Brattleboro Words Trail Podcast Brattleboro Words Project

The old depot of the West River Railroad in Newfane Vermont was where Station Master JJ Green, a prominent citizen of the town who wore many hats, including telegraph operator and journalist, worked each day and kept a diary for the year 1885. The depot was lovingly restored in recent years by The Historical Society of Windham County into the West River Railroad museum, where the original copy of Green's diary and many other artifacts are preserved. The book, 'The Diary of JJ Green: A Daily Record of the Year 1885 by a Stationmaster on the West River Railroad', gives an intimate view of life at the time, reflections on the seasons and current events, and the woes of the West River Railroad.

The story is poignant, the diary ironic: JJ Green died on the train on his way to deliver a story to the Vermont Phoenix in Brattleboro in the infamous “Wreck at Three Bridges” the very next year (1886).

The second third of the podcast is an interview with writer and narrator Deborah Lee Luskin on a bit of the history of the West River Railroad, where it fit-in regionally and a sense of how it was used. A description of the museum is also discussed as well as the West River Trail's recreational possibilities.

Narrator Maria Margaronis introduces us to the writers and creatives who retreated the chaos of the time in the late 60s to Vermont to create intentional communities based on free expression and the idea of a commonwealth in a hamlet in Guilford near Brattleboro, Vermont. Maria discovered this 'little Utopia' in the 80s when she was 'a slip of a girl' and returns frequently from her home base in London. First part introduces the community founded 'around the word at a time of language assassination' with comments from poet Verandah Porche and Richard Wyzanski, one time 'pariahs' who have turned 'pillars' of today's community, 50 years later. Second Part further explores 'bard of Guilford' Verandah Porche. Verandah shares delightful verse and experiences at 'Total Loss Farm.' Part Three takes us on an evocative night walk around Packer Corners with former 'communer' Peter Gould and where we linger at a cemetery to hear Peter's ghost story about early Black villagers Abijah and Lucy Terry Prince, complete with thundering hoofs in the night.

Brilliant chronicler of the 1960s, Andrew Kopkind was a courageous, insightful and remarkably groundbreaking journalist always 'sniffing the zeitgeist' and pushing boundaries while covering race, civil rights, war and poverty. An openly gay man in an era when such freedom was sorely contested, he co-produced “Lavender Hour,” the first gay and lesbian vari­ety program on American commercial radio with his long-time partner John Scagliotti. After obtaining degrees from Cornell University and the London School of Economics, he reported for Time, the New Republic, the Village Voice and many other publications before becoming Associate Editor of The Nation, America’s oldest continuously published weekly magazine. Kopkind wrote two books: America: The Mixed Curse (1969) and The Thirty Years' Wars: Dispatches and Diversions of a Radical Journalist, 1965-1994, an anthology of his writing published posthumously in 1995, edited by JoAnn Wypijewski. In 1974, Kopkind bought Tree Frog Farm in Guilford, Vermont, which became his and John Scagliotti's home and a gathering place for like minded journalists, filmmakers, and other culture makers -- like episode producer/narrator Maria Margaronis -- who shared Kopkind’s passion for social justice. When Kopkind died of cancer in 1994 at age 59, the Kopkind Colony was founded at Tree Frog Farm to remember his work. The Colony, under the continued direction of Scagliotti, Wypijewski and others, mentors journalists, filmmakers and community activists through a summer residency program and other activities that continue there today.

The evocative ruins of Madame Sherri's 'castle' in West Chesterfield, New Hampshire are about 10 minutes from downtown Brattleboro, but the myths and legends surrounding Madame Sherri have captivated visitors the world over for almost 100 years. A costume designer and vaudeville performer, Madame threw outrageous parties that drew the glitterati of New York and Hollywood to this remote and unlikely place. Our story introduces you to the eccentric Sherri and her exploits while shedding light on the more sobering true facts of her life and legacy.

John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) was one of the world's best known economists whose eloquent and internationally recognized writings on economics, public policy and culture helped shape the identity of the modern United States and 20th-century American liberalism. He was a professor at Harvard University for decades. He spent long summers in Newfane, VT for more than 30 years and frequented the Moore Free Library which reserves a special shelf for the dozens of books he wrote the quintessential analysis of the Great Depression -The Great Crash - and The Affluent Society, both of which were bestsellers from the 1950s through the 2000s. He also wrote hundreds of magazine articles and several novels. He served in the administrations of four presidents and was US Ambassador to India under the Kennedy administration. He received the WWII Medal of Freedom in 1946 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 200 for his public service and contributions to science. His sons Peter and Jamie Galbraith are important writers and continue to use the family home and contribute to local dialogue through the Brattleboro-based Windham World Affairs Council, which continues an annual lecture in honor of their father. In the first half of the episode, Vermont journalist Joyce Marcel narrates these facts about the man. Her husband, Randy Holhut, an editor at the weekly The Commons newspaper, relays a personal story of Galbraith's largesse taken from an obituary he wrote upon Galbraith's death in 2006. The second half of the episode focuses on Galbraith as a writer. Galbraith's son Peter Galbraith says that, despite the fact that his father was one of the world's best known economists, he thought of himself primarily as a writer. Peter shares insights on writing he learned from his father and the elder Galbraith himself shares writing advice through archival tape taken from a 1986 talk at UC Berkeley.

Legendary documentary filmmaker Robert Flaherty (1884 - 1951) and his wife Frances Hubbard Flaherty (1883 - 1972) lived in Dummerston, Vermont just north of Brattleboro and in later years the Flaherty Film Study Center was located there. The episode talks about the Flaherty's early life and marriage, and delves into Robert's first work documenting his explorations of the Belcher Islands in the Hudson Bay region of Canada. The cinematic result was “Nanook of the North”, released in 1922. The film achieved widespread critical acclaim, introducing documentary filmmaking to the world as an art form that could capture people, nature and convey our common humanity. While not strictly documentary in today's sense of the genre, Frances said in her 1960 book The Odyssey of a Filmmaker: Robert Flaherty's Story,' quotes from which are included in the podcast, that their work was the essential Flaherty method, capturing "the thing itself for its own sake." Frances was an active partner in filmmaking and won an Academy Award in 1948 for best original story for the couples' 'Louisiana Story.' This episode provides synopsis of several of the Flaherty's films including 'Nanook of the North', 'Moana' (which the narrator refers to as 'Moana of the South Seas') and 'Man of Aran.' The work of Flaherty daughter Monica Flaherty Frasseto and her work adding sound to Moana thereby breathing new life into it, is discussed. After Roberts death, Frances founded The Flaherty Seminar, a film study center for filmmakers, curators, and students that continues today.