We Were Crafty in NH

We went to a crafts fair this past Tuesday — not an ordinary fair, but a special one that specifically highlights the handicrafts and talents of many NH artists. 

Suspended in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, the League of NH Craftsmen Fair returned to the grounds of the Mount Sunapee Resort in Newbury, NH, for its 88th annual event.

We spent a couple of hours exploring the many exhibit booths and managed to leave without a single purchase, other than the admission fee. There were countless displays of handmade and beautifully crafted items; however, our apt already has enough stuff.

This nine-day event featured the works of 300 artisans with over 200 booths and exhibits. It draws about 25,000 visitors annually offering work for sale, demonstrations and hands-on workshops. Parking is off-site in several large parking lots and shuttle buses, like the one ↑ above take visitors to and from the fair grounds. These same buses are used during winter months to transport skiers to the slopes of Mount Sunapee.

While masking was not a requirement, we did see some fair visitors wearing masks both when riding the shuttle bus and walking the fair grounds. Th event coordinators stated that distancing protocols were in place, but in the crowded tent booths, these did not seem possible.

Travel time was just under 90 minutes one way from Nashua, NH. We chose mid-week to avoid weekend crowds and because temps would be soaring into the high 90s by the end of the week compared to the mid-80s when we visited.

Mary Coolidge

The League of NH Craftsmen includes over 650 juried members and  is one of the oldest and most recognized craft organizations in the U.S. It started from efforts in two small NH towns, Sandwich and Wolfeboro, to promote craft in the mid-1920s in the midst of the Great Depression. The area in and around these towns had become a a popular summer tourist destination for travelers from all over the Northeast. 

For years, the women of Sandwich had been spending NH winters crafting woven rugs, lace, embroidery and pottery to sell at summer fairs. In 1926, Mary Coolidge, a summer resident, was so impressed with their handiwork that she opened the Sandwich Home Industries Shop to sell locally made handicrafts and support the local economy. The center was a way for local people to show and sell their wares. Visitors could spend a summer in NH, then take home a handmade craft.

Coincidentally, a group working with A. Cooper Ballentine, a silversmith and metalworker, began offering craft classes in Wolfeboro. Like Coolidge, Bally  believed that high-quality products would attract the interest of NH vacationeers. The two met and decided that more should be done to keep crafts alive in NH and to help weather the economic downfalls of the Great Depression.

Coolidge and Ballentine conceived the idea of creating a statewide program of craft instruction and marketing. In 1931, they presented their case to NH Gov. John Winant, who agreed to establish and fund the New Hampshire Commission of Arts and Crafts, making NH the first state to support craft making. In 1932, the NH Legislature appropriated $5,000 to launch the League of NH Arts and Crafts with Mary Coolidge as president, a post she held for the next 10 years, remaining honorary president until her death in 1949. Bally served on its council as secretary and president, beginning in 1950. He died in 1984.

In 1933, the League embarked on the first Craftsman’s Fair held in Crawford Notch, NH. A barn was used for demonstrations of pottery, weaving, vegetable dyeing, basketmaking and woodcarving. A blacksmith shop was used for ironworking. Horse stalls were used for exhibitions and sales, and the lawn was used for entertainment and country dancing. The fair’s success exceeded all expectations with sales totaling $2,698, a hefty sum for back then, which convinced members to make the fair an annual event.

Rebranded as the League of NH Craftsmen in 1968, the League is recognized as one of the country’s foremost fine arts organizations.

The first official League Shop was in Wolfeboro. Today, there are eight league galleries throughout the state in Nashua, Concord, Hanover, Hooksett, Sandwich, Littleton, Meredith, and North Conway. These galleries feature handmade crafts of juried League members plus offer programs including class demos and workshops open to all ages and skill levels.

The photos in this post are a very small representation of the many crafts we saw displayed at the fair. The majority seemed to be in the areas of pottery, woodturning, and jewelry with notably few photography exhibits. Not only are most exhibit booths in tight areas making photo taking more difficult, some craftsmen object to photos. I assured most that my purposes were for illustrative use only.

They're Melting

Nothing last forever, not the Wicked Witch of the West (think Wizard of Oz) or ice sculptures.

These ice figures were created on Saturday as part of the Nashua Holiday Stroll, the city's major holiday event which drew thousands of people from the area and neighboring states. A few sculptures were still standing early Sunday; however, with temperatures in the mid-40s, their demise was imminent. 

The sculptures were created at the event in front of Nashua City Hall and would remain there until all were melted.

Unfortunately, we didn't see most of the Holiday Stroll which included a 1/2-mile candlelit procession down Main Street from City Hall to Railroad Square. 

That's because we were helping with traffic control as part of the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT). The downtown area was closed to traffic and CERT volunteers, like ourselves, were posted on side streets to direct motorists to detours.

We hope to catch the 24th annual Holiday Stroll in 2017. Grenville captured this shot of the city's Christmas tree after this year's lighting ceremony.

Ground Breaking Day on the Eastern Shore

Many of you know we live in a semi rural area. Our town is just one mile square. Our population is just  500. In fact if you take the population of the entire Virginia portion of the Delmarva peninsula, Accomack and Northampton counties, we are just slightly over 50,000 folks (not counting livestock).
Amazingly, we have had a Hospital here for over 85 years. But the time had come for a new, modern facility.

Today was the Ground Breaking Ceremony for our new hospital. A few hundred people showed up. From Hospital staff and Administrators, Local, County, and State elected officials, Hospital Board Members and Trustees, and an lot of just plain folks like us.

In 2008, after many years of being a Community owned and operated hospital, they realized the need to associate with a larger health care organization. After a few years of searching, the Board of Directors chose Riverside Health Care System. The choice was based on the fact that Riverside was not a Corporate run organization. Being two of the poorest counties in the State of Virginia, this was vitally important to our citizens.

The distinguished gentleman in the center above, with the blue tie, is our Mayor, Jack Pierson. We all are so glad that he got to keep his gold shovel since he will be breaking ground for our new Town Hall soon. Of course in true Eastern Shore style, we had some refreshments afterwards. Nothing too splashy.

SOOOO what is this all going to look like you may wonder...... well, this is what it looks like now

And this is what it will look like in about two years.

 The new hospital will be approximately 155,000 square feet with an adjacent physician office building of approximately 44,000 square feet that will also house the new Cancer Center, all constructed with materials that are compatible with the architectural character of Virginia’s Eastern Shore. Along with a skilled, experienced and compassionate staff, here’s what you can count on once you’re inside the new Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital: • 57 all-private Inpatient Rooms (with expansion capability for 12 more rooms) • 3 Operating Rooms equipped with the leading-edge safety features • State-of-the-art Intensive Care Unit • 24-hour full-service Emergency Department with 13 private rooms • A comfortable and comforting Newborn Unit • 2 Sleep Study areas • 10 Infusion areas • A Diagnostic Center with MRI, CT and general radiology capabilities • Day Surgery facilities and other outpatient services In all cases, the new facilities will include the latest technology to help you heal and keep you even safer… all brought together with one of the nation’s most advanced electronic health record systems. 

So that is our BIG NEWS here on the Shore. I hope i didn't bore anyone, but we are very excited about this finally becoming a reality after many years of talk, discussions, arguments, and a lot of planing.
Grenville

Jack-o-Lantern Update

THANKS, Everyone for all your comments on the Keene Pumpkin Festival. The “one-night stand” lady in costume was so gracious to strike a pose for me. Too bad she won’t know how many people would compliment her creativity.
UPDATE: Keene did NOT set a new world record.

According to news reports this morning – the final tally was listed at 16,186 – short of both the current record and the city’s 29,762 high mark in 2009.

Keene’s festival began in 1991 with 600 jack-o-lanterns. The town won its first title in 1996 with more than 13,000 lit pumpkins.
Boston holds the current record with 30,128 lit jack-o-lanterns in one place set in 2006

OR does it still?

THAT record may have been broken this year by Highwood, Illinois, according to a report in the Chicago Tribune.  Highwood (pop. 5,000) was vying with Keene to beat the Boston record. The dual attempt was a pre-arranged challenge between the two cities, which had to count and light pumpkins on Oct. 22 at the same time.

Last year, Highwood’s Great Highwood Pumpkin Festival fell short of the record, getting close with 26,287 pumpkins. Event sponsors believe that tally was beat this year.

Did Highwood become the NEW record holder?

A final decision by Guinness World Record officials could take a few weeks . . . to be continued.

Shake Rattle & Roll

I Feel the Earth Move Under My Feet was a good way to describe feelings all along the U.S. East Coast early this afternoon as a 5.9 magnitude earthquake centered in Virginia shook buildings from the Carolinas to New England.

The United States Geological Survey reported that the earthquake occurred at 1:51 p.m. ET with an epicenter 9 miles south of Mineral, Virginia and a depth of 1 km.

Grenville felt it at The Frog & PenguINN, but not me. I was volunteering at the library, less than 10 miles away, and felt nary a rumble, rattle OR roll. Several family and friends from NJ to New England called to see if all was OK here – Thankfully YES.

As far as we know there were no major evacuations in this town of 500. However, one neighbor called Grenville asking about a possible tsunami. He reminded her that we live in the “mountains” of the VA eastern shore, elevation 35 feet above sea level. We did not hear of any major closings or evacuations here. Rail traffic was not halted and the lone bus line remained in operation.

However, it led to numerous building evacuations in major cities such as Washington, DC, NYC, and Philadelphia, PA; halted rail and air traffic. Two east coast nuclear reactors were taken offline.

Memorials and monuments on the National Mall in Washington, DC were evacuated and closed. Some buildings were damaged. The spire on the National Cathedral there was damaged when three of the four pinnacles on the central tower fell off. (Pinnacles are the top stones on the cathedral’s towers.)  Also interior cracking and broken windows were reported to the Smithsonian Institution Building (The Castle) .

Grenville and I hope that blogger friends and their families  along the east coast and New England were also safe. We invite your comments: where were you when the earthquake hit AND did you feel anything?

CREDITS:

I Feel the Earth Move was written and recorded by singer-songwriter Carole King and included on her Tapestry album .

Shake Rattle and Roll was originally recorded by Big Joe Turner and by Bill Haley & His Comets. It was written in 1954 by Charles E. Calhoun (songwriting name of Jesse Stone).

Earthquake graphics courtesy of ABC News. Images of National Cathedral and Smithsonian Castle borrowed from websites.