Although normally the the geography of this blog bears no relationship to the chronology, I have decided to group all six New England states in this 1970ish time frame because it was in the early part of the 1970’s that I first visited all six states. My best memories of Vermont, however, do not spring from that decade but rather from 1998-2002 when Megan, our daughter. attended college outside Brattleboro at Marlboro College. If you don’t know Brattleboro, you really should visit. This article describes it well and recognizes it as one of the 10 best small towns in America. It is so crunchy granola that you feel healthy just walking down the main street. https://www.fodors.com/news/best-small-towns-in-usa-6591?fbclid=IwAR1MqxY_JmQVaDmXq0X4TVS8_TxlK9bfgxlR72e-WjQMYtjy3GlJRch_cyM The sign on the restroom at the crunchy granola restaurant sums it up nicely.
In 1971 my roommate from Providence and I made a weekend jaunt to Rutland, Vermont. It was Veterans’ Day, November 11th, and we labeled it a fall foliage trip. Of course New England is devoid of foliage by the 3rd week in October, although maybe that year a few leaves were hanging on in Rhode Island and we extrapolated that there would be even more in Vermont, known for its fall foliage. In any event the fall foliage trip was a bust, but nevertheless I have pleasant memories of the first trip to the Green Mountain State, the 14th state admitted to the Union, having been known as the independent Green Mountain Republic from 1777 to 1791. We visited with Maureen’s grandparents who lived in a cozy New England farmhouse outside Rutland. I bought a black and blue plaid wool lumberjack shirt at a mill in Rutland and I wore that shirt for years. It was warm and comfortable, a pleasant memory.
My two notable pre-Marlboro trips came in 1986 and again in 1996. The first trip involved an airplane ride from Augusta, Maine, to Montpelier, Vermont in a state plane with an ancient pilot who taught me, “there are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots.” Nevertheless he was willing to have me sit in the co-pilot’s seat (I declined in favor of another passenger who was only a few hours away from his pilot’s license and was a safer choice as far as I was concerned, given the possibility of a heart attack or other emergency.) The pilot was also willing to take a slight detour and circle Mount Washington, the highest peak in New England’s White Mountains. It was a four seater plane, very tiny, and some number cruncher in Augusta figured out that since three of us state workers needed to travel to Montpelier for an afternoon meeting with counterparts in the Vermont governmental hierarchy it would be cheaper to fly us over there in a state plane rather pay us to drive and pay for meals and overnight accomodations. I am glad they figured that out because it was a beautiful way to view the mountain and got us there and back in very short order.
In 1996 I returned to Vermont to attend a week long work conference at the Breadloaf School of English in Middlebury. The school is known for its writers’ workshops and its close association with the poet Robert Frost. It is a beautiful spot about eleven miles outside of town and certainly worth a visit. https://www.middlebury.edu/school-english/locations/vermont The school also has an association with Willa Cather, who once taught there, and thus two of my favorite writers have roots there. When touring Vermont it is a little off the beaten path but well worth a visit.
Speaking of off the beaten path, 1998 brought me to Marlboro, the tiniest of villages outside Brattleboro in the southern part of the state. Our daughter spent four years there at a college located on the grounds of an old dairy farm. Marlboro College was many things and it gave our daughter an outlook on life she would not have acquired at a more traditional school. Marlboro is now defunct, a victim of its small size and smaller endowment. It has merged with Emerson College in Boston and moved from the tranquil campus in the mountains to the urban landscape of downtown Boston. The famous Marlboro Music Festival still functions in the summer, bringing world renown classical musicians to the campus. The Wikipedia entry about Marlboro summarizes the history and philosophy of the college and is well worth a read. You will learn that Robert Frost was an early trustee of the college and the connection to poets in the post’s title. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marlboro_College Every year donors received a complimentary gift of college maple syrup. It really was a special place.
Of course the 4 years that Megan attended Marlboro resulted in a number of trips to Vermont. Of all those visits, the most memorable has to be her graduation in May 2002. It was around the 20th of the month, the lilacs were blooming, and a freak snowstorm arrived. Graduation morning there was about 3 inches of snow on the ground ! It was mostly gone by late afternoon. It gave us quite a shock, but did not deter the festivities. Megan’s uncles and their families and her grandmother traveled to Vermont and we rented Rudyard Kipling’s home and had a marvelous time. You might not know of Kipling’s connection to Vermont, but he did indeed have a Vermont home, Naulakha. It is gorgeous and was a great place to have a family retreat for graduation weekend. https://landmarktrustusa.org/rudyard-kiplings-naulakha You can read about Kipling’s time in Vermont and see the beautiful home and its eclectic design features by visiting the Landmark Trust USA website.
Megan and I took a vacation to Vermont during June 2021 on our way back to Maine from the Hudson Valley. It had been almost twenty years since either of us had spent any time in the state. We traveled alot of country roads and remembered why we loved the state. We stayed at a small cabin near West Dover, which was a million miles from anywhere, but it was peaceful and quiet and we visited some interesting spots, including Shelburne Farm and Woodstock up in northern Vermont (not to be confused with Woodstock, NY where the hippies gathered the summer of love.) Woodstock, Vermont is charming and well worth a visit. https://www.woodstockvt.com/
Even if you find Bernie Sanders to be a rather useless old curmudgeon, Vermont in all its glorious eccentricity is a state that should be visited and savored. And if you really want to get the feel of Vermont you can read Archer Mayer’s mystery series about the Brattleboro detective named Joe Gunther. If you like mysteries and you like Vermont, Joe Gunther fills the bill. https://www.goodreads.com/series/65524-joe-gunther
Memories - A Second Chance at Happiness 