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Your support powers every story we tell. We're committed to producing high-quality, fact-based news and information that gives you the facts in this community we call home. If our work has helped you stay informed, take action, or feel more connected to Windham County – please give now to help us reach our goal of raising $150,000 by December 31st.
TOWNSHEND - The Townshend Historical Society's 2025 annual meeting and election of officers will be held Sunday, Nov. 9, 3 p.m. at the Town Hall on Route 30.
After a brief meeting, there will be a program called "Views of Harmonyville," a series of photos by amateur photographer Lester A. Wheeler. The album the photos came from is dated 1912. A number of the views show the Route 30 area near what is now the 802 Credit Union branch office.
There are also some views of various rock formations in Townshend. One is titled "Boulder in Flynn Pasture." There is some discussion within the Society as to where this boulder is. Come to hear the research that has gone into that quest and perhaps volunteer to go look for it. Refreshments will follow the program. For more information, contact Historical Society president Charles E. Marchant at 802-365-7937.
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Obituaries • Charles W. "Charlie" Aron, 75, of Westminster. Died at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital Oct. 25, 2025. He was born Oct. 22, 1950, in Keene, New Hampshire, son of Edwin and Ruth (Beard) Aron. He received his associate's degree and owned and operated his own printing business. Charlie enjoyed...
BRATTLEBORO-Four new exhibits open at the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) Saturday, Nov. 15. All are welcome to a 5 p.m. opening party with the artists and curators, featuring live music, free food, and a cash bar. Doors open to BMAC members at 4:30 p.m. The new exhibits...
DUMMERSTON-Rev. Yolanda and The Circle of Love perform in concert as a fundraiser for the AIDS Project of Southern Vermont Saturday, Nov. 8, at 3 p.m. at Dummerston Congregational Church, 1535 Middle Rd. Rev. Yolanda and The Circle of Love is Rev. Yolanda, Freddy Freeman, Jay Freeman, and Tyler Wansley. They describe themselves as a "nondenominational, interfaith, inter-spiritual, non-dual 'Musical/Spiritual Happening' where everyone is welcomed." Although they are all seasoned musicians, making music together for more than 20 years, their...
BRATTLEBORO-As winter approaches, a new community-led initiative says it is working "to ensure that there are open doors to anyone who needs a warm and welcoming overnight shelter." All are invited to a free "Soup Supper" Thursday, Nov. 6, from 5:30 to 7 p.m., at Beloved Community Church, 18 Town Crier Drive. The supper will offer a chance to hear from steering committee members about the project and what support is still needed from the community. According to a news...
SAXTONS RIVER-Bowls will be filled with soups donated by local restaurants for the annual "Empty Bowl Dinner" and auction Sunday, Nov. 9, to benefit Our Place Community Food Center in Bellows Falls. The event marks its 27th year as it gets underway at 5 p.m. at the Saxtons River Inn. "We're looking forward to this year's fundraiser because it will be a great opportunity to support our clients who are facing the loss of their food benefits," Our Place Executive...
BRATTLEBORO-An editing error in the Oct. 29 cover story ("'I don't just want to read the landscape. I want to eat it.'") resulted in logistical confusion about the date and time of an upcoming event celebrating Newfane author Deborah Lee Luskin's new memoir, Reviving Artemis. Luskin will be signing books at ByWay Books (399 Canal St., Brattleboro) on Saturday, Dec. 6, from 2 to 4 p.m. This News item was submitted to The Commons.
LONDONDERRY-On Friday, Nov. 14, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., Neighborhood Connections offers a special edition of its "Soup and Sandwich" series for all emergency responders. Dr. Kendra LaRoche, executive director of the Special Needs Support Center, a White River Junction–based nonprofit that provides support for people with disabilities, will provide an overview of disability awareness and de-escalation training, and she will offer continuing education credit for all attendees who may benefit from it. Emergency responders are often the first...
BRATTLEBORO-Palaver Strings presents a tango-inspired program, preceded by a tango workshop, Saturday, Nov. 8, at the Brattleboro Music Center (BMC). The 7 p.m. program, "Port City," explores tango music throughout the genre's history, and features bandoneon visionary Heyni Solera as soloist and composer. The bandoneon is a a reed instrument, similar to a concertina, popular in tango music. Palaver Strings will perform danceable classics alongside contemporary tango-inspired compositions. This performance "celebrates tango's ongoing evolution and the powerful interplay between music...
Robert F. Smith reports for The Commons on Bellows Falls and surrounding communities. A longtime reporter and editor in the region, he has also worked in frontline health care. BELLOWS FALLS-The rapidly approaching end to subsidies for families using the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for health insurance has many Vermont households looking at health insurance premiums that will double, triple, or rise by even greater magnitude in 2026. It is estimated that 42,000 Vermonters will be affected by these increases,
BRATTLEBORO-A new book, set to go on sale Nov. 9, will celebrate the town's history through photos of local marches, cavalcades, and protests. Brattleboro on Parade, a 104-page paperback, features images from the Brattleboro Historical Society. The book looks at parades as far back as horse-drawn Valley Fair carriages in 1889 and as recently as the current "By the People: Brattleboro Goes Fourth" Independence Day parade. In between, the book pictures historic events, including presidential visits, local troops departing for...
BRATTLEBORO-Write Action wishes to thank the wonderful local businesses that contributed to our café fundraiser at the Brattleboro Literary Festival, Oct 18 and 19. We encourage you to patronize their businesses: Scott Farm, Vermont Country Deli, Grafton Village Cheese, Mocha Joe's, the Brattleboro Food Co-op, The Works, Tavernier Chocolates, Amy's Bakery Arts Café, Dutton's Farm Stand, and Domino's Pizza. A hearty thank you goes as well to the volunteers who staffed the tables in the Brooks House! Write Action Brattleboro...
WEST DOVER-Mount Snow officials have reversed their recent decision to reduce their child care program starting in November ["Mount Snow Child Care will shift to 'employee-first' enrollment model,'" News, Oct. 15]. Instead, the reduction in the child care program won't go into effect until June 19, 2026. The initial proposal was intended to limit the child care program to the children of Mount Snow employees, though community members could be wait-listed for open slots. It would have left 16 families...
-Two of Windham County's most successful high school sports programs - the Bellows Falls Terriers field hockey team and the Twin Valley Wildcats boys' soccer teams - ended their seasons on Nov. 1 with championship trophies. • Bellows Falls also snapped a championship drought with a 4-1 win over U-32 in the Division II final in Burlington for the Terriers' first title since 2020 and the eighth state field hockey championship in the program's history. The Terriers haven't had a...
MARLBORO-The first performance in Marlboro Music's 2025–26 artist residency series spotlights the newly formed Phaidros String Quartet. Their performance takes place Sunday, Nov. 9, at 2 pm. Admission is free. Reservations are required. Now in its second season, Marlboro Music's artist residency program brings emerging chamber music ensembles to the Marlboro campus throughout the year for creative work and concert offerings. Each group is in residence for 1 to 3 weeks, spending concentrated time together in a retreat-like environment where...
BRATTLEBORO-I became a resident at 9 Canal St., where the apartments are right above the Brattleboro Food Co-op. I have befriended a half a dozen residents. The topic of the day tends to center around the drug activity that takes place in and around the building. Often times the users and dealers sneak past a resident who has keys to the lobby door. My response to this intrusion is to simply say, "No, I will not let you in." I...
SAXTONS RIVER-The third annual Generosity Fair gets underway at 24 Main Street Community Building, Saturday, Nov. 8 at 2 p.m. More than 20 area nonprofit organizations will showcase their activities and "provide an opportunity to turn generosity into meaningful holiday gift-giving" with the option of attending information sessions about planned giving and volunteering, wrote organizers in a news release. The event is free and open to all. "This is a great chance for folks to learn about these wonderful nonprofits...
BRATTLEBORO-A legend is coming to Brattleboro. I don't write those words lightly. I have been a Richard Thompson fan since the old Fairport Convention days, in 1967, when the band kind of invented folk-rock. I was out of the country for the Richard and Linda Thompson days, when he and his now-ex-wife tore out the hearts of each other and their fans. I picked up Thompson again when I came back to this country, seeing him over and over again...
SAXTONS RIVER-The recent reporting from VTDigger about the inadequacy of the state's private nursing homes ["Problems followed some of Vermont's largest and most troubled nursing homes after state approved new ownership," VTDigger, Oct. 28] reminded me of a very different mode of caring for our infirm elderly that seems especially appropriate to a state with underutilized homes and capable nursing providers - the group home. More than two decades ago, when my parents were slowly declining, I was invited by...
PUTNEY-For Rodney Bell, death provides a living. Bell works as a burial excavation specialist - that is, a gravedigger. When Bell, 57, was a toddler in early 1970, his father, Howard Bell, was working for Washburn Vault, then in West Brattleboro and now in New Hampshire. "He was going to different cemeteries with [burial] vaults for different funerals, and he met this guy who dug graves in one cemetery, who asked my father to help him," Bell said. "My dad...
BRATTLEBORO-When Jen Ricker heard the news that she had been named the 2025 Vermont Early Childhood Educator of the Year by the Vermont Association for the Education of Young Children (VTAEYC; vtaeyc.org), she "burst into tears." "It's a great job," says Ricker, the lead teacher at the Winston Prouty Center for Child and Family Development. Ricker teaches infants and toddlers and was recognized for her two decades of work supporting children and families, building warm and welcoming relationships between family...
BRATTLEBORO-When the Valley Moonstompers Society takes the stage at Marigold in Brattleboro on Friday, Nov. 7, at 8 p.m., the band's leader and founder, Dan Thomas, said the night will be "a celebration of Jamaican music." The band, which primarily plays a Jamaican genre of music know as ska, holds a monthly residency at the Main Street venue on the first Friday of every month, coinciding with the town's Gallery Walk. Ska originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s and...
-In the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricane Melissa in Jamaica last week, apple growers in Vermont have begun fundraisers to provide direct financial support to their Jamaican team members who annually come to Vermont to help with the harvest. On Oct. 29, Champlain Orchards of Shoreham announced it is organizing a statewide relief campaign by Vermont apple growers: the Vermont Apple Growers' Support Fund for Jamaican Seasonal Workers. The crowdfunding, via a GoFundMe appeal, will provide direct financial...
Robyn Stires is the director of Mercy Ministries Food Pantry at Agape Christian Fellowship in Brattleboro, where she has run the program for the past 12 years. She also hosts a podcast, "Blooming in a Cage." BRATTLEBORO-During the Great Depression, hunger was visible. People stood in long breadlines, and the government began buying surplus food from farmers to feed struggling families - the first steps toward what we now call SNAP. As someone who runs a modern day breadline, I...
BRATTLEBORO-Electronic music returns to its ancestral home on Saturday, Nov. 15, when Brattleboro welcomes Circuits in the Woods, an all-day electronic music festival that features two lectures, two hands-on events, and 20-plus musicians playing a variety of genres of music in five downtown venues. The festival takes place from 1 p.m. to midnight and honors Vermont's importance to electronic music by following the ley lines that begin at the old Estey Organ Company on Birge Street in Brattleboro, track north...
Jon Schottland is a psychotherapist and a school counselor. BRATTLEBORO-The other day I was walking my dog on Washington Street in Brattleboro. It was early morning and the streets were mostly empty, when a pickup truck slowly drove past and then pulled over to the curb ahead of us. A woman dressed in a sweatshirt, jeans, and winter hat jumped out of the cab. She picked up several bags of leaf litter that had been placed there, tossing them in...
BELLOWS FALLS-Vermont, the first state in the country to legalize civil unions, has a storied history supporting LGBTQ+ rights. On Oct. 25, a crowd gathered to hear speakers illuminate historical figures who championed the cause, and hear about a gathering place that served as a safe haven for the LGBTQ+ community. The Andrews Inn, run as a restaurant, inn, gay bar, and disco club from 1973 to 1984 at the heart of downtown Bellows Falls, was a magnet for people...
