Moving Past Adversity Celebrating 20 Years of Community Journalism

1993 • 20 T H ANNIVERS A RY S UPPLEMENT • 2013 TDECEMBER 12,h 2013 eBridge Celebrating 20 Years of e Community g rid B e h Journalism T 0 2 “We haven’t yet exceeded our capacity to imagine what we are going to become.” – Tom Greene T A FAMILY CHRISTMAS GATHERING been in touch with the editors at Blair & Ketchum’s A in Marlboro, Vermont, in December 1981, my Country Journal in Manchester, Vermont, and they Moving Past cousin Teddy Moore made a proposal that I could not agreed to pay me to write a story about homesteading resist: Would I, the following summer, be willing to drive in the remote Alaska bush. his pickup truck, along with his dog Swarth and a load of I won’t report here on all the details of driving Adversity furniture, from Marlboro, Vermont, to Anchorage, Alaska? that pickup truck from Marlboro into New York State, Harnessing intelligence, Ted, his wife, Ginny, and their two children had been through the Midwest, up into Canada and along the living and working back East for a couple of years, but Alaska Highway. I’ll save that for another time. Instead, imagination and resilience they had a permanent home in Anchorage, and they were let me concentrate here on a side trip I took from as we confront the future. looking for someone to drive that loaded pickup truck my cousin’s home in Anchorage to the little town of back to Alaska. McCarthy, as I pursued my story for the Country Journal My only knowledge of Alaska was from National about homesteading. Geographic, picture books and Jack London’s life-and- I started out by driving north from Anchorage to by Nat Frothingham death stories of survival on the Alaska frontier, and here Wasilla, then on to Glennallen, then found myself in the was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see some of that vast tiny, one-horse town of Chitina. The needle on my gas expanse of rivers, snow, ice, glaciers—and mountain gauge was pointing toward empty when I saw a sign by peaks so numerous some hadn’t even been named. After the side of the road as I was leaving Chitina that said Christmas, I called up Ted and told him I wanted to “No More Gas After This.” I had three choices: I could make the trip. Our deal was this: Ted would pay for gas stop. I could turn back. I could keep going. in exchange for the driving. And one other thing. I had continued on page 2 1993 • T H E B R I D G E 20 T H ANNIVERS A RY S UPPLEMENT • 2013 Moving Past Adversity continued from page 1 The Bridge at 20: In the years that followed, I have remembered many times the feeling of dread and paralysis that permeated Two Decades of Community Journalism my being when I saw that sign in Chitina. All the choices looked bad: stop, go back, go forward. My feeling of des- peration was perhaps not unlike what a mountain climber n 1993, I was asking around to see if anyone must feel way up on a narrow rock ledge. You can’t climb might be interested in starting a volunteer I up because it’s too steep. You can’t stay where you are newspaper covering Montpelier. Nat Frothingham because it’s too cold. And with darkness failing, you can’t heard about it and gave me a call. We met for a climb down either. cup of coffee at the old Horn of the Moon Café, As I think about the present moment in this coun- located where the Shoe Horn is now. try and all of what’s facing us in America—north, Before long, we were putting up flyers an- east, south, west—I sometimes feel the same sickening nouncing a meeting. A dozen enthusiastic and paralysis. It could be war or hunger or homelessness or talented people showed up. Those who helped prison populations or looking for work and not finding it, launch The Bridge, in addition to Nat and myself, or personal and collective debt, or drugs, or bought-and- included Jake Brown, Bernie Folta, Nancy sold politicians. It could be anything. The crisis cup is Schulz, Steve Larose, Kate Mueller, Irene Racz, overflowing. Don Pfister, Dan Renfro, Nikki Parker and But back to that forbidding roadside sign as I was Mason Singer. leaving Chitina. I kept going. And the road ended where Today, I am pleased and amazed that the the map said it would—on a high bank overlooking the newspaper is alive and well, covering both Mont- swollen, glacial torrent of the pelier and nearby towns, and publishing twice a Kennicott River. I parked the month. Over the years, there have been hun- truck, set the brakes, gathered dreds of other volunteers, financial contributors, a small bag of belongings and advertisers and paid staff, all of whom helped pulled myself up into a metal keep The Bridge moving forward. triangle attached to a cable Most of us who were involved at the begin- that spanned the rapids of the ning have moved on. The one constant over the slate-gray river below. Seated years has been Nat Frothingham, now the owner, on that triangle, I pulled myself We are all too editor, publisher and guiding force behind the hand-over-hand along the cable aware of the paper. He has devoted an enormous amount of across the river until my feet obstructions that time and energy to a not-so-easy task. I tip my touched the McCarthy side of hat to you, sir. The next cup of coffee is on me. A copy of the first issue ofT he Bridge published block our lives. 20 years ago. the river. But we are less It was July 3. The next day —Phil Dodd, aware of our cofounder of The Bridge was the Fourth of July, and there was a party in McCarthy own resources at the tiny general store. of intelligence, At this party I met a home- imagination steader whose place was on the and persistence. other side of the glacial river. Sponsors/Supporters TheBridge Free, Independent & Local We talked. He had gas. He told me how to find his place. And a few days later, after pursuing my homesteader story P.O. Box 1143, Montpelier, VT 05601 in McCarthy, I went hand-over-hand back across the river, National Life Group Phone: 802-223-5112 Fax: 802-223-7852 got into my cousin’s pickup truck, found the homesteader’s • place, got the gas and drove back to Anchorage. So, the David F. Kelley Editor & Publisher: Nat Frothingham Production Manager: Robert Nuner sign by the side of the road at Chitina was wrong. • Asssistant Production Manager: Jerrry Carter Over the years, my road and hand-over-hand adven- Montpelier Property Management ture from Anchorage to McCarthy and back has become 20th Anniversary Commemorative edition • something of a personal life fable—an advisory. We are Community National Bank Project Coordinator: Joyce Kahn all too aware of the obstructions in our lives. The world is • Project Development Associate: Amy Brooks Thornton often telling us about things that are fixed and immutable, Capitol Copy Project Editor: Kate Mueller as in territorial boundaries, judicial edicts, constitutional • Principal Photographer: Annie Tiberio Cameron law, structures and prohibitions of all kinds. But we are Betsy Frothingham Advertising Sales: Carolyn Grodinsky, Ivan Shadis, less aware of our own resources of intelligence, imagina- • Rick McMahon, Suzannah Mullikin and Liz Dodd tion and persistence and of the help that can come from Hunger Mountain Coop Graphic Design: The Laughing Bear Associates unexpected places as soon as we have the courage to move • toward our objectives. Vermont College of Fine Arts The Bridge acknowledges the valued contributions of writers whose names appear in bylines under their stories. In this 20th anniversary supplement of The Bridge, we are publishing a range of stories about local Vermonters in our midst who give us examples of courage, imagination, persistence, good humor and plain common sense in facing difficulties or adversity or in bringing ingenuity and inven- tion to what they are doing in their lives. Not every one of My note of thanks these stories describes a superhuman act of heroism, as in conquering a mountain or starting a Fortune 500 company. Sometimes heroism shows itself most brightly in just show- It is impossible to remember and thank each together a business plan, deal with uncollected ing up and persisting in doing a good job. Sometimes an one of the many people who have helped debts or reach out to the best person at what act of kindness or generosity can encourage someone else The Bridge in so many ways over the years. we can pay to do critical job. to make a personal breakthrough. Little of what The Bridge has achieved would When we lost money from an embezzle- I very much like what Tom Greene, president of the have been made possible without our ment, the outpouring of help, including Vermont College of Fine Arts, said about the college. loyal advertisers. money, legal advice, accounting, didn’t quit. Looking out on the future, we might do well to embrace Over and over again we have asked our Over and over again, the people at Tom’s courage and optimism: “We haven’t yet exceeded readers to help fill a gap between advertising Upper Valley Press who print our paper— our capacity for imagining what we’re going to become.” revenues and what it costs to produce the in management, prepress, printing and paper, and they have responded generously.

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