Pownal

Commonly chosen routes for getting north are the cemented highays, U.S. 7 on the west...known as the Ethan Allen Highway, and for all its length it has associations with the Green Mountain Boys and the early history of Vermont. The gateway is at Pownal...and after a lung-filling and eye-filling view from the Pownal road you are soon in Bennington...Charles Edward Crane


Last week I found myself one warm, sunny morning driving across the southern border of Vermont, thinking about how my nineteen year old son would soon be walking across the same state line with a sixty pound pack on his back. I had just dropped him off at the start of the Long Trail in Williamstown, Massachusetts, where he was setting off for a three week, 270 mile trek along the ridge of the Green Mountains all the way to Canada. The Long Trail is the oldest long-distance hiking path in the U.S., and was the inspiration for the more-famous Appalachian Trail.


Like so many Vermont (and American, as Alexis de Tocqueville noted) enterprises, the Long Trail was conceived, built and maintained by visionary volunteers. The original dreamer was James P. Taylor, who one morning in 1910 while waiting for the mist to clear from the top of Stratton Mountain had the rather crazy idea of a path that could run through the Greens from the top to the bottom of Vermont.

The state's peaks had been largely unappreciated and unused for recreation until Taylor decided to help "make the Vermont mountains play a larger part in the life of the people." His dream took its first step towards reality at a small gathering of outdoor enthusiasts in Burlington, the first of a hundred years of meetings (and subsequent trail clearings) by the Green Mountain Club.

So while my son began his adventure ten miles behind and a thousand feet above me, I drove into the Pownal valley, and as usual when coming back to Vermont felt myself slip a bit back in time.


When I used to drive from Washington to Lake Champlain for summer vacations, I usually crossed into Vermont on Route 7, and I remembered the area for the creepy greyhound race track that was visible from the road. It's been vacant for over ten years now, though plans for some interesting commercial development (including a farmer's market) are in the works.

Now you can see vestiges of the tourism industry of our grandparent's time. I always covet these little guesthouses that are still settled along rivers all over the state, and want to take one up to our back acres, a retreat for mini-vacations at home.

Pownal has a long and complicated history, settled first by native Americans eons ago, then claimed by the Dutch in the late 1600's and finally passing later that century into English hands. By the Revolutionary War, settlers began arriving to the town (named for the head of the Massachusetts Bay Colony) from the more crowded Southern parts of New England. Their claims set the stage for a brewing war with wealthy New Yorkers who thought they'd been granted the same Vermont acres by England, a simmer that was to come to a full boil during the Revolutionary War when towns like Pownal split between Tories and Green Mountain Boys. Guess who won!

An itinerant minister was less than impressed with free and independent Pownal when he came over the mountain for a visit in 1789: “Pawnal ye first town, poor land – very unpleasant – very uneven – miserable set of inhabitants – no religion..." That was HIS opinion, anyway; the Pownalers would have probably answered him disdainfully with a pithy retort about private beliefs and personal responsibility.

By the 1900's Pownal did have churches, plus ten schools, textile mills (a Lewis Hine image of “Anemic Little Spinner in North Pownal Cotton Mill" helped inspire the first child labor law), and a Berkshires to Bennington electric railroad. The mills are gone forever, but maybe the train will be back.


Until then, to visit the town of Pownal take a short detour from Route 7 to Route 346, which will also allow you to see North Pownal (look sharp or you'll end up in New York) and best of all, drive the back roads to Bennington.

More about Pownal

Castleton

The Bibical injunction is "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house," but I sin that sin every time I ride about Vermont... Charles Edward Crane


Castleton is home to one of our state's small public college's (originally one of the country's first medical schools) as well as the locus of about the nicest possible conglomeration of nineteenth century architecture. The town has a long and storied history. In 1775 Ethan Allen and a large pack of the Green Mountain boys galluped down Main Street (no doubt much to the alarm and disgust of the staid Puritan residents) and over brews at the Remington tavern plotted their attack on the British at Fort Ticonderoga.

Castleton continued to grow as a farming community following the war, and during the nineteenth century the slate and marble industries thrived. Lovely nearby Lake Bomoseen became a vacation mecca with luxury hotels and trolley service to town--a transportation innovation whose time should come again!

Industry and agriculture flourished, and residents along Main Street replaced log cabins with dignified Federal and Greek Revival mansions. Some of the most remarkable were built by homegrown architectural wunderkind Thomas Dake, especially famous for the elegance of his residential staircases.


Fires, the scourge of pre-electrical civilization, devastated much of the town's center in the early twentieth century, and Castleton's prosperity subsequently declined. But it remains one of the loveliest villages in the state, and I'd argue with any New Yorker that no town over their border (just seven miles away) can compare.

Ira

The visitor whisking along Vermont's highways would conclude that an industry so tied to the soil and to livestock as farming would be 'well-rooted and stabilized.' As a matter of fact, fundamental as farming is, it is fickle...nothing about it is so constant as change... Charles Edward Crane


I've been off of the winding Vermont road for almost a month, concentrating on a stint of teaching and my Art of Action "Elements of Place" series. It's good to be back behind the wheel with my well-worn sketchbook on the passenger seat.

Before my hiatus I had navigated a jaunt from Rutland to West Rutland, Castleton, Middleton Springs, Wallingford, and Clarendon (see previous postings). This could have been a neat circular trip, but it started in an erratic way: leaving Castleton, where I had given a lecture on my painting at the college, I had to make a quick decision whether to take two lane local Route 4a east, or the high speed bypass Route 4. I chose speed, and regretted it immediately. Since our highways don't have many exits I was forced to keep driving towards Rutland.

My eyes darted yearningly across the Otter River that lay on my right and towards parallel Route 4a, as though it was the yellow brick road and I just had to see up close what wonders lay along it (especially that mysterious large dairy farm that I had driven by so many times on my way to the Vermont border.)

So I exited the highway as soon as I could and backtracked towards Castleton again along the smaller road, thereby reaffirming the wisdom of Lesson Number One as I show myself Vermont: to hell with saving time.

The dairy farm, which had an amazing curved metal roof (see the painted photo above) didn't disappoint, and neither did the sad but picturesque tumbledown barn further along the way, or the long blue shadows cast by the overpass as I drove into West Rutland.


I have to admit, I came close to Ira but didn't exactly drive through it, let alone get out and walk the streets of a town named for legendary "Green Mountain Boy" Ira Allen. I'll have some more exploring to do the next time I chose the two instead of four lane option.


More about Ira

Clarendon

No, there is still much unmapped character left here, and I find it more interesting than studying the crowds in the subway to drift among our people, never ceasing to wonder that there is some indefinable overtone in their character which somehow spells Vermont...Charles Edward Crane


Heading north out of Wallingford towards Rutland on Route 7 I saw a sign for Clarendon, and since an objective of this Vermont exploration is to try and fight my natural inclination towards inertia, I made a u-turn and drove back down the road in search of another town on my life list. But Clarendon proved elusive, and after finding the beautiful brick house with the satellite dish pictured above but no town center, I was back on the highway again driving north.

I found out later that this mysterious, hidden town of Clarendon has over 2,500 citizens, and is split between five villages. It began as Clarendon Springs, once one of the most popular spas in the region, and one of the few that was founded by a psychic. Asa Smith in 1776 dreamed the exact location of the healing waters right down to the details of their mineral composition. As he was a victim of "scrofulous humor", he had to stagger a painfully long way through deep forest to find the waters of his vision. But there it was as dreamed, and a drink did cure his ailments, and another thriving resort was born.

Clarendon Springs Hotel is still there, even if the crowds of elegant vacationers have vanished, and according to my google search looks to be for sale. Hopefully this graceful building will live to see another century.

Wallingford

Paul Harris, who founded the International Rotarians, was brought up here in Wallingford by his grandparents, later moving to Chicago, where in a casual inspiration one day he founded the organization which has become so widespread...Charles Edward Crane


Wallingford was a pleasant surprise--in fact, I hadn't heard of the town until I saw its sign on Route 7 (which says more about my ignorance than Wallingford's obscurity). Though it's considered part of the Rutland "metro area", it feels very much like its own distinct place rather than an example of urban sprawl. The town is nice and compact, reflecting its original design: "six miles square was chosen because from anywhere within that area the distance to market, to church, or to town meeting could be traveled between morning and evening chores."


On the ever-amazing internet I found a 210 page history of Wallingford written in 1911, and even a quick perusal of this tome (I'll have to curl up in bed with my warm laptop on a chilly evening to read the rest) revealed the rich industrial and social past that seems to be the norm of even small Vermont towns. For example, in the early 19th century Wallingford was the home of the country's first fork (the kind used on hay, rather than on ham) factory. This very successful farm implement company was eventually bought out by True Temper, and their tools’ ash handles are still produced locally.

The prosperous founder of the original Wallingford farm tool company was a businessman "characterized by fairness, honesty and integrity, whose word was as good as his bond" (take note, 21st century scions of Wall Street!) Like so many other Vermonters, this Mr. Batcheller was also a staunch abolitionist who was willing to risk his own security by making his home a stop on the underground railway. And like most Vermont towns during the Great Rebellion, Wallingford answered the call of Lincoln with "far more than its proportional share" of soldiers and taxes.

Besides the extremely successful farm tool company, Wallingford was home to a grist mill, creamery and cheese factory that created "value added" products (shipped to Boston and also enjoyed locally) from surrounding farms' grain and milk.

Main Street, with its distinctive red brick town hall, and unusual multi-steepled church, is graceful and and antique enough to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places, as is an entire zone of nearby Otter Valley farm land. In my quick trip through I missed seeing that area, as well as the distinct villages of East and South Wallingford, so I definitely need to find my way back down Route 7 before the snow flies again.

Middletown Springs

This professional tourist business is no new thing in Vermont. I think it began in 1805. I have found that in that year many persons came from Albany in a horse and buggy to visit the mineral springs which were then thought notable at Middletown Springs...it is strange, with Saratoga Springs so near, that these New Yorkers came to Vermont to take our waters...Charles Edward Crane


I've been out of the car and in my studio for the last few weeks, getting a good start on my Elements of Landscape series for the Art of Action project. But finally I could no longer resist the siren call of Route 100 South, and on a recent sunny Sunday ventured out on a circuitous path through Rutland County.

My first and only stop in Middletown Springs (for I had many a mile to go that afternoon) was at the crossroads of Routes 140 and 133. That's an intersection with presence, marked by an impressive sign that points you towards Canada or New York City, conjuring up images of Hobbitt-like journeys. I turned right and ventured north up the open road for thirty feet, then turned again and took a closer look at the lovely 19th century buildings that line two sides of the village green.


The tall-steepled church, the neo-classical hall (now the Historical Society, unfortunately closed that day) and the very ornamented large pink and cream wedding cake of a house all spoke of a prosperous past. Then as now, prosperity in a state with many mountains and rivers but few fertile valleys was all about tourism.

Like thirty other Vermont towns that discovered a source of mineral water (and the fouler smelling and viler tasting, the better) Middletown Springs became a destination for infirm flatlanders ready to pay well for remedies promised by the town's waters. ("For asthma, drink from Tap Number 2 and wish on Tap Number 3.") Doctors, patients and owners of mineral springs all testified to their curative powers.

By the early 1900's, sulpher's healing abilities were debunked, and the crowds vanished from the resorts built around noxious mineral springs. Still, a few tourists came and found that after a few days they generally felt better.

Maybe just being in rural Vermont, away from the stresses of city life, rocking gently on the Middletown Springs Hotel verandah, the North Brook babbling and mockingbirds singing, was enough by itself to alleviate dyspepsia and piles.

Barnard

You here in Vermont have a priceless heritage-old houses that must not be torn down, and beauty that must not be defiled, roads that must not be cluttered with billboards and hot-dog stands. You are guardians of this priceless heritage...Charles Edward Crane quoting Sinclair Lewis's address to the Barnard rotary club


From Bethel I drove up and down North Road's hills to the center of Barnard, two graceful churches and a forthright general store. I perused these appreciatively from the Route 12 intersection, and then continued south down the Stage Road towards Woodstock.


I didn't know it at the time, but my dirt-covered Toyota had driven past the pristine 300 acres of Twin Farms, a luxury resort that must cater to that 10% of our population holding 70% of our national wealth, since accommodations range up to $3,000. a night. What tickles my fancy is that this property used to belong to leftist critic of the bourgeoisie (remember those novels "Babbitt", "Dodsworth", "Main Street", and "It Can't Happen Here"?) Sinclair Lewis, and his wife, anti-fascist journalist Dorothy Thompson--and you can sleep in "Red's Room" (Nobel Laureate Sinclair's bedroom) for $1,300. a night. The irony is gratis.


I'm glad I didn't find out about Twin Farms until later, as my populist rant would have distracted from enjoying the beauty of Stage Road in twilight.

Barnard facts and figures

Bethel

"Diversity" has been Vermont's watchword, and it has saved the state from the worst of the depressions which more intensified industry has known. We have made almost everything in Vermont, from counterfeit money to clothes-pins and coffins...Charles Edward Crane


I've been driving past Bethel for years, turning left at this corner on my way from Interstate 89 to Rutland and points south. I always look up and appreciate this grain elevator planted so comfortably in the backyard of the town's main residential street--the scene reminds me of the WPA-style motifs of my father's paintings from his days as an artist and labor organizer during the Depression. Happily, rather than being an empty 1930's relic, this structure now houses the organic livestock grain supplier Green Mountain Feeds.


Last time I drove into Bethel, rather than take my usual turn south on Route 107 I headed up narrow Main Street to see what the town had to offer a visitor, especially in the way of food. The "Cockadoodle Pizza Cafe" beckoned me inside and didn't disappoint, offering a very respectable Greek slice (feta and spinach) served in an idiosyncratically pleasant interior, complete with wifi access and an interesting painting display on cheerful yellow walls (so much better than the depressing yellow arches I would have found in Rutland!)


Refreshed, I continued up Main Street in search of Bethel Mills Lumber, a very successful local enterprise with an interesting history. Founded during the Revolutionary War, Bethel Mills ground corn and sawed timber morning and night to meet the demands of new settlers. The business was operated by the same family for the next 100 years, then wiped out by the great flood of 1927, and rebuilt from the ground up as soon as the waters receded.

When the Great Depression hit, Bethel Mills struggled to keep its doors open. And then a twist of fate: a man with family in tow shows up looking for a job and is hired as a salesman; a week later the boss dies of a heart attack, and the new guy convinces the boss's widow to give him a chance managing the company rather than shut it down. She did, and together they rebuilt the business. And here's a typical Vermont happy ending to this entrepreneurial fairy tale: the new owner, unable to reach an agreement with the local power company over rates, decides to build his own hydroelectric plant on the river next to the mill. Though ridiculed by both his fellow townspeople and the utility, he perseveres and a few years later figures out how to produce enough electricity to both run the mill and sell back the extra juice to the power company--a satisfying arrangement that continues to this day.

Bethel facts and figures

Update on Ferrisburgh Update!

The Friends of Ferrisburgh are urging artists and other concerned Vermonters to come to the Zoning Board Public Hearing, Wednesday, Feb 4th at 7:00 PM in the Ferrisburgh Town Hall and voice our opinion--no Mcdonalds/truck stop/parking lot needed on this beautiful historic stretch of Route 7!

Randolph

We are now nearly a century away from the days of the first railroad boom in Vermont, and far, too, from the days when the Vermont poet wrote:
"Singing through the forests,
rattling over bridges,
Shooting under arches,
Rambling over ridges,
Whizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o'er the vale,
Bless me! This is pleasant,
Riding on the rail." ...Charles Edward Crane

Randolph makes a good impression: comfortable neighborhoods and an active downtown that offers shopping, banking, eating and a library (what I think of as a total "park and carry basket for morning of errands and then books and coffee reward" experience). Randolph also feels like it's connected to the outside world, sitting in the path of major north-south roads (though the commerce once brought into town by Route 12 was drained by the nearby interstate) and an active Amtrak line. How exciting! The Vermonter runs between St. Albans and Washington, DC, with stops in Phillie and New York, and one member of my family makes that entire run frequently. Fortunately he's a stoic, because it's a very long trip over very old rails. Bring on the public works rail upgrade infrastructure program, President-elect Obama!


Randolph affords lovely views from quiet crossroads looking up the railroad tracks and down tree-lined residential streets. Its houses are detailed and varied, and I could easily spend a month standing on the sidewalk with my french easel, painting all those different facades, and the sunlight moving across Vistorian roofs and windows.


Many of these 19th century homes have carriage houses that sheltered the horse and wagon, or maybe provided a place to milk "Bossie" the family Jersey. These structures still serve a function protecting the family car, bikes and mower, and they also are a pleasure to look upon, elegant links to a living past.

Randolph facts and figures