John (Jack) Hayes - Requiescat in Pace

 This is to post a belated public farewell to a dear friend and colleague, John Hayes.  I "met" John in the early years of this blog, and some of you may remember his eclectic blog, Robert Frost's Banjo.  A musician as well as a poet, some years ago John and his partner wrote and performed on the movie track a musical score for Nell Shipman's silent film The Grub-Stake (1923) which I covered in this previous post on my Another Old Movie Blog.

Most recently, John published a three-volume book set of poetry, which I posted about here.  Another volume of poetry will be published by Askance Publishing posthumously.  He was overjoyed at the contract and the accomplishment even as he bravely faced rapidly declining health.  A gentle man of extraordinary perspective, he faced his mortality with grace and gallantry.

For many years he was also my proofreader of my books, and I will miss his friendship.  Unlike most of the dear friends I've gratefully come to know through this blog, I actually was delighted to have met John in person.  He had been living on the West Coast, but on a trip to Boston to visit his mother, he kindly made arrangements to visit me in western Massachusetts, and we went to lunch.  

I read his poems from time to time and I feel the comfort of his big heart, his intellect, and his spirituality.  He has left us in his poetry a precious gift: himself.

Here is his obituary as published in The Oregonian.

John Hayes Obituary

John (Jack Hayes, his pen name) entered the light of heaven July 12. Born in 1956 to Elizabeth (Atkinson) and John Hayes Sr. in Bellows Falls, Vt., Jack was a warm, loving man with a generous, kind spirit. He received his BA in English from UVM and his MFA in Poetry from UVA and had a lot of passions, including music, baseball, and Tai Chi, but poetry was his calling. He published 11 books of poetry, most recently Prayer Wind (Askance), and has one more collection slated for publication posthumously. In life, as in his poems, John saw beauty in the ordinary and the unordinary, often in nature. He shared music that he loved, played with, and taught both guitar and ukulele.
In 2018, John married his true love, Sandy Pullella. Besides her, he leaves behind her family; his sister, Naomi (Mort) Rosenberg; niece, Jessie; nephew, Ethan; their children; several cousins; and his beloved dog, Chloe; and cat, Curious.
John felt enormous gratitude to the Taoist Tai Chi Society, where he practiced in Portland, Ore. for many years. He developed lifelong friendships with two nuns from the Marymount Hermitage in Mesa, ID and also felt deeply connected to his editor and friend, Sheila Graham-Smith.
Thank you to the teams of Kaiser Permanente Hospice and Palliative Care, Portland, Ore., OHSU, and the Alpha One Foundation. In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to Kaiser Hospice, the Alpha One Foundation, or the Marymount Hermitage. John's body has been donated to the OHSU Body Donation Program. Mass will be at St. Andrew's Episcopal Church 7600 N. Hereford, Portland, July 28, 2024, at 10:30 a.m. 

Published by The Oregonian from Jul. 22 to Jul. 28, 2024.

Poet Jack Hayes' new work -- PRAYER WIND

Jack Hayes' recent volume of poetry, one of an ambitious three-volume project, is being published by Askance Publishing.  Prayer Wind is the first title, and is available at the Askance website, and also at Amazon and Kobo.

Here's the lovely description on the Askance website:

"Written through four difficult years, the poems reflect not only Jack’s personal journey but the hugely challenging times in which we all found ourselves. His words also reflect the cycle of the year and the pulse of nature with their inevitable highs and lows. Playful, deeply reflective, sad and joyful – Prayer Wind is all these and more.

"These are poems not to be hurried but to be read at leisure, to be savoured." 

Two earlier collections of poetry were featured on this blog previously, called The Spring Ghazals here, and The Days of Wine and Roses here.  Jack is a native Vermonter, now living in Oregon.  Read more about his journey here.  His voice is original, authentic, spiritual, contemplative, and bold.  Please have a look at the links here to get your copy of Prayer Wind.

Woodstock and Windsor - in the Middle of Vermont

A ride through Vermont today, and a few views from the middle of the state.  Above, here's the common and town center of Woodstock.

Across from the common is where you drop your letters to Santa.  But not this time of year.  A relic akin to the old hitching post.

Eastward and nestled beside the long Connecticut River (Connecticut actually meaning: long tidal river), is the town of Windsor, where we take advantage of a good day for some spring planting.

Both towns are in Windsor County, both have populations of a bit over 3,000 people, but one thrived in the Industrial Revolution, and the other remained largely agricultural.  Windsor is where those rebellious free thinkers wrote themselves a Constitution, broke off from Mother England, and declared the Republic of Vermont.

We previously covered the Windsor-Cornish Covered Bridge here, one of the longest covered bridges in the world, where you can slip over to New Hampshire if you want to.  Go ahead, I'll wait.

New England Vampires

With Halloween approaching this week, we give thought to an episode in New England history when vampires were thought to dwell among us.

Not vampires like Dracula, but it was very common in the folklore of New England, even unto the early 1800s, that death by consumption—or tuberculosis as we now call it—was due to the souls of the dead feeding on the living.

Tuberculosis is a bacterial infection, easily spread among people in close quarters.  Entire families were wiped out by the disease, but with absolutely no knowledge of germs, the infected victims and their frightened relatives sought other answers.

In rural New England, folklore persisted that in order to stop the disease, the body of a family member who died of it would be exhumed, and ritually desecrated in various manners—the organs would be removed and burned, or the head decapitated, or the body simply turned over to face downward.

It might have given a panicked family a night’s sleep to think they’d solved the problem, but the ritual obviously did nothing to curb the consumption of remaining family members.

A fascinating article on the subject by Abigail Tucker, which begins with an eerie investigation into an unmarked graveyard and leads to incidents in Griswold, Connecticut; Woodstock, Vermont; Plymouth, Massachusetts; and Exeter, Rhode Island; was published in Smithsonian magazine in October 2012, and reads like a mystery novel, an historical documentary, and a tantalizing ghost story.  You can read it here.

 

Hard Labor in New England

A few photos in anticipation of the upcoming Labor Day holiday.  Once upon a time, it meant more than the last backyard barbecue of summer.

The Fisk, Chicopee, Massachusetts, likely in the late 1930s.  Image Museum website.

 

 

 

Isaac Prouty Boot & Shoe Co, Spencer, Massachusetts, Spencer Historical Museum Collections. Richard Sugden Library, Spencer, Massachusetts.

 

 

Skinner Mfg. Co., Holyoke, Mass. Image Museum website.  See here for my previous posts on the Skinner silk mills: http://newenglandtravels.blogspot.com/2012/01/william-skinners-silk-mills-holyoke.html

http://newenglandtravels.blogspot.com/2013/07/doris-tanguay-at-william-skinner-mfg-co.html

http://newenglandtravels.blogspot.com/2013/07/doris-tanguay-at-skinner-company.html

 

 

 

War worker in 1942.  Gilbert Company, New Haven, Connecticut.  Photo Howard Hollem, Office of War Information.  See here for my previous post on women war workers:

http://newenglandtravels.blogspot.com/2013/07/ladies-who-were-wows-springfield-armory.html

 

 

Boys who worked at a cotton mill in North Pownal, Vermont, 1910. 

Lewis Wickes Hine, photographer, Library of Congress

 

 

Eastport, Maine, East Coast Canning Co., 1911,

Lewis Wickes Hine photographer, Library of Congress

 

 

Fiskeville, Rhode Island, Jackson Mill, 1909,

Lewis Wickes Hine photographer, Library of Congress

 

 

There but for the union go I.  Or you.  Happy Labor Day.

 

 

 



You Are Here - Chester, Vermont

Even though the signal lights aren't flashing, always be careful crossing railroad tracks like these here in Chester, Vermont.  In the cartoons, somebody's always getting flattened by a train that zooms right in front of them the minute they put a toe on the track.  Wile E. Coyote, mostly.

Latchis Hotel - Brattleboro, Vermont

The Latchis Hotel and Theater in Brattleboro, Vermont is an Art Deco blast from the past, with a confident future and a vital place in this community.


Built in 1938, the hotel and movie theater under one roof is on the National Register of Historic Buildings. The hotel offers modern amenities, and the theater provides a mix of film, lectures and live entertainment.

Have a look at this website for more on the Latchis.

Village Green - Woodstock, Vermont

The town common, or village green in Woodstock, Vermont. It is early spring, and the activities held here by the community are for another day. Today, we have it all to ourselves.


If you want to know more about Woodstock, here’s the marker right on the green to fill you in. These are the facts.  I like the one about it being the the site of the first ski-tow in the US, in 1934.

Poet William Blake provides some color commentary in “The Echoing Green”:

The sun does arise,


And make happy the skies.


The merry bells ring


To welcome the spring.


The skylark and thrush,


The birds of the bush,


Sing louder around,


To the bells’ cheerful sound,


While our sports shall be seen


On the echoing green.






Old John with white hair


Does laugh away care,


Sitting under the oak,


Among the old folk.


They laugh at our play,


And soon they all say:


‘Such, such were the joys


When we all, girls and boys,


In our youth-time were seen


On the echoing green.’






Till the little ones weary


No more can be merry;


The sun does descend,


And our sports have an end.


Round the laps of their mother


Many sisters and brothers,


Like birds in their nest,


Are ready for rest;


And sport no more seen


On the darkening green.



William Blake (1757-1827)

Chester, Vermont Train Depot

Another Chester, another depot...

A couple of weeks ago we covered the Chester, Connecticut filming locations of the movie "It Happened to Jane" (1959).  Among those photos was the whistle stop Chester depot.

Here's another cozy train depot in Chester, Vermont.  You can stop here on the Green Mountain Flyer.

Like this one.



A Stroll from New Hampshire to Vermont

A little walk from New Hampshire to Vermont involves a little bridge.  Here we begin in Hanover, New Hampshire in the northern part of the state.

Across the Connecticut River in Norwich, Vermont, we come upon the site of a first settler, cabin long gone.  Only the historical marker to tell the tale.







Briggs Opera House - White River Junction, Vermont

Here, photographed in warmer days, is the Briggs Opera House of White River Junction, Vermont. It is a small, but vibrant, theater nestled in a great battleship of a building, the Gates-Briggs Building on North Main Street.

The building has stood here since 1890, and the theater, once called the Gates Opera House, was for many decades home to concerts, rallies, ceremonies, boxing and other sports, community theatre, and survived a fallow period from the mid 1980s until 1997 when the Northern Stage theatre company took over.

Any community is fortunate to have live theater, especially so to have it grace a stately building right in its downtown.

The Northern Stage produces a full season of plays and musicals. Its current show, “Annie” runs through this Sunday, January 8th.

Here’s the remainder of the season:

“Les Liaisons Dangereuses”

by Christopher Hampton, from the novel by Choderlos de Laclos

January 18 - February 5, 2012

As the French Revolution approaches, a treacherous man and woman devise a cruel game intended to betray a married woman and a young lady fresh from a convent.

“M. Butterfly”

by Henry David Hwang

February 15 - March 4, 2012

A French diplomat, caught up in the swirl of Maoist China in the 1960s, becomes obsessed with a Chinese opera performer, leading to mystery, diplomatic intrigue and a star-crossed 20-year romance. Based on real events, this Broadway sensation won the Tony Award and Drama Desk Award for Best Play and was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.

“Red”

by John Logan

March 14 - April 1, 2012

New York, 1958. In a tension-filled studio, painter Mark Rothko works furiously to complete a definitive work for an extraordinary setting. As the huge project takes shape, his internal struggle to reconcile his growing wealth with his artistic integrity threatens to destroy him.

“Chicago”

Book by Fred Ebb and Bob Fosse, Music by John Kander, Lyrics by Fred Ebb, based on the play by Maurine Dallas Watkins

April 11 - May 6, 2012

Shocking secrets are revealed in this story of crime, greed and corruption. Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly, showgirls convicted of murder, fight for attention in the press. From "All That Jazz" to "Razzle Dazzle," the songs are as hot as the Prohibition-era setting.

For more on Northern Stage, have a look at this website.

Taftsville Covered Bridge - Woodstock, Vermont

The Taftsville Covered Bridge crosses the Ottauquechee River. We’re in Woodstock, Vermont.

Build in 1836, it’s one of the oldest covered bridges in Vermont.

It’s stretches 189 feet over two spans, with a Multiple Kingpost truss. It was renovated in the 1950s, more repairs in the 1990s. Artists like to paint it. Placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

These pictures are from before.

In August this year, it was battered by rising floodwaters when the storm Irene made a rude and impromptu visit to New England. Though still standing, it’s unsafe for auto traffic now and closed. Here is a brief video clip showing the bridge standing up to the raging Ottauquechee. Before this, it was slated to undergo further renovation.



Plans at this point are for repairs next summer. Life goes on after storms, and sometimes, so do covered bridges.

Lincoln Covered Bridge - Woodstock, Vermont

Here is the Lincoln Covered Bridge in Woodstock, Vermont. These photos were taken before Hurricane Irene, but the bridge is still safe and standing, as it has since it was built in 1877.

The bridge is open to auto traffic, one lane only, spanning the Ottauquechee River. Have a look here for more on the Lincoln Covered Bridge.

 

Bridge of Flowers - Shelburne Falls, Mass

Here is the Bridge of Flowers in Shelburne Falls, western Massachusetts on another beautiful fall day. Our beautiful fall tourist season is fast approaching, though with a few less trees this year. Just this past weekend with Hurricane, then Tropical Storm Irene, the Bridge of Flowers faced another weather challenge from the rapidly rising Deerfield River.

Rivers become angry, scary creatures in the wake of too much rain or snow melt, and as we have often seen, can do terrific damage. Smaller hill towns can find themselves isolated, without power, emergency assistance, or escape. Irene could have been much worse, but a storm is never a good thing under the best of circumstances. In the past, the odd hurricanes that meander up here often destroy businesses that never reopen. It is sometimes easier for us to put a number on the horrific loss of life than it is to account for jobs and income lost.

We don’t know yet what the extent of damage and loss still occurring in Vermont. Many communities are isolated from washed-out roads. Some of Vermont’s celebrated covered bridges are damaged or swept away.

The Bridge of Flowers may have a happier fate. It has a modest history, the pride of this small town of Shelburne Falls. It had been a trolley bridge built in 1908 by the Shelburne Falls & Colrain Street Railway. It connected Shelburne Falls and Buckland across the Deerfield River. The trolley company went bankrupt in 1927 (another flood year, as it happens), when more people and goods began to be transported by car and truck. You can see the old restored No. 10 trolley and more info at the Shelburne Falls Trolley Museum. Have a look at this website.

The year after the trolley bridge was discontinued, in a series of public spiritedness and plain good ideas, the bridge was bought by the Shelburne Falls Fire District, and the Shelburne Falls Woman’s Club sponsored a project to turn the old railway bridge into a unique garden. In the spring of 1929, loads of loam and fertilizer were laid out on the bridge, and donated labor created a garden and a pathway through which one could stroll from Buckland to Shelburne Falls along one of the prettiest routes ever created.

In the earlier 1980s, the community again banded together to restore the aging Bridge of Flowers.  For more information on the Bridge of Flowers, have a look here.

In weeks to come I’ll try to post more on some of Vermont’s covered bridges, both ones that were swept away and those that remain. Unfortunately, it will take some weeks for the Green Mountain State to even assess the ruin left by Tropical Storm Irene. One can only speculate at this time if their upcoming beautiful fall tourist season may be one of those casualties.

Constitution House - Windsor, Vermont

Here at Elijah West’s tavern in Windsor, Vermont along the Connecticut River, the locals decided in July of 1777 to make this place a free and independent republic. There were a few things to iron out of course, land grants claimed by New Hampshire across the river, and claims by New York on the other side (independence from its neighbors more than independence from Great Britain was the main issue at this stage), and then this whole Revolutionary War hullabaloo. Also, a few months earlier it was decided in a preliminary vote to call the whole prospect “New Connecticut”.

But (we may presume) over a tankard or two, they got down to business and decided that Vermont would be the name (a derivation of the French verd mont -- green mountains), and that their constitution would be a bit different to what had been hammered out by the other states. Vermont was the first to outlaw slavery, and to assure universal voting rights for men whether or not they owned property. Vermont was also the first to establish free public schools.

Having got that out of the way, it was another decade after the Revolutionary War ended that they got around to shedding their Republic and joining the United States in 1791. Vermonters like to be sure, and they seem to have decided the USA was going to work out all right.

For more on the Constitution House, now a museum, have a look at this website.

New England State Symbols

There is an astonishing collection of state symbols in New England, most of which most of us probably have never heard of, until reading trivia lists like this:

The state shellfish of Connecticut is the Eastern oyster. Massachusetts has the New England Neptune as its state shell. Vermont seems to do all right without a state shell or shellfish.

Birds are popular state symbols. Rhode Island has its Rhode Island Red chicken, Connecticut took the robin, which departs in winter so one wonders how reliable a state bird that is. Both Maine and Massachusetts of course have the Chickadee, mainly or Mainely because Maine was once part of Massachusetts -- which also explains the coincidence of the mayflower being the state flower. That and Patriot’s Day.

Vermont has red clover for its flower, and milk for its state beverage. Three cheers and a milk mustache for the dairy industry in Vermont. Maine’s state beverage is Moxie, which you need to drink the stuff.

Berries are awfully important, too. The cranberry belongs to Massachusetts, and Maine’s is the wild blueberry.

The state rock in New Hampshire is granite, of course. It’s marble in Vermont, and cumberlandite in Rhode Island. Don’t suppose there are too many countertops or statues made of the slightly magnetic cumberlandite, but maybe some of our readers can educate us about that.

Unusual in the world of state symbols is the category of state folk art symbol -- Rhode Island has the Crescent Park carousel. Not to be outdone in fringe symbols, Massachusetts has a state donut -- the Boston Crème, and a state cookie, the Toll House, or chocolate chip cookie to you.

Both Massachusetts and Vermont have chosen the Morgan horse for its state horse. And for its state ship, Connecticut adopted the nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus. Vermont has a state flavor -- maple, of course. Massachusetts has a state children’s book author, Dr. Seuss, who lost out to state children’s book -- which is Robert McCloskey’s “Make Way for Ducklings”.

Many of these symbols are references to aspects of our history or culture, though one may be hard pressed to discover why Connecticut required the praying mantis for its state insect. There’s a lot of important voting going on in the state houses. They might do some of it if there’s any time left over after voting on state cat, state fossil, and state polka.

"The Spring Ghazals" by Jack Hayes

There are splinters of imagery, of memory, that weave a complicated pattern from very simple triggers of thought in the latest book of poetry published by Jack Hayes, called “The Spring Ghazals.” We skip from

a transistor radio crackling a Red Sox game thru a
Rockingham VT hemlock green spring evening a screened-in porch in
1966 listening to balls & strikes with a man whose breathing was
labored – he did sit quiet in hemlock green air rising from the green
Connecticut River the house built into it had hemlock green
trim…

To images of San Francisco and of Idaho, where this Vermont-born poet now lives.

A ghazal is a particular kind of poem structure that has its roots in 6th century Arabic verse, and traveled about the globe through Persia and Asia, and in 19th century Europe, where Goethe introduced this poetic form that became very popular in Germany. A ghazal is defined not just by its formal structure, but by the subject. It deals with the pain of lost love or love unrequited, or separation.

Mr. Hayes, whose previous volume of poetry, “Days of Wine &, Roses” we discussed in this post from March, also performs as a blues musician, and writes the blog (as John Hayes) “Robert Frost’s Banjo.” “The Spring Ghazals” is a deeply personal journey through decades, and geography, through memories so sharp and clear we seem to share them.

Poem titles such as “what can we talk about that will take all night?” and “Pasta Alleluia” evoke intimacy in the mode ordinary of settings where the mind, and heart, wanders to other days and back again.

to the splinters of imagery in language that is simple, but precise:

A cigarette butt in a puddle outside the hospital

Or

A portion of silence

Or,

The blue scar of morning’s twilight a tightrope you’re walking between the day &  night

Skipping back to Vermont, by way of Charlottesville, Virginia, by way of an Idaho kitchen. We skirt by

A Quonset hut hulking in January drizzle

And

A chowder shack in Bodega Bay.

It’s a long way to go, but we always end up back at the beginning, if only to marvel how far we’ve come.
In his post on his other blog dedicated to “The Spring Ghazals”, John relates the bittersweet real-life story behind this collection of poems. Have a look here. You can also hear him read aloud a few selections, which I recommend as he has an excellent voice and timbre for reading poetry.

“The Spring Ghazals” is available on this website.

Pres. Calvin Coolidge State Historic Site - Plymouth Notch, Vermont

The boyhood home of President Calvin Coolidge in Plymouth Notch, Vermont, is currently undergoing renovation.

On August 23, 1923, President Warren G. Harding died, and Vice President Coolidge, who was up here at his parents’ home on vacation, received the shocking news from Washington. A few minutes later, Coolidge placed his hand on the family bible. His father, a notary public, administered the oath of office, making his son President of the United States. The simple protocol was undertaken by the light of a kerosene lamp.

This quiet, rural farmhouse entered history. Even “Silent Cal”, looking back on the event, understood the remarkable greatness and poignancy of the moment.

"It seemed a simple and natural thing to do at the time,” he wrote, “but I can now realize something of the dramatic force of the event."

The President Calvin Coolidge State Historic Site is comprised of 560 acres and several buildings, all preserved as they were, including a general store, barns, church, and the dance hall that was referred to as the Summer White House of the Coolidge presidency. That one’s a little hard to imagine, isn’t it? You’re just going to have to see for yourself. But not this season, there’s too much work to be done. Put it on your calendar for next year, after they’ve got it all spruced up for you.

For more on the President Calvin Coolidge State Historic Site, have a look at this website.

Quechee Gorge - Vermont

The Quechee Gorge is sometimes called Vermont’s Grand Canyon. This nickname is not so much a comparison of the Gorge to the Grand Canyon, but comparing it to the rest of New England’s glacial gouges.

New England has, for the most part, a fairly gentle landscape. Catching an eyeful of the Quechee Gorge is a jaw-dropper, I suppose because it’s sudden depth and craggy walls are not what you’d expect on your average country drive. It was formed some 13,000 years ago by glacial movement, which left a 165-foot slash in the earth, at the bottom of which lies the Ottauqhechee River, still rumbling along, oblivious to the gawkers on the bridge above.

There are trails here, and a nearby shopping plaza to catch the tourists who, driving unsuspectingly on Route 4 (that’s “root”), yank the car over to the side of the road after crossing that bridge with the surprising view. You might want to come and have a look for yourself.

For more on the Quechee Gorge, have a look at this website.

New England Train Routes

New London Amtrak station

This Saturday marks National Train Day sponsored by Amtrak. There are a number of events tied to the celebration, the purpose of which is to foster education and interest on train travel in this country.

Interest in future commuter and high-speed rail systems has accelerated, if you will, with federal rail stimulus funding appropriated to Massachusetts last fall to rebuild the rail line to Vermont. A feasibility study may be conducted on a high-speed link from western Mass. to Boston.

Commuter rail service is spotty in New England where once train travel was proliferate. The new scheme to improve commuter service from Connecticut to Vermont recalls the days of over 40 years ago and the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad, when commuter rail linked Springfield to New Haven. The new projected route through Springfield, Holyoke, Northampton, and Greenfield to Vermont is being referred to as the Knowledge Corridor.

Part of the rail stimulus funs will also go to extending Amtrak’s current Downeaster route beyond Portland to Brunswick.

Amtrak currently offers several regional routes which service New England. Have a look at these pages on the Amtrak website for more detail:

The Vermonter, the Downeaster, the Lake Shore Limited, the Ethan Allen Express, the Northeast Regional, and of course the only "high-speed" route, the Acela Express.

Looking down the corridor of a sleeper car.

New England also has a variety of tourist excursion trains which use restored cars from bygone eras to remind us, or give us our first taste, of what train travel was like when it was much more common. Here are a few train adventures you might like to try:

The Essex Steam Train of Essex, Connecticut. The Green Mountain Railroad in Vermont. The Cape Cod Central Railroad in Hyannis, and the Berkshire Scenic Railway from Lenox to Stockbridge, Mass. New Hampshire can boast the most scenic railroads out of any New England state, and here is a website that will link you to a variety of them. The Conway Scenic Railroad in Conway is one of them.

The Green Mountain Railroad at the Bellows Falls station.

Maine has its Maine Eastern Railroad from Rockland to Brunswick, and even little Rhode Island has its Old Colony and Newport Railway. If you’ve traveled on any of these trains, let us know what you thought.

For more on National Train Day, have a look at this website.