Rural Intelligence (Page 697)

Parties

The Beacon Cinema Says "Thank You" and "Welcome"

Cultural correspondent Bess J. M. Hochstein reports from Pittsfield: The brand new Beacon Cinema officially opened on November 19 with a raucous North Street block party and midnight screening of New Moon. But the very next Monday, November 23, the cinema closed its doors to the public to throw another

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Community

Excursions: Holiday Fetes and Strolls

Holiday spirit is highly infectious—no way you'll catch it at home, watching t.v., and all it takes is one trip to any mall to guarantee immunity well past New Year's Eve. Our small town holiday festivals, on the other hand, are veritable petri dishes

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Food

AgriCulture: "Food Insecurity"? How About Just Plain "Hunger"

Peter Davies and Mark Scherzer are the owners of Turkana Farms in Germantown, NY. This week Mark writes: You may think I'm suffering from a case of eater's remorse, but in fact even before the recent holiday, I was giving a lot of thought to how

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Food

AgriCulture: Ten Years Hence, There is Much to be Thankful For

Peter Davies and Mark Scherzer are the owners of Turkana Farms in Germantown, New York. This week Peter writes: This will be our tenth Thanksgiving at Turkana Farms. And we can be thankful that the house has, at last, been fully restored, the final room being the eighteenth-century basement

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Arts

Dan's Diary: Winter, Spring, Summer or Fall . . .

Even in the off season, Tanglewood dominates the cultural and economic life of the Berkshires. "For the Berkshires to thrive, we need Tanglewood to survive," says BSO trustee Nancy Fitzpatrick, the owner of the Red Lion Inn, who is head of the Tanglewood Business Partners. According to the

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Community

Berkshire Taconic's Neighbor-to-Neighbor Program

"Poverty is all around us but it's more hidden in our region than in other places," says Jennifer Dowley, the president of the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation, noting that 15,000 people in Berkshire County alone receive fuel assistance. "Whether you're in Millbrook

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Community

Road Trip: Sinterklaas is Comin' to Town

A fairy tale: A town was going through a time of trial, as towns often do when they grow. Newcomers were impacting the outcomes of elections, and some even took exception to the quasi-religious celebrations that took place seasonally in their children's new schools. For their part,

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Parties

Night of 100 Plates: A Feast to Help Feed the Hungry

Cultural correspondent Bess J.M. Hochstein reports from Pittsfield: Art dealers Leslie Ferrin and Donald Clark were thinking of ways to give back to the community during the holidays, so they decided to host a festive dinner to benefit St. Stephen’s Table on November 21. The meal followed the

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Parties

"The French Blue" Book Party at The Mount

Cultural Correspondent Bess J.M. Hochstein reports from Lenox: It should come as no surprise that self-taught goldsmith and gemologist Richard W. Wise gets things done with a certain flair. Rather than hold the typical author's reading and signing to launch his new book, The French Blue,

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Food

Butternut Pie with Gingersnap Crust

Amy Cotler, the author of The Locavore Way: Discovering the Pleasures of Eating Fresh, Locally Grown Food (Storey Publishing, $12.95) has an uncanny way of using fresh, local produce. Unable to find good cooking pumpkins and unwilling to use pumpkin from a can, she devised an alternative dessert pie

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Food

AgriCulture: The Superior Long Island Cheese Pumpkin

Peter Davies and Mark Scherzer are the owners of Turkana Farms in Germantown, New York. This week Mark writes: Although it's Friday the 13th, things seem relatively stable here on the farm. The coyotes have returned, but the calf is sticking close by his mama and has not

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Community

It's Finally Show Time at the Beacon Cinema in Pittsfield

Richard Stanley knows first hand how a movie theater can be a tipping point for a community. After all, fourteen years ago, he opened The Triplex, a brand new independent movie house in Great Barrington. By all accounts, The Triplex was the catalyst for Great Barrington's metamorphosis, attracting

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