hockey the way the southeastern United States loves its college football. By the age of 2, Swanson was on skates, eventually earning a spot on the U.S. Men’s world and national speedskating team, competing in the world championship in 1990 in Obihiro, Japan; other competitions saw him pierce the Iron Curtain with events in East Germany. Today, Swanson plays coed hockey three times a week— once in Stowe and twice in Waterbury—and competes regularly in the annual Hyde Cup Hockey Tournament in Stowe. While he’s more than comfortable on skates, last July he began training to operate the Zamboni, a job that is much more complex than operating a riding lawnmower. “It’s very technical,” he said. “You have to drive in the same pattern every time you go out there. The hockey Zamboni is designed to fit the arena, and the pattern hasn’t changed since it was designed.” For Swanson, the act of driving the Zamboni dovetails with his work with his church. “It takes all the focus in the world

SMOOTH AS ICE The Rev. Rick Swanson pilots a Zamboni, repairing the churned-up surface at The Ice Center in Waterbury. Inset: The Rev. Swanson sharpens his skates.

to keep to those patterns, but at the same time, you are focused on this one thing, and it clears the mind and you begin to feel something spiritual,” he said. While the venues might be quite different—the church and the rink—the act of driving the Zamboni is akin to walking a labyrinth, a pattern found on the floor of many large churches and cathedrals. The earliest known labyrinth dates to the fourth century A.D. at Basilica of Reparatus at Orleansville, Algeria. Most modern labyrinths are modeled after the one found in Chartres Cathedral in France. Walking a labyrinth is said to resemble making a pilgrimage to a holy site, calming the mind and centering the soul. “I would say I have two spiritual centers, not just figuratively but literally,” Swanson said. “One is Sunday mornings in worship and the other is being in a rink on ice. My faith is informed by worship on Sunday morning, and there is a sacred and spiritual experience I get every time I skate.” —Josh O’Gorman

THE STREAK ENDS! Stowe Guide & Magazine has won Best Niche publication for nine consecutive years in the New England Newspaper & Press Association’s BETTER NEWSPAPER COMPETITION, but had to settle for third in 2019. RECOUNT! Judges said, “Gorgeous publication ... We enjoyed all of the content but really like the departments.” Other firsts for the magazine included Rob Kiener’s story about skiing legend Billy Kidd, “THE KIDD FROM STOWE.” “Bright writing and skillful juxtaposition of Kidd in his heyday and today make this a can’t-put-down profile—even if you’ve never strapped on skis.” PHOTOGRAPHER PAUL ROGERS won the top award in the photo story category for “Agricultural Goddess.” (He also took second in the same category for “Light & Shadow.”) JULIA SHIPLEY took second for her social issues feature story, “The Valedictorian.” Overall, the VERMONT COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER GROUP, which publishes five weeklies and two magazines, won 35 awards. First-place winners for the Stowe Reporter included Beverly Mullaney, with three first-place advertising design awards, and KRISTEN BRALEY, for online ad design. Braley and Hannah Normandeau won for best newsletter, while the staff took first in the contests category for its annual 4393 Readers’ Choice awards. TOMMY GARDNER’S story, “Look out! 160 stuck on a lift, rescued,” was first in its class in the spot news category. Judges said the story provided readers “a unique analysis of a high-altitude rescue situation while never straying far from the element of human drama.”

NARROW ESCAPE Stowe Mountain Rescue rang in the new year by rescuing a dog from Bingham Falls in Stowe after the pooch fell 25 feet into the frigid water. At right and inset: Dog and owner reunite, as a couple of rescuers enjoy the save. A rescue team member grabs Greta the dog off a narrow ledge and prepares to haul her up.

Stowe Mountain Rescue makes New Year’s save Stowe Mountain Rescue rang in new year 2020 by helping an 84-year old that had fallen into Bingham Falls—at least that’s how old if you measure in dog years. The rescue outfit was called out Jan. 1 by the owner of a 12-year-old Weimaraner named Greta. According to rescue chief Doug Veliko, Greta and her owner had gone for a walk to the Bingham Falls area from the Notchbrook condominiums and the dog darted off, got too close to the edge of the upper falls, and fell about 25 feet into one of the pools. “He described the dog as chasing a squirrel,” Veliko said. “He just watched the whole thing in horror.” Greta was swept downstream about 100 feet but managed to get onto a ledge. She was on that ledge when rescue crews arrived. Veliko said everyone moved swiftly, worried she might make a leap for the shore; she likely would not have made it and almost certainly would have been swept under the ice. The rescue crews set up a rope system with two attendants at the top, while a third crewmember, wearing a dry suit just in case he had to enter the frigid water, rappelled down the cliff to the ledge. The crewmember on the rope placed Greta into a dog backpacking harness typically used for hiking, backed that up with a secure net of climbing webbing, just in case the dog kicked her way out of the harness, and tied it off to his rope. Veliko said the action was performed “just like the way you do with little kids. You put the subject in front of you,” instead of the way it’s done with adults, who are typically attached to the rope below the rescuer. One thing rescuers don’t have to worry about when pulling humans out of peril? Sharp, biting teeth. That was no problem with Greta, Veliko said. “Even the nicest dogs, when they’re in that kind of life-and-death situation, you don’t know how they’re going to react,” he said. “This dog was super sweet.” By 10 a.m., Greta was rescued; she was cold and shaken but otherwise fine after her ordeal. Greta’s owner later shared his thoughts with the crew, and the message was posted to its Facebook page, saying the operation was “incredibly efficient.” “Bingham Falls, though beautiful, is a very dangerous place in winter and I should have had Greta on her leash at all times,” the owner wrote. “The Stowe Mountain Rescue Team saved Greta’s life. Every team member on the scene was a pro.” Neil Van Dyke, Stowe Mountain Rescue’s deputy chief and one of its founders—he’s also the search and rescue coordinator for the Vermont Department of Public Safety—noted that, when it comes to rescue efforts involving animals, “it’s either rescue the dog or respond later and rescue the owner.” Veliko agreed: “That’s one of the reasons we go right away, because we don’t want the humans to go after them.” —Tommy Gardner

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Team leader: Charles Safford ‘There’s a lot of underpinning to keep Stowe going’ Every town needs a manager, a hired executive officer who works outside of the political realm to keep operations running smoothly. In Stowe, that’s Charles Safford. He became Stowe’s town manager in 2007, and has since balanced local needs, wants, and desires with state and federal government edicts. “They don’t teach you those skills in school,” he said. Safford lives in Elmore with his wife, Jennifer, who majored in animal science; they have two cats and 12 chickens. Their daughter Grace attends Champlain College and is majoring in professional writing, and their son Daniel lives in Hartford and works in the IT department at Dartmouth College’s Thayer School of Engineering.

Why town manager? My father was an Army colonel and a political science teacher and I grew up with a sense of community service. I learned about societal issues and those types of conversations were prevalent in my childhood. After graduating from Bellows Falls Union High School, I went to Keene State, where I needed to declare a major. My father suggested town manager and I liked the idea. I did an internship with the city of Keene and rewrote its sign ordinance. When I graduated in 1988, I applied to be the administrative assistant to the town manager in Middlebury. I got the job and started the day after graduating.

How did you end up in Stowe? I worked in Middlebury for four years, then went to Hardwick as its town manager, and then I was the village manager for Essex Junction. At the same time, I earned a master’s in administration at St. Michael’s College. When Essex town and village merged, I was no longer the town manager by default. That’s when I came to Stowe. It was the same time that it moved to the council manager form of government. I applied for the job as town manager because I wanted to face Stowe’s challenges and see how I could be of assistance to this community.

GORDON MILLER

the intErviEw

What do you like about the job? It’s not assembly-line work. It’s different every day and there is opportunity to excel. This job gives me a deep appreciation for how everyone from different occupations and aspects of life contributes to the whole. We’ve built a talented team of municipal employees who can serve the community and make it go round. There’s a lot of underpinning to keep Stowe going.

What is a typical day like? There isn’t one. It changes from day to day and it ebbs and flows. I’m here to assist the 11 department heads. Some days are not as good as others. We have to deal with urgent things like hurricanes, microbursts like the one in Cady Hill Forest in October 2017, and snowstorms. Anything that involves society involves the government. Our most challenging issue has been the COVID-19 pandemic, from finding out about the virus to closing down town offices in Akeley Memorial Building to basically closing down the whole town. We have been trying to operate as effectively and safely as possible and still be in a position to respond to emergencies. We have to keep people working on wastewater, EMS responders, fire, and police. At the end of the day, I have to work with each department head to keep Stowe inhabitants safe.

INTERVIEW CONDUCTED & COMPILED BY KATE CARTER

RURAL ROUTE

What are your strengths as a manager? My ability to effectively lead a team and understand my role within the organization. I have a lot of background and experience, having been exposed to four different municipal corporations. It gives me a depth of perspective. Also, my ability to work well with people. I love everyone, some more than others.

What are some of your achievements? Since I’ve been here, we’ve had significant major capital improvement projects, including a new public safety facility that houses all the departments and unites services and responses. Also, the new ice arena and burying overhead wires. A lot goes along with that to maintain services and keep businesses running. There are a lot of logistics to figure out.

How many departments do you oversee? Eleven departments and about 65 full-time employees. And then there are all the volunteers. A lot of people are involved in a town government and a lot of things are going on in a community.

What do you like best about your job? Most days, the people. And the variety of challenges. I’ve been fortunate to have very dedicated select board members. We’ve learned you can’t make everybody happy, but they have done a good job of wading through issues and making good decisions on behalf of the public. Like most things, it’s easier said than done. Some days we forget there are many people who give up their time to serve the public and earn their trust.

What have you learned? Empathy. I take secret pleasure in conversing with someone who doesn’t like government, and when we’re done, they think it’s not so bad after all.

How do you cope with day-to-day stress? What keeps me sane is my wife and family. And I enjoy the outdoors—Nordic skiing, offtrack skiing, and I’m an avid bow hunter. I was once advised that I better have a good hobby to escape to. You have to have something else besides work or you won’t be able to sustain yourself. ■

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② Do you have a photo of our magazine on some far-flung island or rugged peak? Send a high-rez copy to ads@stowereporter.com, with Stowe Magazine in the subject line.

1. Jane Lanning, drama director for a high school in Spencerville, Md., and her husband, Jim, flew their Cessna 172 into the Morrisville/Stowe airport for a special visit to Trapp Family Lodge. “My cast performed ‘The Sound of Music’ this year and as a thank you gesture they gave us a getaway visit to the lodge,” says Jane. “As we took off and flew over the lodge, I seized the opportunity to catch our far-flung photo op. ... What a great idea to capture these experiences in your publication!” We think so too, Jane, but must admit we stole it from another magazine. In the cool coincidences category, 20 years ago when Jane’s school first performed the play Rosemarie von Trapp visited and shared the ‘real story’ of the von Trapp family, and led a sing-along. 2. Here’s Calvin A. Bensch II with our magazine in Bad Dürkheim, Germany, in front of the largest wine cask in the world, which doesn’t actually hold wine, but a 435-seat wine bar on two levels. He’s holding the magazine open to the page showing an earlier photo of him and his son in Nassau, Bahamas. “Reading Stowe Magazine from afar is a pleasant reminder of one of my favorite New England villages. While Germany was beautiful, my heart belongs to those green rolling hills of northern Vermont.” 3. Katerina Hrdlicka and Marty Werth of Mud City in Morrisville on a quick adventure to Key West, posing in front of the marker for the southernmost spot on the U.S. mainland. Kat is production manager at the Stowe Reporter and News & Citizen and art director of Green Mountain Weddings, while Marty owns a landscaping and excavation company. The couple is holding last summer’s magazine, which featured one of Kat’s paintings on the cover!

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David Stackpole was the quintessential man about town. The Stowe lawyer, longtime town moderator and social butterfly died Feb. 16, but according to those who knew him, his presence is still felt. Born Oct. 19, 1933, Stackpole was a Lamoille County kid. He grew up in Johnson, graduated from Peoples Academy in Morrisville, and returned to the area after graduating from Cornell Law School. Stackpole was also the Stowe town moderator for 18 years. Current moderator Leighton Detora said he first met Stackpole when Detora was bartending at The Whip in the early 1970s. “I learned a lot about practicing law that you don’t pick up in law school,” Detora said. “I would find out that much of law, like much of life, is about human management.”

in his place more than once.” Stackpole’s relationship with his four grandchildren was equally close—and unique. Savage said he had an individual relationship with each of them, “exactly geared to the child. I made the cakes and bought the presents, and he sat and talked with them and took them on adventures.”

The people’s lawyer

Law partner Ed French worked with Stackpole

Husband, then friend

Stackpole’s obituary makes note of “good friend and former wife” Paige Savage. Lots of divorced couples may say that, but Savage said it’s quite true for her and Stackpole; they remained friends. Even when Savage moved to California for a spell, Stackpole would come and visit. “And on the occasion I had a date, I’d set out an extra plate at the table for him,” she said. Savage and Stackpole were married for about a decade, long enough for the couple to have their two daughters—Anna and Katie. And then they were separated for even longer than that, not bothering to get a divorce. When they finally decided to formally dissolve their union, Savage said Stackpole told her, “’Don’t bother to get an attorney. You can have whatever you want.’ He always gave me whatever I needed and whatever I wanted.” While he was a good ex-husband, Savage said that paled in comparison to his goodness as a father and grandfather. “He was a miraculous father with them, and a great partner in bringing them up,” Savage said. “He raised two very strong-minded daughters who put him

FAMILY GUY David Stackpole with his two daughters, Anna and Katie, in the 1970s during one of the many adventures they enjoyed together. As a young boy in the 1930s. A more recent portrait.

for more than 40 years, until Stackpole retired in 2015. He said Stackpole was a man of the people, and that guided their law practice. “David and I always prided ourselves in practicing what he called the humanist school of law,” French said. The future law partners were introduced in the summer of 1977, when French was in law school and clerked under Stackpole and his then-partner Tom Amidon. He said the two had very different styles, with Amidon being ultraorganized—he would go home and work around his impeccably landscaped home—

while Stackpole, far more relaxed, would spend his weekends on the town, socializing. “You couldn’t have found a more odd couple,” French said. Amidon died in 2017. That humanist touch allowed Stackpole to take cases that others might not touch. For instance, French remembers how the firm represented the Stowe village electric department, when there was still a village government, in a lawsuit against the Seabrook nuclear power plant in New Hampshire. The utility wanted to get out of its contract with Seabrook, but to do so it had to win eight lawsuits. It won them all. “He was always sticking his nose in places you wouldn’t expect it,” French said. French said Stowe didn’t have a full-time law firm when Stackpole set up his private practice in 1964, four years before teaming up with Ami-don. It’s hard to believe now, but French said when Stackpole asked a fellow lawyer whether he ought to hang a shingle in Stowe, the lawyer said to him, “Boy, do you want to eat?” “The town would basically shut down in the summer,” French said. Savage said that, after Stackpole died, she received a note from a former client who told her that Stackpole had saved his trailer from foreclosure. She said it’s not just his name that’s sticking around. Remember when Savage said she’d put a plate out for Stackpole when he came to visit her in California? Even after he died, there was a place for him at the table. Savage said she and Katie and Anna went out for lunch in Stowe soon after Stackpole died. They all sat at a four-top. “The waitress said, ‘Will there be another?’ ” Savage remembers. “I said, ‘Oh, he’s here. He’s just not eating.’ ” —Tommy Gardner

RURAL ROUTE ARENA TIME Part of the skating Clark family of Stowe, Leo Clark, starting goalie for the Peoples-Stowe hockey squad, is considered one of the best goalies in Vermont. Here she makes a save in a 1-0 victory over rival Harwood. According to John Clark, becoming a sports announcer for local hockey games was the best speech therapy possible for his son, Jack. Graham Mink of Stowe celebrates after scoring in the Hershey Bears’ 4-1 victory in the AHL playoffs. Grand opening of Stowe Arena in 2013.

BUILDING COMMUNITY ON ICE

GORDON MILLER; MILLER; COURTESY; INSET: GLENN CALLAHAN

This year, the Stowe Arena celebrates its eighth year as a key part of Stowe’s recreational culture. It draws tots and teenagers, coaches and parents, figure skaters and hockey players, residents and visitors. Turf replaces the ice every spring so teams can practice for lacrosse and baseball when fields are still iced over. When Leo Clark came to Stowe in 1984 as the town administrator, the venerable Jackson Arena had ice as long as the weather cooperated. The arena had a roof, but its walls stopped well short of the ground. When the temperature dropped below zero, skaters suffered. When a January thaw softened the ice, hockey games had to be postponed. Stowe needed reliable ice to be accepted into Vermont interschool hockey. With support from the community, hockey and figure skaters, an agreement with the Stowe Performing Arts and an enthusiastic staff, Jackson Arena got the equipment needed to upgrade the ice. The school board added a boys hockey team in 1992 and a girls team in 2002. “I’m 70 now,” Leo Clark says, “and still enjoy officiating girls high school hockey games. I’ve lived with ice my entire life.”

Building tradition

• “Stowe hockey connected me to a successful future,” says Graham Mink, a 1997 Stowe High graduate. “I played at UVM and then enjoyed a 10-year professional hockey career. When I retired in 2014, I returned to Stowe with my wife, Christine. “Through the sport, I built many great memories and relationships. I wanted to return here where I started and give back to this community. I am grateful for the beautiful, new arena and the opportunity to coach our two kids.” Mink now heads the Stowe Youth Hockey Association, coaches kids, and plays on the Stowe Slugs adult team. “I am optimistic about our kids in Stowe,” he said. “The learn-to-skate program had just eight kids a few years ago; 50 kids this year. Presidents Weekend we hosted a Jamboree for Under-8 hockey with five Vermont towns. Hundreds of kids and their families enjoyed our Stowe Arena. Family—that’s what we are all about.” • The six Clarks are a model hockey family. When not at their Stowe UPS store, John and Monica are likely at the arena—coaching, cheering, or playing. John played high school hockey and passed along that action to the kids. JJ, a 2015 Stowe High graduate, was a team captain for

Raiders hockey and then played at High Point University. Younger brother Jack (a 2018 Stowe High graduate) is an enthusiastic, wheelchair-bound high school game announcer. Daughter Leocadia, a standout goalie for three years at Stowe High, finished high school at Rice in South Burlington and is evaluating college offers. Their outspoken grandfather, Jack, is her No. 1 fan. “The kids started skating before school age,” Monica recalls. “They went to Jackson Arena most days, even really cold ones. JJ and Leo would pull and push Jack around on a sled. Bruce Godin and Tony Whitaker kept all the kids in line.” High school hockey is a multitown affair—Peoples Academy in Morrisville and Stowe High field cooperative hockey teams, joined by kids from Elmore, which is also part of the school district. “Hockey is bringing together our three communities as one family,” John said. “As the kids play together and our families cheer together, our communities will grow closer together.” Monica skates Monday nights with the “Godin League.” “We are all low-key players. If someone gets too good, we ask them to quit.” • Being a hockey parent is hard work, as the Priestley family can attest. Predawn hockey practices are brutal. “When our son, Dylan, got his driver’s license, Joanne and I were the happiest parents in Stowe,” said Mike Priestley. “It’s so nice to sleep past 5 a.m.” —Lynn Altadonna

KIT ‘SHARKS’ GIVE STOWE CO. NATIONAL EXPOSURE orrest Shinners, co-founder of Stowe gear-rental company Kit Lender, couldn’t get any investors to bite during his appearance on ABC’s “Shark Tank” last winter, but he said the exposure helped make an already busy holiday season even busier. Kit Lender rents ski and snowboard clothing to people who don’t do either frequently enough to buy their own gear, shipping it in boxes to the customer’s hotel or ski resort destination, and providing return instructions. Shinners told the “Shark Tank” investors— his episode featured Mark Cuban, Barbara Corcoran, Kevin “Mr. Wonderful” O’Leary, Lori Grenier, and Robert Herjavec—that Kit Lender, which he started in his apartment almost five years ago, had $755,000 in sales last year, with $106,000 earnings for the company. Those figures brought a “wow” of approval from Cuban. Shinners asked the sharks for a $200,000 investment in exchange for a 7 percent stake in Kit Lender but, one by one, they politely declined. Whether from the editing or the actual pitch, it seemed as if Herjavec was close to investing, but ultimately he fell in line with the other sharks: They thought it would cost too much to make the leap to become a bigger company. O’Leary suggested Kit Lender partner with the “two players that know where 80 percent of the customers are,” likely a reference to Vail and Alterra, which have been gobbling up ski resorts, including Stowe Mountain Resort, in the past few years. He suggested he do it soon, too, before someone else sees “how good of an idea this is.” “Someone else is going to think big. It should be you,” O’Leary said. Shinners turned on the charm with Herjavec, telling him “the table is all set” with the company, and suggesting with a grin the two could go riding together on their Italian motorcycles. “I have worked on this so hard, and I’m ready to take it to the next level,” he said. In addition to the Shark Tank bump, the appearance on the show made things more hectic in other ways, namely Shinners’s social life. He said he’s received so many emails, texts, phone calls, and Instagram messages that he joked he might need to hire someone to respond to all of them. He likes to respond to everyone who takes the time to reach out to him and the company. Some of the support has come from the recovery population, after Shinners told the

sharks that, shortly after launching the company in 2015, he was going back and forth constantly between New York City and Stowe, and selling out of product regularly. “That’s when I realized I had a pretty unhealthy relationship with alcohol,” he said, tearing up as he told the sharks, and about 5

GORDON MILLER; SHOW PHOTOS: ERIC MCCANDLESS

RURAL ROUTE

GEAR TO GO Kit Lender owner Forrest Shinners took an idea to “Shark Tank” seeking investor money. Shinners, third from right, manager Sarah Boes, and crew amid racks of clothes they rent to tourists headed for ski country. Making the pitch to The Sharks.

million people. “So, I quit drinking and focused on this business.” Shinners said he’s been sober for four years and quit his day job at a New York investment firm to concentrate full-time on Kit Lender. After the Shark Tank episode, not only is business booming for Kit Lender, but the world

is coming out to support Shinners. “It’s pretty cool that people reach out, kind of cool connection to people,” Shinners said. “It’s this great common bond among people.” —Tommy Gardner

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RURAL ROUTE MANY FACES OF MISS O From left: A frustrated Bev Osterberg, former Stowe High School field hockey coach, who died in March. Bev O smiles as the Stowe High School field hockey pitch is dedicated in her honor in 2011. Bev O on the sidelines of both the 2004 and 2007 Division 3 field hockey finals. Stowe won both years. Inset: One of Bev O’s winning squads.

THE WINNINGEST COACH IN STOWE HIGH HISTORY DIES

BEV-O Beverly Osterberg—who died March 5, 2020—was one of a kind. She was a terrific athlete and a longtime driver education teacher, but Miss O—that’s what everyone called her—left an indelible mark on Stowe athletics. But she was bestknown as a coach. And a terrific coach she was. She established the Stowe High School fieldhockey program and coached the team for 44 years. Her teams won 16 state championships—one every 2.75 years—and played for the title 28 times. She was one of five coaches in the nation to reach 500 high school victories. Her field hockey teams had just one losing season, and at one point won 47 straight games. She also coached the Stowe High girls basketball team for 34 years and won 346 games and two state championships. She coached softball at Peoples Academy and then at Stowe High, and coached the Stowe High tennis team for three years, winning two state team titles and a New England championship.

The Stowe High field hockey field bears her name. But numbers don’t do Miss O justice. Miss O was tough. If you weren’t trying

Sour ending

hard enough, she said so; if you were not up to it, she said so. And she taught her players to be humble. When her team celebrated its 47-game win streak, she noted that, back when she was playing basketball for Williamstown High School, her team won 104 games in a row. STORY BY

Miss O also taught driver education at Stowe High. “I think of her often when I drive by the Stowe High School sports fields (and every time I parallel park),” wrote Anne Economou.

/ Tom Kearney

Yet, despite her great record, she got a poor job review and in 2012 was not rehired, after 45 years as Stowe’s first and only field hockey coach. Hundreds of people signed a petition asking school officials to rehire Miss O, to no avail. People were furious. “Her success as a coach is merely a fraction of her value as a member of the Stowe High School community. She taught us life lessons while motivating us to be active and have passion for what we do,” wrote Rebecca Condon, Amanda Wood, and Olivia DeRienzo, captains of the 2010 field hockey team. “From her coaching, we discovered our own power to achieve, both on and off the field. Miss O is a mentor, motivator, friend and, above all, a coach who will live in our hearts forever.”

GLENN CALLAHAN

Wrote Katrine Wolfgang of Stowe: “Without Miss O’s influence, I am certain I wouldn’t be where I am today, and I suspect Miss O’s influence had much to do with developing my daughter’s self-discipline and work ethic, which is leading her into a career in neuroscience. It is that very ‘old school’ style, the scowls, the growls, the bellowing, the demanding and insisting, which pushed us, not just to win field hockey games, but to dig in, focus, and achieve much more than by rights anyone from a small school in a hedonistic resort town has any right to expect they will.” “Miss O is an amazing coach and person,” wrote Anna Stackpole Stein after Miss O’s contract wasn’t renewed. “I graduated from Stowe High School in 1984. We won four state championships in a row and were unscored on our senior year. Her influence and dedication to all of us were unsurpassed. We knew her and she knew us, and we were better athletes and people because of her.” “I was benched plenty of times, and I knew what I did wrong and I corrected it if I wanted playing time,” wrote Treva West Southworth, a 1989 Stowe High graduate. “I didn’t cry to my mommy, who then cried to the principal and athletic director. I was held accountable for my actions, and I appreciate Miss O for caring enough to instill those values in me. If I had been allowed to play when I didn’t deserve to, then what would I have learned?”

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COURTESY PHOTO

BOARD OPS More than 100 people gather on a rainy March day to honor snowboard pioneer Jake Burton Carpenter, who died last winter. His widow, Donna, speaks at the dedication of a trail, Jake’s Ride, named in his honor, as two of their sons, Timmy and Taylor, look on.

A TRAIL BY ANY OTHER NAME Stowe dedicates run to Jake Carpenter

Wind, rain and a pandemic didn’t stop more than 100 people from honoring the late Jake Burton Carpenter, as a trail was dedicated in his memory at Stowe Mountain Resort in March. Carpenter, the founder of Burton Snowboards, died in November 2019. He was a pioneer in snowboarding and a key player in bringing the sport into the mainSTORY / MIKE VERILLO stream. Stowe’s easy riding green, Lullaby Lane, is now called Jake’s Ride, but that wasn’t the extent of the dedication. In a collaborative effort involving resorts, snowboard companies, and people close to Carpenter, a Day for Jake was born, a “snowboarding holiday,” according to Jeff Boliba, a vice president at Burton. The idea is to make March 13 an annual observance celebrating the sport.

As rain pelted helmets and goggles and wind shut down all but one lift on the mountain, more than 100 people gathered to celebrate the man and christen the newly named run. “We had every challenge possible, with the coronavirus and the wind and pouring rain,” Boliba said. “It was really cool; we had a ton of people.” Carpenter’s wife, Donna, and his sons Timmy and Taylor, plus a large contingent of Burton employees, were among the many who braved the weather. “Someone like Jake, who often rode 100 days a year, you had to ride in all kinds of conditions. I think this was him making us kind of earn the day,” Boliba said. Carpenter had talked to Donna about renaming that run before and, after he died, it was clear that was the trail to dedicate. “The fact that Vail Resorts and Stowe Mountain Resort approved giving Jake his

favorite run—and that was his favorite run— was really rad,” Boliba said. The run is an easy rider, with places a snowboarder could dip into the trees, mess around with side features and tap into some fresh stuff on a powder day when everything else was exhausted, and that why Carpenter liked it, he said. Boliba was responsible for coordinating the Day for Jake celebration with 13 resorts across the world, and it just happened to sit on the precipice between relative normalcy and a state of emergency. One day after they took that run, Gov. Phil Scott called for the end of all large gatherings and resorts stopped their lifts. Still, “out of the 13 resorts, we were able to execute at nine of them,” Boliba said. “The fact we were able to have a trail dedication at Stowe and have a Day for Jake at Stratton on More on Jake the same day was amazing.”

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SNOWBOARD PIONEER Burton founder Jake Carpenter dies, key to sport’s success

Jake Burton Carpenter—the man whose name became synonymous with the evolution of snowboarding, from maligned troublemaker fringe sport, through mainstream acceptance and success, to Olympic gold—died in November from complications from a re-occurrence of cancer. He was 65. Nationally and around the world, Carpenter was known as the founder of Burton snowboards, renowned for learning to ride down snow-covered hills on a single plank known as the “Snurfer” and turning the technology into the industry standard known as the snowboard. Locally, he was known as a Stowe resident famed for the annual party he and his wife Donna Carpenter held at their Shaw Hill home and for the contributions he and Donna made to the community. Bud Keene rode for Team Burton and coached the U.S. Snowboarding Team in the 2006 and 2010 Winter Olympics, gaining particular attention for coaching halfpipe legend Shaun White. “Jake’s pioneering of the sport of snowboarding coincided with my adult life,” Keene wrote when asked about Carpenter’s impacts on the sport and on his own life. “I was truly in the right place at the right time. “After having the extreme privilege to meet him and then to ride for Burton, I became a snowboard coach and in that role found my true purpose and passion. None of that would have been possible without Jake. “Of course, he continued to tirelessly and deftly create, define, and push the sport from every conceivable angle. “It is rare, and perhaps unheard of, for an individual to have so singlehandedly and deeply affected the lives of generations worldwide.

“From sports, to culture, to style, to clothing, to language, to music, and, of course, to people, he left a good and lasting mark on the world.” Rusty DeWees, Stowe-based writer, comedian, and actor, put together a few of his trademark “scrawlins” when asked about Carpenter. “Doing errands in town, I’d hope to run into Jake to enjoy a spirited word,” DeWees wrote. “I’ve called Stowe home since 1968. Of the folks who’ve lived and passed here, Jake stands in the tippy-top level of the corkiest of the corkers.” DeWees signed off by noting he was doing his late-night scrawlins while wearing a piece of Burton clothing—at least, presumably, lest ol’ Russ got himself a new tattoo. “As I write, his name is across my chest,” DeWees wrote. “Cast in bold letters.” If the sayings about Carpenter doing things his own way are true, then it makes sense that the lengthy timeline on Burton’s blog—bit.ly/3dBTLgB—would be largely penned by him. According to the blog post, a few months prior to his death, Carpenter strung together some of the most important events in his life. He was born April 29, 1954, in New York City, and grew up on Long Island, where, as a 14-year-old, he bought his first Snurfer, which he learned to ride on a local sledding hill and at Mohawk Mountain Ski Area, near his Connecticut boarding school. He moved to southern Vermont at the end of 1977, after a short stint at a Manhattan investment firm, and started Burton Boards out of a barn in Londonderry. According to Stowe historian Pat Haslam, Burton made an early appearance at Shaw’s General Store, where Haslam’s daughter Sarah was working.

QUESTION & ANSWER

TRAIL RIDE Stowe Trails Partnership oversees world-class network A long-time outdoor recreation enthusiast, Rachel Fussell, 32, is the executive director of Stowe Trails Partnership, whose mission is to build and maintain a world-class trail network in Stowe. The club currently has over 1,200 members and approximately 25 miles of trails. Fussell, originally from North Carolina, came to Stowe for the outdoor lifestyle. She lives in Stowe Hollow with her husband Kelly Murphey and their border collie Ellie.

What did you do prior to joining Stowe Trails Partnership? I started with the partnership in July 2018. Prior to that I was with Northeast Organic Farming Association in Richmond. I also worked on a small heritage produce farm and as Vermont Technical College’s STORY & PHOTOGRAPH / KATE CARTER organic garden manager. I have done a lot of work with non-profits and I have been very active with trail crews and the Youth Conversation Corps, which is how I came to understand trails and how to manage them.

How did you end up in Stowe? We came to Vermont in 2013 and lived in Montpelier, but spent all our free time in Stowe because of the outdoor recreation opportunities. We decided

to move here in 2015. With the help of Stowe Land Trust we were able to purchase the 72-acre conserved Burnham Farm in Stowe Hollow and build a 750-square-foot energy efficient house. Some of the land is in current use.

Why the name change from Stowe Mountain Bike Club to Stowe Trails Partnership? The bike club realized all its trails are multi-use, not just for mountain bikers, but for a wide range of uses. We wanted to be inclusive, not exclusive. Language affects how people view us, and we felt a name change would be more welcoming to all types of trail users.

Is everything the partnership maintains on public land? We do have some trails on private land, and are very aware of the generosity of the landowners. Everything we’ve built we maintain to high standards, and we work to educate users about trail etiquette.

What is the partnership’s focus? We have three trail pods that we maintain: Cady Hill, Sterling Valley, and Adams Camp. All have conservation easements. Basically, we maintain all of Stowe’s no-fee zones. Right now we are working with the community to steward these trails. We are concentrating on enhancing people’s relation-

ship with the outdoors, fostering relationships with the community, and encouraging a healthy lifestyle. We use counters on the trails to see how much they are impacted. The counters help us determine where we need to work.

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What is new for 2020? For the first time we are hiring two trail maintenance people. They will be busy getting trails up to snuff for all types of users. Also, we will focus on trail progression so riders can continue to improve their skills. We are creating beginner and family-friendly trails, and will continue to work with state, town, and private landowners on advanced trails, with options for additional technical features.

What about long-term plans? We have a seven-year plan to connect Adams Camp to Sterling Valley by way of Edson Hill trails. We are working with the owners of Edson Hill and other private landowners to make this happen. It will open up the possibilities for much longer rides. We also want to connect Stowe to the Waterbury trails via Cotton Brook.

Now that Brownsville is conserved, are there any plans for trails? We are currently creating a maintenance plan for pedestrian-only trails. We will still be stewards, with or without mountain bikes. For now we are working on access and signage.

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After the micro-burst in Cady Hill Forest in 2018, how did the clean-up go? It was amazing. I was so impressed with the support we got. All types of trail users turned out to help, and we were able to make it rideable in a short period of time.

What is the biggest challenge? The balance between public and private lands, between different user groups and how we all coexist, and between what is best for the community and trails and the health of the local economy. Everyone has his or her own point of view and the challenge for me is to put myself in their shoes and experience their point of view. This job requires a lot of empathy, and I feel like we are all in this together.

What other outdoor sports to you do? Mountain biking is number one, but I snowboard and I’m relearning downhill and Nordic skiing. I’m an avid backpacker and long-distance hiker, which is how I got involved in trail work. Kelly and I did a two-week trek of the Landmannalaugar, a place in the Fjallabak Nature Reserve in the highlands of Iceland, on our honeymoon. We like to travel, live in a tent, and backpack.

What do you do in your spare time? Ride my bike! Hike with Ellie. I also love to garden and I do ballet in Burlington. ■

TOMMY GARDNER

O N M O U N TA I N

BOULDER ON Local stashes offer five-star rated climbs For some, Vermont’s beauty is best appreciated by staring intently at a rock and figuring out, how do I get myself up that? Two of the best and most popular climbing places in the greater Stowe area are the cliffs of West Bolton and the boulders around the twisting Route 108 through Smugglers Notch in Cambridge. They are popular with advanced and beginner climbers, which is one of the great things about getting into the sport—expert climbers can find something to challenge them on the very same rock that a beginner can handle. Rock climbing isn’t much like fishing, or backcountry skiing, where the location of STORY / TOMMY GARDNER one’s favorite riverbend or hidden fall line is shrouded in secrecy. Yes, there are secret stashes of boulders and cliff walls, but often the best places where the public can climb are quite visible. You can see climbers on the West Bolton cliffs from Interstate 89. And in the Notch, drivers frequently see climbers clinging to the very roadside boulders they’re trying to navigate their cars through. “There’s so much here,” said Sam England, a New Hampshire woman who visited the Notch for a weekend of climbing with her husband, Dylan. “Everywhere you look ... there’s one right here, there’s a bunch over there.” The couple was warming up on Workout Wall, and taking their time, because some other boulders were temporarily inaccessible because a driROCK GARDEN At top: Sam (foreground) and Dylan England boulder in Smugglers Notch, a popular destination for both advanced and beginner climbers.

ver managed to wedge his tractortrailer truck between some of them. The Notch is packed with routes that could keep climbers going in one spot for days and days without repetition. Some of the classic boulders include Moon Tower, Wheaties, the B.F.B. (you’ll know when you see it) and Baby Pac Man, which one online resource says, “This is not the place to go if you dislike being gawked at by tourists.” If you really, really want to be gawked at by tourists, try some of the eight different routes of the Quartz Crack Face. That’s the one that everyone literally looks up at when they park in the main parking lot at the top of the Notch. If you could hear them, the tourists’ oohs and aahs would either knock you off your game or boost your confidence. Dylan said the Notch and Bolton offer five-star rated climbing. “They’re some of the best around,” he said. “Those are the two big ones in Vermont that I’ve always heard about.” Bolton’s Lower West Wall is where countless Vermonters learned to climb with ropes. The routes are varied enough for beginners and experts, the latter of whom are typically lead climbing so the beginners can get on belay and climb up the route without worrying about placing gear. ■

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FISH STORY

ON THE WATER A great way to leaf peep—and catch fish! ant an even better way to see Vermont’s famous fall foliage? Try a boat tour of the 850-acre Waterbury Reservoir from mid-September, when the leaves start to turn, through most of October, when stick season arrives—which offers its own kind of stark beauty. “It’s the best one hour you can spend in Vermont,” says Bob Shannon, owner of the Fly Rod Shop in Stowe, which leads tours on the reservoir. Up to six leaf-peepers can go on each of the three or four daily tours, depending on demand. Being on the water offers an entirely different leaf-peeping perspective. Hills seem to emerge from the water as the Green STORY / ANDREW MARTIN Mountains, ablaze in red, green, orange, and yellow, frame them in the background. Forests surrounding the long, finger-shaped reservoir offer a broad variety of trees, and as the shoreline is mostly undeveloped, you’re completely immersed in the changing foliage, and you feel like you’re miles from civilization even though Route 100 is just over the hill. “It gets people out in the foliage, up close and personal,” Shannon says. All the guides know the history of the reservoir and the region, and love to feed tidbits of information to guests. No guarantees, but people often see one or both of the bald eagles nesting at the reservoir. On one recent day, all three tours included an eagle sighting. Moose aren’t a common sight anymore, but deer are, and one tour last fall featured two bears.

W 46

“Tons of waterfowl, and there’s several pairs of nesting loons,” Shannon said. After a decade of tours, Shannon has gotten pretty good at predicting when fall colors will peak. “Nine days,” he said confidently last Sept. 26. He thinks that’s about five days ahead of last fall.

Fishing trips, too

A fishing trip is another way to get out on the water to see spectacular views of Vermont’s hills and mountains alive with color. Dog’s Head Falls on the Lamoille River in Johnson is one such tour. “It runs through a gorge, and has spectacular colors,” said Shannon.

DIEHARD “Vermont Trout Streams: A Fly Angler’s Guide to the Best,” by Bob Shannon and Peter Shea. Cruising Vermont’s waterways is an ideal way to see Vermont’s fall foliage.

The Gihon River in Johnson, the North Branch of the Lamoille River along Route 109 in Waterville and Belvidere, and the Winooski River below Bolton Dam are other great spots to view foliage and catch trout, he said.

May-October, Tuesday-Saturday, 10 to 4

Explore exhibits, walk the museum grounds, enjoy the views along the Stevens Branch of the Winooski River, climb the indoor bouldering wall, play bocce ball, or tour the museum grounds by pedal car. Want to catch a trout? Read this

Shannon knows a bit about fishing. The longtime owner of the Fly Rod Shop, Shannon is sharing his expertise and knowledge about fishing for trout in the Green Mountain State in a new book. He recently teamed up with well-known fishing writer Peter Shea for “Vermont Trout Streams: A Fly Angler’s Guide to the Best.” Shea and Shannon wrote the 142-page guide based on their own experiences and with the help of several other anglers, experts, and staff at the state Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department. Broken down by different watershed areas, the book lays out just where someone looking to land a Vermont trout should cast. It includes 20 hand-drawn maps, state stocking patterns, fly-fishing patterns, where public access to different streams and rivers is available, and local intel from professional guides and people who know the fishing in each region intimately. Shannon has been a professional fly-fishing guide for over 30 years and teaches fly fishing as an adjunct professor at Northern Vermont University. Shea has fished Vermont waters since he was a kid and has written eight other books on trout fishing in Vermont. ■ //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: Book a tour or grab the book at the Fly Rod Shop, 2703 Waterbury Road, Stowe, VT 05672. (802) 253-7346, or flyrodshop.com.

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TRAIL JOURNAL

FROM TOP LEFT: PAUL ROGERS; COURTESY PHOTO, ROGERS; COURTESY

GET OUTDOORS View from the top of Stowe Pinnacle. A mist-shrouded Brownsville forest. Geological formation at Sunset Rock. Biking in Cady Hill Forest.

CLOSE TO HOME No need to go far from Stowe Village for great hikes, bikes, and views

Vermont offers great hiking. Peak bagging, end-to-end on the Long Trail, point-to-point on the Worcester Range, long loops, you name it. But what if you want something a little more relaxed that doesn’t require much car time and that’s easily accessible from Stowe village? Here are four places to hike close to town where you can enjoy nature, views, and wildlife, and get some exercise to boot. All four hikes are dog-friendly, but sadly it still needs to be said: Pick up your furry friend’s waste and pack it out.

Getting there: From downtown Stowe, take School Street about 0.3 miles to a fork. Stay right on Stowe Hollow Road and continue for 1.6 miles, then continue straight up Upper Hollow Road for 0.6 miles. The parking area and trailhead are on the left. You can make the hike shorter by starting at the Pinnacle Meadow Trailhead. To get there, follow the directions to the main trailhead, but turn left just before the trailhead onto Pinnacle Road. Go 0.4 miles and turn right onto Upper Pinnacle. Continue 0.6 miles. Follow signs for Pinnacle Meadow parking area on the left.

Stowe Pinnacle

Cady Hill Forest

One of Vermont’s most frequently traveled trails, Stowe Pinnacle packs a lot of punch for a 1.6-mile hike, one-way, but don’t let the distance fool you. It’s a relentless climb, gaining 1,520 feet in elevation. The hardearned reward is the 360-degree view at the top. From the trailhead on Upper Hollow STORY / KATE CARTER Road, the trail features a gentle grade for about half a mile before ascending a steep staircase-like climb through a mixed hardwood forest. Two-thirds of the way, take the overlook spur with views to the west of Mount Mansfield. From there it’s flat for a bit before it climbs steeply again, breaking out onto a bald, rocky peak, with views of Mount Hunger, Sugarbush, Camel’s Hump, Bolton, Mount Mansfield, Elmore Mountain, and Mount Worcester. It’s also a great vantage point for a view of the landslide in Cotton Brook.

This trail network is well-known by mountain bikers, but hikers and runners are welcome, too. The 258-acre parcel has about 11 miles of trails with great views and diverse terrain. The well-maintained trails are a combination of machine-built and hand-built, designed to prevent erosion. Most of the land was cleared for farming in the late 1700s, and was used as pasture or crop land. The property was protected in May 2012, when the Stowe Land Trust purchased it and transferred it to the Stowe town government. Getting there: Cady Hill Forest trail network can be accessed from a large parking area on Route 108 across from the Town and Country Resort.

Sunset Rock

A short walk from the village, the Sunset Rock Trail is a perfect choice if time is limited. Sunset Rock is a remarkable viewpoint overlooking Main Street and the village of Stowe. The large rock outcropping faces west and is an ideal place to watch the sun set over Mount Mansfield. The 23-acre parcel was preserved by the Stowe Land Trust in 1999. It’s owned by the town of Stowe, with a conservation easement held by the land trust and the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board. The best way to reach the Sunset Rock trail is to walk from the village to the end of Sunset Street. Parking is not permitted on Sunset Street, so find a spot in town and start from there. It’s a steep climb to the actual Sunset Rock, but well worth the effort. Just past Sunset Rock is a glacial kettle hole, created over 10,000 years ago. The trail continues to climb for another quarter-mile to the upper overlook, where the views are spectacular. Getting there: Park in town—a good place is the parking lot for the Stowe Recreation Path

behind Stowe Community Church—and walk to the end of Sunset Street. You can also reach Sunset Rock by car from Taber Hill Road.

Brownsville-Story Ridge Forest

For a throwback in time, visit Brownsville Forest. It was an active hill farm community through the 1940s; today, it feels untamed and remote. The 758-acre parcel is one of the largest undeveloped swaths of land in Stowe. In 2019, Stowe Land Trust purchased the property from private owners and transferred it to the state. Brownsville-Story Ridge Forest has a limited trail network open to pedestrian use in a northern hardwood forest consisting of sugar maple, yellow birch, and American beech, as well as hemlock and red spruce. Two open meadows in the center of the property provide views across the valley to the Green Mountains. It’s a peaceful place for a walk and chances are you’ll be alone.

Getting there: From Stowe village, take Route 100 north for 1.4 miles. Turn right on Brush Hill Road and drive to the top of the hill, where it takes a sharp right at the Morrill Farm and becomes Brownsville Road. Parking is along the road or in small pull-offs on the side. Make sure to pull out of the way of driveways and traffic, and be respectful of neighbors and adjacent private land. ■

a little of

JOHANNES a lot of VON TRAPPS 50

CATTLE MAN Johannes von Trapp of the famed Von Trapp Family Singers, made famous by “The Sound of Music,” on his family’s 2,500-acre property in Stowe with his herd of Scottish Highland cattle. The family settled in Stowe in 1941.

Clockwise from top: An ibex watches over the von Trapp Bierhall, which opened in 2016 and serves the family’s brewing business. Sam von Trapp and his father, Johannes, at an Oktoberfest celebration at Trapp Family Lodge. Johannes and his son-in-law, Walter Frame, at left, at a Stowe Area Association event at the von Trapp Brewery. Johannes takes his mother Maria on a tour of new lodge construction, June 1983. The original lodge burned to the ground just before Christmas, 1980. Inset: Capt. Georg and Maria von trapp

e is Stowe’s most famous resident. His name is known around the world. He has been interviewed hundreds—make that thousands—of times. Hollywood has even made a movie about his family. But who the heck is Johannes von Trapp? And why does he hate what he calls “that horrible, horrible song,” “Do-Re-Mi,” so much? Let’s start with the easy stuff. Like that song.

“I may have said I hate ‘Do-Re-Mi’ but you have to understand,” says the 81-year-old Johannes as I join him for lunch at the von Trapp Brewing Bierhall near his family’s world-famous lodge, “anyone would come to hate it if they had heard it a million times.” “And there’s another thing,” he continues as I dig into my medium-rare, 7-ounce, wood-grilled, Vermont beef Johannesburger. “Our family of singers had been well-known and admired among a small group of people that liked Baroque music. We performed madrigals, spiritual songs, and some Austrian folk songs. We had a discriminating, sophisticated following. But ‘The Sound of Music,’ both the 1959 Broadway play and especially the 1965 movie, changed all that. Suddenly, we were known as ‘those “Do-Re-Mi” kids.’ “Speaking of ‘Do-Re-Mi,’ I’ll let you in on a little secret,” says Johannes. “I made a pact with Johnny Cassel, who played the piano in our lodge for a quarter of a century. I’d grown so tired of hearing songs from ‘The Sound of Music’ that I kiddingly threatened I’d fire him if he ever played them in my presence. He never did. If he was playing, say ‘Do-Re-Mi’ or ‘Edelweiss’ and saw me coming, he’d immediately—and seamlessly—begin playing ‘Desperado,’ my favorite song.” Johannes lets out a brief sigh and admits with a wry smile, “I miss Johnny.” “Oh yeah; there’s one other thing the movie did,” he continues. “Its massive success made all of us, literally overnight, public property.” Just how public becomes apparent when a lunch guest shyly approaches our table and asks Johannes, “I am so sorry for interrupting. But would you mind if I took a picture of you with my wife? ‘The Sound of Music’ is our favorite movie of all time.” Johannes graciously accepts, rises from the table and puts his arm around the guest’s wife. She beams. It’s obvious Johannes is a pro at this. His pale blue eyes sparkle as he and the woman smile into the camera. “Just one more?” asks the man as he turns his iPhone to include himself in a selfie. “See what I mean?” Johannes asks me as he settles his trim, 6’1” frame back into his chair. “At least they didn’t ask me to sing.”

STORY

: robert kiener O P E N E R : glenn callahan

FROM TOP: COURTESY PHOTO; GORDON MILLER; MILLER; MICHALE CLARK; ARCHIVES

STOWE REPORTER ARCHIVES; TOP: GORDON MILLER; SKI RACE: GLENN CALLAHAN. INSET: PAUL ROGERS

Clockwise, from top: Johannes and Lynne von Trapp celebrate the 50th anniversary of Trapp Family cross-

country center in January 2018 with family and friends, including Per Sørlie, center in blue jacket, who Johannes recruited from Norway when the ski center opened in 1968, the first of its kind in the U.S. Their children, Kristina and Sam, are kneeling, far left. An early Richardson postcard of the von Trapp home. Lynne and Johannes at an antique ski race at Trapps, January 2010. Maria von Trapp out for a ski. The cross-country center. Inset: A recent shot of Trapp Family Lodge.

t is no secret that Johannes, his mother and his siblings (of the 10 von Trapp children, only Johannes and two of his sisters, Rosmarie and Eleonore, are still living) were not thrilled with the movie and the life-changing effects its enduring popularity has had on the family. Much has been written about their dissatisfaction with the way their father has been portrayed. “He was a very loving, charming man,” says Johannes as we walk along manicured paths at the 2,500-acre Trapp Family Lodge. “He was nothing like the cold, strict disciplinarian depicted in the film. In fact, my mother was more like that—very determined—and less like the sugary-sweet character Julie Andrews portrayed.” There were other inaccuracies, such as the famous ending that showed the family escaping the Nazis by climbing through the Alps on their way to Switzerland. Rather, they took a train to Italy. Switzerland is nearly 200 miles from Salzburg and if the family had continued on the path they were shown walking on, they would have sauntered into Berchtesgaden, Germany, close to Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest mountain retreat. At the movie’s premiere, Johannes’ mother, Maria, famously said, “Don’t they know geography in Hollywood?” Robert Wise, the film’s director, replied, “In Hollywood, you make your own geography.” “There are a lot of other mistakes in the movie but we realized that was par for the course with a Hollywood production,” explains Johannes. “To be more precise, the film is a Hollywood version of the Broadway version of the German film version of the book that my mother wrote. So perhaps it’s not surprising that it was, shall we say, less than accurate.” Aside from the factual errors, it’s what Johannes describes as “the disruptive effect on my family” the movie has had that has long irked him. Although the family stopped singing and touring in 1956, the Broadway musical and especially the movie shaped the public’s Hollywood-fantasy idea of who the family was. “Believe it or not, we still get visitors who come to the lodge and ask, “ ‘Where are the singing von Trapp children?’ They really expect to be greeted by the children lined up at the front door. I’m 81 and the movie is 55 years old; it’s as if they expect we were frozen in time!” Perhaps surprisingly, “The Sound of Music” connection has not been the cash cow for the von Trapp family that many may believe. Indeed, Maria received only $9,000 for the rights that she sold to German publishers in the 1950s and the family gets a small percentage, around $100,000, of royalties annually. Johannes admits he has “mellowed” and changed his opinion about the movie over the years. He explains, “I realize ‘The Sound of Music’ means so much to so many people and that it is so loved because it expresses such universal themes as love of country, love of a man and a woman, and love of family.” Johannes began helping run the lodge in 1969. Over the years, many have suggested to him that he take fuller advantage of the Lodge’s ties to what’s become the world’s most popular musical film, seen by more than one billion people worldwide. But he has resisted. Indeed, there’s a sign that greets visitors as they drive through the lush birch, beech, maple, and pine-forested drive on the way to the lodge that hints how he has helped the lodge survive, grow and prosper without adding any extra servings of Hollywoodflavored kitsch. It reads: “The Trapp Family invites you to share a little of Austria, a lot of Vermont.” As he explains, “I’ve often said that I never wanted to turn the lodge into a Disney-like ‘Sound of Music’ theme park.” And he’s kept his word. “It’s not part of our vision.”

ision. It’s a word that pops up often when you ask people how Johannes von Trapp managed to turn a modest guest lodge into a multimillion-dollar, 2,500-acre, worldclass resort. “My father has this amazing skill of not looking backward but looking forward,” says Kristina von Trapp Frame, who along with her brother Sam and her husband Walter Frame are slowly taking over the management of the lodge. “He has been able to combine this vision with a keen business sense, a skill for conflict management and the ability to get people to produce.” “He’s naturally shy but can also be a sly charmer,” explains Kristina. She remembers going to a dinner with Johannes, her mother, Lynne, and some bankers when she was 11 years old. “The (original) lodge had burned down and things were desperate. We needed a massive loan to rebuild and expand

and he was working hard to get bankers to believe in him and his vision. “I’ll never forget the way he took the time to teach me how to eat an oyster, a food I’d never seen before. As several bankers looked on, he told me, ‘Just squirt a little bit of lemon on it and swallow it whole. Bottoms up!’ One of the bankers who was watching was amazed and told Dad, ‘If you can convince an 11-year-old to eat an oyster, you won’t have any trouble getting us to give you the money you’re looking for.’ He got his $11.5 million, in my opinion, thanks in large part to his personality and charisma.” Says son Sam, “He has a keen sense of what will work, what will fit. For example, just look at the way he opened what was the nation’s first commercial cross-country ski center in 1968. There was no precedent but he hoped it would help bring some winter guests to our then 27room lodge, but he also believed it could grow into something bigger. He had that vision.” Johannes imported 50 hickory skis and hired 24-year-old Norwegian Per Sørlie to teach cross

country skiing—then little known—to a curious public. Today, the lodge’s Nordic Center includes a bustling retail shop, 37 miles of groomed trails and 62 miles of backcountry trails. It has been ranked the top cross-country ski resort in North America by USA Today. Add 100 timeshare units, villas, a $15 million brewery and beer hall/restaurant to the list of successes envisioned and set up by Johannes, and it’s clear that he’s come a long way from singing madrigals and Austrian folk songs to heading up one of Vermont’s most successful hospitality ventures. (Along the way, he also managed to earn a degree in history at Dartmouth and a master’s degree in forestry at Yale.) Where did all of this business acumen come from? “I don’t think I am that good of a businessman,” Johannes tells me over a cup of coffee in the lodge’s dining room. “I am an entrepreneur. But I don’t think I am a great businessman.” “But—,” I say, and then he interrupts me. “You know, I’ve traveled a lot, seen a lot of things and have a pretty good idea of what will work here and what won’t. And I’ve made my share of mistakes. So I will say I am a better businessman now at 81 then I was at 41.”

One thing he has learned, he admits, is to fight for what he believes in. “I suppose I got some of that from my mother,” he explains. “She had a very strong personality and presence and it was not easy to fight or argue with her. But it was easier for me than my siblings. Some of them thought I was spoiled; the golden boy. But I think it might have been because I was the only one in the family born and raised in the USA. They came here as adults and had to adapt their lives drastically.” In 1993, some of his siblings, unhappy with Johannes’ running of the family business, voted to oust him from his $115,000-a-year job as president. As Vanity Fair magazine reported, “Some of his relatives felt that Johannes had become overbearing and arrogant and that he wanted to maintain the total control his mother (who died in 1987) had permitted him.” Less than a year later, Johannes pressured the shareholders to elect a new board and he was put back in charge as chairman. As the magazine noted, “Johannes struck back like lightning.”

“I was frustrated that many of my siblings just didn’t understand the business,” says Johannes, as he lowers his voice while we talk in the lodge’s now-crowded dining room. “After the fire, when this place was a hole in the ground with smoke coming out of it, nobody was interested in it.” He remembers, during the turbulent times after his mother died, when he hired a family business psychologist to interview the family about the growing troubles. “I was driving him back to airport after his visit and he asked me, ‘When did these troubles with your family start?’ I said after my mother’s death. He said, ‘Yes, that’s what I thought.’ “He told me that my siblings had unresolved issues with our mother and they have carried a lot of resentment toward her because of the inability to resolve these issues. Now that she was gone, they transferred that resentment to me. I asked him what I could do about that.”

Clockwise, top right: Johannes is flanked by his parents, Maria and Georg von Trapp, in this mid-1940s family photo. Johannes promotes Vermont in a spot produced by the Vermont Agency of Development & Community Affairs, 1970s. The singing von Trapp family, led by Capt. von Trapp, with Johannes on his lap. Johannes poses with Maria. Inset: A 2013 photo shoot for the Stowe Reporter with Sam, Lynne, Johannes and Kristina (Frame) von Trapp, surrounded by the family’s herd of Scottish Highland cattle.

Johannes sits back, takes a deep breath and continues, “He told me, ‘There is nothing you can do.’ I didn’t disagree with him. That taught me another lesson: Don’t waste your time trying to resolve issues that are irresolvable.”

or the last decade or so, Johannes has been telling friends, family, and the press that he’s been ready to retire—or at least drastically cut back—from his duties at the lodge. In 2008, for example, he told The New York Times, “I’ll get back to Montana. I’ve sort of done my thing here. Now it’s up to my son to take it from here.” But Johannes is still at it. “I keep threatening to disappear into the woods, to a ranch in Montana or Arizona, but I keep putting that off,” he says as he relaxes in the library and office of the expansive post-and-beam home several miles from the lodge that he shares with Lynne, his wife of 51 years. But he hasn’t. He did once own a cattle ranch in British Columbia. It was in the late 1970s and he moved to the ranch in an urge to get away from home. “It was fun for a while,” he remembers. “Out there I called myself ‘Von,’ which was my nickname when I was in the army, just as I’d called myself John Trapp, instead of Johannes von Trapp, while I was at Dartmouth. I wanted to be more normal, and that simplified matters.” The library looks out on the Green Mountains and as he points GLENN CALLAHAN; ALL OTHERS: ARCHIVES outside, the former forestry graduate students tells me, “Right there is one of the best examples of a glacial cirque in New England. You can just imagine that massive glacier sitting there and carving out that bowl.” The library is overflowing with thousands of books—he is an avid reader—but also the flotsam and jetsam of a live well-lived. There are artifacts from Papua New Guinea where he spent three years in his late teens, helping his mother and two sisters work as missionaries on remote Fergusson Island. A menagerie of hunting trophies, and shelf after shelf of Gray’s Sporting Journals, reflect his lifelong interest—his love affair— with big game hunting. There is a stuffed buffalo he shot in the North West territories of Australia, a wildebeest from Namibia, an Alaskan grizzly bear pelt, an Arizona mountain lion, a baboon skull, wild boars from the Central African Republic, a black bear from New Hampshire, a zebra rug and more than 40 rifles. “This is my favorite,” he tells me as he lovingly caresses a custommade rifle that boasts a beautiful Circassian walnut gunstock. Family pictures line the library walls and shelves. There’s a picture of Sam and Kristina attempting to brand a calf on an Arizona ranch some 35 years ago. And there are elegant portraits of his parents, Georg von Trapp and his wife Maria. He looks briefly at his mother’s portrait and asks me, “You remember when I told you what a strong presence and personality she had? She really was amazing; so determined. I’ve often said that without her strength we wouldn’t be here today.” He pauses for a second, then continues, “No, we would have disappeared into a concentration camp. No question.” He extends his right arm as if to straighten his father’s portrait on the wall and says, “There’s a story I have told about—” He suddenly stops midsentence, wipes a tear from his eye and explains, “Every time I tell this story, I tear up a bit. Sorry.” He remembers the day he was visiting his mother in her room at the Trapp Family Lodge. It was a crisp autumn afternoon in the 1970s and the two of them were sitting on her balcony that looked out onto the property’s rolling hills and mixed forests in the distance and the family’s private cemetery some 200 feet away. “We had recently fenced off the family cemetery because so many visitors had trampled down the grass and flattened the flowers. Suddenly, I saw a visitor climb over the fence and thought, ‘Not again! What’s he doing?’ ” He pauses once more, blinks back a tear and explains, “Looking at him more closely, I realized he was wearing a service dress white uniform. He was a United States Navy officer. He went up to my father’s grave, stood there at attention and saluted. He held his salute for a moment, slowly lowered his arm and then did an about-face. Then he climbed back over the wall and walked away.” “I was incredibly moved. In fact, I was speechless,” remembers Johannes. “But I soon realized that, if it had not been for ‘The Sound of Music,’ my father’s story wouldn’t be as well known as it is. It also proved to me that there are people who respect my family for what we are and what we’ve done. That means the world to us.” ■

KEN STRONG The stories. The times. The man. The Shed. STORY

/ MIKE VERILLO

PORTRAIT

/ PETER MILLER

en Strong was a legend—a pioneer in Stowe’s restaurant and bar business, a pillar of the community and an all-around good guy. His iconic bar and restaurant, The Shed, was the source of boundless stories that define an era past and helped shape what was to come. He was a friend you could count on, whether you occupied a stool several nights a week or a few days a year. His instinctual hospitality never changed in the four and a half decades The Shed welcomed people looking for a pint and friends after a fun day on the slopes or a long one at work. Strong died April 17, after a two-year battle with cancer, but memories remain vivid for his countless friends and his role in shaping Stowe.

‘Finally a place to go’

It’s hard to imagine a time a Stowe that wasn’t flush with restaurants and bars, but that was the case in the 1960s before Strong opened The Shed with his business partner Ted Ross. Aside from lodges and hotels, the only place to grab a drink year-round was the Yankee Tavern. “I was scared to go in alone,” said Nancy Stead, a longtime columnist for the Stowe Reporter. Yankee Tavern was where the “serious drinkers” were, she said. “I had no problem going to The Shed alone,” she said. That was the whole point: build a place where ski bums and locals could have a good time. The idea was hatched at Jim Jackson’s house, where Strong was living, over a night of drinking in the summer of 1965. Paul Biedermann, owner of the Snowdrift Motel, was there and had a small building that had served as a cider mill, hostel, and gas station over its 130 years. Strong and Ross came up with $2,500 each and bought it. Stead was selling real estate at the time and remembered showing the property just after the sale. “When I came with my customer, it was too late, but I’m glad Ken won.” Hank Cushman, then a ski instructor who worked with Strong, was there the night the scheme was cooked up. He and a handful of others helped Strong and Ross renovate the space. “It was quite a bit of work,” he said, but “most of us were carpenters or something anyway.” The Shed opened that December, and the good times rolled. “There was finally a place to go and have a glass of beer,” Cushman said.

‘The best bartender’

The space was tight with stools and tables and smoke from cigarettes and the kitchen. The beer poured for 15 cents—Budweiser primarily—and stories of raucous nights could fill volumes of books. Clocks were blasted with a shotgun. A horse stopped in. A Christmas tree was mounted to the ceiling one year. Many nights continued deep into the morning. Back then, a cop would follow patrons home to make sure they made it OK. It was a drinking culture. “The drinking was Olympic,” said Charlie Lusk, later a Stowe select board member and now a library trustee. He lived in Jackson’s building with Strong and started working at The Shed in 1967. In all this festivity and chaos, the constant was Strong. He was at The Shed seven days a week, flipping Shed Burgers and keeping patrons watered. “He went along with it, but kept it down to a dull roar,” said Cushman, the one who brought that aforementioned horse into the establishment. Strong and The Shed birthed Stowe’s nightlife. “It was the glue of our social life,” Stead said. “And Kenny was always so glad to see everybody.” “There was a modest generosity to the man; you had to know him to see it happening,” Lusk said. He may have been too generous in some ways. Lusk figures there’s still a cigar box full of unpaid tabs somewhere in Strong’s possessions.

Behind the bar, Strong had an endearing poise, the kind that made anyone feel at home. “He was kind and funny, quick with the jokes, the laughter,” Stead said. “He had a laugh you could hear two counties away.” “Whenever the phone rang, before Ken would pick up, he’d ask, ‘Who’s not here?’ ” said Kitty Coppock, Ted Ross’s first wife. “Not only did he run the best bar in town, he was the best bartender.” “It was a good time, kind of loose and everyone knew everyone else,” Cushman said. “I haven’t seen a place like that since.”

An extensive legacy

The Shed’s reputation grew and matured along with the town of Stowe. The building was expanded a few times but then burned down in 1994. A much larger building took its place. Some Shed regulars liked the old place better —the one that had actually been a shed—but the new Shed was a testament to Strong’s ambition. “It was the apple of his eye. He really cared about the kind of place it was,” Lusk said. “He was doing what he wanted to do—he wanted to grow the business.” “When people talk about The Shed never being quite the same, they’re not talking about The Shed; they’re talking about the times in general,” said Nate Lusk, Charlie Lusk’s son. He practically grew up at The Shed, and he worked there in the 1990s into the early 2000s. Though the building changed, Nate said Strong’s dedication to the bar and community did not. He recalled a busy night working as a busboy and seeing the dishwasher tired and overwhelmed. “Kenny, on New Year’s Eve in a three-piece suit, looks at the dishwasher, pushed him aside and absolutely crushed it,” he said. “That is something that’s stuck with me through life and, in fact, is one of the things that made me successful.” Strong’s mark on Stowe goes beyond his beloved bar. He had a large role in founding Stowe Performing Arts and was an active board member of many public and private organizations. He was a people person through and through. Nate Lusk recalled when he and his father visited Strong in the hospital. “I was dreading it and thinking ‘this is gonna be awful’ and I was really upset about it,” he said, but Ken Strong was still Ken Strong. “I came out of there feeling like a million bucks. That’s the effect Kenny has on people.” n

See Peter Miller’s story, “The Shed: Requiem for a skier’s bar,” at vtcng.com.

ONE OF A KIND An iconic Peter Miller photograph of Ken Strong from The Shed’s early days. Inset: For the longest time, The Shed was synonymous with Stowe. Can you name another restaurant—ever—where revelers costumed up as, well, a building!

stowe community church GORDON MILLER; OPPOSITE: COURTESY PHOTO

No matter how you arrive in Stowe—from the north or the south on Vermont’s iconic Route 100, or over the mountain through Smugglers Notch via 108, or on any number of back roads—you are greeted by the same landmark: the towering steeple of the Stowe Community Church. While the first white settlers arrived in Stowe in 1794, taking advantage of the wide swath of valley at the base of Mount Mansfield to establish farms and put down roots, it wasn’t until 1818 that residents built a structure that served as both a church and meeting hall. It was where Stowe Community Church now sits, at the intersection of Main and School streets. At the time, the church was nondenominational—a hint of how things would be nearly two centuries later—and hosted services for Congregationalists, Methodists, Union Baptists, and Christians who did not belong to any particular denomination. At the time, most churches in Vermont were either Congregationalist or Methodist, and in Stowe, the congregations were served by itinerant pastors—sometimes known as circuit riders—who traveled by horseback from one community to the next. In those days, it was said that, to be a circuitriding pastor, all you needed was a horse, a Bible, and a pair of spectacles.

STORY

: josh o’gorman 61

By 1840, the Methodists had built their own church at the lower end of Main Street, while the Congregationalists built a church at the juncture of Maple and Sunset streets. The original meetinghouse/church was moved to a spot just beyond the Green Mountain Inn, now the Vermont Ski & Snowboard Museum, clearing the way for the Universalist congregation to build what is now the Stowe Community Church. It was completed in 1863. And so life continued for nearly 60 years, with the three denominations meeting separately in their respective places of worship. All of that changed in November 1918, when leaders of the three churches met to discuss unification. Stowe congregants were far from alone in this discussion; at the time, many Vermont communities—faced with the cost of maintaining so many individual churches, from basic upkeep to the enormous expense of keeping them warm during savagely cold northern Vermont winters— were looking to set aside the differences in the way they worship and focus on their commonalities. In 1920, the Stowe Community Church was born, and this year, on July 20, we celebrate its centennial.

ARCHIVES OF STOWE COMMUNITY CHURCH AND STOWE REPORTER; INSET: COURTESY PHOTO; ORGANIST: GORDON MILLER

More than a building

Marylou Durett has attended the church for three-quarters of a century, since childhood. For the last 20 years, she’s been the administrative assistant at the church. “I grew up here in town and this was the church that we always went to—my mother, father, two sisters, and me—and we enjoyed many, many wonderful services and funs times, and not just the Sunday services,” she said. “I’ve been coming to this church, on and off, for 75 years, and I can’t imagine being anywhere else.” She recalled being 10 years old and attending a haunted house put on by the church youth group. She remembers the scary experience that many children have felt over the years—sitting in a darkened room and putting her hands in bowls containing things that, absent illumination, feel terrifying to the touch. “We sat in the dark of what is now the nursery, and we passed things around and had to guess what they were. I was terrified of the fish,” she said. Less scary, but just as memorable, were the many church activities that brought people together outside of the regular Sunday services—potluck dinners, summer fairs, mother-daughter banquets. “I sang in the junior choir, and met so many friends there,” she said. For Durett, the church symbolizes more than worship. “I feel that it is a very meaningful place, not only spiritually speaking, for the town. It is the center of the community. All those lovely pictures we have of the town and the steeple, it means this is a safe place, a good place to be,” she said.

LEADERS AND LAYPEOPLE This page, from top: Rev. Frederick T. Crane, 1914, in the pulpit of the Unity Church, which was created when Stowe’s Universalist and Unitarian groups merged. The photo shows the fresco, long since removed, depicting a three-dimensional decoration on the chancel of an arch framed by massive pillars with niches on both sides. The trompe d’oeil was extended to both side walls of the sanctuary. The Stowe Community Church parsonage and the old Congregational Church, after 1840, on the corner of Sunset and Maple streets. The Congregational Church was moved to a site near Stowe Elementary School, became a village, then school, gym, and served as both classrooms and storage space. It sat empty for years and was sold for salvage a few years ago. View of Stowe Community Church, sans clock, from atop the old Mansfield Hotel, which took up several blocks on Main Street. The hotel burned to the ground in 1889, and the clock became part of the church spire in 1904. Inset: Marylou Durett, administrative assistant at the church for the last 20 years. Clockwise from top left: Church minister Rev. Douglas Brayton (June 1954-August 1967). Madame Russell Lordwood, an accomplished musician and summer resident, playing the organ in the mid-1930s. Church choir in the 1930s: from left, front row, Florence Lang, Mabel Tomlinson, Lillie Barrows, Nan Pike, Amber Macutchan, and Ruth Pike. Back row, Harry Burnham, Velma Cochran, Tom Douglass, and Frank I. Foster. The choir during Rev. Clifford Newton’s tenure, 1942-1953: from left, front row, Mabel Tomlinson, Ruth Gale, Kathleen Ellsworth, Claire Hill, Betty Burnham, Venila Magoon, and Joyce Wilkins. Back row, Grandmother Hill, Morris Pike, Helen Newton, Ruth Gottlieb, Merton Pike, and Rev. Newton. Rev. Newton. Karen Miller, music director and organist since 2007.

Safe and welcoming Durett’s perception of the church as a “safe place” is quite accurate. When Vaus arrived at the church, the congregation was discussing whether to allow same-sex marriage. “First year, there was a church-wide dialogue about samesex weddings,” Vaus recalled. “I was told during my interview process that it would be an issue, and we had a vote and it was overwhelming in favor. We lost some people who voted against it, but it wasn’t a large migration. The more important issue is whether you are open and affirming to all people.” Indeed, the church is open and affirming, welcoming congregants of all denominations, or no denomination at all. “The church is a very diverse group of people,” Vaus said. “It’s nondenominational, or rather interdenominational, in that that we have people from all backgrounds. “In December, when we do the ‘Messiah’ sing, we have every kind of Protestant, former Catholics, and people with little or no religious background. It’s a place where I think anybody can feel comfortable.” As for the congregation, Vaus said it reflects the demographics of Stowe itself—a mix of natives, retirees, and young families who have come to town to take advantage of the vast array of outdoor activities the area offers, from skiing and snowboarding to hiking and mountain biking, and for its well-regarded school system. The church services also draw visitors who are in town for the day or the week, as well as parishioners who come out just for major holidays; the most recent Christmas Eve services drew 845 people.

A COMMUNITY OF PEOPLE From top: Current minister Rev. William Vaus, who replaced Rev. Bruce Comiskey, the longest serving minister of the church. Three reverends who collectively served the church for 53 years, Bruce Comiskey (1987-2015), Philip Chase (1971-1986), and Douglas Brayton (1954-1967). Rev. Richard Pryce, with Ruth Gottlieb and Ellen Hensel, look through photographs. Pryce served two years, 1968-1970. Previous page, from top left: There are always two kinds of pie at the annual Stowe Community Church chicken pie supper: chicken pie—and pie! Lots of pie, served up here by Kathy Jones. Ruth and Carroll Pike, Doris Houston, and Ruth Gottlieb, with Rev. Brayton, Rev. Chase, and friend in the sanctuary, 1970s. Gottlieb was organist at the church for 38 years. Destiny Africa Children’s Choir, representing Kampala Children’s Centre in Uganda, nearly filled the house at a free concert in 2010. Church and community members make offerings of peace to one another at a post 9/11 prayer service in 2001.

ARCHIVES OF STOWE COMMUNITY CHURCH AND STOWE REPORTER; PRAYER SERVICE: GLENN CALLAHAN; CHILDREN’S CHOIR: PAUL ROGERS

The steeple is iconic, representing not just the church but the Stowe community, with the image used to market not just the town, but all of New England. “It’s so symbolic of Stowe itself,” said Lynne von Trapp. She has sung in the church choir for half a century. “It’s used on business logos, on our town signs, and it really exemplifies what our town is about.” It’s even part of the flag of the local newspaper. For von Trapp, the music is what draws her to the church. “The acoustics are just amazing,” she said. “When we’re all there, there are 20 of us, but even when there are 12, the sound just sails out. We tackle some pretty challenging pieces. Sometimes, we don’t pull it together until Sunday morning, but we pull it together. For some people, the most important thing is Bible study. For some people, it’s the sermon. For me, it’s the music” For the past five years, Will Vaus has been the church pastor, and he quickly learned how popular the church is for destination weddings. In many cases, it’s the image of the church and its steeple—the tallest in the state that brings brides and grooms to town. “A few years ago, I did a wedding for a couple from England,” Vaus said. “The groom said, ‘Your church is emblazoned on brochures for travel to New England.’ I’ve done more weddings here in the last five years than my entire career combined.”

“It’s a real variety. I call it a merry-go-round church because everyone is getting on and off at different times,” Vaus said. The church—both the building and the congregation—offers an array of services to the community, from hosting AA meetings to collecting food for the area food shelf and raising money for the local drug-and-alcohol treatment center. “The community uses the church more than the congregation does on a Saturday,” Vaus said.

ARCHIVES OF THE STOWE REPORTER; PIANO REFLECTION, COLUMN, PEWS: PAUL ROGERS; STEEPLE AND WINDOWS: GLENN CALLAHAN

In the time of COVID

HAPPY 100 YEARS! The church will celebrate its centennial with an outdoor worship service in Parsonage Park in Stowe Village on July 19 at 9:30 a.m., followed by a concert with Taryn Noelle at 4:30 p.m. An update of “A History of the Stowe Community Church,” edited by Rev. Will Vaus, is available at the church. Livestream services at stowechurch.org.

During ordinary times—meaning no COVID-19 pandemic—the church doors remain open all day, welcoming thousands of tourists who flock to Stowe throughout the year. For Vaus, the popularity of the spot has been an unprecedented experience. “People coming by to take photos—it’s a daily thing, and when I first came here, that was something I had to get used to, people just walking in,” Vaus said. “The people who come, they’ve done their research about the building before they get here. People come here knowing it’s a tourist attraction, almost. If I see someone taking a picture, I tell them where the best place is to get the best picture.” Pro tip: The best place to take a picture—and this will soon change when the town finishes burying the utility lines on Main Street—is in the middle of School Street next to Black Cap Coffee. More important pro tip: Look out for traffic. When the church doors are open, visitors enter a sanctuary that exemplifies the Platonic ideal of a New England church—two rows of pews flanked by a series of clear-glassed, triple-hung windows stretching nearly 30 tall that make the sanctuary bright and inviting. While the doors are closed for now, the church offers a constant livestream of the sanctuary at stowechurch.org. However, the church wasn’t always that way. “When we first got there, it was a bit dingy,” recalled Ben Brayton, whose father was the church’s pastor from 1954 to 1967. “We learned that they had over-stoked the coal furnace on a Saturday night, and on Sunday morning there was soot in the sanctuary. It was about that time we changed over to oil heat.” In the 1950s, the sanctuary underwent a significant renovation, and the organ was moved from the front of the sanctuary to the balcony, or choir gallery. (In 1911, the organ had been moved from the gallery to the front of the church to provide a living space for the minister and his family. The organ, built by the Boston-based Simmons Organ Factory and installed in 1864, has been restored numerous times over the years, most recently in 1998. While many small churches in New England have sold their large pipe organs or allowed them to fall into disrepair, Stowe’s organ notes continue to ring out through the sanctuary every Sunday. “We’re very proud of that organ,” Brayton said. As the Stowe community returns to some feeling of normalcy, now that the first wave of COVID has passed and everyone looks to return to group gatherings, congregants of the church look forward to reopening the doors to the public. “It will be great when we reopen, for visitors who wish to see what a New England church looks like, or to just meditate and work some things out,” von Trapp said. For Durett, who continues to work at the church, the hope is to reopen soon. “I love coming here and working, and I hope this pandemic gets over soon so we can have people come back. I miss seeing people.” ■

REACHING FOR THE HEAVENS From top: A beautiful June day, 1975, as the Stowe Community Church spire, which rises 175 feet from the basement, keeps watch over the village of Stowe. The church has hosted countless weddings over its 100 years. Next page: Architectural details of the church. The body of the building is 75 feet by 50 feet, with a 10-foot portico over which “the belfry rested on granite bases, supported by four fluted Ionic columns. The Universalist Church departed from the practice of separate entrances for men and women and had a single entrance for all at the front of the church.”

36 HOURS IN Dubbed “The Northeast Kingdom” by Vermont Senator (and previously governor) George Aiken in the 1940s, this socalled sovereignty comprises the state’s most northeastern counties: Orleans, Caledonia, and Essex. As the state’s least populated region, it was one of the last places in the United States to receive electricity. Today the area has spotty, if any, cell service. As to the name’s origins, the scepter swings both ways: Maybe it was Aiken’s way of marketing the remote hills and small bucolic villages, or perhaps it referred to the rum runners during Prohibition, and their shady rule over this dominion. As Peter Milliken, a co-owner of the Highland Lodge, said, the NEK (as it’s also called) is “a little off the beaten path—you have to seek it out.” Indisputably beautiful and replete with treasures—it’s worth a visit. Of course, in light of COVID-19, all hours and days of operation are subject to change. 68

GREENSBORO, VERMONT

THE KINGDOM S T O R Y : Julia Shipley

COVER

P H O T O : Paul Rogers

FRIDAY 4 p.m. — A royal splash l Cannonball into Greensboro’s Caspian Lake. Guests of the Highland Lodge can contemplate the lake’s sapphire waters from a rocking chair on the porch or suit up and plunge in from its private beach, which includes use of the lodge’s canoes and kayaks. For those not staying in the 1950s vintage-feel cabins and rooms, there’s a free beach in town. highlandlodge.com

5 p.m. — Grab your goblet m Fill up a growler—a 64-oz. jug—at the Hill Farmstead Brewery, Taproom and Retail Shop, the seven-time winner of “Best Brewery in the World,” according to ratebeer.com. Choose from among founder Shaun E. Hill’s “library” of 296 beers. Directions (involving dirt roads) on the website or ask the cashiers at Willey’s. hillfarmstead.com, 403 Hill Road, Greensboro Bend, VT 05842, (802) 533-7450

CLOCKWISE FROM BLUEBERRIES: KATE CARTER; GLENN CALLAHAN; COURTESY; CARTER; PAUL ROGERS. OPPOSITE: PAUL ROGERS.

10 a.m. — Parsley, sage, rosemary, and denim aprons The Craftsbury Farmers Market has become appointment shopping. Located on the town’s hilltop green, or Common, the weekly market has been thriving for two decades, selling everything from apple butter to wool mittens. In recent years, the market’s risen to new heights thanks to a companion roster of events including Blueberry Festival and a Vermont Authors Fest. craftsburyfarmersmarket.com

n 11 a.m. — (Blue-ish) purple reigns Stain your fingers and pay by the pound—harvesting your own produce is a way to engage all your senses. From late July to Labor Day, Brown’s Beautiful Blueberries offers foodies, families, and friends the chance to do a lot of picking. Park in gravel drive, sign the guest log, grab a bucket and discover its hillside teeming with hundreds of mature berry bushes. bbblueberries.com, 93 Coburn Hill Road, Craftsbury, VT 05826, (802) 586-2202

6 p.m. — The Willey’s Store Forget something? The Willey’s Store, owned and operated by five generations of the Willey family, has you covered. Peruse its narrow aisles and creaky, century-old floors for bait, Brie, bathing suit, batteries, Barron’s, booze, (fine wines), bugdope, and bore … er, more. facebook.com/willeys.store

6:30 p.m. — Leer at Lear at Highland Center The seating and stage inside this quasi-palatial arts hub were modeled on Shakespeare’s Globe Theater. The center also has a casual eatery, Hardwick Street Café, which offers moderately priced farm-to-table fare, with seating on the patio or inside. After dinner, wander through the gallery, which hosts a rotating exhibit of paintings, prints, and photographs. No matter what theatric or musical performance is scheduled, every seat is equally great because it’s a theater in the round. highlandartsvt.org, 2875 Hardwick St., Greensboro, VT 05841

SATURDAY 8 a.m. — Not jousting around l Blast into woods on a mountain bike at the Craftsbury Outdoor Center—a nonprofit resort devoted to serious play, where Olympic scullers, cross-country skiers, and biathletes train. Pedal your rental bike (if you left yours at home) along nature trails that weave in and out of the balsam fir woods beside Big Hosmer Pond. craftsbury.com, 535 Lost Nation Road, Craftsbury Common, VT

12:30 p.m. — Banquets to go l General stores throughout Vermont have diminished over the past decade (about 75 remain statewide), but Craftsbury still has two—Craftsbury General Store and the C-Village Store, practically across the street from each other. Both operate out of historic buildings and purvey prepared foods, maple syrup, and groceries. Spread a blanket on the Common and do lunch. 2 p.m. — Thither & yon m l Like any tour, this is your free time. After lunch, wander about Craftsbury Common with its over-abundance of centuries-old structures— omes, post office, town buildings, churches, and Sterling College. It’s easy to see why Alfred Hitchcock picked Craftsbury to shoot his film “The Trouble with Harry” in 1955. It is the quintessential New England village.

Vintage postcard of Caspian Lake in Greensboro from Black Point. What kid doesn’t love blueberries. Hill Farmstead Brewery in The Bend. Susan Waterhouse works the counter at Village Store & Deli in Craftsbury. Film director Alfred Hitchcock with “The Trouble with Harry” stars John Forsythe and Shirley MacLaine, which was filmed in and around Craftsbury in 1954. Rowing at Big Hosmer Pond. United Church of Craftsbury, on the Common.

4 p.m. — Knight on the town m Cruise Vermont’s sinuous Route 14 south to The Town That Food Saved. The hardscrabble town of Hardwick was made famous in 2010 when local author Ben Hewitt’s zeitgeist-y book brought national attention to it and the area’s surge in agripreneurs—cheesemakers, seed growers, tofu producers, organic dairies, and vegetable farmers. Some of Hardwick’s gems: The Whistle Emporium, Buffalo Mountain Coop, founded in 1975 and named for the nearby mountain, and Galaxy Book Shop, featuring the latest novels and works by the region’s accomplished poets, journalists, and novelists. Those Kingdom writers include former National Poet Laureate Galway Kinnell, who kept a part-time home in Sheffield; Howard Frank Mosher, who wrote his spellbinding novels in Irasburg; brother and sister authors Natalie Kinsey Warnock and Leland Kinsey, who have channeled their Kingdom upbringings into children’s stories and poetry; and Hardwick writer David Budbill, who captured the Kingdom’s genius loci in his book Judevine, an extraordinary novel in verse. Interestingly, Dewees starred in one of the book’s first stage adaptations.

9 a.m. — The people’s castle l Browse the former dairy barn turned showroom packed with the Bread & Puppet theater troupe’s retired puppets. These giant, poetic relics made of painted papier-mache and cloth have been part of Peter and Elka Schumann’s series of summer performances in Glover for more than 50 years. breadandpuppet.org 11 a.m. — Three rules m Rule one: flick the lights on when you visit the Museum of Everyday Life, which, like the Puppet barn, is another mostly unattended roadside attraction in Glover that’s also located in an old cow barn. Founder Clare Dolan’s shrine to ordinary items “shouts against the white walls of the traditional art and artifact institution: no more vitrines! Nothing under glass!” Each year the museum curates an exhibit based on one new theme, which in past years has included the match, toothbrush, safety pin, mirror, and pencil. This year it’s the pivot and the blade (scissors.) Rules two and three: sign the guest book and turn the lights off when you leave. museumofeverydaylife.org

6 p.m. — Eat, drink and be merry k This little town feeds big appetites. After exploring Hardwick, dinner options include pizza, a diner that serves breakfast all day, and a fresh fish house.

Noon — Lunch under cover Vegans and carnivores alike will adore the menu at the Lyndon Freighthouse in Lyndonville, which offers two kinds of burgers. Choose the Vermont beancrafter veggie patty or the organic grass-fed beef from the restaurant’s own Tamarlane Farm. Pre- or post-feast, poke around the Lyndon area, which features five covered bridges—Randall, Chamberlain Mill, Sandborn Run, Millers Run, and School House). thelyndonfreighthouse.com, lyndonvermont.com

7 p.m. — Surely they jest k Mosey over to The Hardwick Town House and guffaw your way through a production of Vermont Vaudeville, performed by the beloved, insanely talented theater group whose variety shows run in spring and fall. Or, snag a seat to hear the renowned Craftsbury Chamber Players, who has performed world-class music in this corner of the Kingdom since 1966. COVID permitting. hardwicktownhouse.org, vermontvaudeville.com, craftsburychamberplayers.org

SUNDAY 8 a.m. — Let yourself eat cake (or at least fried dough) Who doesn’t love golden, tender, still-warm doughnuts? Cinnamon sugar and plain doughnuts are just some of the decadent edibles at Cheri Safford’s backyard bake-stand Red Sky Trading Post in Glover. Despite the name, there’s no trading involved. Safford leaves a calculator on the table: Payment is by the honor system. redskytrading.com 72

1 p.m. — Animal’s kingdom l Dog Mountain isn’t just for Cavalier King Charles spaniels. Three miles from downtown St. Johnsbury, this property also pays tribute to the common pooch. Designed with dogs at the fore by artist Stephen Huneck with his wife, Gwen, this canine dominion houses the world’s only dog chapel, perched on a hill amid 150 rolling acres, complete with pews and stained glass. Additionally, there are hiking trails, a pond, a dog agility course and a gallery of the artist’s humorous, colorful, dog-oriented art. dogmt.com n 2 p.m. — Crown jewel The closest thing to a king, Horace Fairbanks, who made his fortune by manufacturing scales, built and dedicated the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum to townspeople in 1871. Nearly 150 years later, the library/art gallery continues to favor nobles and yeomen with its handsome architecture, lecture series, sculpture, and paintings, including Albert Bierstadt’s astonishing “The Domes of Yosemite.” stjathenaeum.org CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: PAUL ROGERS; GLENN CALLAHAN; COURTESY. OPPOSITE: PAUL ROGERS

Local actor and personality Rusty Dewees grabs lunch at Connieâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Kitchen in Hardwick. The Museum of Everyday Life is a must see. Bread & Puppet theater performers. The chapel at Dog Mountain. St. Johnsbury Athenaeum. Members of Vermont Vaudeville, which traditionally performs at the Hardwick Town House, but not this summer.

THE BASICS The Northeast Kingdom is a one-hour drive from Stowe. The nearest major airport is Burlington International Airport. The nearest Amtrak Station is Stowe/Waterbury or Montpelier Junction. Greensboro, Vt., is a seven-hour drive from New York City. 73

casting a brush FLY FISHING LEADS TO REDEDICATION TO ART

â&#x2013; Notch Stream, Stowe, 12"x16", oil on panel

STORY

: kate carter

WORKS

: david pound |

PORTRAIT

: gordon miller

■ Autumn Escape, 54"x36", oil on stretched canvas, and Sterling Brook Respite, 42"x24", oil on stretched linen

hen David Pound goes fly fishing, it’s not because he loves casting the line, floating the nymph, and getting a strike—which he truly does—but when he’s standing thigh-deep in a stream, he’s in that Zen-like state many fly fishermen describe, and that is when ideas come to him for his fine-art oil paintings. “I get a lot of inspiration from the water,” Pound says. “There’s something about Vermont’s beauty that puts people in front of a canvas. I come from a city environment, and nature and the wild are incredible to me. I never thought I could be sitting at the dining room table, eating dinner, and watching a deer walk by the window.” Spending a few hours on a river casting flies prompted Pound to return with greater focus and dedication to his lifelong passion for painting. “I’m standing there in a river, enveloped by a canopy of trees, alone, and peaceful. Catching a fish is not really all that important,” he says. Pound grew up in London and still has his charming British accent that makes you feel like tea is about to be served. After a long career in graphic design, a career that began in England, prospered in Florida, and grew roots in Vermont, he circled back to oil painting. “I’m on a journey to find something that represents me. I don’t know if I’ll ever get there, but I’m having fun experimenting along the way,” he says. “My style is sort of a blend of abstract realism and realism. I’d like to come to some degree of compromise between the two. Strict realism doesn’t allow me to express myself as much. Being on a stream or river, there’s movement and a way to capture it without being realistic.” >>

CELEBRATING 30 YEARS OF EXCELLENCE

■ Moose in Haze, 18"x24", oil

■ Guardian of the Falls, 18"x24", oil on panel

Gail O’Toole, co-owner of Robert Paul Galleries in Stowe, where Pound’s paintings are sold on commission, says Pound has found his niche. “You feel the local atmosphere in his work. It has an ethereal quality. He uses so much light in the sky that is reflected elsewhere in the painting. You can see the softness mixed with detail, light, and color. It’s a blend of impressionism and realism.” Light and shadow are important to Pound, giving his paintings dimension, intensity, and interest. “When a painting looks flat, I know I need to bring in light and dimension. A painting takes on its own life and you need to know when to stop,” he says. “One brush stroke can make or break a painting. You know when it’s right and you know when it’s wrong.” As a child, Pound became enamored with painting, and also wildlife. He became a member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds at an early age to learn more about the wildlife he enjoyed. He attended his first year of collage at Wimbledon School of Art. “I arrived very green,” Pound remembers. “The first day, our instructor told us to go out and pick a twig and paint with it. He taught us to think outside the box.” It was a time of experimentation for Pound, and he spent the year learning art fundamentals. It helped him understand what direction to go in and where to focus his talent. “I found out I had a strength in graphic design, so after that first year I did my three-year degree at Kingston Polytechnic, now called Kingston University. It was the complete opposite of Wimbledon. Very strict. We learned all about logos, corporate branding, advertising, marketing … and it was all pre-computer. “Computers changed things overnight in so many ways. Steve Jobs really changed my life. Before computers, it was tactile. With the advent of computers, it was no less challenging; you still had to come up with a concept and execute it,” Pound adds. Concepts were his strength, and the discipline of fine art was always there. Throughout >>

■ The Majesty of Chaos, 35"x46", oil on canvas

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his work in graphic design, Pound was still painting and doing illustrations, and always had art lurking in the background. Pound came to the U.S. in 1982 during the height of Britain’s recession. He had an opportunity to work with an agency in southern Florida, specializing in corporate design. His clients included Florida Power & Light Nuclear Division, for which he won the Deming prize in 1989, Shasta Beverages, various medical and hospital clients, radio stations, and theaters. His first female client was Dionne Warwick. He put together branding, concept, and staging for her. It was in Florida that Pound met his wife, Glenna. They married and had a daughter, Emily. But Pound missed the northern climate and seasons, so the family visited Vermont and did the “magazine tour” of the state. They liked the Stowe area, found a Realtor, and bought a house. Eventually Pound had a stable of graphic design clients, including Community Health Services of Lamoille Valley, Copley Hospital, Boyden Valley Winery, Trapp Family Lodge, and Smugglers’ Notch Resort. He continued to dabble in oil painting in his spare time and became a U.S. citizen in 2002. In the last few years, Pound has gradually shifted to painting full time. He still retains a few graphic design clients, while honing his painting style. “I get a lot of satisfaction from putting myself wholly into it, and I’m purposely not letting myself be frustrated, but am enjoying the journey.” Oils are, and have always been, his medium of choice. “There’s something about the translucence. You can get a glazing effect. Oils reflect the bottom layer and give a dimension I haven’t found in acrylics and watercolors,

which I think are best left to the people who devote themselves to those mediums. To me, oils are not as complicated.” ound’s method for a landscape is a combination of a plein air sketches for composition and layout, combined with plein air painting, and finishing large works in his studio. Occasionally he will work from a photograph. Most difficult is wildlife, because, well, there’s little likelihood a bear or deer will stand still for three hours. “I like them to be complementary to the landscape,” he says, and has a large reference collection of animal images. Pound’s studio is meticulously clean and organized, with a collection of vinyl albums on one wall and a display of Boyden Valley wine bottles bearing labels he designed. An assortment of finished and not-yet-completed canvases lean against walls or rest on easels, waiting for the final touch. One area is set up as a photography studio with light stands, where Pound photographs his finished paintings. In addition to finding inspiration on fly fishing excursions, Pound is influenced by Joseph William Turner. “I can’t get enough of him,” Pound says, as he pulls “Mood and Light,” a book about Turner, from his bookshelf. He also relates to the Hudson River School style of painting, and will occasionally take a drive to the library at the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum, wherein hangs a painting by Hudson River School painter Albert Bierstadt, one of the most prominent and influential American landscape painters of the 19th century. “I stand in front of ‘The Domes of Yosemite’ and just gawk at it.” >>

Autumn ■ Anticipation, 13"x32" oil on board, poplar frame

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Locally, Pound has many artist friends, yet he feels insular. “I try to meet as many people as I can, but am into my own work in solitude. When you can come together with other artists, the conversation, criticism, and feedback is really great. Sometimes I just have to get out of my studio and go for a walk or a drive. I’m discovering parts of the countryside I would have never seen.”

ecently, Pound incorporated custom frames into his paintings. A hobby woodworker, he has a woodworking studio in his basement, where he crafts individual frames specific to a painting. Where the canvas ends, the frame continues as part of the imagery. In a framed painting of a woodpecker, there’s a small section of the frame next to the bird’s beak that appears to have been gouged out, as if the woodpecker had pecked a hole right in the frame. It brings levity to a painting, as well as an urge to take a closer look. This summer, wearing waders and standing knee-deep in a river, Pound will cast his rod, watch it land in an eddy, and become mesmerized by the water’s swirling currents. Maybe he’ll see a fox observing him, an otter slide down a bank into a river, mist lifting from a stream, or the light sifting through a canopy of leaves. Time will tell how the inspiration he derives from those experiences will transfer to the canvas. ■

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: Find Pound’s work at Robert Paul Galleries, Stowe; Frog Hollow, Burlington; Art Hound Studio, Essex Outlet Mall; and online at davidpound.com and @davidpoundart.

ARTISANS GALLERY FAMILY AFFAIR Glass artist Devin Burgess and ceramicist Jerilyn Virden in their respective studios. Some of Virdenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work, both sculpture and utilitarian objects: Facet bowl, Bermuda. Perpetual, red. Drift. White nesting bowls. Olive boats. Appetizer trays, with pears.

BOREALIS STUDIOS Greensboro artisans make connections using glass, clay STORY

/ KATE CARTER

ARTIST PHOTOS: KAREN GOWEN PHOTOGRAPHY; OTHERS: COURTESY

Primitive tools are ancient pieces of human effort. Crafted to be functional, not beautiful, with time they become beautiful works of art. This perception of primal human endeavors is a thread that weaves through Jerilyn Virden’s ceramics and inspires her two bodies of work: double-walled sculptures and singlewalled utilitarian objects. “There is value in using handmade objects,” Virden said. “You have a connection to the creator, even if you don’t know that person. The object has a life and energy that stock objects don’t have.” The same value holds true for her husband, Devin Burgess, a glass artist, who believes most people have forgotten that a majority of everyday objects in their lives were once made by hand. The artistic couple lives in the quaint Vermont village of Greensboro. Their house doubles as living space and Borealis Studios, Virden and Burgess’s combined gallery. (Check-in first before making the trip) The couple chose Greensboro because they found a location that could house their family, two studios—one for ceramics, one for glass—and gallery. Also, Burgess grew up in Montpelier and wanted to return to Vermont to be closer to family, the northern climate, and skiing. Virden, from Allentown, Pa., has been up to her elbows in clay since college. “I started in pre-pharmaceutics the first year because I like science, but the minute I didn’t have an art class I realized I was in the wrong major. I like science and chemistry. They both play important roles in ceramics.” >>

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Virden has been making a living producing sculptural and utilitarian pieces since 2001. She was drawn to clay because she can control it and turn it into solid items. “It’s such a malleable material and I get to play with science and be dirty. I also like the connection to the kitchen. I love to serve beautiful food, and clay goes with that.”

Virden’s graceful double-walled sculptural pieces often don’t look like ceramics. Some look like beautifully polished cherry or mahogany, a look she achieves through building with slabs, glazing, and sandblasting. Her utilitarian pieces have a similar style; most are made by building, shaping, and carving. A bowl may look more like the hull of a ship than a typical round shape. “One body of work sparks ideas for the other,” Virden said. “They influence each other and provide a mental break. They really complement each other well.” Virden works with earthenware—red clay and black clay—and has turned out a huge body of sculpture and pottery, primarily for interior designers. For a while, she thought she would focus only on sculpture, but she could not stop thinking about utilitarian objects. “I can make a lot of little things and fill my wheel cart, but when it’s sculpture, I worry that I’m not turning out enough.” Burgess and Virden met at Penland School of Crafts in Bakersville, N.C., a tight community of craftspeople. Both were in the residency program, honing their chosen mediums. After Penland, the

couple started vending their wares at craft shows and learning the business aspect of being financially secure artists. But craft shows were small volume, so they began to focus on shows that would make a difference. They attended industry shows in the design fields, focusing on larger companies and interior designers. “For 11 years, we did the Architectural Digest design show,” said Virden. “Now we sell a lot through interior designers, galleries, design stores, and direct to the public in our own gallery.” Their biggest customer is Comerford Collection, an interior design studio in Bridgehampton, N.Y. They also do a steady business from their Greensboro gallery. You can order online and have your item shipped, or pick it up in person.

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Burgess got his first taste of glass artistry in high school, when his mother enrolled him in a workshop at Church and Maple Glass Studio in Burlington. It was a glimpse into his future. After Montpelier High School, he attended Alfred University in upstate New York for printmaking, but discovered it had a glass-blowing program. The decision to switch his major to glass was easy. Upon graduating, he did an apprenticeship in Seattle, where he worked with various artists. “I liked working with something industrial. I would work it out on paper and go to the studio to turn it into something tactile. I enjoy the different aspects of the material, the melting, grinding, and chipping away.” Like Virden, the shapes Burgess creates are graceful, with a hint of sculpture that gives them a distinct look. Also like Virden, Burgess is drawn to science and chemistry, which play an important part in glass art, as well as ceramics. Early on, he had a stint doing department displays for Macy’s, which was informative and a good income, but not fulfilling. Now he’s focusing on filling their own gallery space with household goods—barware, bowls, farmhouse glassware, everyday objects—made by hand from recycled glass. “I used to use a type of glass from North Carolina by the ton. Now I’m focusing on using clear recycled glass. Everyone thought it was a crazy idea because different glass is not always compatible. But with help from friends, we figured out a way to make it work. “Glass is a medium we all depend on. It’s in almost every aspect of our lives, from a drinking glass to a satellite shuttle system. It’s a really interesting material that’s always moving. I think it’s amazing that you can heat sand to 2,400 degrees, melt it, and it becomes clear crystal overnight. The alchemy is beyond fascinating. Once it’s cooled, you can add to it or take away from it. You can even re-melt it.” Burgess usually melts, or “charges,” 300 pounds of sand a week, which fills his furnace. If it’s busy, he’ll charge twice a week. His bestsellers vary from production work to wine glasses to installations of still life of different-sized vases and bottle shapes. He also does a lot of engraving. Much of his work goes to design firms that place his glassware at different locations around the world, and he often has no idea where they end up. “People have forgotten that a majority of things in their lives were once handmade. We’ve turned into a world where things are immediate. The ability to pick up an object—drinking glass, vase, tool—people lack that connection and they need it in their everyday lives. We’d all be better off if we could slow down and appreciate what we hold in our hands.” ■

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THE NAKED JUNGLE Alexandra Martin and two fellow competitors share a moment around their camp in the Colombian jungle in the Discovery Channel show “Naked and Afraid.” Contestants are dropped into the wilderness to see if they can last for three weeks with only their wits and skills.

NAKED AND AFRAID Stowe woman tests her mettle on jungle challenge show Three weeks in a jungle near the Equator without supplies, shelter or even clothes? Most people would say no, thank you, but not Stowe resident Alexandra Martin. Martin was a participant on the most recent season of Discovery Channel’s “Naked and Afraid.” In each episode, two or three people are dropped into a remote wilderness somewhere in the world for three weeks without supplies, shelter and, most importantly, clothes. Martin grew up in Hyde Park and has lived in Stowe for years. She has spent much of her life traveling and seeing the world while running her own business, and when a casting agency STORY / ANDREW MARTIN approached her about “Naked and Afraid,” she saw a chance to travel even more while also testing her endurance, skills, and her mind. “I’ve always enjoyed doing things that scare me a bit,” she said. “And I really wanted to do it to know I could.” Martin saw the show as a way to experience the suffering many people around the world face every day. Martin was pretty outdoorsy growing up, and wanted to prove to herself she could do it. She’d been bullied growing up and looked forward to the chance to say “I can do this, be tough, and exorcise those demons.”

“A small-town girl going on this wild adventure, being able to inspire my family and my community and bringing that treasure back has been rewarding,” she said. Martin’s three-week survival challenge took place in the rainforests of Colombia, in an episode titled “Two Tarzans, One Jane,” with Martin and two men trying to survive in the wilds of the South American country. She worried a little: What if she was stuck with a misogynist, “a real tough guy who was demeaning?” But things turned out better than that. One of the biggest challenges in surviving naked in the jungle is how cold it gets at night.

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Sleep was another challenge. She and her partners had to continually wake up to feed the fire, with jungle critters moving around just outside the firelight. “You hear things like big cats, trying to be quiet; they move differently than other animals in the forest,” she said. During the day, walking through dense jungle vegetation with feet and legs exposed, there was constant dread about an encounter with a snake or a poison dart frog. And then there was hunger, and all sorts of bugs. Martin’s biggest takeaway from the experience? “Recognizing that the body and will are incredibly capable. It’s so easy to get into a negative thought pattern, but it’s also just as easy to get into a positive thought pattern. For me, it strengthened my mind muscle.” /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: View Martin’s episode at go.discovery.com/tv-shows/naked-and-afraid.

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Vermonters have an opportunity to protect and restore watersheds by purchasing a conservation license plate, featuring a loon, elk, or a trout. What many might not know is that those license plate images come from original paintings by Linda Mirabile, a Montpelierbased graphic designer and painter of all aspects of avian life. Her work ranges from hyper-realistic to dreamy. She captures not only anatomical correctness, but also a bird’s essence. Her avian art is grounded in a lifetime of observing and studying birds. A birder extraordinaire, Mirabile’s acrylic paintings are a true testament to her skills. INFO: saatchiart.com/mirabile

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CONDIMENTS A LA GOURMET Vermont Harvest has been making jams, jellies, chutneys, conserves, dips, vinegars, and oils for over two decades. Its sauces and reserves are a delicious addition to any marinade or topping, and its mouthwatering traditional Scottish shortbreads are the perfect hostess gift. Or midnight snack! But beware, you might feel compelled to eat the entire bag. Gourmet condiments are made from fresh ingredients and free of additives and preservatives. Check out the website for awesome recipes. INFO: Find at specialty food stores and online at vtharvest.com

WHODUNIT? Florida has Carl Hiaasen, Maine has Stephen King, and Vermont has Archer Mayor. A former detective and currently a death investigator for Vermont’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, Mayor loosely bases his crime series, featuring detective Joe Gunther, on his personal field experience. The series of 30 books about Gunther’s case-solving prowess—the most recent, “Bomber’s Moon,” published in 2019—are all based in Vermont, and have been published yearly since 1988. If you haven’t read any of the Joe Gunther series books, start at the beginning and binge. INFO: Available at Stowe’s Bear Pond Books and archermayor.com

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GREEN MOUNTAIN BYWAYS Clockwise from top left: Creamery Bridge in Montgomery. The Old Round Church, Richmond. Dr. Janes House, Waterbury. The Old Red Mill, Jericho. Famous floating bridge, Sunset Lake, Brookfield. Waterbury train depot. Village of Johnson.

ROADS LESS TRAVELED Join the 251 Club and discover Vermont

Some people seek out Vermont’s covered bridges, others search for the state’s unique round churches and barns, while still others set a goal of dipping a paddle in every pond. But if you really want to get to know Vermont, join the 251 Club! Now in its 66th year, members of the 251 Club of Vermont dedicate themselves to visiting all of the state’s 251 cities and towns. Dr. Arthur W. Peach, a poet, STORY / KATE CARTER professor, writer, and historian introduced the idea in the summer 1954 issue of Vermont Life, where he served on the magazine’s advisory board. The concept of visiting the 251 towns was a response to one of the magazine’s most frequently asked questions: “How can I come to know the real Vermont?”

Peach’s idea was to take roads less traveled, because every corner of Vermont has attractions, beauty, history, traditions, and people of interest. At the time, Vermont Life was found on many a coffee table, and the response was immediate. A new batch of Vermont maps had to be printed to meet the growing demand, while letters from prospective club members rolled in. As of 2020, the club has over 6,000 members, one of whom resides in Stowe. Barb Baraw has been emotionally involved in the 251 Club since 1975, and active since 2016. “I’ve always loved to travel and have had the fortune of stepping a foot on all seven continents,” Baraw said. “I love driving, too, and when my kids were little, after dinner I’d take them for drives all over Stowe’s

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back roads, mainly to calm them down. Then I started branching out to other towns.â&#x20AC;? In 2014, Barawâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s partner, Bill, was struggling with cancer, and the one thing he could do comfortably was take 2-hour car rides, so thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what the couple did. They visited many of the towns in the Champlain Valley. Bill died in 2016, and on her way home from the funeral, Baraw decided to take a different route, one that sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d never seen before. â&#x20AC;&#x153;That was when I decided that in honor of Bill and all the traveling we did, I would visit all 251 towns in Vermont.â&#x20AC;? But it took a nudge from a friend, Jack Carter of Waterbury Center, to get her started. They were standing side by side at the 2016 Vermont Expo, watching an exhibit by a couple who had done the 251 challenge, but with twist. They put their canoe in a river or pond in every town. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Jack and I were watching their slide show and my conversation with Jack made me re-commit. Baraw did 60 towns in the first 3 months and found the experience cathartic. â&#x20AC;&#x153;My self-commitment was to get photos in every town. I wanted documentation, not just recollection, and I have two gazetteers full of markings on the maps.â&#x20AC;? Baraw would spend an average of 20 minutes in each town, or whatever her mood dictated. â&#x20AC;&#x153;It was a goal in a time of my life when I wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t completing very much, and it was an accomplishment that helped me get through a down period.â&#x20AC;? Her favorite town? Each month, as she reflected, sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d say, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Oh, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s my favorite.â&#x20AC;? But her instant response now is Sutton. â&#x20AC;&#x153;I was fascinated with their 19th century school, which had been visibly added on to over time. The town also had a big Baptist church similar the Stowe Community Church. I looked in a window and next to the altar was a 60-inch TV screen. It personified the old and the new.â&#x20AC;? Everyone has their own personal methods and reasons for visiting all of Vermontâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cities and towns. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a challenge, and like any challenge, takes commitment and determination. The 251 Club is open to anyone, and charges its members with visitingâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;not simply driving throughâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;each town. Members can document their adventures through photos and notes and earn the â&#x20AC;&#x153;plusâ&#x20AC;? membership when theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve toured them all. â&#x2013; //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: Membership in the 251 Club of Vermont is $18 annually. vt251.com.

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DINING & LODGING

The Stowe area boasts a variety of cuisines and dining atmospheres, from swanky bistros that embrace the local food movement to fine-dining establishments featuring award-winning chefs and busy pubs with the latest microbrews—and everything in between! Check out the area’s great places to stay, as well, from full-service resorts to quaint country inns. Our guide to dining and lodging outlines the myriad choices from which to choose, and perfectly complements the Stowe Area Association’s menu and dining book.

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SETH YACOVONE

Tommy Gardner | C O V E R P H O T O : Kate Bowen

Seth Yacovone has been in my house every day for the past month. This is actually unremarkable. As of this writing, the guitarist with a reputation as the hardest-working musician around these parts has dutifully gone into his basement every day for weeks, sat on a stool facing a camera, and played a couple of songs. His partner and quarantine mate Kate Bowen shoots video of the sessions in crisp black and white. The choice lends an othertimeliness to details like Yacovone’s nonstop beard and his King Crimson hat, the plastic Yoda on the amp, the cellar door, and the rough post holding up the ceiling. This is Seth Yacovone’s Quarantine Video Single Series, folks. Limit two per day. It’s a far cry from the Green Mountain guitarist’s typical schedule, logging 300 shows a year for half a decade, in a Subaru Impreza Sport with 200,000 miles on it. He’s making the best of the break. “I want to be playing. But there’s a part of me that just feels like it’s not gonna happen quickly. I’ve been keeping it separate in my brain, that the other thing, it will happen in the future. So, to actually take a breather isn’t too bad,” he said in mid-April. “There’s only so many hours a week to devote to music before I’m just unable to grasp the inspiration, even, the energy. So, it’s nice to have a little bit more time to do that.”

MUSIC MAN Seth Yacovone’s talent emerges early on, seen here in a local talent show, and below as teenager.

BORN WITH A GUITAR IN HIS HAND In a state where it’s second nature to have a second job, Yacovone is that rare Vermont musician who can put “guitarist” on his business card. He grew up in Wolcott, the hill and river burg that acts as a buffer between Morrisville and Hardwick, assuring the larger towns don’t just bleed into one another. At least he did until he was 16, and the family moved “down to the big city,” known around here as Mo-Vegas, in tones both affectionate and not. The “straight outta Woolkit” Yacovone said there’s a certain vibe to these parts—“an interesting combination of compassion and ‘don’t talk to me and I won’t talk to you’ at the same time. I feel like that’s in me, a lot. Same with my music. There’s that small-town thing that only happens in, you know, small towns.” Wolcott kids get to choose where they go to school after sixth grade and Yacovone chose tony Stowe over more nearby places, at least until he decided he’d rather not be there, either. He began homeschooling at the beginning of ninth grade. “My parents kind of were, like, let’s give it a week. And he’s gonna miss all his friends and be bored,” he said. “But I stuck with it.” Homeschooling allowed Yacovone to practice and read and write, hone his fret work and feed his brain. “Instead of sitting in study hall, I was able to play guitar,” he said. It also gave him time to work on his writing, evident in the adult output of a boy taught by a guitar-playing mom and a dad who’s still a Democratic fixture in state government. Dave Yacovone, a state representative and former head of the Department

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for Children and Families, said Seth had a Martin Luther King Jr. poster in his bedroom in second grade, the one urging people to not judge people by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. The songwriter’s characters are certainly colorful. Take the song “Caveman Guerilla,” loosely based on the 2013 shooting of a Burlington man, Wayne Brunette, on his parents’ lawn after he allegedly threatened a cop with a shovel. It was the first time Burlington police had fired at someone since 1997. Yacovone describes his ill-fated protagonist as a “navel gazer staring at the sun, like a raisin overdone,” whose “eyebrow is a shelf; it is beside itself.” There’s quirky confidence in his lyric writing, with wordplay and nods to current events and references to esoterica. He’s been writing song lyrics for about as long as he’s been playing guitar, “lucky enough to just think that writing songs was part of it.” Eight years old. He took some lessons here and there but he doesn’t really read music—he knows it because he makes it, facility from muscle memory, countless chords constructed since he was a kid. Mother Debbie was an early influence; like her son, she started early. She received a guitar for Christmas when she was 12, right when the Beatles were on the scene, when they were the scene.

KATE BOWEN

BASEMENT SESSIONS Seth Yacovone’s been playing and writing in the basement during COVID-19.

In the early ’80s, the Lamoille Valley Railway still operated a passenger service fueled by nostalgia and Vermont’s famous foliage, and it hired musicians to play in the aisles. Debbie was one of them, performing train songs and classic covers on a slow-chugging there-and-back between Wolcott and Joe’s Pond in Danville. “Well, he says I was an influence, but he’s long surpassed me,” she said. “He’s actually my influence. I got inspired to play out and about again after watching him.” Mom and son have jammed together a few times at Moog’s Place in Morrisville, where Yacovone has been playing pretty much every Monday night since the place opened in 2012. Last fall, they played together at a show in East Dover, Vt. In Wolcott in the 1980s and early ’90s, there were several excellent area musicians whose names aren’t now as readily recognizable as Yacovone, but whom he recalls with right proper respect and deference: Marc Bigelow, Andy Shapiro, Peter Bertolotti, and others. Much like rural pockets all over the country, people have long filled Vermont’s quiet spots with music for whatever is the opposite of “the masses.” For Yacovone the youngster, discovering people in Wolcott and the surrounding towns played music and played it well—that it wasn’t just done by professionals who put out albums or made videos for MTV— was revelatory. “A lot of music other than local music is very much a product,” he said. “I feel like being in a small town, to actually have good players, and being around it, you could tell that it’s just something that people do.”

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TUNES AND QUARANTUNES There’s a correlation between reading and writing, between examining art and making it, between listening to music and playing it. Creativity in, creativity out. Yacovone listens to a lot of music. By a lot of different artists. Not a big surprise to anyone who’s sat in at one of his album cover nights and watched him perform run-throughs of his favorite LPs, everything from Lucinda Williams to Ween. Lately, he’s taken his music listening to quantitative levels. Since late March, he has posted to his Facebook page a list of what he listened to the previous week while being stuck at home, a weekly list of “quarantunes” that typically runs longer than a regular workweek. I did an experiment and made a Spotify playlist from the music he had enumerated for one week— it ran for 50 hours and 20 minutes and took me three weeks of pretty steady listening to get through it. In that time, Yacovone put out three more lists, some of them even longer, rarely a repeat in the mix. This is no mean feat, considering there are wide swaths of music culture excluded. There’s hardly any hip-hop. No Taylor or Beyonce, Timberlake or Bieber. His tastes, big surprise, trend toward blues and guitar-heavy performances. Yacovone thinks the first rock music he heard was probably on one of his mom’s Beatles albums. He definitely remembers his first Jimi Hendrix. “I heard ‘Purple Haze’ and the boom bom boom bom, those dinosaur stomps that’s the intro to the song, immediately grabbed me,” he said.

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“I was, like, ‘Whoa, what’s this thing screaming and crying over there, coming out of the speaker?’ ” When he was 10, he saw Stevie Ray Vaughn—touring with Joe Cocker—and he had another Hendrix-like experience. That, and a viewing of “The Blues Brothers” at just the right age, sent him down a blues path from which he rarely deviated for a number of years. But nobody puts Seth in a corner. He said he didn’t want to get “completely cemented in this regimen of it still being exactly 1955,” dressing in white suits and playing other people’s music. He felt it would be inauthentic to not let in all of the other music influences, the Santanas, Dios, Dylans, Fripps and Garcias of the world. But behind it all … “It’s the great building block of the rest of the music I’ve liked that’s come since,” he said. “Somewhere, the heartbeat of the blues is in it, either in the feeling or in the actual music. And I feel I’m real-

ly grateful. That I did get, kind of, I don’t want to say pigeonholed, but focused on the roots of it, when I had the time and the energy to really learn how to keep that as a basis of the music I make.”

THE GIGS A band named Phish worked out its early raw material at a place called Nectar’s in Burlington, and named its third album after the gravy-fryserving, live-music mainstay. “So, it might have come as a shock that, in 2015, when the club gave out its first and only Nectar’s Lifetime Achievement Award as part of its 40th anniversary celebration, it chose Yacovone. He started playing there every Friday night in 2005 and it took a global pandemic to stop him.

JAMMED Seth Yacovone plays at the Oxbow Music Festival in Morrisville. Cover art for a few of Yacovone’s albums.

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“Strictly based on hours on stage, and the longest running residence, I would bet, of any artist, he’s definitely put in the most time on the Nectar’s stage,” said Alexander Budney, one of Nectar’s owners and the bassist in the Seth Yacovone Band. Dad Dave worked pretty hard in the mid-’90s, too, driving Seth to and from his first gigs at Nectar’s, before the teenager got his driver’s license. When he was able to drive himself, the family fretted about him coming home at 2:30 in the morning. Parents are parents and they worry. Luckily, mostly everyone Yacovone has played with has been older than him, playing long enough to recognize that the only thing that keeps musicians going is hard work and discipline, and for the most part had gotten past their youthful dumminess. That goes for wunderkinds, as well. If you need to wrap your rock ’n’ roll mythos in drugs and booze and sex, then Yacovone isn’t your mythos. He nurses his whiskey drinks, doesn’t really mention drugs either way, and he’s been with the same woman for 14 years. He just works, like countless people before and after him. That variation of a theme we’ve all heard, about working harder than the next guy? Turns out it’s true. “He’s an endless pool of music, and one of the hardest working people ever,” Budney said. In 1995, at age 15, Yacovone hit the Burlington music scene after placing second in a guitar contest at Club Metronome—upstairs from Nectars, with a bigger stage and more room to dance—and won some free studio recording time. The contest was sponsored by Advance Music Center, whose owner, Bill Schafer, helped Yacovone round up a band to put together a demo tape. They called themselves Seth Yacovone and the Broke and Hungry Blues Band, after the Blind Lemon Jefferson song. “When you have an adult who backs you up, you go from just saying, ‘Hey, I’m 16, you wanna play in my band?’ and some 30-year-old man going, ‘ahhh, I don’t know,’ to having someone on your side.” The band’s first live show was at 242 Main, the legendary Burlington all-ages punk music basement. The only teen in the band that night was the bandleader. When you’re that age and that good, unless you get your buddies together and form a band, and all of you start learning how to play together, you’re not going to find many other high schoolers with years on the bar circuit. That’s particularly true for a teenager in the ’90s so thoroughly fixated on the blues. Good luck finding people your same age who wouldn’t rather perfect the fuzzy opener to Green Day’s “When I Come Around.” So, Yacovone played with people older than him. He watched them for cues on how to be a live musician. He also allowed them to keep his head from getting too big. And they watched over the lad, which Dave was happy for. “I learned so much from just watching people who had more experience than me, just trying to keep up and not let them down,” Seth said. “Especially when it’s your name on the thing, you don’t want to be the weak rower.” Having older musicians around was key to lay a bedrock that Yacovone could float above without coming untethered. “You’re not worried about sinking into the mud because you’ve got the solid floor.” Being young and talented and nimble on the fretwork brought him into legendary orbits. He shared the stage with Phish at its Nov. 29, 1998, show at the Centrum in Worcester, Mass., at the last minute, after playing in Burlington until the bars closed the night before. Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio had been a judge in the Advance Music contest, and had Yacovone lead the band through the composition he had played for the contest, “All the Pain Through the Years.” He also traded notes with Anastasio as the band covered Clapton’s “Layla.” His blues band has opened for Johnny Winter, Ray Charles, Dr. John, and B.B. King. King, for whom Yacovone warmed up numerous crowds, would hang out post-show—after he had a little personal B.B. time.

GIGOLOGY Seth Yacovone at Moogs Place in Morrisville. At Nectar’s nightclub in Burlington with Steve Hadeka and Alexander Budney. Jamming at Moogs.

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“Mr. Charles” as his handlers insisted he be addressed, was far less accessible, traveling with “17 guys in the band and there’s this taskmaster running around … almost like a military feel.” In the mid-90s, after young guitar heroes like Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Derek Trucks came onto the scene, there were some who heralded Yacovone as the next of their ilk. Indeed, he ascended high enough to see what that life might be like, and the Seth Yacovone Band—Yacovone, Budney, and drummer Steve Hadeka—did wideranging tours throughout the early 2000s, playing as far west as Colorado, down south to Florida, and a couple of trips to Italy. It simply stopped making financial sense and the band got burned out and took a few years off after the 2004 touring to tend to family and solo pursuits. “When we started the band back up in earnest, it didn’t really make too much sense to go race around to lose money and play to, like, six people in a town that doesn’t know us,” he said.

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Like an athlete at the end of an 82-game season, a musician who hustles as much as Yacovone needs some down time. Now, everyone has some. Being at home more often means more time with Bowen. The couple met “years and years and years ago” at a gig, became good friends for a while and have been more-than-friends now for 14 years. “In my normal everyday life, I pretty much leave in the early evenings and I’m gone until after people go to bed, so there’s not a lot of eating dinner together or anything, you know, that happens in normal life. So, it is enjoyable to actually have some home time,” he said. “I’m so fortunate that she understood from the beginning my strange addiction to the music world, that it’s just part of me. It’s what I’m up to, and it takes a lot of time.” Before things went into lockdown mode, Yacovone went to a usual getaway spot in Maine to get some writing done—Budney said Yac’ll sometimes come back from these solo retreats with 30 new songs for the band to play. Now, he and Budney and Hadeka have to be content with seeing each other remotely, although the trio did manage to stream a show in April from Budney’s backyard. “That was a good day,” Budney said. “It’d been over a month since I’d played with anyone else, and before that it’d been four to five times a week.” One of these days, people are going to look at a music calendar and say, oh, 10 p.m. isn’t really past my bedtime anymore. For now, we’ve got the basement sessions. We’ve got the playlists. And who knows how much material for a new Yacovone album. “Even though it’s not necessarily the most sensible or sound career at times—almost all the time—it’s a tradeoff that works out for me,” he said. “I can’t imagine not playing music. I’d become even loonier than I am.” ■

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LOCAL HANGOUT Co-owner Lee Kinsey behind the bar at Blackbird Bistro, a relatively new eatery in Craftsbury. Inset: Burger and rings.

BLACKBIRD BISTRO It’s all in the family at Craftsbury’s only bar, restaurant The rambling, stately farmhouse at 1037 South Craftsbury Road in Craftsbury looks much like it has for decades. But the 19th-century farmhouse—former home of the Sedore family and Whetstone Bed & Breakfast—lights up at night, when the newest occupant, Blackbird Bistro, opens. It’s STORY / ANDREW MARTIN Craftsbury’s only full-service restaurant, and is the new go-to place in this tiny Northeast Kingdom town. Business blew up after it opened in November 2019; people flocked from near and far to the small, homey restaurant to enjoy comfort food, craft cocktails, and craft beer. The coronavirus pandemic closed it for a while, but now it’s back in business. The bistro is the brainchild of Lee Kinsey and Jessie Upson, whose maiden name is Sedore. Upson and two of her sisters, Katie Meyer and

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Lindsay Beer, own the building and operate Whetstone Wellness in half of it. The sisters operated a six-bedroom Airbnb in the other half, but that was a challenging business, so the sisters started thinking about what else they could do. That’s where Kinsey comes in. Kinsey’s family has deep roots in Craftsbury. She returned there in the mid-2000s after working in Australia and New Zealand. She started her own mobile business, Blackbird Bar Catering, in 2012. It focused on customized bar packages with specialty cocktails and microbrews. “Somewhere in our fifth or sixth year of business, I realized how I just couldn’t stop thinking about how nice it would be to have a place in Craftsbury,” Kinsey said. But where? Then Kinsey, who’s also a carpenter, took a job for Upson and her sisters, tearing out old cabinets and making some repairs. They started talking about the future of the building. “She asked if we’d ever thought of putting a restaurant in,” Upson >>

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COMFORT ALL THE WAY ROUND The bar quickly became popular after opening in November 2019. Inset: Kinsey is a master mixologist.

GORDON MILLER

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recalled. They hadn’t, but she added, “if it’s going to be your restaurant, then I would.” Kinsey started overhauling the wing building that would become the Bistro, “applying my own personality to the place,” she said. “And here we are, just over a year later.” The restaurant opens at 4, and if you want your pick of a table in the 50-seat restaurant, you’d better be there by 4:05. It’s standing room only by 5—not that anyone seems to mind waiting as long as they have one of Kinsey’s specialty cocktails or a beer in hand. “It’s been gangbusters since we opened,” Kinsey said. Locals are a big part of the business, along with visitors to the nearby Craftsbury Outdoor Center, and Kinsey said people are driving from Stowe and Montpelier to try the Blackbird. The menu features appetizers, salads, the bistro’s toasties—special grilled cheese sandwiches—and beef, chicken, and pork burgers. Kinsey has jumped on the local food movement, too. But Kinsey started Blackbird as a bar, and mixed drinks take center stage. Locally grown ingredients and Vermont-made spirits make for endless drink combinations. Blackbird Bistro is a community-supported restaurant, meaning peo-

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ple sign up for memberships that offer special deals and benefits. Memberships start at $125, and 160 people signed on before the business even opened.

Preserving history The 1826 Sedore home is on the state registry of historic buildings and housed six generations of the family. All construction has followed state guidelines for historical preservation. “We managed to restore it and keep most of the integrity of the original footprint,” Kinsey said. The bar and booth area used to be two bedrooms—Meryl Streep slept in one of those rooms while in town—and you can see the original footprints of the rooms in the large beam overhead and on the preserved hardwood floors. “We tried not to change too much, but wanted to breathe new life into it,” Kinsey said. Three Sedore sisters—Upson, Beer and Megan Amell—work at Blackbird. The future includes renovating an enclosed porch for more seating, dining on an outside patio, and live music. “Our community is so supportive of its people, its businesses,” Upson said. “Craftsbury is a pretty special place.” ■

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PIE STAND Colleen and Becky McGovern.

FALL TRADITION IN STOWE McGovern family keeps Stowe, Cape Cod in pies all summer, fall Becky McGovern is known to many locals as the longtime cross-country coach for Stowe High harriers. She certainly has a gift for getting people to expend energy, but the baked goods she and her family put out at their Nebraska Valley home provide a delicious way to replenish those calories—or just to treat yourself. Hannah Marshall Normandeau asked her a few questions about one of her specialties, and fall’s favorite delicacies: Pie!

When did you start the baking business? When my oldest son was young, he had me baking pies as a way to earn money. But it wasn’t until 2011 that we started to do it more seriously. My older daughters started a summer pie business here in Stowe to help with their college bills. At the same time, I started a pie business on Cape Cod out of our family home while I was caring for my father. I couldn’t keep up with the demand for pies on the Cape in July, so my daughters joined me down there. So, now we operate a business on Cape Cod in the summer and in Stowe on Sundays in the spring and fall. Between the two we make about 3,000 pies a year.

What’s the secret to a good crust? Our pie crusts are made with both shortening and butter. The secret to our pies is that we only use a half-cup of sugar; a little more with rhubarb pies. I think with a good crust you don’t need as much sugar in the pie. Customers appreciate less sugar these days. We prep the bottom crusts the night before and keep them in the refrigerator overnight. I roll out the crusts with a beautiful 2-foot-long solid wood rolling pin that I bought in a market while on a family vacation in Peru.

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What do you use for the filling? We use locally sourced fruit for the pies until we run out. I have rhubarb in the garden, and we used to have Zuber’s berries in our freezer. As for apples, in the summer we use what is available—usually Granny Smith or Cortland. But in season we use local apples, like McIntosh.

What’s your favorite kind of pie? Our personal family favorite is strawberry rhubarb pie. Blueberry is definitely the customer favorite over the summer, and in the fall all kinds of apple pies are everyone’s favorite. My husband, Joe, does the apple pies, and each one is made with great care—as are all the pies, but he believes apple is where it is at. (See recipe, next page.) /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: Pie stand open Sundays at 1 p.m., after Labor Day through October. Nebraska Valley Road, Stowe.

Becky McGovern’s Apple Pie Two crusts (or one, to be topped with a crumb topping) INGREDIENTS 5-6 apples, depending on the size, about 6 cups of cut apples 1 tablespoon lemon juice ¼ cup each brown and white sugar ¼ cup flour A few teaspoons of butter Spices: 1 teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon nutmeg, pinch of salt INSTRUCTIONS Sprinkle apples with lemon juice. Press bottom crust into pie pan. Mix sugars, flour and spices. Toss with apples. Fill bottom crust, dot top of apples with butter. Fill crust with apple mixture, and cover with top crust. Press crusts together, pinch edges as desired, and cut air vents. Or, top with crumb topping. Bake at 385° for 1 hour or until ready. (Ovens can be very different. Look for thick, bubbly filling oozing out of the pie.)

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VERMONT LIFESTYLE Peony blooms, in all shapes, colors, and textures.

PEONY POWER ‘Accidental farmers’ save Bill Countryman’s gardens STORY

/ ROBERT KIENER

hey are one of the largest flowers in nature. Some varieties grow up to 10 inches in diameter. Marco Polo described them as “roses as big as cabbages.” They’ve been called both the “King” and “Queen” of flowers. In China their name means “the most beautiful” and for centuries they were exclusively flowers of Chinese emperors. They come in more than 30 species and more than 3,000 varieties in almost every color (except blue) and symbolize prosperity, good luck, love, a happy marriage, and wealth. Their scent is sweet, often slightly citrus. And their growing season is short; generally just six weeks during May and June. >>

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PHOTOGRAPHS

/ GORDON MILLER

VERMONT LIFESTYLE Dan and Ann Sivori at their Countryman Peony Farm in Northfield.

The flower is, of course, the peony. And, given all its attributes, its long history, and its international appeal, it just may be the world’s most popular flower. (Apologies to the rose, but you just can’t compete with the peony!) So it’s no surprise that by the time I arrive at one of New England’s most famous collections of peonies, the Countryman Peony Farm in Northfield, Vt., the place is packed with eager, floral-loving fans of this much-loved, famously fragrant flower. It is a sunny weekday in mid-June and scores of peony enthusiasts are spread out among the 185-acre farm’s more than 3 acres of blooming and about-to-bloom peonies. The fields are ablaze with a rainbow of colorful peonies, from brilliant, flaming reds to elegant whites to luscious lavenders. “We have about 4,000 plants here and some 600 varieties,” explains Dan Sivori, a retired Connecticut state trooper who bought the farm with his wife, Ann, a former FBI employee, in >>

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VERMONT LIFESTYLE

Visitors walk around the fields of peonies on the Countryman farm, open to the public for tours during the month of June.

2013. “All the peonies are gorgeous but there’s one that’s extra special. Come, let me show you.” I follow Sivori across the peony-packed fields to a robust magenta pink peony that, as he explains, “started all this.” As he gingerly cradles the peony in his hands, he tells me that in 1991 Bill Countryman, the former owner of this spread, was given this very plant, the Comanche, for his 70th birthday and he fell hopelessly in love. “His family claims that this is the plant that started Mr. Countryman’s love affair, obsession even, with peonies,” says Sivori. Countryman, a botanist and professor at nearby Norwich University, began collecting as many peony varieties as he could and eventually filled his Northfield farm with hundreds and hundreds of the plants, all of which he hand-selected. His son Chris told VPR in 2012, “We have peonies that nobody else has. We have some very rare varieties. We traveled to France and England in search of peony varieties that are not readily available in this country.” In time, Bill Countryman’s collection became world-famous. As the American Peony Society has noted, “Bill decided to follow his true passion and >>

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VERMONT LIFESTYLE

create an outstanding peony collection on his farm ... Within a decade, and supported by his loving wife, Anne, Bill had amassed a worldclass peony collection with over 1,500 different peony cultivars—including every gold medal recipient to date.” Countryman died in 2005—at the heart of peony season. Eight years later Dan and Ann Sivori bought the property, which had been largely overgrown and clogged with weeds. Says Ann, “Amazingly, peonies have always been my favorite flower. The first June, when we saw the explosion of peonies in bloom, we knew what we had to do. We had to save this.” For the next two years the couple, who describe themselves as “accidental farmers,” cleared the overgrown property to showcase Countryman’s glorious collection. “I knew we had to honor Mr. Countryman’s magnificent obsession and we became stewards of the land,” explains Ann. “We just couldn’t fathom letting his work disappear. So I traded in my high heels for muck boots.” The couple, as a testament to Bill Countryman’s vision, now allow thousands of visitors to explore their fields of peonies every June for free. People have come from all over the world to see their collection. “It’s really to honor Bill Countryman’s hard work,” says Dan. “We are happy to continue his legacy and show the world what he created in this corner of Vermont.” ■

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ESSENTIALS: Countryman Peony Farm, 868 Winch Hill Road, Northfield VT 05663. The farm does not sell peonies but invites visitors to explore its 3 acres of peony fields, through June 28; Thursday-Sunday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. No dogs. Check out the Facebook page for Countryman Peony Farm for COVID-19 restrictions.

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SPOTLIGHT

Donnie Blake in his office in Morrisville.

DONNIE BLAKE ‘I like a down-to-earth, handshake person, one who gives us creative freedom’ Born in Burlington and raised in Lamoille County, Donnie Blake is the president of Donald P. Blake Jr. Inc., a construction company based in Morrisville—its website is stowebuilder.com—which he founded in January 1985. This year marks the company’s 35th anniversary. He lives in Morrisville with his wife, Julie. They have two grown children, Lindsay, 31, who works for National Life Group, and Jonathon, 28, a project manager for the construction company. >>

STORY

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& P H O T O G R A P H : Kate Carter

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GLENN CALLAHAN

How did you get your start in the construction industry? I graduated from Peoples Academy in 1973 and worked for a local construction company in Stowe owned by Clint Thompson. I did a lot of commercial work for him and really liked it. I did not go to college, but instead, learned as I got paid. After a while, I wanted to get back to my first love, which is wood, and worked for John Gregg at Butternut Construction. From there I worked for Tomas C. Bjerke for five years. That’s when I decided if I was going to work that hard, I would work for myself. Interestingly, Tom Bjerke has been working for me for the past six years as executive supervisor.

What is your company’s scope of work? Our forte is high-end custom residential construction and also some light commercial. We did Stowe Bowl and are currently working on MSI, tying together two buildings with a 62,000square-foot footprint. We’ve done homes up to 12,000 square feet and are currently doing a large home in Robinson Springs in Stowe. We usually have three or four large homes in the works, plus a number of small projects, renovations, and small commercial. Right now we are working on the old TD bank in Waterbury. We call it The Vault, for obvious reasons.

Do you travel for projects? Our normal span is a 25-mile radius, but we have gone as far as Isle La Motte. When I see something challenging, I’m drawn to it. The house in Isle la Motte was for Aldo Bensadoun, owner of Aldo Group, a retail shoe company based in Montreal. It is quite the structure.

Some of the projects of Donald P. Blake Jr. Inc.

What is a favorite house you built? Oh my, there have been so many good ones, but to pick one it would be the Bridge House in Stowe. We built that at an important time in my life. It was early on in my career and a challenging project. We had to come up with custom means and methods. It’s a covered bridge house that spans a brook. It was unique, but so Vermont. The project was done using local products as much as possible.

How many employees do you have? We vary from about 32 to 37. Four are full-time office support, three are project managers, my son Jonathon is our primary estimator and project manager, and we have five on-site supervisors. The rest make up the construction crew. We also do property services, which is basically annual maintenance. We do a program for clients for whom we built homes.

What is your favorite type of client? I like a down-to-earth, handshake person, who is willing to give us creative freedom, but I really enjoy working with all types of clients. I like stepping back and seeing what we were able to do with our hands and our heads. It’s important for all players—owner, architect, designer, construction crew, contractors—to walk away feeling good.

Do you offer any benefits for your employees? We pay a percentage of their health insurance and we have a 401k program. We also have a profit-sharing plan that goes into the 401ks. We provide six paid holidays and are willing to be flexible about personal time. We try to accommodate our staff’s personal needs. Our staff works 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Thursday, and Friday 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. If someone needs to make up hours, they can do it on Friday afternoons. We have a low turnover rate and some people have been with us over 20 years.

What are your strengths as owner of the company? I am diplomatic and I have a lot of common sense. I work well with people. I have almost 50 years in construction and have seen incredible changes.

What are some of those changes? Everything used to be labor. Today we do everything with equipment, both heavy equipment and smaller hand-held tools. We’ve gone from hammers to battery-powered pneumatic nailers. The equipment these days makes work easier and safer. Now we are much more aware of safety and personal protective gear and we hold annual safety days. One of the biggest changes in the last 10 years is energy-efficiency construction methods. The typical R value used to be R13. Now it’s anywhere from R60 to 80 in ceilings and typically R32 to 40 and beyond in wall cavities. We’ve also seen huge changes in synthetic and recycled products.

Do you do any custom woodworking? We have a custom woodworking space and we like to do specialty things— vanities, furniture, specialty milling, custom details. We don’t usually do custom kitchens because it ties up the shop for too long.

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Do you still bang nails? No, but I do an occasional project in the woodworking shop. We have a good team here. The company can run on its own.

You are 65. Do you have a succession plan? I want the company to continue when I’m gone. I’ve built a reputation on quality work at a fair price. I wanted to bring on someone younger, and in 1991 Travis Cutler came on board. I could see so much of myself in Travis. He studied construction management at Vermont Technical College, and over time he worked his way up to partner and is currently the vice president. In order to make it work, I wanted him to have ownership and shares in the company, to have skin in the game. Now I’m trying to do the same with my son, Jonathon. Both are way more tech-savvy than I, which is a huge advantage today. We have shareholder agreements and we are very open with each other.

What is your community involvement? I am the advancement chair for Boy Scouts and an assistant scoutmaster. I know Boy Scouts are getting bad press from things that happened 30 years ago, but it is much different now. I really enjoy the cause. I get to see boys learn to be good community members and leaders. I also coached softball for Lindsay’s team when she was younger. It was as much therapy for me as it was coaching. I found I could completely forget about work when I was coaching. I’m a past president of Associated General Contractors of Vermont and have been on the executive board for 10 years. The company has helped out with Habitat for Humanity and we donated time to convert a house to wheelchair-accessible for a war veteran. I like to volunteer for things that have to do with kids and seniors. ■

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MOUNTAIN MODERN Hillside home dramatically re-imagined STORY

: robert kiener |

PHOTOGRAPHS

: derrick barrett

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outdoor living

towe-based architect Brian Hamor admits he loves a challenge. He certainly got one in drawing up plans for a massive renovation of a home near the northern edge of Stowe. “Massive is a good word,” says Hamor as he sits at his neat-as-apin desk in his office on Main Street. “The owners wanted to turn a not-so-special house into something very, very special. It was a big, challenging job that required a lot of collaboration. That’s always exciting.” The owners, who had bought the house for a vacation home and had lived in it for several years, finally decided that it “screamed out” for renovating. As the wife explains, “One of our biggest complaints about the home was that it didn’t take advantage of the site’s incredible views.”

The house, built in 1987, sat high on a hillside that offered majestic, panoramic views of the Worcester Range, Camel’s Hump and Mount Mansfield. But its small windows and aging decks limited the views. “We also weren’t crazy about the home’s style,” adds the husband. “It looked like a colonial that had merely been plopped down in a beautiful spot. It just didn’t fit the location.” The couple put together a list of “must haves,” including a new, dramatic entryway, a design that brought the outside in, room to display their growing art collection, new decks that could serve as three-season “outside rooms,” a revamped, open-plan kitchen, a wine lounge, a reading nook, and more. This would be a major, “strip-to-the studs” renovation. Because the owners knew they’d need a skilled team that could easily collaborate, they reached out to Hamor, landscape architect Cynthia Knauf, interior designer Amber Hodgins, and Travis Cutler from Donald P. Blake Jr. Inc. builders. “Many of us had worked together on other projects so we all felt comfortable with one story, p.144

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another,” Hamor says. “It’s so helpful to have everybody on board from the very beginning of a project.” (The Cushman Design Group in Stowe also helped in an early phase of the home’s redesign.) The home’s transformation began with Knauf’s vision of building what she referred to as “an outside room,” or terrace, anchored into the lot’s steep hillside by a concrete retaining wall and embraced by the site’s stunning combination of forest, sky, and mountains. “The clients wanted a clean, contemporary look and plenty of space to entertain outside,” remembers Knauf. So she went with lots of stainless steel cabled railings, natural materials such as wood and marble, and a floor or deck of a bluish-green shade of bluestone. The existing deck was removed and replaced by this much larger, multilevel terrace. The couple has a large family and outside entertaining was high on the wish list, so Knauf planned for a stainless steel spa/hot tub, a plunge pool, a gas-fed fire table and fire bowls, planters, and plenty of seating and softscaping. “We also trimmed some trees to enhance the views but left as many as we could because the couple are devoted birders,” says Knauf. Hamor describes his overall design concept for the renovation as “mountain modern.” “I wanted the home to look like it belonged to the region but didn’t want it to look too kitschy. I didn’t, for example, want a cookiecutter farmhouse,” he says. The clients gave Hamor a lot of leeway in his design, telling him they wanted “something special” and hoped for the “wow factor.” Says the wife, “We really wanted the team to run with their best ideas and didn’t want to stifle them.” That team didn’t disappoint. Among the client’s favorite transformations was Hamor’s decision to bump out a breakfast

room with wraparound windows at waist height. “This was a delightful bonus for us,” says the wife. “Because of the way the room extends out from the house, you feel like you’re standing outside while you’re having breakfast.” Another striking change was a redesigned entryway that unifies the home and offers an obvious and dramatic “front door” for visitors. This new, several-story-high entryway also helps fill the home with light and gives the clients plenty of wall space for their growing art collection, including a few landscapes from noted local artist Craig Mooney. It also boasts maple and bluestone floors, benches, and hidden cherry-veneer closets for masses of storage. Throughout the residence, the home’s former small windows have been replaced by massive, oversize, double-glazed windows that offer dramatic distant views. “It’s a completely different feeling; now there are knockout views from almost every room in the house,” says the husband. Amber Hodgins chose a natural, muted color palette for much of her interior design. “We went with lots of neutral wall colorings to create an open feel and also help the artwork ‘pop out’ from the walls,” she explains. She worked with Hamor and the wife to balance and blend the wood used throughout the interior. “We used lots of maple and walnut and often paired it with clean, sleek painted surfaces so it wouldn’t over-dominate the design,” says Hodgins. She chose bluestone flooring to help link the exterior spaces with the interior—another clever touch that helped bring the outside in. Perhaps the best example of how the renovation design team collaborated is the home’s new kitchen. “Everyone pitched in here,” says Hamor. “It was a real joint effort.” The clients offered a list of wants, including an open design, a marble and tiger maple-topped island that offered views to the outside, and a kitchen office space. Says the wife, “The kitchen is the heart of the house and I wanted a way to see guests arriving so I could have that personal visual connection with them.” The wife got the island she wanted and more, including a ceiling of diagonal wood and a knocked-out wall through which she can now see guests arriving. Hamor designed a dual-level wood and marble-topped island, with hidden electrical and internet connections so the entire family can sit on barstools and use their computers while sitting in the kitchen and still enjoy the views outside. Hodgins designed barstools and elegant cabinetry that was built by Morrisville-based cabinet maker Derrick Barrett. Hamor even found room for a small kitchen office that offers one of the home’s best long-distance views of the Worcester Mountain Range. As the couple reflect on the way their holiday home has been transformed, they admit they often have a hard time remembering what it looked like before. “It was comfortable,” admits the wife, “but it lacked the sense of surprise and the wow factor that our design and building team has given us. We cannot thank them enough.” ■

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“Jake came into the store and talked to Ken Savela about his board. Ken thought that Marshall Hill would be a great place to test it out,” Haslam wrote in an email. Carpenter married Donna Gaston in 1983, a little over a year after meeting her at a New Year’s party at a bar in Londonderry. The couple was inseparable, both personally and, eventually, as the Burton brand, from then on. Snowboarding gradually evolved from a fringe sport—local riders remember skiers on Stowe’s chairlifts spitting on them—to an Olympic one, with snowboarders finally allowed to compete at the 1998 Games in Nagano, Japan. By the time the 2014 Olympics rolled around, Burton was so synonymous with the sport that the company created the entire Olympic snowboard team’s uniforms. Carpenter was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2011. After just a few months of treatment, “I sent an email to the company that my cancer was ‘toast,’ ” he wrote on his Burton timeline. A knee replacement followed in 2014, followed by a yearlong battle with Miller Fisher syndrome, a rare version of an already rare autoimmune disorder known as Guillain-Barre syndrome. It left him paralyzed for eight weeks and having to learn basic functions like eating with utensils. And then on Nov. 10 of last year, Carpenter sent an email to Burton employees that said, “You will not believe this, but my cancer has come back.” He died days later. Continues from page 40

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Hundreds gather to honor Carpenter

Hundreds of family, friends and admirers attended a service for the snowboarding icon in the Spruce Camp base lodge at Stowe Mountain Resort, spilling out of the room where a video screen allowed people outside to see and hear the remembrance. Kate Carter, a writer and photographer who also maintained the gardens at Jake and Donna Carpenter’s Stowe home, said the ceremony was filled with laughter and tears and talk about Carpenter’s big heart. Ski patrol members helped guide people to the right places and Carpenter’s children and friends spoke about him. “It was just really poignant and thoughtful,” Carter said. “With him, it was, basically, go big or go home. Everything he did was big and done with gusto.” Playing on repeat was a 20-minute video that contained numerous interviews with people in the sport of snowboarding. The video included an appearance by Lukas Nelson, son of country music legend Willy Nelson, singing a song for Jake and Donna—“Moonlight in Vermont,” the couple’s wedding song. That song also ended the service. “I gotta tell you, man, it was a tearjerker,” Carter said. “What a way to end it.” ■

Read the uncut version of this story at bit.ly/3dOtuLO

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R E A L E S TAT E

WHAT $750K BUYS Along the Route 100 corridor, Morrisville to Waterbury TEXT & PHOTOS BY / KATE CARTER

STOWE

$750,000

Contemporary mountain home 3,114 square feet, 3.15 acres Built in 2004 Taxes: $12,600

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nteresting angles and curves, a cathedral ceiling, two porches, a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace, and a ton of privacy are this homeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s calling cards. Each of the three floors has its own en suite bedroom. An attached 2-car heated garage and 2 carports make winter living easy, and a screened porch makes summer living delightful. Large bedrooms have built-ins and the climate-controlled walk-out basement is finished. Outside: Country setting, landscaped, dead-end gravel/paved road maintained by an association.

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R E A L E S TAT E

WATERBURY

$669,000

Peace and privacy 4,274 square feet, 10.09 acres Built in 1999 Taxes: $14,679 This contemporary home has an exquisite setting in an open field surrounded by woods. Inside are several half-octagonal rooms and an open floorplan on the main floor, with the kitchen and its high-end Energy Star appliances as the focal point. Windows on all sides let in plenty of light; a fieldstone fireplace in the living room provides warmth and ambiance. Recent upgrades include maple hardwood flooring on the second floor, and new paint throughout. The lower level is finished and has a full bath. A master suite, 2 bedrooms, and a full bath are on the top floor, while a fourth guest bedroom/office is on the main floor. An attached garage accommodates two cars and all your athletic toys. Outside: A long gravel/paved right-of-way driveway to a private setting, established perennial gardens, patio. Trails close by.

MORRISTOWN / $695,000 Invite the in-laws! Or, a room for everyone 11,559 square feet, 1.06 acres Built in 1885 Taxes: $18,291 A former inn/retreat, this jaw-dropping 18room structure has 13 bathrooms and 7 full baths. No waiting in line! Every room features architectural details that reflect an earlier time, with coffered cross-beamed ceilings, columns, hardwood floors, and 10 chandeliers. The entrance has blue stone and blue pearl granite with a curved archway and circular staircase. A spacious arched foyer and French doors lead to the heart of the home, with its dramatic great room and Russian-designed, solid-stone hearth and oven. An enormous dining area will seat a crowd. Private self-contained suites each have kitchen and living areas, private baths, and private balconies. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s even a 45-seat theater with surround-sound system. And get this: an indoor pool! Outside: Courtyard contained within a wrought iron fence. Patio, garden space, handicap access. Plenty of parking on site, in the heart of downtown Morrisville.

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S TOWE-SMUGGLERS BUSINESS DIRECTORY AIRPORT & AVIATION STOWE AVIATION Stowe Aviation at the Morrisville-Stowe State Airport (KMVL) enables effortless access to Stowe from cities such as Boston and New York, with scheduled flights from Westchester Airport and non-stop flights on demand, 24 hours a day. (802) 253-2332. stoweaviation.com.

ANTIQUES

SAM SCOFIELD, ARCHITECT, AIA Professional architectural services for all phases of design and construction. Residential and commercial. Carlson Building, Main Street, Stowe. samscofieldarchitect.com. (802) 253-9948.

TEKTONIKA STUDIO ARCHITECTS Dedicated to the craft and composition of sustainable, siteinspired design. Emphasis on a collaborative design process to meet our client’s vision and budget. Located in Lower Stowe Village. (802) 253-2020. tektonikavt.com.

BITTNER ANTIQUES Third-generation Vermont antique dealer Brian Bittner: broad experience with pocket and wristwatches, jewelry, silver, artwork, coins/paper money, historical/military, older collectibles, heirlooms. Free house visits, (802) 272-7527. bittnerantiques.com.

ARCHITECTS ALPHA GENESIS DESIGN BUILD, LLC Full-service architectural design-build firm that delivers distinctively bold and purposeful designs for the connoisseurs of life. We develop and execute unique concepts using uncommon material that make end products truly exceptional. (267) 750-0452. alphagenesisdesign.com.

ELD ARHITECTURE Creating thoughtful design inspired by place. We utilize sophisticated three-dimensional technology to accurately model our buildings, allowing both architect and client to envision the project as it develops. (802) 521-7101. eldarchitecture.com.

ELIZABETH HERRMANN ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN EHA+D is an award-winning residential architecture firm based in Central Vermont. We specialize in designing exceptionally beautiful, well-crafted, energy-efficient homes. (802) 453-6401, eharchitect.com.

HARRY HUNT ARCHITECTS Modern green homes—true to the spirit of Vermont. Member American Institute of Architects. Certified passive house designer. (802) 253-2374, harryhuntarchitects.com.

J. GRAHAM GOLDSMITH, ARCHITECTS Quality design and professional architectural services specializing in residential, hotel, restaurant, retail, and resort development. Member Stowe Area. (800) 862-4053. jggarchitects.com. Email: VT@jggarchitects.com.

LEE HUNTER ARCHITECT, AIA Stowe-based architectural firm offering a personal approach to creative, elegant design. Residential, commercial, and renovations. (802) 253-9928. leehunterarchitect.com.

MAD MOOSE ARCHITECTURE Mad Moose Architecture was founded on a commitment to provide a more thoughtful way of designing shelter, with reverence for the environment and respect for the earth and its inhabitants. (802) 234-5720, madmoosearchitecture.com.

METHOD ARCHITECTURE STUDIO, PLLC A Stowe-based architectural studio specializing in energy efficient, modern timber frame, custom home designs. View our process, portfolio, and client stories at methodarch.com. 1799 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 585-3121. methodarch.com.

PAUL ROBERT ROUSSELLE, ARCHITECT, AIA Architectural services offering creative design approach for environmentally responsible homes true to their surroundings. We create spaces that move clients functionally, aesthetically, and emotionally with exquisitely detailed, beautifully built, inspiring designs. (802) 253-2110.

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ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN ALAN GUAZZONI DESIGN I look forward to working with you in designing your home or light commercial building, to create a comfortable, healthy, and inspiring space, while respecting your budget. Stowe. Please call (802) 253-6664. guazzonidesign.com.

CUSHMAN DESIGN GROUP Architectural, interior, and landscape design featuring beauty, craftsmanship, and excellent energy efficiency. Creative, intuitive, functional, efficient. (802) 253-2169. cushmandesign.com.

BAKERIES BLACK CAP COFFEE & BEER Housemade pastries and treats, light breakfast, lunch options. Locally roasted coffee, espresso, lattes. Beers and wines from Vermont, U.S., around the world. Free wi-fi. Daily. 144 Main St., across from Stowe’s classic New England church; and 63 Lower Main St., Morrisville. Facebook.

BIKES & BIKE INSTRUCTION 4 POINTS VERMONT MOUNTAIN BIKE SCHOOL & GUIDES Trained instructors will introduce you to mountain biking in a step-by-step process to help you further your skills for safer and more advanced riding. Call Rick at (802) 793-9246, 4pointsvt.com.

MOUNTAINOPS High-quality bikes and best location guarantee—exclusive access to the Stowe Recreation Path across from Topnotch Resort. Hiking information, trail maps and accessories, extensive line of camping gear. Daily at 9 a.m. (802) 253-4531. mountainops.com.

BOOKSTORES BEAR POND BOOKS

ARTS & CRAFTS LITTLE RIVER HOTGLASS STUDIO Walk into the studio and experience the art of glassblowing up close. Adjacent gallery features works of resident artist Michael Trimpol. Thurs. – Mon. 10-5. (802) 253-0889. littleriverhotglass.com.

ART GALLERIES THE ARTISANS’ GALLERY An inspired collection of fine art and craft from Vermont’s established and emerging artists. Celebrating 25 years. Gifts and cards for every occasion. 11-6 daily. Historic Bridge Street, Waitsfield 05674. (802) 496-6256. vtartisansgallery.com.

Complete family bookstore. NY Times bestsellers and new releases. Children and adult hardcovers, paperbacks, Vermont authors, daily papers, puzzles, greeting cards. Open daily. Depot Building, Main Street, Stowe. (802) 253-8236.

BREWERIES THE ALCHEMIST A family owned and operated craft brewery specializing in fresh, unfiltered IPA. You can visit our tasting room and retail shop Monday - Saturday 11 a.m. - 7 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. 100 Cottage Club Rd., Stowe. alchemistbeer.com.

LAWSON’S FINEST LIQUIDS Award-winning brewery, stunning timberframe taproom and retail store featuring world-class beers and light fare of the highest quality. Open daily. 155 Carroll Rd., Waitsfield. (802) 496-HOPS. lawsonsfinest.com.

BRYAN MEMORIAL GALLERY Vermont’s premier gallery for landscape painting features over 200 artists in a year-round exhibition schedule. Thurs. – Sun. 11-4 through June 25. Daily 11-5 June 27 – Oct 8, and by appointment. Closed January. 180 Main St., Jeffersonville. (802) 644-5100. bryangallery.org.

HELEN DAY ART CENTER Center for contemporary art and art education, established in 1981. Local, national, and international exhibitors. Art classes. Cultural events. Schedule: Tuesday-Saturday 10-5. 90 Pond St., Stowe. (802) 253-8358, helenday.com.

ROBERT PAUL GALLERIES An outstanding selection of original paintings, sculpture, and fine art glass by locally, nationally, and internationally acclaimed artists. Celebrating 30 years. Open daily. 394 Mountain Road, Baggy Knees Shopping Center, Stowe. robertpaulgalleries.com. (802) 253-7282.

AUTOMOTIVE REPAIR 253 AUTO Fast, friendly, reliable service on all makes and makes and models. Tire sales, mount/balance, repairs, Vermont state inspections, computer diagnostics, Intoxalock installation and service. Give me a call and we’ll give you the cost. 745 S. Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-9979.

VON TRAPP BREWING & BIERHALL Von Trapp Brewing brews a selection of authentic Austrian lagers. Stop by for a pint and enjoy Austrian fare and mountaintop views at our Bierhall or seasonal biergarten. (800) 826-7000. vontrappbrewing.com.

BUILDERS & CONTRACTORS AARON FLINT BUILDERS Creating inspiring spaces in Central Vermont for over 20 years. (802) 882-7060, aaronflintbuilders.com.

ALPHA GENESIS DESIGN BUILD, LLC Full-service architectural design-build firm that delivers bold and purposeful designs for the connoisseurs of life. From inception to completion, Alpha Genesis artfully directs all aspects of the architectural, design, and construction process. (267) 750-0452. alphagenesisdesign.com.

BARRETT BUILT CUSTOM CABINETRY Traditional to contemporary. Kitchens, baths, built-ins, with detailed shop drawings. Anything is possible. Derrick Barrett, Morrisville. (802) 793-7310.

DONALD P. BLAKE JR INC. Handcrafted quality in building, offering experienced and reliable contracting services since 1985. Specializing in custom home new construction, renovations, commercial construction, construction management, and property services. (802) 888-3629, stowebuilder.com.

GEOBARNS Geobarns is an environmentally conscious, minimal waste builder, specializing in artistic barns using modified post-andbeam structures with diagonal framing to achieve a combination of strength, versatility, and beauty at reasonable prices. (802) 295-9687. geobarns.com.

GORDON DIXON CONSTRUCTION, INC. Fine craftsmanship, attention to detail, integrity, and dependable workmanship. 30 years of award-winning experience. Custom homes, additions, renovations, design/build, project management. Stop in at 626 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-9367 or visit gordondixonconstruction.com.

MOUNTAIN LOGWORKS, LLC Handcrafted log homes. Specializing in Scandinavian Full Scribe and Adirondack-style log structures with log diameters up to 30 inches. In-house design service available. (802) 748-5929. mountainlogworks.com

PEREGRINE DESIGN BUILD Peregrine Design Build specializes in remodeling and building custom homes and teams with Vermont architects and designers as their builder of choice. Visit peregrinedesignbuild.com to see our range of work.

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RED HOUSE BUILDING Full-service, employee-owned building company. Emphasis on timeless craftsmanship. Meeting the challenges of unique and demanding building projects, from contemporary mountain retreats, meticulously restored historic buildings to highefficiency homes. (802) 655-0043. redhousebuilding.com.

SISLER BUILDERS, INC. Custom home building, remodeling, woodworking, home energy audits and retrofits, quality craftsmanship, resource efficient construction, modest additions to multi-million dollar estates. 30 years in Stowe. References available. sislerbuilders.com. (802) 253-5672.

PERENNIAL PLEASURES

TIM MEEHAN BUILDERS Building excellence, exceptional homes, professional project management creative remodeling. 30 years plus in Stowe. Tim Meehan, (802) 777-0283. timmeehanbuilders.com.

YANKEE BARN HOMES For more than 45 years, Yankee Barn Homes has been designing and prefabricating custom post-and-beam homes built with the finest materials for durability, weather protection, and energy conservation. yankeebarnhomes.com, (800) 258-9786.

BUILDING MATERIALS CAMARA SLATE National supplier of roofing slate, slate flooring, flagstone, countertops, and other structural components. Committed to delivering a standard beyond our competitors’ abilities with excellent service and quality-valued products. Fair Haven, Vt. (802) 265-3200, info@camaraslate.com. camaraslate.com.

LOEWEN WINDOW CENTER OF VT & NH Beautifully crafted Douglas fir windows and doors for the discerning homeowner. Double- and triple-glazed options available in aluminum, copper, and bronze clad. Style Inspired By You. loewenvtnh.com, (802) 295-6555, info@loewenvtnh.com.

RK MILES Founded in 1940, rk Miles is a family-owned company providing services and materials for all types of building and design. Six locations serving Vermont and western Massachusetts, including Stowe and Morrisville. rkmiles.com.

NURSERY & TEA GARDEN

“Come spend a pleasant day!”

Since 1980, specializing in heirloom and unusual flowers and herbs. Enjoy a stroll through our extensive display gardens.

ENGLISH CREAM TEAS Served in a beautiful garden setting or greenhouse. Tea is 12-4 daily except Mondays, Memorial Day to Labor Day. Reservations for tea recommended.

IN OUR GIFT SHOP: A well-chosen collection of useful, unusual and just

plain gorgeous items, including scarves, jewelry, teapots and gardening goods. Summer and garden hats are a specialty!

Join us for our 18TH

ANNUAL PHLOX FEST, August 1 to 16

www.perennialpleasures.net 63 BRICK HOUSE ROAD, EAST HARDWICK, VT • 1-802-472-5104

Open 10-5 daily except Mondays, May 2 to Sept. 20 • Free Garden Tours, Sundays at 1 A scenic 40-minute drive from Stowe

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S TOWE-SMUGGLERS BUSINESS DIRECTORY CAKES & CATERING

CLOTHING & ACCESSORIES

BEN & JERRY’S ICE CREAM

BOUTIQUE AT STOWE MERCANTILE

Time to celebrate. Ice cream cakes serve 1-36 people and are ready-to-go or can be custom ordered. Call (802) 8822034 or online at benjerry.com/waterbury. Ice-cream catering inquiries: call (802) 222-1665.

Fabulous contemporary fashion for women. From casual to professional, Boutique can make you feel beautiful any time. Lingerie, dresses, skirts, tops, jeans, sweaters, more. We’ll dress you for any occasion. Depot Building, Main Street, Stowe. (802) 253-3712.

CHAMMOMILE

CHURCHES & SYNAGOGUES BLESSED SACRAMENT CATHOLIC CHURCH Mass schedule: Saturday, 4:30 p.m., Sunday, 8 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. See bulletin for daily masses. Confession Saturday 3:30-4 p.m. Father John Schnobrich, Pastor. 728 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-7536.

HUNGER MOUNTAIN CHRISTIAN ASSEMBLY Route 100, Waterbury Center. Sunday worship service at 10 a.m. (802) 244-5921.

JEWISH COMMUNITY OF GREATER STOWE For information regarding services, holiday gatherings, classes, and workshops: JCOGS, Stowe, Vt. 05672. 1189 Cape Cod Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-1800 or jcogs.org.

THE MOUNTAIN CHAPEL At the halfway point on the Mt. Mansfield Toll Road. A place for meditation, prayer and praise for skiers, hikers, and tourists. Seasonal Sunday service 2 p.m. The Rev. Dr. David P. Ransom. (802) 644-8144.

ST. JOHN’S IN THE MOUNTAINS EPISCOPAL At the crossroads of Mountain and Luce Hill roads in Stowe. Holy Eucharist every Sunday at 10 a.m. The Rev. Rick Swanson, rector. Wheelchair friendly; visitors and children welcome. Office open Tuesday, Thursday. (802) 253-7578. stjohnsinthemountains.org. office@ stjohnsinthemountains.org.

SECOND CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH Located in Hyde Park. Sunday worship services begin at 10:15 a.m. Sunday school is held at the same time September through June. Handicapped accessible. All are welcome. (802) 888-3636 or check us out on Facebook.

STOWE COMMUNITY CHURCH Adult bible study: Sundays at 8:30 a.m. Traditional service with children’s program: Sundays at 9:30 a.m. Contemporary service: Sundays at 4:30 p.m. The Rev. Will Vaus. (802) 253-7257.

UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST FELLOWSHIP Sunday services at 4:30 p.m., St. John’s in the Mountains Episcopal Church, Mountain and Luce Hill roads, Stowe. Weekly from Sept. 1 to June 1. All welcome. For information: (802) 253-8291, UU Fellowship of Stowe on Facebook, or bit.ly/stoweuu.

WATERBURY CENTER COMMUNITY Route 100 next to the Cider Mill. We warmly welcome visitors. (802) 244-6286. Sunday worship 10:45 a.m. Handicapped accessible. Church is a National Historic Place. Pastor John Lucy.

CLEAN BEAUTY CHAMMOMILE Widest assortment of clean beauty brands in skin care and makeup in northern New England. Variety of on-floor and byappointment facial and makeup services. 25 Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-5005. @chammomilestowe, chammomile.com.

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Clothing, shoes, accessories, and clean beauty. Specializing in emerging designers and family owned brands from the U.S. and Europe. Largest brick and mortar collection of Emerson Fry anywhere. Daily. 25 Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-5005. @chammomilestowe, chammomile.com.

FORGET-ME-NOT-SHOP Treasure hunt through our huge selection of famous label off price clothing for men, women, and teens at 60-80 percent off. Route 15 Johnson, just 1.5 miles west of Johnson Village. Open 10-7.

GREEN ENVY Boutique with a contemporary style. Vince, rag & bone, Golden Goose, Tata Harper, Longchamp. Fashion, jewelry, shoes, accessories from over 300 designers. Best source for denim in New England. Daily. 1800 Mountain Rd., Stowe. 3 Main St., Burlington. (802) 253-2661, vermontenvy.com.

IN COMPANY CLOTHING Celebrating 20 years. Specializing in personalized service and top designer labels. Come see what’s in. 10 - 5:30 daily, 10 - 5 Sunday. 344 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-4595. incompanyclothing.com, @incompanyclothing.

JOHNSON FARM, GARDEN, HARDWARE & RENTAL Quality brands for the whole family. Casual, work, rain, active and outer wear. Patagonia, Carhartt, Prana, Toad & Co, Columbia, Kuhl, more. Huge selection of footwear, fully outfitted hiking and camping department. Route 15, Johnson. (802) 635-7282, jhrvt.com.

JOHNSON WOOLEN MILLS Home of famous Johnson Woolen Outerwear and headquarters for Carhartt, Filson, Pendleton, Woolrich, woolen blankets, fine men’s and ladies sportswear, sweaters, hats, gloves, scarves, socks. Since 1842. Johnson, Vt. (802) 635-2271. johnsonwoolenmills.com.

MOUNTAIN ROAD OUTFITTERS / MALOJA (MAH-LOW-YA) FLAGSHIP STORE Made for the mountains. A European outdoor sport, lifestyle, apparel, and accessories brand. Stocked with winter Nordic and alpine winter, summer mountain and road bike. 409 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 760-6605. mountainroadoutfitters.com.

PK COFFEE Breakfast sandwiches, croissants, coffee, espresso drinks, tea, and the best grilled cheese in town—all made in house by our fabulous team. 1880 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 760-6151, pkcoffee.com.

DELICATESSEN EDELWEISS MOUNTAIN DELI Stowe’s #1 deli featuring delicious sandwiches, fresh chili, soups, salads and baked goods. Specialty foods store. Come taste Vermont’s finest spirits. Great beer and wine selection. Daily 6:30-6. 2251 Mountain Rd. (802) 253-4034.

DENTISTRY CHRISTOPHER P. ALTADONNA, DDS, JEFFREY R. MCKECHNIE, DMD, & NICHOLAS A. BRYAN, DMD (802) 253-7932. stowedentalassociates.com. stowedentist@gmail.com.

STOWE FAMILY DENTISTRY Creating beautiful smiles for over 40 years. Always welcoming new patients. 1593 Pucker St., Stowe. (802) 253-4157.

DISTILLERIES GREEN MOUNTAIN DISTILLERY Vermont’s No. 1 organic distillery. Vodkas, gin, maple liqueur, and small-batch whiskey. 171 Whiskey Run, (Route 100 between Stowe and Morrisville; turn on Goeltz Road). (802) 253-0064, greendistillers.com.

EDUCATION & COLLEGES NORTHERN VERMONT UNIVERSITY One university, two unique campuses. With our Lyndon and Johnson campuses, NVU combines the best of our nationally recognized liberal arts and professional programs. northernvermont.edu.

UVM GROOMSMAN SCHOOL OF BUSINESS Acclaimed, rigorous academic program. World-class faculty conducts cutting-edge research while mentoring and teaching. At University of Vermont, Burlington (802) 656-3131, uvm.edu.

ENGINEERS MUMLEY ENGINEERING INC. Civil engineering services for residential and commercial land development projects. Planning and design for subdivisions, site plans, water, wastewater and stormwater systems, construction oversight, and more. Local zoning, state, and Act 250 permitting. (802) 881-6314, mumleyengineering.com.

EVENT RENTALS

ROAM VERMONT Adventurous footwear and apparel for men and women. Explore in style with Patagonia, Kuhl, Prana, Dansko, and Blundstone. Located on historic Langdon Street in downtown Montpelier. Open daily. (802) 613-3902. roamvt.com.

WELL HEELED Sophisticated collection of shoes, boots, clothing, and accessories for an effortlessly chic lifestyle. Stylish interior combined with personalized service and by appointment shopping available—a #mustdoinstowe. Daily 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. (802) 253-6077. wellheeledstowe.com.

COFFEE HOUSES BLACK CAP COFFEE & BEER Locally roasted coffee, espresso and lattes in an inviting atmosphere. Free wi-fi. House-baked pastries, light breakfast and lunch options. Daily. 144 Main St., across from Stowe’s classic New England church, and 63 Lower Main St., downtown Morrisville. See us on Facebook.

RAIN OR SHINE TENT & EVENTS CO. Innovative rental company that creates beautifully composed and well-executed weddings and events throughout New England—for 20-plus years. We provide clients with the highest quality products and services. (800) 640-8368, rainorshinevt.com.

EXCAVATING DALE E. PERCY, INC. Excavating contractors, commercial and residential. Earthmoving equipment. Site work, trucking, sand, gravel, soil, sewer, water, drainage systems, and supplies. Snow removal, salting, sanding. Weeks Hill Road. (802) 253-8503.

FARMERS MARKET STOWE FARMERS MARKET Every Sunday through Oct. 11, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m. Take home local produce, meat, cheese, herbal products, crafts, and jewelry. 1799 Mountain Rd. stowefarmersmarket.com.

FISHING & HUNTING

FURNITURE

CATAMOUNT FISHING ADVENTURES

BURLINGTON FURNITURE

Guided fly-fishing, spin-fishing, ice-fishing adventures. River wading, canoe, drift boat, motorboat fishing. Guiding Vermont since 1994. Equipment provided. All abilities. Willy, owner/guide. Federation of Fly Fishers certified. Licensed, insured. catamountfishing.com. (802) 253-8500.

We are Vermont’s destination for furniture, interior design services, and lighting. Come see why we were voted Best Furniture Store nine years in a row. Locally owned, connected to the community, and to sustaining the environment. 747 Pine St. (802) 862-5056, burlingtongfurniture.us.

FLY ROD SHOP Vermont’s most experienced guide service. Guided fly fishing, ice fishing and family tours. Weekly Taste of Vermont Tours. Fly Tackle, fly tying supplies, spin and ice fishing tackle. Route 100 South, Stowe. flyrodshop.com, (802) 253-7346.

FITNESS EQUIPMENT TOTAL FITNESS EQUIPMENT Vermont’s premier specialty fitness equipment company has just opened its second location in South Burlington. Visit huge showroom to see the latest treadmills, ellipticals, rowers, indoor cycler gyms, more. (802) 860-1030. totalfitnessequipment.com.

FLOORING FLOORING AMERICA Customize your home with flooring that compliments your space while honoring your style. Choose from our leading collection of hardwood, carpet, tile, laminate, vinyl, and rug selections. Williston, (802) 862-5757, flooringamerica-vt.com.

WE • WA TE

THE COUNTRY STORE ON MAIN Luxury bedding, dreamy candles, kitchen gadgets, children’s items, pet goods, rugs, frames, clocks, greeting cards, and more. Located in the former Lackey Building next to Stowe Community Church. 109 Main Street, (802) 253-7653, countrystorevt.com.

STOWE MERCANTILE Fabulous old country store, Vermont specialty foods, penny candy, clothing, bath and body, wine, craft beer and cider, and toys. Play a game of checkers or a tune on our piano. Depot Building, Main Street. (802) 253-4554. stowemercantile.com.

Housewares Cabot stains Painting supplies Electrical supplies Ice and snow removal • Cleaning supplies • Minwax stains • Best selection of fasteners

We Service Foreign and Domestic Vehicles

AWA R D

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• STO

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Country store focused on all things maple—a carefully curated selection of our favorite products. Specialty cheeses, honey, jams, Vermont-made products, crafts, and gifts. (800) 899-6349, marvinscountrystore.com.

PLACE W LE

43 9 3

BUTTERNUT MOUNTAIN FARM & MARVIN’S COUNTRY STORE

GIFT & SPECIALTY SHOPS

Repairs, Diagnostics, VT State Inspections and Intoxalock® Ignition Interlock Devices

745 S Main Street, Stowe

802-253-9979

430 Mountain Road, Stowe

Mon-Sat 8-5:30 • Sun 9-3:30

253-7205

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S TOWE-SMUGGLERS BUSINESS DIRECTORY GLASS ACME GLASS Your source for everything glass. New construction, remodel and service for residential and commercial homes and businesses. Windows, doors, glass shower enclosures, mirrors, insulated glass, screen porches, much more. info@acmeglassvt.com, (802) 658-1400.

HOME ENTERTAINMENT & SMART HOMES VERMONT ELECTRONICS Providing local support for custom design and installation of home theater, whole house audio, lighting control, shade control, thermostat control, home automation, and your security needs. (802) 253-6509. info@vermontelectronics.biz.

GOLF

ICE CREAM

STOWE COUNTRY CLUB

STOWE SWEETS

An impeccably conditioned championship course with stunning views of the Green Mountains. Join us for Craft Beer Tuesdays all season long. Open to the public. 744 Cape Cod Rd., Stowe. stowevtgolf.com, (802) 760-4653.

HARDWARE JOHNSON HARDWARE & RENTAL, FARM & GARDEN Largest Milwaukee dealer in the Northeast; authorized Milwaukee repair shop. Cabot, Valspar, Vermont Natural stain. Fully outfitted hardware store, Echo tools, large selection of growing/gardening supplies, soil, mulch, grain, pet supplies. Route 15 Johnson, (802) 635-7282, jhrvt.com.

STOWE HARDWARE & DRY GOODS Unique hardware store providing North Country necessities and quality products. Craftsman tools, Cabot Stain, complete selection of fasteners, housewares, home-care products. Open 8-5:30 Mon.-Sat., Sundays 9-3:30. 430 Mountain Rd. Established since 1829. (802) 253-7205.

HEALTH CARE COPLEY HOSPITAL Exceptional care. Community focused. 24-hour emergency services, The Women’s Center, Mansfield Orthopaedics, general surgery, cardiology, diagnostic imaging, oncology, and rehabilitation. Morrisville. (802) 888-8888, copleyvt.org.

MANSFIELD ORTHOPAEDICS Fellowship-trained orthopaedic surgeons. Comprehensive orthopedic care and sports medicine. Nicholas Antell, MD; Brian Aros, MD; Bryan Huber, MD; John Macy, MD; Joseph McLaughlin, MD; and Bryan Monier, MD. Morrisville and Waterbury. (802) 888-8405, mansfieldorthopaedics.com.

Ice cream and treats. Serving up the yummiest ice cream and more. Stop in while riding the Stowe bike path. See the white church steeple? We’re right next door. 109 Main St., Stowe. stowesweets.com.

INNS & RESORTS COMMODORES INN Spacious rooms, 3-1/2 acre lake, kayaks, row boats, fireside living room, indoor and outdoor pool, Jacuzzis, and saunas, restaurant, popular sports bar, kids free, pets welcome. Route 100, Lower Village. commodoresinn.com. (802) 253-7131.

JAY PEAK RESORT Let the mountain move you with our indoor waterpark and climbing gym, outdoor pools and hot tubs, hiking trails, championship golf course, tournament ready athletic fields, summer music series, and Vermont’s only aerial tram. jaypeakresort.com.

SMUGGLERS’ NOTCH RESORT, VERMONT America’s Family Resort. Mountainside lodging. Award-winning kids’ programs. Zipline canopy tours. Summer: 8 pools, 4 waterslides, disc golf, mountain bike park. Winter: Three interconnected mountains, 2,610 vertical. FunZone 2.0 entertainment complex. (888) 256-7623, smuggs.com/sg.

STOWEFLAKE MOUNTAIN RESORT & SPA Nestled in the heart of Stowe, surrounded by over 30 shops, restaurants and attractions. Casual yet elegant rooms and townhouses with multiple on-site activities. World-renowned spa, award-winning restaurant, snowshoeing, dogsledding. AAA Four-Diamond rated. On Mountain Road Shuttle Route. (802) 253-7355, stoweflake.com.

THE STOWEHOF Classic alpine hotel on 26 acres. Fritz Bar + Restaurant open daily. Mountain views, fabulous outdoor pool with poolside dining, living room with 180-degree views. Outdoor firepit every evening. 434 Edson Hill Rd., (802) 253-9722, thestowehof.com.

STOWE FAMILY PRACTICE Providing routine and urgent medical care for all ages. Walkins welcome and Saturday hours for your convenience. (802) 253-4853. chslv.org.

HEALTH & FITNESS CLUBS SWIMMING HOLE Stowe’s premier family fitness and recreation center. 25-meter lap pool, children’s pool, waterslide, group exercise classes, personal training, masters swimming, swim lessons. State-ofthe-art facility. Day passes, memberships available. (802) 253-9229. theswimmingholestowe.com.

TRAPP FAMILY LODGE Mountain resort in the European tradition. 96 rooms and suites, panoramic mountain views and over 28 miles of biking/hiking trails. European-style cuisine, shops, fitness center, pool, climbing wall, yoga, von Trapp family history tours. (800) 826-7000. trappfamily.com.

VILLAGE GREEN AT STOWE Fully furnished condominiums at the center of all Stowe has to offer. Fireplaces, indoor pool, sauna, Jacuzzi. Affordable. (802) 253-9705 or (800) 451-3297. thevillagegreen-stowe.com.

FRED’S ENERGY Experienced, licensed professionals. Quality plumbing, heating, AC installation/service; heating oil; propane; water heaters/softeners; sewer pumps; generators; bathroom remodels; 24/7 emergency service. Morrisville: (802) 888-3827, Derby: (802) 766-4949, Lyndonville: (802) 626-4588. callfreds.com.

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AMBER HODGINS DESIGN Full-service interior architecture and design. Specializing in décor, renovations and new construction for residential and commercial projects. (802) 585-5544. amberhodgins.com.

CUSTOM COVERS Custom Covers at the Grist Mill is a full-service shop. Designer fabrics, trims, wallpaper, custom-made slipcovers, upholstery, window treatments. By appointment. (802) 324-2123. 92 Stowe Street, Waterbury.

DESIGN STUDIO OF STOWE Creating beautiful interiors from classic to modern with respect to client’s taste, property, budget, deadline. New construction, renovations, and updates to existing spaces. Residential to light commercial projects. Allied Member ASID. 626 Mountain Road, Stowe. (802) 253-9600. designstudiovt.com.

INTERIOR CREATIONS Full-service kitchen and bath showroom. Providing custom cabinetry, countertops, stone tile, plumbing accessories, and more for remodel and new construction projects. Open Monday through Friday 8-4 or by appointment. (802) 479-7909.

STOWE KITCHEN BATH AND LINENS Interior design and stylist always available. We have an enormous furniture selection at every price point. Specializing in bedding, rugs, furniture, lighting, right down to all your kitchen needs. Free consultations. (802) 253-8050. 1813 Mountain Rd., Stowe. kate@stowekitchen.net.

JEWELRY FERRO ESTATE & CUSTOM JEWELERS Stowe’s premier full-service jeweler since 2006. We specialize in estate jewelry, fine diamonds, custom design, jewelry repair, and appraisals. In-house repair studio. American Gem Society. 91 Main St. ferrojewelers.com/stowe. (802) 253-3033.

KITCHENS & BATHS CLOSE TO HOME Locally owned and operated since 1999, we have the finest selection of bath fixtures and vanities, kitchen sinks and faucets, door/cabinet hardware, and more. A culture of customer service. 257 Pine St., Burlington. (802) 861-3200. closetohomevt.com.

COUNTRY HOME CENTER Our kitchen and bath department offers cabinet lines from mid-range to custom. Quartz, granite, and solid surface countertops. Tile showers. Tile, solid wood, engineered, LVT and laminate flooring for today’s Vermont lifestyle. 85 Center Rd., Morrisville. (802) 888-3177. countryhomecenter.net.

LANDSCAPE DESIGN INSURANCE

HEATING/AC & PLUMBING

INTERIOR DESIGN

HICKOK & BOARDMAN, INC. Providing superior service and innovative solutions for all your insurance needs. Home, auto, and business insurance since 1821. “Here when you need us.” 618 S. Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-9707.

STOWE INSURANCE AGENCY, INC. Stowe’s premier multi-line insurance agency since 1955. Our pricing and service is second to none. Glenn Mink, Teela Leach, Robert Mink, and Renee Davis. (802) 253-4855.

AMBLER DESIGN Full-service landscape architecture and construction company in Stowe. Working with plants, water, stone, and earth, we create unique, exceptional, and beautiful outdoor spaces. (802) 253-4536. amblerdesign.com.

KNAUF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE We transform landscapes into beautiful outdoor living spaces that ignite the senses and seamlessly connect inside and out, with balance and harmony. Member ASLA. (802) 522-0676. cynthiaknauf.com.

LANDSHAPES Serving Vermont’s residential and commercial landscapes with design, installations, and property maintenance. Projects include unlimited varieties of stonework, gardens, water features, and installation of San Juan pools and spas. (802) 434-3500. landshapes.net.

MARKETS COMMODITIES NATURAL MARKET Best market 2015-2019. One-stop grocery shopping featuring organic produce, groceries, artisanal cheeses, bread, local meats, craft beer and wine, bulk, gluten-free, wellness, CBD products. Open daily. commoditiesnaturalmarket.com. (802) 253-4464.

WAGNER HODGSON LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE The process of uniting program, context, form and materials provides the basis for our work, crafting modern sculptural landscapes expressing the essential inherent beauty of natural materials. (802) 864-0010. wagnerhodgson.com.

LAWYERS ANDERSON & ASSOCIATES A general practice of law: civil, family, and criminal litigation, probate and estate planning, business law, and transactions. 954 South Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-4011. andersonlawvt.com.

Complex litigation and commercial transactions, including class actions, securities litigation, EB-5 fraud, arbitrations, trials, appeals, criminal defense, corporate mergers/acquisitions, Native American/tribal matters, real estate, aviation, personal injury/wrongful death, estates, and other matters. Licensed in Vermont, New York, and Massachusetts. Offices at 125 Mountain Rd., Stowe, and 100 Park Ave., New York, N.Y. barrlaw.com. (802) 253-6272 or (212) 486-3910.

DARBY KOLTER & NORDLE, LLP General civil practice: commercial and residential, real estate, environmental, estate planning/administration, personal injury & worker’s comp, mediation services, business formation, family law. Stowe: 996 Main St., Unit 1A, (802) 253-7165; Waterbury: 89 S. Main St., (802) 244-7352.

HORSLEY LAJOIE GOLDFINE, LLC General practice including civil litigation, personal injury, real estate, corporate, estate planning/administration. Located in Stowe village at 166 S. Main St. (802) 760-6480. hlgattorneys.com.

OLSON & ASSOCIATES, PLC General law practice: commercial and residential real estate contracts, estate planning and probate administration, business formation and maintenance, general litigation, family law, mediation services. 188 S. Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-7810, olsonplc.net.

STACKPOLE AND FRENCH Litigation, real estate, corporate, utility, wills, and estate administration. 255 Maple St., Stowe. (802) 253-7339. stackpolefrench.com.

LIGHTING BARRE ELECTRIC & LIGHTING SUPPLY, INC. Indoor and outdoor lighting, fans and home accents. The supplier of choice for area electricians and builders. Come visit our 3,000-square foot showroom featuring working displays for kitchen and bath lighting. Route 302, Barre. (802) 476-0280. barreelectric.com.

MAD RIVER ANTLER Handcrafted one-of-a-kind antler creations in the form of chandeliers, sconces, table lamps, floor lamps, and custom creations using naturally shed antler from moose, deer, and elk. (802) 496-9290, madriverantler.com.

LAMOILLE VALLEY PAINTERS, LLC Custom painting company in Stowe, specializing in high-end interior and exterior painting, staining and wall-coverings for homes, decks, barns, commercial businesses in the Lamoille Valley. dan@lamoillevalleypainters.com. (802) 730-2776.

MASSAGE & BODYWORK

PERSONAL CHEF

BRAD HIGHBERGER, LMT, RCST

SWEET & SAVORY PERSONAL CHEF SERVICES

Specializing in chronic pain and injuries of the neck, shoulder, jaw, arms, hands and feet. Twenty-five years of experience working with neuromuscular therapy, myofascial release and biodynamic cranio-sacral therapy in Stowe. (802) 730-4955.

KATE GRAVES, CMT, BHS Relaxation, deep tissue, moist heat, facilitated stretching, sound healing, Thai, energy work (Brennan Healing Science graduate 2000). In practice over 35 years. Competitive rates. Stowe Yoga Center, 515 Moscow Rd. stoweyoga.com. kgravesmt@gmail.com, (802) 253-8427.

STOWE VILLAGE MASSAGE BARR LAW GROUP

PAINTING—INTERIOR & EXTERIOR

Exceptional bodywork services from relaxation to injury recovery. Certified practitioners in a casual atmosphere. 60minute massages starting from $90. Daily from 9 a.m. - 7 p.m. 49 Depot St., Stowe. Book online at stowevillagemassage.com. (802) 253-6555, info@stowevillagemassage.com.

MATTRESSES BURLINGTON MATTRESS We’re here to help you get a better night’s sleep. Mattresses, bedroom furniture, lifestyle bases, and futons. Trusted brands covering the bases from bed in a box to luxury mattresses. 747 Pine St. (802) 862-7167, burlingtongmattress.us.

Sweet & Savory’s goal is to prepare and deliver high-quality, healthy, and delicious meals to locals and visiting out-of-towners. Personal chef services, weekly meals, catering for all occasions. Easier than takeout. (802) 730-2792, sweetsavorystowe.com.

PHYSICAL THERAPY COPLEY REHABILITATION SERVICES Therapies include physical, occupational, hand, speech, aquatic, pediatric, cardiac, pulmonary; work conditioning and other comprehensive rehab services. Clinics in Hardwick and Morrisville (Mansfield Orthopaedics, Tamarack Family Medicine, and Copley Hospital). (802) 888-8303, copleyvt.org.

PINNACLE PHYSICAL THERAPY Skilled physical therapy for orthopedic and neuromuscular conditions, sports, family wellness, pre- and post-surgery. Personal, professional care: 1878 Mountain Rd., Stowe. Appointment within 24 hours, M-F. (802) 253-2273. info@pinnacleptvermont.com or pinnacleptvermont.com.

PICTURE FRAMING AXEL’S FRAME SHOP & GALLERY

MULTI-SPECIALTY CLINIC ADAM KUNIN, MD, CARDIOLOGIST Personalized cardiac care. Board-certified in cardiology, nuclear cardiology and internal medicine. Providing general cardiology, advanced cardiac tests, and imaging. Morrisville, (802) 888-8372. copleyvt.org.

DONALD DUPUIS, MD, & COURTNEY OLMSTEAD, MD, GENERAL SURGEONS Board-certified general surgeons. Specializing in advanced laparoscopic procedures. Providing a wide spectrum of inpatient and outpatient surgical care. Morrisville, (802) 888-8372. copleyvt.org.

Providing high-quality picture framing to central Vermont for almost 40 years. Keeping custom picture framing affordable is just as important to us as providing incredible customer and design service. Stowe Street, Waterbury. (802) 244-7801, axelsgallery.com.

PRINTING THE UPS STORE From blueprints and banners to business cards and brochures, we print it. Shipping, scanning, and every other business service you can think of, we are your locally owned business partner. 112 S. Main St., Stowe. (802) 253-2233. store2614@theupsstore.com.

THE WOMEN’S CENTER (OB/GYN) Board-certified specialist William Ellis, MD, and certified nurse midwives Kipp Bovey, Rebecca Gloss, Erinn Mandeville, and Jennifer Walters. Comprehensive gynecological care and obstetrics. Morrisville, (802) 888-8100, copleyvt.org.

NEEDLEWORK THE WOODEN NEEDLE Charming needle arts shop in heart of Stowe Village. Counted cross-stitch and needlepoint featured. Specializing in linens, hand-painted canvases, Paternayan wool, Weeks Dye Works, Gentle Art cottons, fun fibers. Park and Pond Streets. (802) 253-3086, wooden-needle.com.

NURSERIES PERENNIAL PLEASURES NURSERY & TEA GARDEN Stroll through beautiful display gardens, shop for flowers and herbs. Enjoy tea or light lunches in the tea room, browse for hats in the gift shop. Free Sunday garden tours at 1 p.m. East Hardwick. (802) 472-5104. perennialpleasures.net.

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT RURAL RESOURCES Comprehensive property and household management services. Full-service professional management team specializing in the details of preserving your investment. Concierge/housekeeping, vendor management, design/remodels, much more. (802) 253-9496, admin@ruralresourcesvt.com.

STOWE COUNTRY HOMES Property management, maintenance, repair, and renovations specialists. Lawn and garden care, landscaping, trash removal, etc. Renovations large and small. Quality work guaranteed—on budget and schedule. (802) 253-8132, ext. 102, or jeanette@stowecountryhomes.com. stowecountryhomes.com.

STOWE RESORT HOMES Personalized management for Stowe’s vacation homes. Home checks, personal shopping, remodeling project management, maintenance coordination, more. We also offer marketing and rental agent services for select vacation homes. (802) 760-1157. stoweresorthomes.com.

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S TOWE-SMUGGLERS BUSINESS DIRECTORY REAL ESTATE & RENTALS COLDWELL BANKER CARLSON REAL ESTATE Real estate sales and rentals, representing Stowe and surrounding communities. Our talented team leads the industry in technology, innovation, and passion. 91 Main St., Stowe, (802) 253-7358; 74 Portland St., Morrisville, (802) 521-7962. stowevermontrealestate.com.

FOUR SEASONS SOTHEBY’S INT’L REALTY Four Seasons Sotheby’s International Realty strives everyday to exceed our clients’ expectations. To learn how we can put the power of our brand to work for you, visit us at fourseasonssir.com or (802) 253-7267.

LITTLE RIVER REALTY Your trusted real estate advisors representing buyers, sellers and rentals. Your goals are our priority. We are full-time realtors who appreciate the importance of your real estate decisions. (802) 253-1553, info@lrrvermont.com and lrrvermont.com.

PALL SPERA COMPANY REALTORS Stowe and Lamoille County’s leading real-estate company serving Central and Northern Vermont from 3 offices and 24 hours a day at pallspera.com. Mountain Road, Stowe (802) 253-9771, Stowe Village (802) 253-1806, Morrisville (802) 888-1102.

HARRISON’S RESTAURANT & BAR Located in historic Stowe Village serving elevated takes on American dishes with wine, craft beers and cocktails in a unique, parlorlike space. Summer/fall patio dining. Reservations accepted. (802) 253-7773, harrisonsstowe.com.

HOB KNOB BAR & LOUNGE Enjoy a drink in or lounge and some comfort food from our kitchen Thursday-Saturday, put your feet up sit by the fire. Bring the family, play some games and enjoy. hobknobinn.com. (802) 253-8549.

HOURGLASS Serving up local libations and inspired pub fare for lunch and dinner. Free valet parking for restaurant guests. 802) 760-4732. 7412 Mountain Road, Stowe.

IDLETYME BREWING COMPANY Small-batch craft lagers and ales. Lunch and dinner daily from 11:30 a.m. Innovative cocktails, extensive wine list, family friendly, fireplace dining. Outdoor patio. Perfect for special events. Beer to go. 1859 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-4765, idletymebrewing.com.

KIRKWOOD’S PUB Experience the best patio in Stowe. Enjoy a craft beer and delicious pub fare over looking the mountains and the 18th green. Lunch and dinner, seasonally. (802) 760-4653. 744 Cape Cod Rd., Stowe.

RED BARN REALTY OF VERMONT An office of dynamic professionals, each with a unique love of Vermont. We look forward to helping you fulfill your real estate sales and rental needs. 1878 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-4994. redbarnvt.com.

SMUGGLERS’ NOTCH MANAGEMENT CO. Make America’s #1 Family Resort your vacation home in the mountains. Full and fractional ownership. Extensive benefits: discounted lift passes, children’s programs, pools, waterslides. Betty Brgant, broker, 30 years experience. (802) 343-0014, bbrgant@smuggs.com. smuggs.com/re for listings.

STOWE COUNTRY HOMES Vacation homes and condos for short- or long-term rental. Professionally and locally managed. Luxury slopeside properties, secluded private homes, affordable condos—we have what you want, meeting all budgets. 253-8132. stowecountryhomes.com.

STOWE RESORT HOMES Luxury vacation homes for the savvy traveler. Book some of Stowe’s best resort homes—online. Well-appointed, tastefully decorated homes at Topnotch, Spruce Peak, and throughout Stowe. (802) 760-1157. stoweresorthomes.com.

WILLIAM RAVEIS STOWE REALTY We combine the marketing and technology of one of the largest brokerages in the U.S. with the local knowledge and community focus of a Vermont family business. You can count on our family to be there for yours. (802) 253-8484, raveis.com.

RESTAURANTS & NIGHTCLUBS BLACK DIAMOND BARBEQUE We only use quality meats prepared with homemade rubs and marinades, then slowly smoke using native hardwoods. Our bar features craft beer and cocktails. blackdiamondbbq.com.

CHARLIE B’S PUB & RESTAURANT A Stowe tradition with a festive atmosphere, Vermont Fresh cuisine, and award-winning wine list of over 40 wines by the glass, martini bar, and Vermont craft beers on tap. Inviting wraparound bar and fireside dining. Mountain Road, Stowe. (802) 760-1096, charliebspub.com.

TRAPP FAMILY LODGE KAFFEEHAUS Offering a variety of European pastries, soups, salads, sandwiches, wine, and our von Trapp lagers. Open daily. For hours call (800) 826-7000. trappfamily.com.

TRAPP FAMILY LODGE—LOUNGE & DINING ROOM Our dining room offers seasonal menus for breakfast and dinner reflecting both Austrian and Vermont traditions, featuring farm-to-table cuisine. Lounge has great seasonal lunch offerings. Daily. Reservations: (802) 253-5733. trappfamily.com.

WHIP BAR & GRILL Friendly, casual newly renovated atmosphere with open grill and patio dining. Fresh seafood, hand-cut steaks, vegetarian specialties, gluten-free, children’s menu. Lunch and dinner daily, Sunday brunch. At the Green Mountain Inn. (802) 253-6554 for reservations. thewhip.com.

RETIREMENT COMMUNITY COPLEY WOODLANDS Come home to Stowe, where retirement living is easy. Spacious condos, fine dining, activities. Available for adults 55+. Copley Woodlands, 125 Thomas Lane, Stowe. (802) 253-7200, copleywoodlands.com.

MICHAEL’S ON THE HILL WAKE ROBIN Farm-to-table cuisine. Swiss chef owned. Green Restaurant/Wine Spectator/Best Chefs America. Most Romantic Restaurant in Vermont: TripAdvisor, msn.com, delish.com. Best European Inspired Farm-to-Table Restaurant, Vermont: Lux Life Restaurant & Bar Awards. 5:30-9, closed Tuesdays. 5 minutes from Stowe. Route 100, Waterbury Center. (802) 244-7476. michaelsonthehill.com.

OVER THE WALL Combination of Latin X and Asian flavors creates delicious and fascinating dining experience. Wide assortment of tequilas and clever cocktails. Chill atmosphere in renovated 1836 farmhouse. Daily 3 to 10 pm. Saturday and Sunday brunch coming this winter. 2160 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-9333. overthewallvt.com.

PIECASSO PIZZERIA & LOUNGE Traditional, hand-tossed New York style pizza with modern style, eclectic music, and great vibes. A local favorite, voted a “Top 11 Slice in the Country” by travelandleisure.com. Creative entrees, craft beer, gluten-free menu, online ordering, takeout, delivery. (802) 253-4411, piecasso.com.

RANCH CAMP Stowe’s mountain bike base lodge. Full-service bike shop with Stowe’s best demo fleet. Fast casual eatery, craft beers on tap, and smiles for days. ranchcampvt.com, (802) 253-2753.

A vibrant non-profit life-care community located on 136 acres just south of Burlington in Shelburne, Vt. Residents enjoy independent living in cottages and apartments and comprehensive, on-site health care for life. wakerobin.com, (802) 264-5100.

SHOE STORES JOHNSON FARM, GARDEN, HARDWARE & RENTAL Quality footwear and clothing for every lifestyle and the whole family. Footwear for work, hiking, running, casual and dress. Keen, Timberland Pro, Chippewa, Muck, Bogs, Columbia, Salomon, Blundstone, Dansko, Birkenstock, Merrell, Sorel, more. Route 15 Johnson, (802) 635-7282, jhrvt.com.

WELL HEELED Unique collection of shoes, boots, handbags, belts, clothing, and jewelry in a chicly updated Vermont farmhouse halfway up Stowe’s Mountain Road. Shoes are our specialty and effortlessly chic our motto. Daily 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. (802) 253-6077. wellheeledstowe.com.

SALUTE STOWE Chef owned and operated. Authentic Italian cuisine. Homemade pasta and mozzarella, prime wood-fired steaks, fresh seafood, lasagna and veal parmigiana, fresh baked bread, desserts, daily specials. Outdoor sitting. Catering. 18 Edson Hill Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-5677, salutevt.com.

SUNSET GRILLE & TAP ROOM Northern-style southern barbecue with a side of sports. Craft beers and cocktails. Patio dining, family friendly. NFL Sunday ticket. 30 TVs. Just off the beaten path. Cottage Club Road, Stowe. (802) 253-9281. sunsetgrillevt.com.

SUSHI YOSHI Experience the best in Chinese and Japanese cuisine. Eclectic menu with something for everyone. The entire family will enjoy our gourmet hibachi steakhouse. Daily outdoor seating in summer. Call for free shuttle. 1128 Mountain Rd., Stowe. (802) 253-4135. sushistowe.com.

SPA THE SPA AT SPRUCE PEAK Harness the goodness of nature and experience serious relaxation with signature treatments such as our Stowe cider scrub or CBD facial. Featuring the only cryotherapy available in Stowe. (802) 760-4782. 7412 Mountain Rd., Stowe. sprucepeak.com.

SPA & WELLNESS CENTER AT STOWEFLAKE MOUNTAIN RESORT World-class spa integrates natural surroundings, luxurious amenities, over 120 treatments. Bingham Hydrotherapy waterfall, Hungarian soaking mineral pool, lounges, steam, sauna, hot tub, Jacuzzi, yoga, Pilates, fitness classes. Open to public. Mountain Road, Stowe. (802) 760-1083, spaatstoweflake.com.

SPECIAL ATTRACTIONS

SPECIALTY FOODS

BRAGG FARM SUGARHOUSE & GIFTS

LAKE CHAMPLAIN CHOCOLATES

8th generation sugarhouse, using traditional sugaring methods. Free daily tours, walk through 2,000-acre maple woods. World’s best maple creemees. Farm animals. Route 14N, East Montpelier. Near Cabot Creamery and Grandview Winery. (802) 223-5757.

What the New York Times calls “some of the best chocolate in the country.” Made from fair-trade certified chocolate, Vermont cream, other natural ingredients. Caramels, truffles, clusters, hot chocolate, factory seconds. (802) 241-4150. lakechamplainchocolates.com.

TRAPP FAMILY LODGE From intimate ceremonies in our lodge to grand receptions under a tent with spectacular mountain views, we tailor to individual tastes and budgets. European-style cuisine and accommodations. (800) 826-7000. trappfamily.com.

WINDOWS & DOORS ACME GLASS

CABOT CREAMERY VISITORS CENTER Come see where the “Best Cheddar in the World” begins. Watch video, nibble Cabot cheddars, sample Vermont specialty foods. Weekly specials. Fun, delicious and educational. Daily. Visit cabotcheese.coop/visit-us for hours. (ADA accessible, motorcoaches welcome.)

SPORTING GOODS OUTDOOR GEAR EXCHANGE & GEARX.COM Locally owned since 1995, offering the area’s best prices, service, and selection of gear and clothing for camping, hiking, climbing, paddling, and a life lived outdoors. Open 7 days. Burlington. (802) 860-0190.

CABOT FARMERS STORE Sample Cabot’s entire selection of award-winning cheeses and dairy products. Weekly specials. Great selection of Vermont specialty foods, artisanal cheeses, Vermont wines and microbrews. With Danforth Pewter, Lake Champlain Chocolates, Smugglers’ Notch Distillery. Daily. Visit cabotcheese.coop/visit-us for hours. (ADA accessible, motorcoaches welcome.)

SPRUCE PEAK PERFORMING ARTS CENTER The Stowe region’s premier, year-round presenter of music, theater, dance, film, education, and family programs on stage, on screen, and across the community. (802) 760-4634. Visit sprucepeakarts.org for more info.

STOWE HISTORICAL SOCIETY & MUSEUM Preserving Stowe’s rich history. Museum at the West Branch and Bloody Brook Schoolhouses, next to Stowe Library. Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, noon-3 p.m., and when the flags are out. (802) 253-1518. stowehistoricalsociety.org, info@stowehistoricalsociety.org.

LITTLE RIVER SURVEY COMPANY Surveying, mapping. Boundary, subdivision and topographic surveys. Site plans, FEMA elevation certificates and LOMA’s. Forestry services available. Large document copying, scanning, reducing. (802) 253-8214, littleriversurveyvt.com.

TOYS & GAMES JOHNSON FARM, GARDEN, HARDWARE & RENTAL Sports equipment, Legos, arts and crafts, outdoor/board games, puzzles. Trucks, tractors, science and stem kits, fun and creative toys and games for the whole family. Schleich, Hape, Schylling, Ravensburger, Bruder, Plan Toys, Mindware, Crayola. Route 15 Johnson, (802) 635-7282, jhrvt.com.

ONCE UPON A TIME TOYS Make every day a play day with our amazing Airfort®. Test your agility on a ninjaline. Traditional toys like Lego® to eclectic ones like Russian nesting dolls. Vermont’s most exciting store for 43 years. Birthday? Get a free balloon. (802) 253-8319, fun@stowetoys.com, stowetoys.com.

TUNBRIDGE WORLD’S FAIR

VERMONT GRANITE MUSEUM

Fantastic wine selections from around the world. Great prices. From the rare to the exceptional value. Under $10-$100+ we’re nuts about wine. Please see our ad on page 2. (802) 253-2630. finewinecellars.us.

SHELBURNE VINEYARD Come visit, then stay awhile to taste, tour, and share our adventure growing grapes and making fine wines in Vermont’s cold climate. We’ll make you feel welcome and surprise your palate. Open all year. (802) 985-8222. shelburnevineyard.com.

STOWE BEVERAGE Full-service wine, beer, liquor, mixers, snacks. Stowe’s best wine and beer selection. Best price in town on Vermont maple syrup. Cigars. Free local paper with wine purchases. 9-9 Monday through Saturday; Sunday 11-6. (802) 253-4525.

4 POINTS VERMONT BREWERY TOURS

YARN

Vermont is home to some great microbreweries and our tours bring you to some of the best. We pick up in the local area, and guarantee a good time. Call Rick at (802) 793-9246, 4pointsvt.com.

EDSON HILL Edson Hill offers you an exclusive, quintessential Vermont country estate with picturesque views, 23 luxurious guestrooms, and a talented culinary team to help create the wedding of your dreams. edsonhill.com, (802) 253-7371.

STOWEFLAKE MOUNTAIN RESORT & SPA

Explore history, art, science, technology, and people of Vermont’s granite industry. Create a clay sculpture, climbing wall, pedal cars to explore the grounds. Through October, Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. 7 Jones Brothers Way, Barre. (802) 476-4605. vtgranitemuseum.org.

FINE WINE CELLARS

YARN

WEDDING FACILITIES

Dedicated to family farm traditions and current rends all four days. Livestock shows, Antique Hill Museum, midway, entertainment. Located in the beautiful First Branch of the White River valley. Sept. 17-20. Tunbridge, Vt. tunbridgeworldsfair.com.

Carefully curated beer selection of Vermont, American and imported craft beers. Regular tastings. Hand-picked wines and sparkling wines. Fresh coffee, espresso, lattes, pastries, breakfast, sandwiches. Daily. 144 Main St., across from the church; 63 Lower Main St., downtown Morrisville. Facebook.

TRAVEL & TOURS STOWE PERFORMING ARTS Stowe Performing Arts presents great music—classical, blues, jazz, swing, pop, bluegrass, country—in dramatic settings throughout the community. Noon Music in May, Gazebo concerts, and Music in the Meadow. (802) 253-7792 or stoweperformingarts.com.

WINE, BEER, & SPIRITS BLACK CAP COFFEE & BEER

SURVEYORS

LITTLE RIVER HOTGLASS STUDIO Walk into the studio and experience the art of glassblowing up close. Adjacent gallery features works of resident artist Michael Trimpol. Thurs. – Mon. 10-5. (802) 253-0889. littleriverhotglass.com.

Your source for everything glass. New construction, remodel and service for residential and commercial homes and businesses. Windows, doors, glass shower enclosures, mirrors, insulated glass, screen porches, much more. info@acmeglassvt.com, (802) 658-1400.

Leave the planning to us. Perfect wedding location in the heart of Stowe in any season. Indoor and outdoor spaces for weddings, receptions, or rehearsals. Spa bridal services from hair to make-up. Mountain Road, Stowe. (802) 253-7355, stoweflake.com.

Yarn offers a wide selection of yarns from near and far as well as needles, accessories, gifts, inspiration, classes, and a friendly fiber community. 80 S. Main St., Suite 3, Waterbury. (802) 241-2244. yarnvt.com.

YOGA & PILATES STOWE YOGA CENTER Practice yoga in a beautiful space. Kate Graves is a respectful, knowledgeable teacher of over 35 years. Weekly schedule online. Special series: meditation, chakra yoga, prenatal, chair yoga. Privates available. 515 Moscow Rd. (802) 2538427, kgravesmt@gmail.com, stoweyoga.com.

YOGA BARN Livestream classes from the Yoga Barn setting daily. In-person classes, daily, as permitted. Individual and small-group privates. Customized yoga retreats, as permitted. Please check our website at theyogabarnstowe.com. 2850 Mountain Rd., Stowe.

Find us online at stowetoday.com

INDEX AARON FLINT BUILDERS ACME GLASS ALCHEMIST BREWERY ALPHA GENESIS DESIGN ANDERSON & ASSOCIATES ARTISANS’ GALLERY 253 AUTO AXEL’S FRAME SHOP & GALLERY BARRE ELECTRIC & LIGHTING SUPPLY BARRETT BUILT CUSTOM CABINETRY BEN & JERRY’S CATERING BIERHALL AT TRAPP FAMILY LODGE BITTNER ANTIQUES BLACK CAP COFFEE BLACK DIAMOND BARBECUE BOUTIQUE BRAD HIGHBERGER BRAGG FARM SUGARHOUSE BRYAN MEMORIAL GALLERY BURLINGTON FURNITURE CO. BURLINGTON MATTRESS BUTTERNUT MOUNTAIN FARM CABOT FARMERS’ STORE CAMARA SLATE PRODUCTS CHAMMOMILE CLOSE TO HOME COLDWELL BANKER CARLSON RE COMMODITIES NATURAL MARKET COMMODORES INN COUNTRY HOME CENTER COUNTRY STORE ON MAIN CUSHMAN DESIGN GROUP DONALD P BLAKE JR BUILDER EDELWEISS DELI EDSON HILL MANOR ELD ARCHITECTURE ELIZABETH HERRMANN ARCHITECTURE/DESIGN FERRO ESTATE & CUSTOM JEWELERS FINE WINE CELLARS FLOORING AMERICA FLY ROD SHOP FORGET-ME-NOT-SHOP FOUR SEASONS SOTHEBY’S RE FRED’S ENERGY FRITZ BAR AND RESTAURANT GEOBARNS GORDON DIXON CONSTRUCTION GREEN ENVY BOUTIQUE GREEN MOUNTAIN DISTILLERS HARRISON’S RESTAURANT HARRY HUNT ARCHITECTS HOB KNOB INN BAR & LOUNGE IDLETYME BREWING CO. IN COMPANY CLOTHING INTERIOR CREATIONS J. GRAHAM GOLDSMITH ARCHITECTS JAY PEAK VERMONT JOHNSON HARDWARE RENTAL, FARM & GARDEN JOHNSON WOOLEN MILLS KATHERINE GRAVES MASSAGE KNAUF LANDSCAPE DESIGN LANDSCAPES LAWSON’S FINEST LITTLE RIVER HOTGLASS STUDIO & GALLERY LITTLE RIVER REALTY LOEWEN WINDOW CENTER OF VT & NH MAD MOOSE ARCHITECTURE MAD RIVER ANTLER MARTIN WERTH LANDSCAPING & EXCAVATING

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ADVERTISERS

149 133 101 10, 11 36 91 155 95 149 144 49 1 45 13 96 93 36 45 95 3 121 89 94 45 16, 87 139 INSIDE FRONT 108 111 137 87 127 117 5 105 149 135 2 2 123 39 89 117 151 105 151 141 81 113 113 145 109 103 85 43 139 27 31 94 25 144 119 25 79 129 147 129 82 151

METHOD ARCHITECTURE STUDIO MICHAEL’S ON THE HILL MOUNTAIN LOGWORKS MOUNTAINOPS OUTDOOR GEAR MOUNTAIN ROAD OUTFITTERS MUMLEY ENGINEERING NORTHERN VERMONT UNIVERSITY ONCE UPON A TIME TOYS OVER THE WALL PALL SPERA CO. REALTORS PAUL ROBERT ROUSSELLE ARCHITECT PEREGRINE DESIGN/BUILD PERENNIAL PLEASURES NURSERY PIECASSO PIZZERIA & LOUNGE PINNACLE PHYSICAL THERAPY PK COFFEE RAIN OR SHINE TENT & EVENTS RANCH CAMP RED BARN REALTY OF VERMONT RED HOUSE FINE HOMEBUILDING RK MILES ROAM ROBERT PAUL GALLERIES RURAL RESOURCES SALUTE SHELBURNE VINEYARD SISLER BUILDERS SMUGGLERS’ NOTCH RESORT SPA AT SPRUCE PEAK SPRUCE PEAK ARTS STOWE BEVERAGE & LIQUOR STORE STOWE COUNTRY HOMES STOWE FAMILY DENTISTRY STOWE FAMILY PRACTICE STOWE FARMERS MARKET STOWEFLAKE MOUNTAIN RESORT STOWE HARDWARE & DRY GOODS STOWEHOF STOWE KITCHEN BATH & LINENS STOWE MERCANTILE STOWE PERFORMING ARTS STOWE RESORT HOMES STOWE SWEETS STOWE VILLAGE MASSAGE STOWE YOGA CENTER SUNSET GRILLE & TAP ROOM SUSHI YOSHI SWEET & SAVORY PERSONAL CHEF SWIMMING HOLE TEKTONIKA STUDIO ARCHITECTS TIM MEEHAN BUILDERS TOTAL FITNESS TRAPP FAMILY LODGE TUNBRIDGE WORLD’S FAIR UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT VERMONT ELECTRONICS VERMONT GRANITE MUSEUM VILLAGE GREEN AT STOWE WAGNER HODGSON LANDSCAPE ARCH WAKE ROBIN WELL HEELED WHIP BAR & GRILL WILLIAM RAVEIS REAL ESTATE WOODEN NEEDLE YANKEE BARN HOMES YARN YOGA BARN

143 97 147 7 37 153 29 80 107 21 151 135 153 111 36 108 93 107 141 143 145 82 77 146 109 109 149 9 107 91 115 124 35 33 41 INSIDE BACK 155 105 43 83 17 15 87 35 25 115 103 113 41 124 146 47 1 36 23 137 47 BACK COVER 125 33 19 115 125 36 127 80 19

THE VILLAGE GREEN AT STOWE A Condominium Resort For All Seasons Offering affordable rentals for 2 nights or more

Our Town Homes Provide • Spacious 2 & 3 bedroom accommodations • Fully equipped kitchens • Fireplace • Cable TV • Majestic views from 40 acres of beautiful land, surrounded by the Stowe Country Club and Golf Course and Stowe’s award winning recreation path.

Amenities • 2 Pools (1 indoor) • Whirlpool Spa • Sauna • 2 Outdoor Tennis Courts • Recreation Center • Video Games • Ping Pong, Air Hockey and Pool Tables

1003 CAPE COD ROAD, STOWE, VERMONT 05672

802-253-9705 • 800-451-3297 Visit our website at www.vgasstowe.com for more info and rates