Before Anaïs Mitchell can take the stage, Matt Smith, manager of Club Passim in Cambridge, Massachusetts, takes the mic and starts talking about chairs. They’re uncomfortable, he says, and the 125 people crowded into the tiny basement room nod back in agreement. Comfier ones cost money, though, so a little later Matt passes the hat, […]
How much rope do you need to hang yourself? About nine words’ worth, apparently. “North Adams is still a sorry gateway to anywhere …” I’ve had those words thrown in my face more times than I care to count, and I didn’t even write them. In fact, I was 13 when they were printed. But […]
VIDEO: Marginal Way The Marginal Way is a seaside path that stretches along the granite coastline of Ogunquit, Maine. Entirely paved and mostly flat, it’s hardly a strenuous hike, yet it remains one of the most popular in New England. People flock to the Marginal Way for the view. Though only 1-1/4 miles long, it offers […]
The waist-high bookshelves that line the reading room at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art are crammed with stories that span a lifetime. When a child tugs loose one of the colorful spines and brings it back to her grandmother to read, there’s no telling what treasure she’ll hand her. Maybe it’s a […]
The first thing of note P. T. Barnum accomplished was getting thrown in jail. As a young newspaper editor, he accused merchant Seth Seelye–a prominent citizen of Barnum’s own hometown of Bethel, Connecticut–of usury and spent two months locked up for libel. Upon his release he was hardly repentant: He orchestrated his own parade to […]
When Gary Vincent ushers you up to the third floor of Funspot, the world’s largest arcade, in Weirs Beach, New Hampshire, he knows he’s welcoming you to the Promised Land. “The biggest joy I get,” he says, “is the first-time visitor who comes up the stairs and they’re like, ‘Wow.’ “ What you behold is […]
Whatever happened to the Old Man of the Mountain in NH? It’s been years since its collapse, but its fate still hangs in the balance.
SLIDE SHOW: Trustees of Reservations Will Garrison watches his “decorative” cows munch the green grass at the bottom of the hill. They don’t actually belong to him, or for that matter, to Naumkeag, the historic mansion (now a museum) in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, that he helps manage. More than 30 years ago, the Trustees of Reservations […]
Gordon Lankton’s first Russian icon, a c. 1850 image of St. Nicholas, hangs in a dark corner of the lowest level of his museum. He found it lying in the dust at a Russian flea market in 1990 and bought it for $25. He doesn’t think it’s a very good one anymore, and he’s not […]
Photographer Jon Olsen finds exquisite peace in New England’s snow-covered landscapes — Vermont barns, New Hampshire hills, Maine coast. “There’s something very soothing about that,” says Olsen. “The world is still.” See more of his work: jonolsenphotography.com
The console of the Kotzschmar Organ looks lonely at the center of the stage in Portland City Hall’s Merrill Auditorium. The room swallows it. With an imposing facade of pipes towering before it and three tiers of seats looming behind, the console seems tiny and vulnerable–like a raft poised on the lip of a whale. […]
The proposition seems impossible at worst, masochistic at best, but the RPM Challenge continues to draw in the curious, the brave, and the otherwise unoccupied. Conceived of by Portsmouth, New Hampshire’s alternative arts and culture weekly, The Wire, the premise is simple: Write, record, and produce an album of music entirely in the month of […]
