We helped plant strawberries at Apple Hill
When you think of planting fruits and vegetables, it’s done on your hands and knees, digging small holes in the dirt in your yard. But when you have 17,000 strawberry plants to get in the ground like Chuck and Diane Souther at Apple Hill Farm do, there just isn’t the time to plant them individually. And here’s a fun fact: “Strawberries are one of the more difficult crops we grow,” Chuck said. There’s way too many other things to get...
What hidden gems will you find this weekend?
It sure is fun to see what you can find at yard sales. And it just so happens that yard sale season is upon us. Sure there have been some here and there over the last month or so, but starting this weekend and extending through the summer months, chances are you won’t be able to pass a telephone or intersection without seeing a handmade sign pointing you to an address where people will be sitting in their yard or driveway trying to...
Students get water-crafty with cardboard
Students at Christa McAuliffe School are up to something crafty – watercrafty, that is. By that we mean they’re making real boats out of cardboard – well, the boats have been made but they just need a finishing touch in the form of a protective coating. The goal is to launch the boats into Squam Lake at the end of the school year and see how their craftsmanship turned out. Third- and fifth-grade students at the elementary school...
What happens to all the unsold treasures?
We’ve all seen yard sales before – assuming we’ve all been out of the house at least once on a weekend morning at some point in life. What many people never see is the untold story: What happens to all the stuff that doesn’t get sold? After all, even the biggest and best yard sales in the land will still end up with some stragglers – “I can’t believe nobody bought my great aunt’s Christmas dish collection!” So what happens to those...
Think you’ve got what it takes to pull a fire truck?
So be honest, do you think there’s a real possibility that you could pull a fire truck down Main Street? Don’t worry, you won’t have to do it alone. You can put together a team of 10 to try and be the fastest to drag Concord’s 45,000 pound reserve fire truck down a section of Main Street during the annual Market Days festivities. This is the fourth annual fire truck pull put on by the Concord Public Safety Foundation, and registration...
4,500-mile ride on tap for Thomson brothers
There’s a good chance that while you’re reading this latest copy of the Insider, Derek and Dylan Thomson are riding their bikes. That’s because last Saturday, the Concord raised brothers embarked on a cross-country journey on their bicycles, carrying 60 or 70 pounds of supplies, to raise money for Concord High School Principal Gene Connolly. And since they plan to complete the 4,500-mile quest from San Francisco to Seabrook in 50 days...
Nothing says spring in N.H. like outdoor art
Mill Brook Gallery and Sculpture Garden is celebrating its 19th annual outdoor sculpture exhibit with a garden party on Sunday. You can meet the sculptors, which there are 25 of, and discuss the pieces that have been created in bronze, welded aluminum, carved marble, corten steel and resins. You’ll probably be just as amazed with the work as we were when we stopped in for a sneak peek last week. The party is free and open to the...
Tasty Brews: Tuckerman Pale Ale
Another week, another review of a New Hampshire-made beer on tap somewhere in Concord. It’s a tough job, but somebody’s gotta do it. We don’t always do Granite State beers, but we’re on a local kick lately so figured we’d keep it going. This time it’s Tuckerman Pale Ale from Makris Lobster & Steak House. This beer is somewhere between an IPA and a traditional pilsner: not too hoppy and bitey, but definitely not boring and...
This Week in Concord History
May 24, 1844: Samuel F.B. Morse, who began his career as a Concord mechanic, sends the first message over his electro-magnetic telegraph. The previous year, Congress appropriated $30,000 to test the machine on a line laid from Washington to Baltimore. New Hampshireman Benjamin Brown French, who will soon join Morse and others in the Magnetic Telegraph Co., calls it “one of the greatest inventions of the age” and predicts it will...
Book of the Week: ‘Breaking News: Bear Alert’
Breaking News: Bear Alert David Biedrzycki 2014 Children’s fiction This children’s book opens with Jean Louis from the TV show Our Furry Planet going into a bear’s den and poking a sleeping bear. Not a good idea! The bears wake up and cleverly hitch a ride into town on top of the TV truck. Hilarious mayhem begins. The bears explore the town, going into a diner, trying on things at Paddington’s Department Store, and using a...
Bulletin Board
Bow Garden Club plant sale Saturday The Bow Garden Club will hold its annual spring plant sale on Saturday at the Bow Community Building, 3 Bow Center Road, from 8 a.m. to noon. Annuals, perennials, vegetable starters, herbs and hanging plants will be available for purchase with proceeds to benefit the Bow High School Scholarship Program, the club’s ongoing civic beautification efforts and the various community projects they...
Spend your Thursday nights with the Concord Model Railroad Club
Choo Choo! That’s the sound you might hear on Thursday nights at the CSI Charter School in Penacook, where the Concord Model Railroad Club meets. The club was incorporated in 1986 by a small group of HO-scale model railroad enthusiasts for the purpose of promoting model railroading and enjoying the fellowship of other modelers. (HO scale is 1:87 – half the size of O-scale trains, Lionels being the most common O-scale trains.) It...
It’s the perfect time of year to get into the hobby of birding
One of the signature features of spring is the return of the pleasant chirping of all kinds of birds. Sure, there are still birds around here in the winter, but not nearly as many as there are in spring, especially early spring when the migratory birds are coming back from the South (and some even come South to New Hampshire from Canada). In that case, it’s the perfect time to learn a little something about a relaxing and easy hobby:...
Everett Arena says goodbye to ice and boards until September
If you’re a serious ice skater, we have some bad news for you: Everett Arena is now ice-free until September. While that may be a bummer to the future Nancy Kerrigans or Patrice Bergerons of the world, it should come as welcome news for most of us, because it can only mean that spring is here to stay. After a winter (that really didn’t seem that bad or that long) of ice skating, the arena will now host all kinds of friction-dependent...
Mark your calendars: Voting for the 2016 Cappies opens April 1
It’s getting to be that time again, folks. No, not spring – well, yes, it is spring, but that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about the always-popular and highly anticipated Cappies. This is that time of year, more than any other, when we lean heavily on you, our faithful readers. We want to know what you love most about Concord – everything from your favorite brunch joint to your favorite place to get a root canal....
Depot Antiques & Toys is the place for all your model railroad needs
Whether you’re in the Concord Model Railroad Club or not, if you like model trains, you need a place to get them – and all of the accompanying accessories. Luckily, Concord has just such a place: Depot Antiques & Toys. Located on Main Street (and conveniently close to Depot Street), this shop has all kinds of old-fashioned trinkets and doodads. You can get an autographed baseball, a vintage toy gun and an antique metal sign if you...
Filmmaker Dan Habib has another good documentary in the works
Dan Habib is a guy who has worn a lot of hats over the years. He’s also held many different jobs and titles, including photojournalist, former Monitor photo editor, award-winning documentarian and now filmmaker and project director at the UNH Institute on Disability. Habib made a splash with his debut documentary Including Samuel in 2008. The film was about Habib’s son Samuel and his challenges with living with a disability. Including...
Check out the new ‘Trans Pose’ exhibit at McGowan Fine Art
McGowan Fine Art’s latest exhibit, “Trans Pose,” features a collection of paintings by Catherine Graffam. “My work mainly deals with my identity as a transgender woman, and how it affects not only myself but my interpersonal relationships,” reads a section of Graffam’s Artist Statement on McGowan’s website. The exhibit runs until April 22.
Everett Arena trades ice for thousands of antiques, crafts, shoppers
Everett Arena hosted its first non-ice event of the year last week with a flea market. Hundreds of shoppers packed the arena to poke around at some vintage wares. And there was plenty to look at!
Mill Brook opens April 1 with springy exhibition
If you’ve ever spent much time walking around Hopkinton Road, you may have come across a bunch of huge stones sitting in a big metal basket off the side of the road. That’s how you know you’re at Mill Brook Gallery & Sculpture Garden. Mill Brook always has a lot of interesting stuff to look at – and buy – both outside and in. The gallery opens for the season April 1, and there will be a new exhibit all about spring. We gave you a...
Instagram Photo of the Week
It was kind of a crazy week for weather around here last week. There was sun, rain, a little snow, some ice. All par for the course in New Hampshire in late March. Anyway, Instagram user @stephenwaynefumio opted to take his camera out during one of the nice days, and it paid off in the form of this nice, flowery shot of the State House. There are always plenty of State House photos on Instagram every week, but this one stood out due...
If you want some of these flowers in your garden, it’s time to plan
Now that you’ve read up on how to get your garden ready for planting (we’re assuming you read the page right before this because you always read the Insider from cover to cover each week), it’s time to start thinking about when to plant. We know it’s only March and a little late season snow (eek) might still be lingering on your beds, but this is the time when you want to start mapping things out. At least that’s what Concord Garden...
Get yourself a tee time – outdoors – at Beaver Meadow Golf Course
If you’re a hard-core golf enthusiast, you’re probably well aware that Beaver Meadow Golf Course installed two high-tech golf simulators inside the clubhouse in January. Those simulators allowed for golf to be played at the course all year, not just when the weather cooperated. That’s all fine and good – and we had a blast trying them out – but it’s never quite the same experience as playing outside on a real course. Missing are...
We took a tour of the city to see what was going on outside
Since it was so nice out last week, we took to the streets to see what was happening. People were definitely getting an early jump on spring.
It’s about time to get your hands dirty and ‘wake up your garden’
Oh, the doldrums of winter. “Wake up your garden” and prepare to welcome in spring beginning this month and into April. Start by donning those work gloves, grabbing that rake and gently removing all the leaves, twigs and sticks, pine needles and other winter debris that have collected in your once beautiful flower gardens. Attack your sunniest areas first and gradually make your way through your garden beds, as March and even April in...
S&W Sports has everything you need to get back in the saddle again
With the kind of weather we’ve been having lately, it’s really hard to justify staying inside. Why waste the day away inside when you could be out wearing spandex and weaving through traffic while making turn signals with one arm? That’s right, it’s finally spring, and that means it’s time to go into the garage and dust off the ol’ bicycle. It’s probably safe by now to pack away the snowmobiles and skis (although S&W is still...
The parks and rec departments in Concord and Bow have full slates
When the weather starts to warm up, it’s always nice to find something fun to do outside. For parks and recreation departments, that’s pretty much all they do every day. And it just so happens to be spring now, and the parks and rec departments in Concord and Bow can’t wait to get going on the season. Although the fun never ends with either department, the good stuff really ramps up once spring rolls around. We checked out both...
Lots of cool, student-created art is on display at Kimball Jenkins
March is Youth Art Month, and the Kimball Jenkins School of Art is displaying the New Hampshire Art Educators Teacher and Student Exhibit to go along with it. All of the art was created by students across the state.
Attention, kids: There are four Easter egg hunts on the horizon
So Easter is right around the corner already. Where has the time gone? Seems like just yesterday we were chattering our teeth at the Black Ice tournament. But spring is definitely on its way, and that means it’s time to get outside – if you haven’t already been taking advantage of the fine weather. When you think Easter and nice weather, it’s hard not to then think about Easter egg hunts. For many kids (and adults, too), the hunt is...
The Capital Area Well Done! Awards are soon
The Capital Area Wellness Coalition is pleased to announce the third annual Capital Area Well Done! Awards. These awards recognize and bring to the forefront wellness activities taking place at worksites, initiatives of community groups and the leadership of unsung wellness heroes within the community who are making a difference. The CAWC’s Capital Area Well Done! Awards shine a light on these efforts because they align with its...
