Metaboston

Robert Frost, Chicken Farmer

Iconic New England poet Robert Frost supported himself and his family by raising chickens in New Hampshire for a time and began to write stories about them

[I]n 1900, Frost found in raising chickens an occupation that gave him money, time, and a landscape ripe with metaphors for the poems he had begun to write late at night when his wife and children were sleeping.

It's clear from the eleven lively stories Frost published in the trade journals The Eastern Poultryman and Farm-Poultry, from 1903 to 1905, that he was imaginatively engaged by the tragic things that can happen to a chicken. In "Trap Nests," a couple new to chicken farming employ a device "intended to catch and hold the hen until she was willing to purchase freedom at the price of an egg." The trap nests "savor of vivisection and the Inquisition"; the city-bred farmer finds himself taking "a growing satisfaction in ruthlessness, for such, he felt, was life." In another story, a farmer's "first hatches were so exceptionally fine that the gods fell in love with them, and they died young."

Above:  One of Jim Clark's virtual videos of Frost reading "The Road Not Taken"

A Family Confronts Its Slave-Trading History in Rhode Island

 What would you do if, like Katrina Browne, you found out your family, the DeWolfs, made their fortune as the U.S.'s most prominent  slave-traders?  It's quite a revelation, particularly if your family is not from Mississippi but from Rhode Island, the Deep North as she calls it.

Browne looked into her family's history and made a film about it.

Leonard Lopate discusses the movie with Browne in the show above.

One of her cousins Tom DeWolf has also written a book looking into his experiences with the revelation and investigation in Inheriting the Trade: A Northern Family Confronts Its Legacy as the Largest Slave-Trading Dynasty in U.S. History.

An interesting aspect of the whole story is the discussion of how invested the North was with slavery.

Bunnies in Peril

The New England Cottontail, found in New Hampshire and Maine, is facing a range of problems including habitat loss and competition from the rival invasive species, the Eastern Cottontail.

The Eastern cottontail was introduced into the Northeast in the first half of the 20th century, largely by hunting clubs, and is doing fine, largely because it seems better at spotting predators, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

(Image:  Maine Audubon)

Portsmouth, Rhode Island will soon be one of the best places to see the elaborate wire sculptures of Richard Lippold.

In the last year some of Lippold’s most complicated constructions have undergone nimble-fingered repairs costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.Artisans at Newmans Ltd., a metal-restoration outfit in Newport, R.I., and at the Richard Lippold Foundation, a nonprofit or ganization in Locust Valley, N.Y., have been clambering around scaffolding to untangle, dismantle, polish and restring sculptures on miles of wire.

Lippold was an engineering genius, but we’ve been dealing with a piece that had reached the threshold of catastrophe,” said Howard Newman, of the Newport company. Working with a budget of $475,000, his staff is now rehanging a Lippold work called “Trinity”: about 215 aluminum bars on four miles of gold wires, spanning from floor to ceiling at a 1960s Benedictine chapel in Portsmouth, R.I.

“People’s mouths fall open when they see it going back up, like they’re watching a spider spin a web of blazing gold,” Mr. Newman said. “The more that goes up, the more exquisite it gets.”

Newmans Ltd. brought in a yacht-restoration company to sandblast corrosion off the aluminum sections and has wholly replaced the original filaments, which were cracking. The deterioration was partly because of miscalculations by the original construction team, led by the modernist architect Pietro Belluschi, said Michael J. DeMatteo, a senior associate at Newport Collaborative Architects, which is overseeing a $4 million restoration of the chapel for the owners, a monastery and a boarding school (Portsmouth Abbey). The chapel’s wood frame and stained-glass stripes were not engineered to withstand Rhode Island coastal conditions, Mr. DeMatteo said. “The building has leaked and twisted in the wind since the day it opened,” he added, causing uneven stress on the Lippold sculpture.

The restoration of the elaborate sculpture is a complicated work itself

Image: Richard Lippold Foundation

Snowboards, Playboy, and Censorship

The Burton snowboard controversy continues to the point that the Burlington City Council considered asking Burton to withdraw its designs.  Burton's snowboard's became controversial when theThe Council backed away from censorship but have still annoyed the Burton founders.

We...make boards for 18-year-old guys...The fact that these boards don’t appeal to some people is not a surprise. The important thing is that the vast majority of young, core riders appreciates the graphics and does not take them so seriously or perceive them as a threat to society...While I do understand that some people’s feelings are heartfelt, the local reaction to these graphics has been hurtful and out of line."

Political correctness and free speech don't always work well together but they can generate a lot of publicity for Burton.

The debate has left some Vermonters grappling with an identity issue: In a liberal state that values free expression, how can so many residents be pushing for censorship?

You can see a slideshow of the boards.

Is Ben & Jerry's Still a Political Company?

Ben & Jerry's has a hippie image even though it is now owned by multinational Unilever.  Does it still deserve it?  Craig Fehrman takes a look to see what role politics plays at the company now that it Ben and Jerry aren't running the show.

[N]o matter how bland the factory feels, no matter how indifferent my tour guide sounds, no matter how apathetic my tour mates seem, there still exists a body of people who buy and eat Ben & Jerry's because of its politics. And this minority continues to dominate the news coverage.

It was only after spending an afternoon with the company's tepid every-fans that I began to understand this situation. The hyper-political Ben & Jerry's fans—the ones fretting about socially responsible bananas—are the structural equivalent of the Netroots. There's a better link here than Howard Dean. Like the Netroots, the progressive Ben & Jerry's fans drive and distort a bigger portion of the news than they have any right to. They're the media darlings, the ones who must be pacified quickly and quietly.

Carolyn Chute: Maine Novelist and Militia Member

A really interesting profile of Maine novelist Carolyn Chute by Charles McGrath illustrated with an equally great photo by Erik Jacobs (above) that paint a picture of a different kind of writer than usual.

"For most of the time that she has been working on the book, Ms. Chute has also been greatly occupied with an organization called the 2nd Maine Militia, of which she is the founder and, as she says, “secretary of offense, or offensiveness.”

The copier in her living room is used to churn out tracts and fables, mostly written by Ms. Chute and illustrated by her husband, that set out the group’s political philosophy, which is essentially one of cheerful, nonpartisan economic populism.

The 2nd Maine Militia, or Your Wicked Good Militia, as it’s sometimes known, is progun, against corporate lobbying and campaign contributions, and opposed to tax subsidies for big business. The group has been known to meet in a hired hall, but more often it assembles in the woods behind the Chutes’ home, where the members shoot at cans and other targets, talk about what’s wrong with the world and dine on potluck.

In 1996, in an incident recreated in “The School on Heart’s Content Road,” the militia invaded the State Capitol in Augusta, carrying placards that read, “Smash Corporate Tyranny.” Many of the militia children were in costume, and Mr. Chute wore a Revolutionary War uniform. There were some kazoo-playing and a little shouting, and someone duct-taped a piece of cardboard over a portrait of Joshua Chamberlain, the Maine governor and Civil War hero.

What's Killing New England's Bats?

In something of a Halloween hangover there are some updates on white-nose syndrome, apparently caused by a fungus, that is decimating bat populations in New England.  It seems to be a particular problem for bats that hibernate so the problem for our bats like the little brown bat is clear.

Allen's Coffee Brandy, the Champage of Maine

For reasons no one seems to understand, Allen's Coffee Brandy, made in Somerville, is a perennial best-seller in Maine recently selling over 1,000,000 bottles in a year.

Perhaps because of its dominant sales position in Maine, Allen’s Coffee Brandy also has been associated with Maine’s substance abuse troubles. Members of the state’s criminal justice community have said the brand name frequently appears in police incident logs, along with Budweiser beer and Twisted Tea, a blended brand of tea and alcohol. These other brands are not classified as liquor and therefore are not included on the state’s list of top-selling units of hard alcohol.

In the 1990s, state Superior Court Judge Robert Crowley was quoted as saying coffee brandy “is very prevalent in the criminals who come before me. I don’t know whether brandy is more bang for your buck but it runs the gamut.”

“I see it in bar fights, domestic assaults, [drunken driving] and worse crimes,” the judge said.

Vermont's Bears Are Thriving

So they may be spending more time deeper in the woods away from hunters.

Image:  Wikimedia Commons)

Is Vermont Eager to Secede and Join Quebec?

Canadian MP Christian Ouellet of the Bloc Queubecois suggests Vermonters are ready to join the Quebecois in this video (in French but worth a watch for non-Francophones for all the effects).

While a Quebec-Vermont alliance might seem a weird idea Vermont does have a secessionist movement.

Preserving the Nantucket Shoreline

The battle between summer-residents and year-rounders over the disappearing Sconset beach and whether a fortune should be spent to preserve its quickly eroding shoreline.

"But if the scientists are right, if the sea levels continue to rise incrementally and storms become not only more frequent but also more powerful, maybe the only thing Nantucket property owners can do is allow nature its destiny. Jim O'Connell, a coastal geologist for the Sea Grant program at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod, believes that Nantucket's fate is sealed. "I did a lecture out there last year," he says. "I showed aerial and ground photos and talked about what I was seeing and what the data showed. I began with a picture of the open ocean and announced, 'In 8,000 years this will be your island, and until you get to that point, every house is going to enjoy a spectacular ocean view.' I got only a few chuckles."

(Image:  Wikimedia)

New England's Cornucopia of Lit Journals

New England's treasure trove of magazines you aren't reading . . . but probably should. 

Magazines like literary stalwarts Ploughshares and AGNI as well as new blood like Redivider and Quick Fiction.

Lobster Price Slump

Daniel Gross explains more about the great lobster price decline that we've written about.

“At root, the global forces that are driving up the price of food don't significantly affect the vacation lobster business in Maine. Commercial and consumer demand doesn't vary much for off-the-boat lobster. Sure, many lobsters are sold to processing plants. But unlike other seafood products—think of canned tuna, or clam sauce, or frozen fish fillets—lobster is not produced or marketed on a mass global scale, which also means there are no speculators trying to make a killing on lobster futures. The fact that people are eating more and better in China and India isn't much boosting the demand for lobsters from Maine. Even in the United States, lobster remains to a large degree a regional product.

Using Cellphones to Talk With Owls via MIT

MIT Media Lab professor Dale Joachim is using cellphone networks to interact with owls and measure their populations.

Why owls? 

"The technology isn’t limited to screech owls . . . He simply started the experiment with them “because they are nocturnal, and at night, cellular calling time is free.” He believes his innovation will help researchers and conservationists track and keep a fairly accurate count of animals—and without repeatedly disturbing their habitats. “If my equipment were already set up [in the field], I could have done this from my office in Cambridge, or really anywhere in the world,” says Joachim.

Now Joachim is expanding the scope and reach of the cell program.

"What started out as a project aimed at monitoring owls in their natural environment has grown into an international collaboration on how to use widespread networks of citizen-scientists to gain new insights into a wide variety of species. It's an attempt to learn about the natural world by listening to its own voices, says MIT visiting professor Dale Joachim.

"In order to better understand people, I need to listen to them," Joachim explains. In order to better understand nature, "if we can create easily accessible channels through which we can listen to nature, we might get meaning and information that we wouldn't otherwise know."

Joachim started out by trying a series of tests to see if networks of advanced cell phones, equipped with GPS and compasses to monitor their position and orientation and connected to special arrays of directional microphones, could replace human volunteers in assessing owl populations.

Experiments in Connecticut and Maine showed that the system did work -- the owls responded to playback of recorded owl sounds through the cell phones, and their responses could be detected through the phones almost as accurately as when people on the ground listened for their calls and wrote down the results.

Humpback Whales Recovering

Great news although some experts say the overall rise in species population doesn't take into account issues with particular groups of whales, like the 1000 or so who feed from Cape Cod Bay north to Maine.  (Image:  NOAA)

Fall Video Festival

Enter the Alliance for Community Media Fall Video Festival. Deadline is September 3.

"The New England Region of the Alliance for Community Media has issued its call for entries for the 11th Annual Fall Video Festival. Judging is based on six basic criteria: Content, Technical Quality, Creativity, "Local-centricity", Style, and Overall Impact.

There are 20 categories and each will be split into "professional" and "non-professional" divisions and judged separately, except for student programming, which is "non-professional" only. Cambridge Community Television will pay for 1/2 of the $25 entry fee for Access Members who deliver their entries and accompanying material to CCTV by September 3 at 5 PM."

Art Installation in Providence's North Burial Ground

Jay Critchley has installed art in an unusual venue:  the grounds and mausoleums of Providence's North Burial Ground.

“There's art inside the crypt. "Cryptic Providence" features installations throughout this 110-acre public cemetery (there were also staged performances in June and another is planned for Sept. 27, the day before the show closes). Critchley's own piece, "Final Passage," sits in the mausoleum's entrance. It's a vintage Chevy mummified in bandages woven artfully across the hood. He has suspended a handful of Little Trees air fresheners above the car (I guess if there's anywhere you'd need an air freshener, it would be a mausoleum). It's a bold work, slyly tying oil consumption to mortality, and it trumpets Critchley's camp aesthetic.  (Image:  Jay Critchley's 'Mummy Car')

Info:
Cryptic Providence: More Than a Graveyard
On view through September 28.
North Burial Ground,
5 Branch Ave.
Providence, RI
401-621-6123
www.arttixri.com/performance_info.cfm?PID=1688
www.jaycritchley.com

Why Are Coyotes in New England So Large?

An interesting discussion by University of Maine student Cameron McCormick.
(Video by BatGuys of a coyote in Sudbury).

An Island Mansion-Commune-Collaborative in Narragansett Bay

 How do you maintain a 103-year-old mansion perched a few feet above sea level on a tiny island in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island?  By keeping expectations moderated and depending on the kindness and help of friends and pretty much anyone who can contribute. 

"[Henry Wood] and a crew of family and friends who share his passion for the place’s “deep bohemian funk,” as Nicholas Benson, a stone carver from Newport, put it, have dedicated their time and skills (plumbing and wiring experience are always particularly welcome) to keeping the place from slipping into the water forever."

***

"Every spring for a decade or so after the sale, Mr. Wood said, he cursed “this albatross,” his roofless, windowless, floorless, powerless, waterless house. Wrangling what had been a rich man’s plaything, attended by servants and even its own shipyard, into a working couple’s weekend getaway turned out to be much more than a working couple could handle. Eventually, though, as the Woods mustered the talents of their friends, Clingstone and its maintenance evolved into a communal lifestyle, and ultimately a kind of religion."

It seems like the house has become his life's work.  Wood has owned the house since 1961 and he is now 79.  The article has a lot of great details.  It's like the stories of British families who feel compelled to maintain stately homes, except in this case Wood voluntarily took on the project.(Image:  Erik Jakobs for the NY Times)

Age of Steam Game in Vermont and New Hampshire

Age of Steam is a board game where you compete against others to build railroads.  Now you can compete in Vermont and New Hampshire maps.  Players complain that this is a hard area to compete in (because of all the trees blocking the way).  And the price is a hefty $80 (!).

Nantucket Confronts Diversity

View Larger Map Long regarded as enclave of the rich and white Nantucket's population is quickly becoming more diverse and the island is facing issues surrounding the increasing heterogeneity, including culture clashes, policing problems and questions of racism.

"In the Nantucket School District, where a decade ago more than 95 percent of the students were white, 25 percent of this year's nearly 1,300 students are members of a minority group and 10 percent grew up speaking another language.

And then there is the Rev. Donovan Kerr's growing New Life Ministries church, which on Sundays attracts as many as 150 congregants, nearly all of them black or Hispanic.

"We represent the other side of Nantucket," said Kerr, who founded his ministry six years ago with six congregants and recently bought land to build a church. "We represent the changes.""

Rhode Island Police Arrest Record-Holder for Intoxication

Following a single-car (luckily) accident Rhode Island state police arrested a man with the highest blood alcohol level found in a living person in state.

"A breath test showed blood alcohol readings of 0.489 percent, followed by 0.491, [Maj. Steven] O'Donnell said, the highest readings state officials could remember for someone who didn't end up dead.

The legal limit in Rhode Island is 0.08. A level of 0.30 is classified as stupor, 0.4 is comatose and 0.5 is considered fatal, according to the health department."

Helping to Make Soccer More Popular in the U.S.

 

If you don't admire our beautiful sport, you can compliment our heroic staff who help subdue disturbed airline passengers!

"Three staff members of the New England [Revolution], on an American Airlines flight from Boston to Los Angeles, helped subdue a passenger who had stripped, put his clothes back on and then tried to open an emergency exit door.

The American Airlines flight 725 was diverted to Oklahoma City after the passenger had tie wraps placed on him. He was taken off the flight and placed under mental evaluation ."

Urban Gardening at Providence Artspace Firehouse 13

Sarah Zurier set up Green Zone, a "wartime" garden installation, at Firehouse 13 in Providence.

"America has a long tradition that links cultivating gardens on the homefront to wartime conservation. Posters and other propaganda from World Wars I and II show Uncle Sam urging Americans to grow their own food in Victory Gardens. On the other hand, in the aftermath of September 11 and throughout six years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, Uncle Sam says: "Go shopping." The message persists in 2008, via stimulus checks from the IRS, despite worldwide food shortages and record-high food prices.

Green Zone at Firehouse 13 is an organic vegetable, herb, and flower garden planted in the detritus of wartime consumption: old tires, shopping bags, shoes, and other repurposed containers. The plants are mostly leafy (herbs, kale, beet greens, lettuce) or develop their fruit underground (radishes). Most of the tires were pulled out of the Woonasquatucket River during the Earth Day cleanup in April 2008.

Green Zone grows all summer long. Firehouse 13 residents will share its produce. Stop by anytime this summer, and look out for Provflux V, August 7-11. Special thanks to Southside Community Land Trust for starting many of the plants from seed"

Moose Returning to the Northeast

A nice essay by Bill McKibben (from the Patagonia catalog) on the return of the moose to the Northeast, including Massachusetts, and how moose symbolize wildness.

"There’s something prehistoric about the moose – his size, his nearsighted manner, his lack of concern. The fact that he’s been able to roam back into this most relentlessly civilized of all North American regions makes us realize it’s not quite the place we’d thought. Its presence here can’t be taken for granted. Indeed, warming temperatures mean it’s unlikely to get much farther south, and there are already signs of its range starting to constrict as temperatures rise in the upper Midwest. But for the moment, the moose is a tonic symbol that the place we live in isn’t entirely civilized. That’s the idea that conservationists most need to get their work done, the sense that this is still a natural place, indeed more natural all the time. With a moose standing insouciantly in the nearest swamp, our constricted East Coast imaginations have precious freedom to roam."

Fishers: Aggressive Weasel Species in the Suburbs

Once hunted for their fur, fishers were re-introduced to northern New England to help control porcupines.  Since their reintroduction they've been spreading out as far as Rhode Island, Connecticut and suburban Boston.

"Sinewy, with bushy tails and beady eyes, fishers weigh 5 to 15 pounds and live on land and in trees. They are mainly carnivorous, typically eating squirrels, mice, voles and other small animals, as well as nuts and seeds. Fishers are also one of the porcupine’s few enemies, killing it by attacking its snout and flipping it on its back.

“Fishers are pretty vicious,” said Michelle Johnson, the animal control officer in West Greenwich.

The fisher belongs to the mustelid family, which includes weasels, otters and wolverines. It has the aggressive, carnivorous temperament of a wolverine and can climb trees like a marten. Like weasels, a fisher will kill multiple animals at a time in a confined space. Fishers are nocturnal and not easily spotted."

Although fishers can be dangerous to small pets and livestock they aren't a threat to humans.

"In suburban Lexington, Mass., officials hung fliers in the common area of a condominium complex urging residents to keep cats and small dogs indoors because a fisher was spotted in nearby woods. In Northborough, Mass., officials put a warning in the newspaper asking that residents seal all garbage cans and refrain from putting out food for animals." (Image:  Fisher by John James Audubon)

Gatehouse's Wicked Local to Add Social Network

Considering recent questions about Gatehouse's viability, is the social network capability from TownConnect too little too late or just the right thing to build an online community?

"Through the co-branded Wicked Local People sites, residents of the 159 eastern Massachusetts communities served by GateHouse newspapers can participate in a free, secure, private network and easily organize online communities of friends, neighbors and extended families; coordinate schedules; share photos and files; and connect families, friends, and neighbors."

Why Did the Sky Turn Dark in 18th Century New England?

May 19, 1780 was a literally dark day in New England inspiring fear and puzzlement around the new states.

"At noon, it was black as night. It was May 19, 1780 and some people in New England thought judgment day was at hand. Accounts of that day, which became known as 'New England's Dark Day,' include mentions of midday meals by candlelight, night birds coming out to sing, flowers folding their petals,and strange behavior from animals. The mystery of this day has been solved by researchers at the University of Missouri who say evidence from tree rings reveals massive wildfires as the likely cause, one of several theories proposed after the event, but dismissed as 'simple and absurd.'

***
"Limited ability for long-distance communication prevented colonists from knowing the cause of the darkness. It was dark in Maine and along the southern coast of New England with the greatest intensity occurring in northeast Massachusetts, southern New Hampshire and southwest Maine. In the midst of the Revolutionary War, Gen. George Washington noted the dark day in his diary while he was in New Jersey.

Nearly 230 years later, MU researchers combined written accounts and fire scar evidence to determine that the dark day was caused by massive wildfires burning in Canada."

Are Berkshares and Other Local Currencies Effective?

Local activists in the Berkshires created a local currency called BerkShares to encourage the local economy.  Tim Harford questions whether they do any economic good but thinks they may build community ties:

"The real benefits, if they exist, are not economic but social, and best explained not by an economist like me but by a sociologist such as Ed Collom of the University of Southern Maine.

Collom's work looks, at first glance, like bad news for the community-currency movement. He has found, for example, that most currency schemes in the United States last only a few years before collapsing. The ones that thrive are in places which already have strong, liberal, middle-class communities, such as Portland, Ore., or Ithaca, N.Y. In the Rust Belt areas that would seem to need them more, they have not taken root. The schemes take a lot of effort to set up: Brixton LETS, for instance, remains nascent.

But despite the obstacles, Ed Collom is convinced that local currencies can strengthen neighborhood ties and allow people to make friends: They are a focal point for the community-minded, even when they do not last."

Tyler Cowan thinks more of the idea arguing that "private currencies can serve as a form of price discrimination.  By accepting private currency from your local customers, and indeed only your local customers, you can charge them a lower net price and without being very public about it."

Lobsters and Pesticides in Rhode Island

Are the big red bugs we like (lobsters) being killed by the same chemicals we use to get rid of the little bugs we don't like (mosquitos)?  Council members in Newport, Rhode Island think so.

"The Newport City Council voted to ban the toxic chemical methoprene from the city's mosquito abatement program at their April 9 meeting. The issue arose when Newport City Councilman Charles Y. Duncan called for a resolution that bans the use of any of the toxic poisons, such as methoprene, in the mosquito program. Methoprene is thought to be a contributing factor in the decline of the area lobster population."

The concern around methoprene is that it kills lobster larvae and opponents of the pesticide point to Maine's banning of the chemical.

"Altosid is made of methoprene, a larvicide, that when applied, reduces the number of adult mosquitoes and thus reduces human risk from mosquito borne diseases such as EEE and West Nile virus. Rhode Island lobstermen and many environmentalists oppose the use of methoprene because the chemical also kills lobster larvae.

The lobstermen argue that Maine is the only East Coast fishery where the lobster population is at acceptable, sustainable levels because, unlike other East Coast fisheries, Maine bans the use of methoprene and larvicides in its waters. Maine is also the only fishery where the lobster population does not suffer from shell disease. In all the other fisheries, Rhode Island included, lobster birth rates are noticeably below normal."

Finding "Ancient Roads" in Vermont

Towns and groups all over Vermont are engaged in researching the paths of Vermont's "ancient roads." 

"The point is to comply with a 2006 state law that gives Vermont’s cities and towns until early next year to identify all their “ancient roads.” At that point, they can add the elusive roads to official town maps, ensuring that they remain public, or turn them over to owners of adjoining land.

Unlike many other states, where towns automatically forfeit rights to roads that go unused for years, Vermont requires that they remain public until formally discontinued. That has brought fights between towns and landowners whose property abuts or even intersects ancient roads, with the towns eager to preserve public access for outdoor pursuits and the owners seeking clear titles and privacy."

It seems like a fascinating process, hopefully some of the research will be posted on the Internet:  Google Maps anyone? 

"Peter Vollers, a lawyer in Woodstock . . ., said he loved getting out and looking for hints of ancient roads: parallel stone walls or rows of old-growth trees about 50 feet apart. Old culverts are clues, too, as are cellar holes that suggest people lived there; if so, a road probably passed nearby.

Mr. Vollers heads the Vermont Expedition Society, a group of off-roaders who treasure ancient roads as a recreational asset. He recently started a company, Vermont Overland Guide Services, to help off-roaders navigate ancient roads and other rural byways."

That said, it must be nerve-wracking if you own property in Vermont and some amateur historians' fun means you will lose access to some of your land or find a troup of SUVs heading across your lawn, especially if the "road" was last used in 1795

A Documentary on a Modern Sea-Faring Maine Family

How a family spent seven years at sea before settling in Maine:

"After seven years at sea and a third child, the Martins decided to try life on land. As they traveled south, Maine was the first state on the right. They dropped anchor, built their own house, and the kids went to school in America for the first time."

Necronomichrist Thinks Athol Discriminated Against Them

Members of death metal band Necronomichrist are alleging discrimination was behind their ban from local skate park events.

"They say Athol leaders prohibited them from playing at fundraisers for a local skate park because some band members are Satanists, agnostics, Buddhist and atheist."

Not clear about discrimination but some people in Athol certainly don't like them.

""As far as I am concerned, they can go away," [Anthony Brighenti, chairman of the Athol Board of Selectmen] said. "I can't have that type of trash allowed in an open forum. Our families are more important than these particular individuals."

When your band name is a portmanteau of the Necronomicon and the Christian messiah you have to expect that some people won't appreciate it though.

Hannaford Supermarkets Hacked!

Maine-based Hannaford Brothers supermarkets, with 25 Massachusetts stores, is the latest retailer to report that outsiders gained access to its payment information compromising the security of possibly millions of customer credit and debit cards.

"Hannaford didn't mention the number of payment cards that were compromised. But citing company officials, the Associated Press reported that as many as 4.2 million credit and debit card numbers may have been taken, and that about 1,800 cases of fraud have been reported as a result of the breach thus far."

Computerworld has some interesting theories on how the theft was accomplished:

"Avivah Litan, an analyst at Gartner Inc., said that based on the alerts sent to banks by Visa and MasterCard, the intrusion at Hannaford appears to have involved the theft of magnetic stripe data from the back of credit and debit cards. Such data "can be used to make counterfeit cards," Litan noted. "Otherwise, Visa and MasterCard wouldn't have bothered notifying all these banks."

Under the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard mandated by the major credit card companies, retailers are prohibited from storing magnetic stripe data in their systems. In this case, Litan said, the card information appears to have been stolen while it was in transit from Hannaford's systems to those of the financial institution that processes transactions for the chain.

"Thieves are going after data in transit," she said, noting that as companies get better at protecting stored data, more attackers are targeting information while it's being transmitted. According to Litan, many merchants still don't encrypt such data, even though doing so is a requirement under the industry security standard, which is known by the acronym PCI."

Prostitution (indoors) is legal in Rhode Island

Law prof Eugene Volokh reminds us that prostitution (indoors) is legal in Rhode Island:

"“A lot of people don’t realize that prostitution is legal in Rhode Island if you do it indoors,” State Police Inspector Stephen Bannon testified. In an accompanying letter, State Police Supt. Col. Brendan P. Doherty noted that under current law, “persons are free to solicit sex for money in newspapers and/or over the Internet as long as the conduct that is agreed upon takes place in private.”"

Sculptures of nails by John Bisbee at the Portland Museum of Art

Nail-based sculptures by John Bisbee at the Portland Museum of Art.

"It all started when Bisbee was a student in college. He was raiding abandoned houses for found objects to use in his art when he came upon an old bucket of nails.

"I kicked the bucket and it flipped over," Bisbee recalls, "and the nails had cohered, oxidized — they'd rusted into the bucket shape. And it was just such an obvious thing of beauty — it was so clearly above anything I had ever envisioned making myself. And I sat down on the bed, and I knew that I needed to get some nails.'"

You can hear Bisbee discuss his work at the museum on March 22 at 2pm.

The exhibit ends March 23, 2008.

(Image:  Cocoon from Portland Museum of Art)

Catching up with Maine's worst toll evader (allegedly)

What happens if you just drive through the EZPass without one of those little boxes.  Well, in Maine, not much until you get near the 1300th (!) drivethrough.

"Derek M. Theriault, 28, was charged Friday with racking up roughly 1,300 toll-evasion violations totaling $1,797.50, the Portland Press-Herald reported."

Humility License Plates

Maybe they'll return them this week.  Or at least not drive to NY.

What is killing Vermont's bats?

What is killing Vermont's bats?

In mass deaths eerily reminiscent of the honeybee crisis bats hibernating in Vermont and in New York are suffering high rates of death in their winter cave homes.

"At another cave, more than 90 percent of about 15,500 bats have died since 2005, and two-thirds that remain now sleep near the cave's entrance, where conditions are less hospitable. Scientists don't know what's causing the deaths, and biologists wearing sanitary clothing and respirators to prevent the spread of disease are collecting the dead for testing as part of a state and U.S. effort.                  

"'There are an awful lot of bat people, even a month ago before we had half of this bad news, all saying the same thing. We've never seen anything like it, and we're all scared,'said Alan Hicks, the leader of the investigation for the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, in a telephone interview today."

New England Lost Ski Areas

With over 600 lost ski resorts covered, the New England Lost Ski Areas Project has tapped into a powerful nostalgia for a homier skiing environment that used to flourish in New England. 

“'The lost ski areas are closed, but they are alive in the hearts and minds of everyone who called those places home,'” said Jeremy Davis, who started the New England Lost Ski Area Project (www.nelsap.org) nine years ago. “'I can attest to that. Just read my e-mail for a week.'”

Local ski areas started to go out of business when owners were faced with rising insurance costs and a demand for more luxurious resorts.

"[T]he 1970s were hard times for operators of ski areas. There was an energy crisis, which not only cut down leisure driving by potential customers but saddled areas with higher energy prices. At the same time, liability insurance costs spiked. The histories of dozens of small ski areas end with the conclusion that it could not reopen one winter because the owners could not afford their insurance premiums.

Skiing was also a victim of its own success. With six times the number of American skiers in 1970 as in 1955, many skiers began searching for thrills beyond the local hill. And when they did visit a big resort, they rode relatively comfortable chair lifts instead of T-bars. They skied on groomed trails, many covered using something altogether new: snow-making equipment."

Global warming and a demand for even more professional and luxurious accommodations are continuing pressures.  The NELSAP site is a good reminder that are plenty of sites that still exist. There were even several ski areas in Rhode Island and at least one remains.

Mass Moments: What Happened on This Day in Massachusetts

Mass Moments is a daily podcast (and website) describing diverse historical events that took place on that day in past years.  The podcast is a minute long with more detailed information on the website.    Recent historical events of significance have included the birthday of the first African-American Harvard graduate, Bill Belichik's appointment to the Patriots' coaching job, and Boston's Great Molasses Flood.

The Vermont Independence Movement

The Second Vermont Republic is a group of Vermonters who want to secede from the United States.

"Here’s how it will be with Vermont:  The leaders of its secessionist movement, the Second Vermont Republic, want to feed, shelter, clothe, and fuel a free republic broken from the empire. This doesn’t mean the little country will sink into Albanian isolation, its citizens ceasing to trade with China or refusing to watch the rot beamed on DirecTV satellites. It will continue to be a tourist destination, its slopes welcoming New Yorkers and Quebecois equally. But the state's secesh want to keep their tax dollars at home and put them toward localized food economies (calling it "food sovereignty"), energy supplies based on wind and water, and credit lines out of community lenders freed from the distant tyrannical rate controls of central banks." (via Bookforum)

You can up with Vermont independence ideas at Vermont Commons, a newspaper and website "dedicated to the proposition that Vermonters should peaceably secede from the United States Empire and govern themselves as a more sustainable independent republic once again."

Meanwhile what might be a sign of Vermont iconoclasm or idealism, residents of Brattleboro will vote at their March 4 town meeting "on whether President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should be indicted and arrested for war crimes, perjury or obstruction of justice if they ever step foot in Vermont." (via Digg)

More on the teen trashing of the Robert Frost house in Ripton, Vermont

More on the teen trashing of the Robert Frost house in Ripton, Vermont.

"The damage left in their wake reflected some alcohol-induced mischief tinged with certain anger. Broken window, broken screen, broken dishes, broken antiques. Pieces of a broken chair used for wood in the fireplace. Gobs of phlegm spat upon hanging artwork. Vomit, urine, beer everywhere. And a blanket of yellow, pollenlike dust, discharged from fire extinguishers in parting punctuation."

**

"In conveying his disgust over this communal breach, the police sergeant employed the Frostian technique of repetition.

“'They should have known,' he said. 'They should have known.'”

(Image:  Friends of Robert Frost)

Luis Guzman likes Vermont's Cabot Cheese

Roadkill proves bobcats are living in southeastern Massachusetts

Roadkill proves bobcats are living in southeastern Massachusetts.  Coyotes not the only threat to small pets. (Image:  John James Audubon)

Cape Cod is old

Cape Cod is old:
"About a quarter of Cape residents are over 65, compared to about 13 percent nationwide.

Another telling statistic shows the Cape had 5,000 more deaths than births from 2000 to 2006, the sixth-highest percentage loss in the nation. That puts the Cape ahead of retiree-laden Florida's Pinellas, Volusia and Pasco counties."

Vermont Spirits and the Long Tail of Liquor

Vermont Spirits and the Long Tail of Liquor:  St. Johnsbury, Vermont maple sap-based vodka producer Vermont Spirits will be the first vodka distributed by beer giant Anheuser-Busch.  The Anheuser-Busch subsidiary that will handle Vermont Spirits is called Long Tail Libations so it seems like a company known for a mass product is trying to tap into two trends:  the long tail idea of a wide taste spectrum and the development of niche or specialty distilleries.

Maine law school clinic takes on the RIAA

The law student clinical program at the University of Maine School of Law is taking on the RIAA on behalf of fellow students accused of file-sharing violations.

"In what’s probably a world’s first, not lawyers, but student attorneys at the University of Maine School of Law’s Cumberland Legal Aid Clinic have themselves taken up the fight on behalf of  students.

Hannah Ames and Lisa Chmelecki from the Cumberland clinic are now officially representing two Maine students.

Ames and Chmelecki are being guided by clinic director and U of M assistant professor Deirdre Smith.

They’ve filed a reply to the US Supreme Court decision in Bell Atlantic v Twombly, and the subsequent California decision, Interscope v Rodriguez, which dismissed the RIAA’s “making available” complaint as mere “conclusory”, “boilerplate” “speculation”." 

It seems like part of a wider trend among universities and faculty recognizing that they and their students might have an interest in not acquiescing to all the demands of the RIAA.  Another example, the Oregon Attorney General is assisting the University of Oregon's response to another RIAA file-sharing case involving 17 University of Oregon students.  (via Peter Black's Freedom to Differ)

Teenage partiers trash Robert Frost's Vermont house

Teenage partiers trash archetypal New England poet Robert Frost's Vermont summer house Homer Noble Farm with vandals burning furniture for warmth:

"The intruders broke a window to get into the two-story wood frame building — a furnished residence open in the summer — before destroying tables and chairs, pictures, windows, light fixtures, and dishes. Wicker furniture and dressers were smashed and thrown into a fireplace and burned, apparently to provide heat in the unheated building.

Empty beer bottles and cans, plastic cups, and cellophane apparently used to hold marijuana were also found, according to [Sgt. Lee] Hodsden. The vandals vomited in the living room and discharged two fire extinguishers inside the building, on a dead-end road off Route 125."

Weird hyperlinking aside:  why does Yahoo News provide a link from the phrase "empty beer bottles" to a Yahoo search window?  Do they think horrified poetry fans will need an explanation of these mysterious objects?        (Image: Friends of Robert Frost)