View Positively Vermont: Brownell Library, Essex Junction, VT: Host Dennis McMahon talks with Penny Pillsbury, Library Director of the Essex Junction Brownell Library on events coming this year. ### Check out this video of Brownell Library Teen Trustee Christina Yu's speech at the Essex High School graduation (her speech begins in the 12th minute) ### Press Release Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955 Brownell Library Novel Destinations July 15, 2011    Whitcomb Dairy Farm Tour starts from Brownell Library Aug 3rd   Onan and Mary Whitcomb’s Dairy Farm in North Williston is the “Novel Destination” for an hour long tour for 25 people  of all ages on Wednesday August 3rd . Transportation to this event is not included. Sign up is required call 878-6955. Directions will be available at the library. This program is part of the Brownell Library’s Summer Reading program. Children need to be accompanied by an adult.   The Whitcombs own a 300 cow dairy. Visitors will see the nursery of 25 calves and learn how they are raised to become dairy cows.  The milking barn and milking parlor will be part of the tour plus at look at crop rotation.  Tour takers need to wear either boots or old sneakers. It is a “hands on” tour with chances to pet the animals and smell the smells.  ### Brownell Library Volunteer Needed: The Library is seeking a person to enter each of our programs into an online event calendar.  The person should enjoy data entry and be detail oriented.  After brief training at the library the person could even do the task at a home.  Please contact Alison@brownelllibrary.org with your interest or questions. Press Release  Contact: Mary Graf 878-6956 or Penny Pillsbury 878-6955   Collect kids’ books for Camp Agape @ Brownell Lib.   Be a Global Citizen and help us collect kids’ books for Camp Agape a summer camp for kids ages 8 to 11, whose parents are in prison. Bring in gently-used  books to the Brownell Youth Desk during the month of July.   Camp Agape Vermont started in 2006 because some men and women involved in prison ministry were concerned about the children and families of incarcerated women and men.  It has grown from its original one-week residential camp for 28 campers to serving as many as 80 children a summer in two one-week sessions.   In the past 5 years, almost 300 children have experienced the joys of camp in the beautiful setting of Covenant Hills Christian Camp,in  Cabot, Vermont To Learn More... Camp Agape Vermont P.O. Box 8283 Essex, VT 05451-8283 campagapevermont@yahoo.com   ###  Press Release Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955 Brownell Library 6 Lincoln Street Essex Junction, Vt 05452 Howard Coffin to Lead Bus Tour of St. Albans Raid Sites July 12 Vermont’s Civil War scholar Howard Coffin will board the school bus leaving the Brownell Library’s parking lot at 9am on Tuesday July 12th to guide a tour of the Franklin County sites involved in the northernmost engagement of the Civil War. Tour goers will see the Confederate Raid Exhibit at the Franklin Co. Historical Society museum. Then Coffin will lead the group to St. Albans raid sites describing that day’s actions. After lunch the bus will travel, as the raiders did, to Sheldon and then on to Enosburg. Bus will return to Essex Junction ca. 3:30pm. Either bring a bag lunch for a picnic in Taylor Park or be prepared to buy a quick lunch in a downtown restaurant. Bus space is limited, reserve a seat by calling 878-6955 and paying $10 each, checks payable to “Friends of Brownell Library”, before July 12th. Children grade 4 and up are welcome, but must be accompanied by an adult and willing to enjoy the tour. Twenty-one cavalrymen, organized by Confederate agent George Sanders and led by Lieutenant Bennett Young, arrived from Canada by twos and threes over a period of nine days and took over St. Albans, Vermont on October 19, 1864. With his gun drawn, Young mounted the steps of a hotel and shouted: "This city is now in the possession of the Confederate States of America!" Shock and confusion followed as gun-toting horsemen galloped down Main Street, herding terror-stricken town folk onto the Village Green. The raiders managed to make off with over $200,000. By the time residents could organize a pursuit, the marauders were well on their way back to the border. Find out the rest of the story, join the bus at Brownell. ### Press Release Contact: Paul Walker     paulwaav@together.net Or Penny Pillsbury, Brownell Library  878-6955  Amateur Radio Communication Via the Moon, a talk by  Bob DeVarney In 1946, Project Diana, an operation headed up by Lt. Col. John Dewitt at Fort Monmouth, NJ, the US Army Signal Corps successfully bounced signals off the moon using a highly-modified SCR-271 early warning radar; the same type used at Pearl Harbor. Using a giant "bedspring" antenna and some 3000 watts of power, humans were finally able to accurately measure the true distance to the moon. On Monday July 11 at 7:30pm at the Brownell Library, Bob DeVarney will present a step-by-step tutorial on how Dewitt bounced those waves and “on the cheap” to boot. Not to be left behind, in 1953 Amateur Radio operators were able to do the same thing, albeit with somewhat humbler equipment. In much as the CCD imager and inexpensive digital cameras have revolutionized amateur astrophotography, so has software come to the aid of the Amateur Radio operator. With today's sophisticated Digital Signal Processing software, Amateur Radio Operators, or hams, can now make moon-bounce or Earth Moon Earth contacts with very modest equipment on a daily basis ! DeVarney writes about his interest in astronomy; “ I've had a lifelong love affair with all things scientific, but most especially astronomy and amateur radio. My latest hobby combines both passions in a unique way. I've been a ham radio operator for 31 years, and my other hobbies include, but are not limited to, astronomy, competitive shooting/reloading, geo-caching, wood- and metal-working, gardening, and tinkering in general. I am a voracious reader with an insatiable curiosity about the world around me.“ He works as a cell site technician for Verizon Wireless for 20 years this August, and lives in Milton with his wife, dog, cat, and 15 chickens.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                               

Contact:  Penny Pillsbury, Director

or Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator

(802)878-6955

Brownell Library

6 Lincoln St.

Essex Junction, VT 05452

http://www.brownelllibrary.org

THE LOUISA MAY ALCOTT WRITERS’ CHALLENGE @ BROWNELL LIBRARY 

The Louisa May Alcott Writers’ Challenge sponsored by Brownell Library offers a $100 award for a sequel to Alcott’s blood and thunder tale, “Pauline’s Passion and Punishment,” first published anonymously in the January 3 & 10, 1863 issues of Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper.  The award is funded by a donation from an employee of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc., (GMCR) as part of the Company’s matching donation program, offered to all GMCR employees. 

Open to residents of Vermont of all ages, the sequel may be no more than fifty-four pages (or 17,216 words), type-written, double-spaced. “Pauline’s Passion and Punishment” is available on-line: http://www.manybooks.net/titles/alcottloetext058ppau10.html

Full submission guidelines are available on Wednesday, June 29, starting 5:45 p.m. at the Brownell Library program, Louisa May Alcott:  Through Her Eyes, a community pot-luck supper that features 19th century fare, fiddling by Pete Sutherland, and games and Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women a living history performance by Marianne Donnelly.  Deadline for all submissions:  Monday, August 1, 2011.

The $100 prize that Alcott herself won in an 1862-63 competition, at a time that she was developing as an author, encouraged her and provided needed means for her impecunious family.  It predates the runaway acclaim for Little Women in 1868 and what became a famously lucrative writing career.  Likewise in Little Women, Jo—Alcott’s alter-ego—bangs out thrillers for penny dreadfuls to help earn a living.  She, too, wins $100 for a story in the Blarneystone Banner but dismisses this genre as low-minded and eventually gives it up.

Due to the propriety of Alcott’s era, her profitable stories of passion and vengeance were published either anonymously or under the nom de plume, A.M. Barnard.  She also used Flora Fairchild as a pseudonym (probably just once).  There may be others hiding in the library stacks.  This dimension of Alcott’s prodigious oeuvre has been brought more fully to light, appreciated, and celebrated by literary sleuths Leona Rostenberg and Madeleine Stern. 

The prize-winning Alcott short story was esteemed for its “power, description, incident, and moral,” and so shall current entries be judged.

The Brownell Library Louisa May Alcott Writers’ Challenges takes inspiration from “Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women,” a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen.  Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Vermont Public Television and the Vermont Humanities Council are also in concert with Brownell Library.  In addition, we are grateful for the support of the Brownell Library Foundation, Inc. and Friends of Brownell Library.                                 

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:  Penny Pillsbury, Director

or Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator

(802)878-6955

Brownell Library

6 Lincoln St.

Essex Junction, VT 05452

http://www.brownelllibrary.org 

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT ARRIVES @ BROWNELL LIBRARY, ESSEX JUNCTION

On Wednesday, June 29, starting 5:45, Brownell Library invites everyone for Louisa May Alcott-style festivity, Louisa May Alcott:  Through Her Eyes.  For those who come even earlier, there is croquet on the lawn and games that readers recall from the Camp Laurence chapter of Little Women.  For instance, in Rigmarole, “One person begins a story, any nonsense [s/he] likes, and tells as long a s/he pleases, only taking care to stop short at some exciting point, when the next takes it up and does the same.” 

The pot-luck supper under the tent on the front lawn features 19^th century fare—prizes for the most authentic dishes—serenaded by renowned Vermont fiddler Pete Sutherland who plays traditional melodies familiar to Alcott.

Summoned to the parlor, the Main Reading Room, at 7:00 p.m., there is a living-history performance by Marianne Donnelly, Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women.

Donnelly’s Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women is a carefully researched portrayal of writer and activist Louisa May Alcott.  Emphasizing her suffragist and abolitionist involvement, Civil War nursing experience and unique childhood, Louisa is accurately and passionately brought to life.  Following the 40-45 minute performance, the audience may engage Alcott with questions.

These festivities occasion the launch of the Louisa May Alcott Writers’ Challenge, funded by a donation from an employee of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc., (GMCR) as part of the Company’s matching donation program, offered to all GMCR employees. 

This program supports “Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women,” a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen. Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Vermont Public Television and the Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with Brownell Library.  We are also grateful for the assistance of Brownell Library Foundation, Inc., and Friends of Brownell Library.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:  Penny Pillsbury, Director

or Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator

(802)878-6955

Brownell Library

6 Lincoln St.

Essex Junction, VT 05452

http://www.brownelllibrary.org

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT’S BOSTON AND THE SOCIAL REFORM MOVEMENTS THAT SHAPED AND INSPIRED HER @ BROWNELL LIBRARY

On Monday, June 20, 7 p.m. at Brownell Library in Essex Junction, UVM Professor Jacqueline B. Carr gives focus to Louisa May Alcott’s Boston and the Social Reform Movements that Shaped and Inspired Her as part of the continuing series, Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women.

Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) regarded Boston as her city where, as the second daughter of A. Bronson and Abba May, she grew up at the heart of Transcendentalist, anti-slavery, and women’s rights movements.  Her father, an educational reformer who challenged rote-learning, influenced Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, figures of Transcendentalism that advanced the idea of self-reliance over social conformity.  Her mother functioned as a social worker, advocating for the poor and for immigrants.  The Alcotts harbored fugitive slaves.  William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips, at the vanguard of abolition; Elizabeth Peabody, an early exponent of kindergartens; and Margaret Fuller, a vigorous voice for women’s autonomy and a journalist, were Louisa May Alcott’s familiars.   

Prof. Carr, author of After the Siege:  A Social History of Boston, 1775-1800, who specializes in social, economic, and women’s history, makes a full exploration of the period that nurtured Alcott as a writer.

Upcoming in the series:  “Louisa May Alcott:  Through Her Eyes,” a community pot-luck that features 19^th century games, fiddling by Pete Sutherland, and fare on Wed., June 29, starting at 5:45 p.m., followed with a living-history performance by Marianne Donnelly, “Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women.”  Miss Alcott receives us in the parlor, the Main Reading Room at 7 p.m.                        

These programs support “Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women,” a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen. Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Vermont Public Television and the Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with Brownell Library.  We are also grateful for the assistance of Brownell Library Foundation, Inc., and Friends of Brownell Library.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:  Penny Pillsbury, Director

or Martha Penzer, Project Coordinator 

(802)878-6955

Brownell Library

6 Lincoln St.

Essex Junction, VT 05452

SCREENING OF LOUISA MAY ALCOTT: THE WOMAN BEHIND LITTLE WOMEN @ BROWNELL LIBRARY

On Wednesday, May 25, 6:30-8:30 p.m., Brownell Library features Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women, the documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, followed by a discussion led by Mary Lou Kete, Associate Professor of English and Women’s Studies at the University of Vermont.

Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) who grew up in the innermost circle of the Transcendentalist and anti-slavery movements and served as a Civil War army nurse, made her fame and fortune writing Little Women and other children’s books, but she had also worked as a seamstress, a laundress, a domestic servant, lived in a utopian community, and secretly penned thrillers.  She was progressive-minded.  She supported abolition, equal rights for women, and “reforms of all kinds.” 

DVDTOWN.com aptly describes this award-winning film-biography:

“Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind ‘Little Women’ gives us liberal, well-conceived dramatizations throughout, making them as dominant as those talking heads that are also featured. What’s more, there’s none of the usual take-yourself-too-seriously austere narration that so often accompanies literary biographies. Louisa May Alcott and her family are brought to life with dignity, but also humor. All of the dialogue that’s used comes from journals and letters, and that lends an authenticity and unabashed forthrightness that’s uncommon in films like this.”

Awards include:  Booklist’s Editors’ Choice:  Best Video of 2009, CINE GOLD EAGLE 2008, Grand Award Providence Film Festival, Audience Choice Award:  Cape Cod Filmmaker Takeover, Best Feature Documentary:  L.A. Reel Women International Film Festival.

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women is a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen. Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Vermont Public Television and the Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with Brownell Library.  We are also grateful for the support of Brownell Library Foundation, Inc., and Friends of Brownell Library.

Under the mandate of this grant, Brownell Library has mounted a full exploration of Louisa May Alcott, her life, her values, and her work.  Remaining programs in the series:  Louisa May Alcott’s Boston and the Social Movements that Shaped & Inspired Her, a Conversation with Prof. Jacqueline B. Carr, Mon., June 20, 7 p.m. and “Louisa May Alcott:  Through Her Eyes,” a community pot-luck that features 19^th century games, fiddling by Pete Sutherland, and fare on Wed., June 29, starting at 5:45 p.m., followed with a living-history performance by Marianne Donnelly, “Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women.”  Miss Alcott receives us in the parlor, the Main Reading Room at 7 p.m.                       

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Press Release

Contact: Alison Pierce 878-6955

Brownell Library Essex Jct, Vt 05452

 The Fortunate Life of Bill McDonald

On Monday May 9th, at 7pm,  Brownell Library will host Author Diane Goodrich in a reading from her book, The Fortunate Life of Bill McDonald.  In this descriptive and touching memoir, the author struggles to understand her quirky older brother and the eccentric life he comes to lead. Bill’s behaviors, closely associated with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Asperger’s Syndrome, cause a lifetime of consternation for their parents and siblings, are an ongoing source of humor for friends, but challenge her to find answers where there seemed to be none. What she discovers leads her to a greater understanding not only of Bill, but also of her own heart.  Goodrich will bring copies of the book for purchase.

Diane McDonald Goodrich earned her M. Ed. in special education from Saint Michael's College where she now works as an educational administrator. She is one of the founders of the Williston Whistle (now the Williston Observer). She and her husband live in Burlington and have two grown children. This is her first book. For more information call Brownell Library at 878-6955.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury

878-6955

The Things They  Carried

by Tim O’brien

A Vermont/Essex wide Celebration of a book of stories about the experiences of soldiers in the Vietnam War.

Brownell Library Events

Wed. May 4, 6pm Dine & Discuss of O’brien’s book -Vietnam veteran Captain Ed Cashman will lead a Vietnam-inspired potluck supper and encourage participants  to discuss & debate the themes in O’brien’s book. Copies @ Library, Northfield Savings & People’s United Bank, Susie Wilson Rd.

Wed. May 11, 7pm Discussion w/ filmmaker & Vietnam War veteran Patrick  Boyden. Capt. Boyden, Chaplin for the Gold Star Families in Vermont, served in the Vietnam War. He will lead a discussion of two 30 minute movies he produced: “Remembrance”, about memories of Vietnam War and what the war means to us now: “In Country,” winner of the 1999 College Emmy Awards, the story of the Vietnam War told by Americans who were there.

Thurs. May 12, 3:30pm Vietnam Today-a travelogue slide show by Keith Pillsbury , a 1st Lt. in Da Nang in the War, and returned as a traveler in 2008 to find a vibrant country.

Sponsored by The Big Read, Nat’l Endowment for the Arts and Brownell Library.

** During the month of May, Pat Boyden will be exhibiting some of the “Things He Carried” during his tour of Vietnam in the Brownell Library’s Glass case.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955 Brownell Library

Brownell School Bus to MetOpera HD Encore of Verdi Il Trovatore

The encore presentation of the Metropolitan Opera production of Verdi’s Il Trovatore will be shown in HD at the Palace Nine on Wednesday, May 18.  The Friends of Brownell Library are sponsoring a school bus ride to the performance leaving the library’s parking lot at 5:15pm. Local opera expert Toni Hill will meet the bus at Palace 9 to give opera goers some background to this popular work. The library will purchase the opera tickets and provide some treats for Brownell patrons. To reserve tickets and a place on the bus call 878-6955; bring in  or mail $27.60 per ticket payable to the Friends of Brownell Library  (6 Lincoln St. Essex Junction) on or before May 14th.

Il Trovatore by Giuseppe Verdi, rich with melodies of surpassing emotional content, represents Verdi at his most forceful and passionate.   The drama, set in sixteenth century Spain, involves a nobleman and a gypsy in a life-long quest for mutual revenge, and the unsuspecting lovers caught in between, with fatal results.  It is the tunes, however, which have held the allegiance of the public.   II Trovatore established once and for all the new attributes of unbridled passion that distinguish Verdi from his predecessors.  This encore performance is a revival of the David McVicar production which premiered at the Met in 2008.

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Brownell Library    

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
6 Lincoln Street
Essex Junction, Vermont 05452

(802)878-6955

Contact:  Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator
or Penny Pillsbury, Brownell Library Director

DINE & DISCUSS THE LESSER KNOWN WORKS OF LOUISA MAY ALCOTT @ BROWNELL LIBRARY

Dine & Discuss @ Brownell Library in Essex Junction on Wednesday, May 18, 2011,
6:15-8 p.m., features The Lesser Known Works of Louisa May Alcott:  Naughty and Naughtier.  Mary Lou Kete, Associate Professor of English and Women’s Studies at the University of Vermont, animates the discussion of Transcendental Wild Oats (1873), Alcott’s satire of life in a utopian community based on her childhood experience, and “Behind a Mask: or, a Woman’s Story,” (1866), a so-called “blood and thunder” tale, published under her pseudonym A.M. Barnard.  Copies are available at the library or on-line:  http://www.classicauthors.net/Alcott   Participants are asked to bring a pot-luck dish inspired by the texts.  Space is limited; RSVP (802)878-6955. 

Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888), renowned for her children’s stories, was a woman of verve and wit who grew up in the innermost circle of the Transcendentalist and antislavery movements, serving as a Civil War army nurse.  During the 1940’s, literary sleuths Dr. Leona Rostenberg and Madeline Stern discovered the pulp fiction dimension of Alcott’s talent.  Those short stories had been published either anonymously or pseudonymously in the mid 19^th century and have only been re-issued in the last thirty-five years.  Motivated by the need to support her family, Alcott produced a prodigious literary output that includes satires, fairy tales, articles, and works of domestic realism.

The inspiration for this program and others in Brownell Library’s current series comes from Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women, a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen.  Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Vermont Public Television and Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with  Brownell Library, proud to present a full array of programs in 2011.  We are also grateful to the Brownell Library Foundation, Inc., and Friends of Brownell Library.

Under the mandate of this grant, Brownell Library is mounting a full exploration of Louisa May Alcott, her life, her values, and her work.  Remaining programs in the series:  Screening of the documentary, “Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women,” with a discussion, led by Prof. Mary Lou Kete, Wed., May 25, 6:30-8:30 p.m.; “Louisa May Alcott’s Boston and the Social Movements that Shaped & Inspired Her,” a Conversation with Prof. Jacqueline B. Carr, Mon., June 20, 7 p.m.; “Louisa May Alcott:  Through Her Eyes,” a community pot-luck that features 19^th century games, fiddling and fare on Wed., June 29, starting at 5:45 p.m., followed with a living-history performance by Marianne Donnelly, “Louisa May Alcott:  Beyond Little Women.”  Miss Alcott receives us in the parlor, the Main Reading Room at 7 p.m.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955

Brownell Library Essex Jct, Vt 05452

One Regiment’s Story in the Civil War:

The Ninth Vermont, 1862–1865

Several Essex soldiers served in the 9^th Ninth Vermont Regiment. At the Brownell Library in Essex Junction on Monday April 25 at 7pm Civil War historian Donald Wickman will offer tales of the 9th Vermont, highlighted by the stories of some of the 1,878 Vermonters who comprised it, as it became one of the most traveled regiments in the Federal army.  From guarding Confederate prisoners incarcerated at Camp Douglas, Illinois, to the woods of coastal North Carolina and finally to the gates of Richmond, the Ninth Vermont Regiment earned a reputation of being well-disciplined and steadfast under fire. Although lacking the renown of other Vermont units, it represented the state well throughout its history.

Sponsored by the Vermont Humanities Council, this program complements both the Brownell Library’s Essex Civil War Veterans committee’s work and its American Library Association / National Endowment for the Humanities award to study the life and times of Louisa May Alcott.

Under the mandate of this grant, Brownell Library is mounting a full exploration Louisa May Alcott, her life, her values, and her work.  Upcoming programs include:   ‘‘’Oft Think of Me--’ 19th Century Domestic Arts:  Patch-Work Quilting” with Froncie Quinn, on Wed., March 30, 7 p.m.; “Civil War Hospitals in Vermont and the Eyewitness of Louisa May Alcott in Hospital Sketches,” a lecture by Civil War Historian Howard Coffin, Wed., April 27, 7 p.m.   Essex Community Historical Society also presents “Vermont History through Popular Song,” by mezzo-soprano Linda Radtke on Saturday, April 9, 2 p.m. at Memorial Hall in Essex Center.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955

4/4/2011

VERMONT’S CIVIL WAR HOSPITALS;

Reflected in Louisa May Alcott’s Hospital Sketches

On Wednesday, April 27 at 7pm at the Brownell Library in Essex Junction,

Vermont historian Howard Coffin will speak on Civil War hospitals. He will speak particularly about the three hospitals that operated in Vermont in Brattleboro, Montpelier, and Burlington and how they relate to Louisa May Alcott’s book Hospital Sketches and other writings. Miss Alcott worked during the war in a hospital near Washington DC. Copies of Hospital Sketches are available at the library’s circulation desk.

Coffin is author of three Civil War histories:  Full Duty:  Vermont in the Civil War; Nine Months to Gettysburg; and The Battered Stars: One State’s Civil War Ordeal During Grant’s Overland Campaign.  

Free and open to the public, and accessible to people with disabilities. Call 878-6955 for information.

This program is part of a series informed by Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women, a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen.  Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Vermont Public Television  and Vermont Humanities Council  are in concert with Brownell Library.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955 Jane Sandberg 899-2964

Program co-sponsored by the Essex Art League and the Brownell Library

OILS PASTEL WITH CAROL BOUCHER ARTIST –TALK, DEMO & SLIDE PRESENTATION @ BROWNELL LIBRARY

On Wednesday April 20^th the Essex Art League and the Brownell Library present Oil Pastels with Carol Boucher, Artist from 7 to 9pm in the Library’s Kolvoord Community Room.  Essex Junction artist Boucher offers an artist talk and slide presentation and a oil pastel demonstration. This program is free and open to the public 

To see Carol’s work go to www.carolboucher.com

Carol has enjoyed art since childhood, she received a bachelor’s degree in English literature. She became more serious about art in 1986 when she moved to Vermont. For the first ten year she managed a gallery and picture framing shop while painting in her spare time. Once she had a body of work, she began showing locally until age 35 when she decided to do art full time; she found a gallery to represent her and began showing nationally at juried shows. A Review in Seven Days in 2006 said of Carol Boucher, “Whether Boucher travels on roadways or waterways, she has a keen eye for dramatic colors and a sure hand for manipulating them. So if, next summer, you spot an itinerant artist selling paintings from a red Econoline, you'd be well advised to stop and have a look.”

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury

878-6955

4/9.2011

The Things They  Carried

by Tim O’brien

A Vermont/Essex wide Celebration of a book of stories about the experiences of soldiers in the Vietnam War.

Brownell Library Events

Wed. May 4, 6pm Dine & Discuss of O’brien’s book -Vietnam veteran Captain Ed Cashman will lead a Vietnam-inspired potluck supper and encourage participants  to discuss & debate the themes in O’brien’s book. Copies @ Library, Northfield Savings & People’s United Bank, Susie Wilson Rd.

Wed. May 11, 7pm Discussion w/ filmmaker & Vietnam War veteran Patrick  Boyden. Capt. Boyden, Chaplin for the Gold Star Families in Vermont, served in the Vietnam War. He will lead a discussion of two 30 minute movies he produced: “Remembrance”, about memories of Vietnam War and what the war means to us now: “In Country,” winner of the 1999 College Emmy Awards, the story of the Vietnam War told by Americans who were there.

Thurs. May 12, 3:30pm Vietnam Today-a travelogue slide show by Keith Pillsbury , a 1st Lt. in Da Nang in the War, and returned as a traveler in 2008 to find a vibrant country.

Sponsored by The Big Read, Nat’l Endowment for the Arts and Brownell Library.

** During the month of May, Pat Boyden will be exhibiting some of the “Things He Carried” during his tour of Vietnam in the Brownell Library’s Glass case.

Contact:  Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator
or Penny Pillsbury, Brownell Library Director

Louisa May Alcott’s Journals and Yours, a Writing Workshop @ Brownell Library

On Saturday, April 16, 2011, from 2 – 4 p.m., seasoned and neophyte journal-writers (or diary-keepers) are invited to discuss Louisa May Alcott’s journals as inspiration for their own and to spend time writing themselves.  Martha A. Penzer, Louisa May Alcott Project Coordinator, facilitates this session.  Readings are available in advance.

Alcott (1832-88) began keeping a log of her thoughts and experiences by the age of ten or eleven, a practice she maintained throughout her life.  In our times, Alcott has come to be appreciated as much more than a children’s book author, but as a creative force of considerable versatility that influenced American realist style. Her journals are viewed as trove of inspiration for her writing.  Journal-writing was something of a family activity.  Her parents Bronson and Abba responded to their children’s entries with encouragement and instruction.

This workshop responds to the mandate of the American Library Association / National Endowment for the Humanities grant to Brownell Library to explore Alcott’s works that are not widely read.  Other lesser known works under consideration are “Vermont Civil War Hospitals Reflected in Louisa May Alcott’s Hospital Sketches,” a presentation by pre-eminent Civil War Historian Howard Coffin on Wednesday, April 27, 7 p.m., and “The Lesser Known Works of Louisa May Alcott:  Naughty and Naughtier, Transcendental Wild Oats and a sensation tale, 'A Double Tragedy, An Actor’s Story.'”  UVM Professor of English and Women’s Studies Mary Lou Kete leads this Dine & Discuss on Wednesday, May 18, 6:15-8 p.m.

The impetus for the workshop and other programs in Brownell Library’s current series comes from Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women, a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen.  Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Vermont Public Television and Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with Brownell Library.  Brownell Library is also grateful for the support of Friends of Brownell Library and The Brownell Library Foundation.

All programs are free and open to the public.

Other programs in the series also include, “One Regiment’s Story in the Civil War: The 9^th Vermont 1862-1865” a talk by Don Wickham. Several Essex soldiers fought in this regiment, learn where they went and what they did on Monday, April 25, 7pm. Sponsored by the Essex Civil War Veterans Committee. Screening of documentary “Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women” on Wednesday, May 25, 6:30 p.m. followed by discussion with Prof. Mary Lou Kete.  “Louisa May Alcott’s Boston and the Social Reform Movements that Inspired Her,” a Conversation by UVM Professor of Early American History Jacqueline B. Carr, on Monday, June 20, 7 p.m..  “Louisa May Alcott:  Through her Eyes,” a visit by Louisa May Alcott, played by re-enactor Marianne Donnelly, for a community pot-luck that features 19^th century fare and fiddling and conversation about Alcott’s life, her values, and her work on Wednesday, June 29, 5 p.m..

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Brownell Library                                           

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  - 3/12/2011
6 Lincoln Street
Essex Junction, Vermont 05452

(802)878-6955

Contact:  Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator
or Penny Pillsbury, Brownell Library Director

‘‘‛Oft Think of Me—’19th Century Domestic Arts:  Patch-Work Quilting” with Froncie Quinn @ Brownell Library

On Wednesday, March 30, 7 p.m., the Louisa May Alcott series continues with ‘‘‛Oft Think of Me—’19th Century Domestic Arts:  Patch-Work Quilting,” led by Froncie Quinn who recounts the stories behind the making of quilts.

During the Civil War, the U.S. Sanitary Commission was funded and supplied by Northern women volunteers who rolled bandages, sewed quilts and clothing, knitted, purchased medicines, and held fund raisers called “Sanitary Fairs.”  Louisa May Alcott, her mother, and her sisters did their utmost for the Union cause, and such a fair figures in Alcott’s Little Women when Amy’s booth sells out despite the snooty girls.  In Amy’s last will and testament, she bequeaths:  “To Hannah I give the bandbox she wanted and all the patch work I leave hoping she ‘will remember me, when it you see.”

It is said of Alcott herself in the biography, Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women, by Harriet Reisen:  “Like making patchwork as Abby [Louisa’s mother] had taught her in childhood, Louisa went through her scrap bag of feelings, observations, and experiences, then selected and reorganized them to make stories.”

Since 1982, Froncie Quinn has been teaching the art of quilting.  She approached the Shelburne Museum about patterning their antique quilts so that the general public could make reproductions of their collection.  As a consequence, Quinn wrote the patterns for the book, Enduring Grace Quilts from the Shelburne Museum Collection.  This project led to working with Old Sturbridge Village, patterning their quilt collection and also to a latest series patterning antique Vermont quilts.

The inspiration for this program and others in Brownell Library’s current series comes from Louisa May Alcott:  The Woman Behind Little Women, a documentary film co-produced by Nancy Porter Productions, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET New York’s American Masters, and a biography of the same name written by Harriet Reisen.  Louisa May Alcott programs in libraries are sponsored by the American Library Association Public Programs Office with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Vermont Public Television and Vermont Humanities Council are in concert with Brownell Library, proud to present a full array of programs in 2011.

Other programs in the series @ Brownell Library include, “One Regiment’s Story in the Civil War: The 9^th Vermont 1862-1865” a talk by Don Wickham. Several Essex soldiers fought in this regiment, learn where they went and what they did on Monday, Mar. 21, 7pm. Sponsored by the Essex Civil War Veterans Committee. “Louisa May Alcott’s Journals and Yours” on Saturday, April 16, 2 p.m., and “Civil War Hospitals in Vermont and the Eyewitness of Louisa  May Alcott in Hospital Sketches,” a lecture by Civil War Historian Howard Coffin on Wednesday, April 27, 7 p.m..  Essex Community Historical Society presents “Vermont History through Popular Song,” by mezzo-soprano Linda Radtke
on Saturday, April 9, 2 p.m. at Memorial Hall in Essex Center.

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Press Release

Contact: Penny Pillsbury 878-6955

Brownell Library Essex Jct, Vt 05452

One Regiment’s Story in the Civil War:

The Ninth Vermont, 1862–1865

Several Essex soldiers served in the 9^th Ninth Vermont Regiment. At the Brownell Library in Essex Junction on Monday March 21^st at 7pm Civil War historian Donald Wickman will offer tales of the 9th Vermont, highlighted by the stories of some of the 1,878 Vermonters who comprised it, as it became one of the most traveled regiments in the Federal army.  From guarding Confederate prisoners incarcerated at Camp Douglas, Illinois, to the woods of coastal North Carolina and finally to the gates of Richmond, the Ninth Vermont Regiment earned a reputation of being well-disciplined and steadfast under fire. Although lacking the renown of other Vermont units, it represented the state well throughout its history.

Sponsored by the Vermont Humanities Council, this program complements both the Brownell Library’s Essex Civil War Veterans committee’s work and its American Library Association / National Endowment for the Humanities award to study the life and times of Louisa May Alcott.

Under the mandate of this grant, Brownell Library is mounting a full exploration Louisa May Alcott, her life, her values, and her work.  Upcoming programs include:   ‘‘’Oft Think of Me--’ 19th Century Domestic Arts:  Patch-Work Quilting” with Froncie Quinn, on Wed., March 30, 7 p.m.; “Civil War Hospitals in Vermont and the Eyewitness of Louisa May Alcott in Hospital Sketches,” a lecture by Civil War Historian Howard Coffin, Wed., April 27, 7 p.m.   Essex Community Historical Society also presents “Vermont History through Popular Song,” by mezzo-soprano Linda Radtke on Saturday, April 9, 2 p.m. at Memorial Hall in Essex Center.

Brownell Library                        FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  - 2/24/2011
6 Lincoln Street
Essex Junction, Vermont 05452

(802)878-6955

Contact:  Martha A. Penzer, Project Coordinator
or Penny Pillsbury, Brownell Library Director

Nicole@Flavorcom.com

802-238-6809

Five Corners Farmers' Market and the Brownell Library Presents a Special Viewing of Food Inc.

The Five Corners Farmers’ Market, which features over 30 local vendors from June to October, continues to promote sustainable living through promotion and education of local foods and local living. More details on the full line up of events for the Winter Sustainability Series can be found at www.5CornersFarmersMarket.com. Regular event updates are also posted on the Market’s Facebook page.

Brownell Library
6 Lincoln Street
Essex Junction, VT 05452
802-878-6955