So, why should one read a local newspaper?

So, why should one read a local newspaper?

• Res audita perit, litera scripta manet: A thing heard perishes; the written letter remains.

by Manfried Rieder Starhemberg

The old Latin phrase pretty much sums it up: The written letter remains. Think about it how often you have seen one of your friends or relatives bring out a scrapbook with newspaper clippings from the past. There is the wedding announcement of uncle John and his bride Agatha in Barton, the high school reunion pictures or that winning touchdown when your father was 16 years old and they won the pennant. Or the touching obituary of some one's mother, lovingly written by an old friend and preserved forever in the browning pages of the Newport Daily Express or the Barton or St. Jonesbury paper. Those are priceless memories my friends and as the sages of old knew "A thing heard perishes..."

How many news stories that one sees on the TV become important memories? Not many. Which brings me to the above posted question:"Why should one read a local newspaper"?

The answer is manifold but simply put, a local paper, written by local residents and supported by local advertisers is the only true window of today's happenings in that particular community and shall be a valuable tool for future historians, future town planners, able to see successes and failures in the infrastructure of a region as it has developed over time and it will be the timeless chronicle of an era in which we are the current residents, administrators, teachers or preachers, dreamers or criminals.

For the past two centuries the local papers have preserved what no electronic media of today can ever do - it allows us to glimpse into the past through the eyes of those reporters, editors and publishers who had put the paper together, often with thinly masked motifs, political bias or even structured to cater to a favored group of advertisers or religious elements. But even that is a valuable chronicle as we have the benefit of hindsight and can now easily see through those machinations in view of the recorded history of the period. We would not know of the minutiae of life in America through the years of the Civil War, nor understand the vagaries of the local economies which have structured our history and developed our communities to where they are today.

Right here in Newport we have a rich and diversified history and, just for an example, in today's paper (Tuesday, October 22) there is a story about the lumber mills which stood on the site of the Eastside restaurant. The story fascinated me as I am familiar with the place and today I walked the grounds, trying to feel the smell of the steam machinery, see the log rafts or the barges from Prouty Bay to the area behind Waterfront Plaza, envision the rail yard with hundreds of cars laden with lumber. Just this small story demonstrates how valuable our local paper(s) are. For 50 Cents I got an inexpensive history lesson which gave me great pleasure.

But it does not end there. Let us look at the paper as a whole for a moment:

First, it is not a Pulitzer prize winning issue, there are no world class editorials, none of the stories will ever show up in syndication and after this day, few will remember it; Yet the members of the North Country boys cross country team  featured in a photo by Christina Cotnoir on page One will probably keep a copy of the page to show their grand children some day and I assume that the Student Athlete of the week, Ryan Paul, will not discard his picture of page six. The families and friends of Red Lontine Sr., Alfred A. Durocher or Mark Noel Perry will hang on to the obituaries written about their loved ones. Nobody will keep the Vista ad with today's specials but as a lover of a good beef stew, I for one will avail myself of the bottom round stew beef for $ 3.49 per pound while my wife Nancy has cut out the great pork recipes featured on page nine. Of course I already did the crossword puzzle after breakfast and looked at the classified advertisements which still did not have a needed $ 500.- inspected pickup truck but had a job offer for a marina yard laborer. I love boats and even know how to drive any size travel lift to haul them out, but at 65 years of age I doubt they would hire me. And there is always the advertisement "Not Bob's" for the removal of junk cars. I always wonder who "Bob" is or was and what he did to deserve the "Not Bob" moniker. Historians looking at this paper 100 years from now will possibly ponder the same question. Maybe dissertations will be written about it.

Well, I think you got my drift. Just by reading the local paper you become a member of the community as it enriches your experience as a resident, brings you closer to the daily life of the city and the surrounding country and even tells you what is going on, where the good church suppers are and where to get that old car repaired. It explains local doings and planned developments, introduces you to people who do things well and sadly also chronicles the darker side of the community through police and court reports. While many think that it is unnecessary to report those things, it is a proven fact that the threat of being exposed publicly has been a significant deterrent in the case of repeat offenders.

So, remember that you and your community will live on forever in the pages of even this humble paper which  makes it a valuable local resource and future treasure trove!

The Death of a Willow Tree

By Manfried Rieder Starhemberg

Monday was a sad day at the Eastside Restaurant in Newport. The beautiful waterfront had been graced by a stately willow tree for decades and the tree which had grown into a huge arch, has been the backdrop for many a tourist photo, has been a feature in wedding albums or served as a meeting spot for romance. It is no more. Eastside's owner Dena Gray, always vigilant of everything that is changing on her property detected changes in the tree and after examination it was found that the old landmark had become dangerously rotten even though it looked fine from the outside.

Arborist Don Poutre was engaged to deal with it and he did in great style. The tree came down in great style, all of its eighty feet splashing into the lake, revealing that the lower core of it was hollowed by rot. Don had to cut this massive monster bit by bit, standing on the tree right on the lake, attaching chains and eventually "landing" each section by dragging it ashore with his tractor.

Mr. Poutre was kind enough to cut a slice of the trunk so that we could try to count the tree rings to determine the age of the fallen landmark and we were able to count some 80 rings but the tree might be older than that because some of the rings were very small and only an expert examination would yield its true age but it does not really matter as it will live on in the photo albums of thousands of visitors to Newport and the Eastside restaurant.

Vermont Wife Carrying Championship and Lawnmower Racing Cup?

If they can do it in Finland we can do it in Vermont!
By Manfried Rieder Starhemberg

Wife carrying (Finnish: eukonkanto or akankanto, Swedish: kärringkånk, Estonian: naisekandmine) is a sport in which male competitors race while each carrying a female teammate. The objective is for the male to carry the female through a special obstacle track in the fastest time. The sport was first introduced at Sonkajärvi, Finland.

Several types of carry may be practised: piggyback, fireman's carry (over the shoulder), or Estonian-style (the wife hangs upside-down with her legs around the husband's shoulders, holding onto his waist).

Wife Carrying World Championships are held annually in Sonkajärvi, Finland since 1992 (where the prize depends on the wife's weight in beer).

The North American Wife Carrying Championships take place every year on Columbus Day Weekend in October at Sunday River Ski Resort in Newry, Maine.

BUT WE ALL KNOW THAT MAINE AND FINLAND ARE FOREIGN COUNTRIES and we must have our own championship right here in Vermont.

I propose to do this in Barton because they have 1.) the required amount of strong men and presumably willing females in the surrounding hills and 2.) a lovely oval racetrack which we will need for the second part of our biathlon: The Vermont Riding Lawnmower Races.Lawnmower races are held in various parts of the United states and there is even a lawnmower racing association but we don't need to get that serious about it at this stage.
Generally, there are a number of classes depending on the size of the motor and the sharp bits that eat the grass have to be removed in order to avoid grudge races or accidental homicide like we do in hunting season in New England.

Now pay close attention to this: Being a competitor at our lawnmower championship is serious business and will involve an almost year-round state of preparedness which of course means that the mower with its rotating or spinning parts removed, can no longer be used for the mundane task of actually cutting your lawn. As organizers, we would issue a plaque to all contestants that certifies that he or she is a registered racing driver and thus fully absolved in the non-maintenance of mow able landmasses. In case an entrant has actually two riding mowers, it will suffice to state that the second one is the backup racing vehicle and all the aforementioned non-mowing regulations will apply to this mower as well. And this alone should be initiative enough for us to be able to garner a large competitive field of well rested Vermonters and their scythe yielding wives or girlfriends.
This now leads us back to the first part of the biathlon: the wife carrying competition. With the wives  having done all the menial yard work by hand, they should be trim and slim and our well rested non mowers strong and healthy which should add to the competitiveness of the race.

Wikipedia has this to say about the history of this noble athletic event:

There are many thoughts to how this sport first originated in Finland. Tales have been passed down from one person to another about a man named Herkko Rosvo-Ronkainen. This man was considered a robber in the late 1800s, lived in a forest, and ran around with his gang of thieves causing harm to the villages. From what has been found, there are three ideas to why/how this sport was invented. First, Rosvo-Ronkainen and his thieves were accused of stealing food and women from villages in the area he lived in; then carried these women on their backs as they ran away, (hence the “wife” or women carrying). For the second idea, it has been said that young men would go to villages near their own, steal other men’s wives, and then have the woman become their own wife. These wives were also carried on the backs of the young men; this was referred to as “the practice of wife stealing." Lastly, there was the idea that Rosvo-Ronkainen trained his thieves to be “faster and stronger” by carrying big, heavy sacks on their backs, which could have eventually evolved to a sport because of the hard labor (endurance), and muscle strengthening; which most sports ensure. Even though this sport has been considered by some as a joke, competitors take it very seriously, just like any other sport.

The Rules are as follows and we could certainly make up our own as we Vermonters always do but here it is nevertheless:

The original course is a rough, rocky terrain with fences, and brooks, but has been altered to suit modern conditions. There is now sand instead of full rocks, fences are still on the course, and some kind of area filled with water (a pool). These are the following rules set by the International Wife Carrying Competition Rules Committee:

• The length of the official track is 253.5 meters
• The track has two dry obstacles and a water obstacle, about one meter deep
• The wife to be carried may be your own, the neighbor's, or you may have found her further afield; she must, however, be over 17 years of age
• The minimum weight of the wife to be carried is 49 kilograms. If she is less than 49 kg, the wife will be burdened with a rucksack containing additional weight such that the total load to be carried is no less than 49 kg.
• All participants must enjoy themselves
• The only equipment allowed is a belt worn by the carrier, the carried must wear a helmet.
• The contestants run the race two at a time, so each heat is a contest in itself
• Each contestant takes care of his/her safety and, if deemed necessary, insurance
• The contestants have to pay attention to the instructions given by the organizers of the competition
• There is only one category in the World Championships and the winner is the couple who completes the course in the shortest time
• Also the most entertaining couple, the best costume, and the strongest carrier will be awarded a special prize.

Summing this up, I have to admit that we organizers who are as of this date me and my wife Nancy and "the other two guys who have not asked their wives for permission", had originally intended to propose this international Vermont Biathlon to be part of the EB-5 initiative much like the Renaissance Block or the Waterfront Convention Center and Marina but then we decided that we should make this an all Vermont event without offering green cards to far East investors because our project is doable without having our governor fly to China or Vietnam or talk to the United Arab Emirates about it. It is one of those grass roots things we do so well ourselves and since nothing is getting mowed next year, we will certainly have an abundance of grass roots to play with.

Ending this, I am serious about this event and should like to hear from people interested in getting this done. I do not believe that my Internet is monitored by Homeland Security, so your wife will not know about it if you talk to me!

My e-mail is:

mapleleafpress@yahoo.com

A whole new tourism idea for Vermont:

By Manfried Rieder Starhemberg

Folks, I do not eat game because it tastes gamy, my idea of the "wild outdoors" is a night at a Howard Johnson's and I certainly would never hurt Bambi. But - living in northern Vermont I have to recognize that I am surrounded by seasonal hunters and gatherers and while in the rest of the country they call the gatherers "pickers" and the hunters are a two week a year nuisance, well, Vermonters live and breathe the out of doors. And not just for the few days of the hunting season neither - they gather around the fire or the table at the pub and tell never ending hunting stories from New years after the tree has been de-needled until the beginning of the annual hunt. If they don't talk about it, they buy guns, swap guns, long to go to gun shows, some spend weeks of oiling and cleaning the arsenal, others have their own loading equipment and brass polishing gizmo. The rest of them play with their knifes, find new different looking suspenders, add to the collection of loud flannel shirts and polish their boots.Few forget to send in the annual NRA membership dues. Thankfully, I have my own camouflage, from proper hat to checkered shirt so that I am able to sneak through town, buy my groceries and make it home safely as I try to blend in with the locals. Driving a mean old green 4-wheel drive Range rover with the appropriate amount of dents, rust and the big lights in front also helps.

See anyone?

So, having fallen in love with Vermont I feel that I should contribute to the general welfare of the state and I propose a whole new tourism concept; The "Deer hunter for a Day" concept which should be easily marketable to all those gray and desperately sullen millionaire layers, dentists, stock brokers currently not in jail and every current or former politician that has grown too old to engage in the pursuit of sex.

I feel that my beloved Newport would make a fine testing site for the Flannel and Suspender experience. There is plenty of room downtown to rent a cheap store front locale and staff it with a wholesome Vermont country girl in appropriate attire which could be modeled after any episode of the Little House on the Prairie. Then we decorate the outside with a minimum of two big wooden wagon wheels and one large sleigh or three or four smaller toboggans. A pair or two of old wooden skies (crossed of course) will have to be over the door and the regulation broken-down snowshoes can easily be found at the next church bazaar.

Inside we need an old wooden desk with a lot of burn marks and rings made by beer or coffee mugs. A large uncomfortable bench and a few unstable kitchen chairs will round up the furnishings. This we call the Tourist Hunting Blind.

Now we are almost in business. In Vermont tradition we organizers of this new venue will all call for a meeting at Jasper's in downtown Newport City to plan strategy. My plan is simple. We all donate our old hunting clothes the goodwill people would not take and label them by size. They cannot be cleaned under any circumstances. Next we need some non-functional guns, old shotguns with rusted up mechanisms would be preferred but we can certainly take the noise making stuff out of that old 22 and it would serve very well.All this must be enshrined in a gun cabinet. Yes, aunt Gwendolyn's unused jam cupboard would do nicely. Out of courtesy to our expected guests I would actually suggest we buy a few pair of black rubber boots. This mainly so as not to soil the floors of our tourist transport vehicles. Those will need some contemplation. Arguably it would be best if they had at least some mechanical functionality so it might be best to take the snowplow off the old rusted up GMC on the left rear of the barn. You see where I am getting at here; We need authentic hunting vehicles. They cannot start every time, this would take some of the suspense right out of it. The old trucks must also be authentically rusty and muddy because they will be the backdrop of many a cherished photo our guests will hand down for generations to come.

Now that we have the infrastructure well in hand we have to plan excursions for our guests. Most of those who will participate have favorite hunting grounds and since we will do everything but hunt, it should be easy to establish a fire pit, a cooler full of beer and blackberry brandy or even Vermont Applejack. What to grill on the fire will be left to the imagination of the individual tour guide and his sense of humor.

The way I figure it is, when our guests arrive, having been lured up here by tasteful advertisements in the New Yorker, we let them put on the hunting clothes, buy them breakfast at the nearest diner and drag them into the woods for a day of "The authentic Vermont country experience". It will be perfectly o.k. if our guides smoke, chew tobacco or use genuine country language. For those of them who might have forgot of how she is spoke there will be refresher courses after the first-aid training session. 

Lodgings for our visitors should ideally also be provided by the guides and their family if they own a farm, old building way back in the countryside, preferably with a functioning outhouse or know how to trespass at an unused campsite. If it becomes a huge success, we will have the means to buy some old farm houses for just that purpose and dilapidated them until they are suitable rustic.

Well, this is the general outline. I figure we could charge about $ 600.-/day of which half will go to the guide because he is providing transportation and lodging. The other half will keep our office and advertising paid and the authentic Vermont farm woman office manager will get a good salary as well. I assume that the state of Vermont will also give us some money to offset the cost of advertising and I expect a huge tax break since we are advocating Eco-tourism at its finest with no intrusive hotels, water  parks, disco pubs or polluting marina facilities to build and sustain.

Green tourism in the green mountains. All we are missing is that big plywood moose with the hole in the face where people can stick their head into to have their picture taken when they are all garbed out as deerstalkers with their ancient shotguns poised and ready.