Donald Hall has long been one of New England’s most gifted writers of poetry and prose. Writing from his farmhouse in the village of Wilmot, New Hampshire, Hall’s images cut to the heart of anyone, anywhere. This month he begins his one-year appointment as poet laureate of the United States. To honor its local gift […]
This fall, the Red Sox will have to share the spotlight with a new player in town — the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA). The ICA, which has moved from its Boylston Street location to an ultramodern 65,000-square-foot building on Boston’s harborfront, is the first art museum to be built in the city in nearly […]
Maxfield Parrish’s Daybreak recently sold for $7.6 million. That’s good news, because the seller’s grant of $300,000 will help purchase a permanent home for the Cornish Colony Museum, in Windsor, Vermont, home to the largest collection of Parrish’s work. The name of its current Parrish exhibition is, appropriately enough, Coming Home. Through October 29. 802-674-6008. […]
Born and raised in Worcester, Massachusetts, the late Harvey Ball, a self-employed commercial artist, drew the first smiley face in December 1963 for a local insurance company that wanted happy buttons to raise employee morale. He said he received about $45 for the sketch, drawn with black felt-tip pen on yellow paper. Before his death […]
Yankee Magazine‘s fall photo contest is the most popular one we host, and each year our readers submit hundreds of stunning photos. After careful consideration, we’ve narrowed it down to five images that stand out from the rest. Here are the judges’ comments on why these five photos made it into the finals. Congratulations to […]
HOW IS THE FOLIAGE going to be this year? It’s more than a passing interest at Yankee magazine. It’s an obsession! I worked in Yankee‘s art department for 15 autumns, and New England’s color was always spectacular. Some years there was a little more red or the leaves turned earlier than the year before, but […]
1. Leaves contain a green pigment called chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is instrumental in photosynthesis, the process in which energy from sunlight (along with water and carbon dioxide) is used to make sugars that feed the plant. Over time, chlorophyll breaks down, but during the growing season it is continually replaced. 2. In autumn, the environment is […]
1. DO get lost. Carry a good map (we like the detailed atlas and gazetteer series by DeLorme mapmakers in Yarmouth, Maine; 800-561-5105; delorme.com) and get a little lost. With 7,401 miles of unpaved roads just in Vermont, there’s ample opportunity to find adventure. 2. DO observe proper foliage etiquette. Locals use the back roads […]
And a Bottle of Rum: A History of the New World in Ten Cocktails (Crown Publishing, $24), by longtime Yankee contributor Wayne Curtis, tells the story of the rise, fall, and return of America’s most reviled and defamed spirit. Rum began as a byproduct of the 17th-century Caribbean sugar industry but soon took on a […]
Rare is the American outdoors lover who does not have a pair of L.L. Bean’s rubber-bottomed, leather-topped shoes or boots. The boots were a eureka moment for Maine woodsman Leon Leonwood Bean. Legend has it that 90 of the first 100 pairs were returned. Bean’s business sense (and sense of honesty) had him return the […]
“The day they were announcing the Cy Young [last November], I started to think, What do I say if he doesn’t win? … It was our anniversary weekend, so we were leaving that night for the Woodstock Inn in Vermont no matter what. Win, lose, or whatever. I think it was 11:30 in the morning […]
We heard from many readers in response to our September story “The Maine Connection” about the Portland ticket agent who checked in two of the hijackers on September 11, 2001. These are excerpts from some of the letters we received. I just read your article on the man at the US Airways counter on 9/11. […]
