Bulletin Board
McGowan to open Bob Larsen exhibit McGowan Fine Art announces the opening of “Inspirations, New Watercolors” featuring the paintings of Bob Larsen. The show will run through June 30, with an artist’s reception on Friday from 4:30 to 7 p.m. This show is free and open to the public. This show offers a chance to take in the sights of New Hampshire as seen through the eyes of a noted artist. Gallery hours are Tuesday to Friday, 10 a.m. to...
This Week in Concord History
May 31, 1856: Edward H. Rollins, Concord politico, leads a mass meeting at Phenix Hall to condemn terrorism in Kansas and the caning of Sen. Charles Sumner on the floor of the U.S. Senate. It is among the first gatherings in the city of a new party, the Republicans. May 31, 1873: The city council appropriates $12,000 to build a new bridge over the Contoocook River in Penacook. May 31, 1932: The Schoonmaker Chair Co. goes...
We went to all the yard sales we could find
Now that it’s finally (probably) safe to put away the winter gear, it’s time for everybody’s favorite time of year: yard sale season. Who doesn’t love getting up at the crack of dawn every weekend, loading up with cash and heading out to see what can be bought off lawns? We sure as heck live for that stuff, so we went out this past weekend to see what we could find. We were not disappointed.
If you like yard sales, check out this place
It’s just a bit after 3 on a Monday afternoon and the Concord Auction Center is starting to get busy. There’s an auction in a few hours and people want to see what kind of stuff they can take home with them. If they have the winning bid that is. When we took a stroll around the 126 Hall St. warehouse, the volume of stuff for the weekly Monday auction was a little overwhelming. At the Concord Auction Center, Mondays are for household...
Food Snob: Smokeshow Barbeque
If there’s one food group that we just can’t get enough of, it’s barbeque. So when we heard there was a new place over on Fort Eddy Road serving up smoked BBQ meats, we had to give it a taste. We wouldn’t be doing our jobs if we didn’t. Let us introduce you to Smokeshow Barbeque. It’s located in the Merrimack Center (the same one that houses Planet Fitness and Cobblestone Design) and since they got top billing on the sign out front,...
Go Try It: Open jam session at NEC
Every once in a while, you just need to rock out. It’s a cathartic experience that experts say adds decades to your life, and there’s somewhere right downtown where you can do exactly that: NEC Concord. The little college campus on North Main Street hosts live music once a week as part of the Listening Room Series. This past Thursday, we hit up the ProJam Open Jam Session, which is basically exactly what it sounds like: an open jam...
You’ve got two chances to see St. Paul’s ballet
Insider staff When it comes to dancing in front of others, we like to refrain as much as possible. If you’ve seen us bust a move, then you know exactly what we’re talking about.But the exact opposite can be said for the 14 dancers that make up the St. Paul’s School Ballet Company. The whole point of the ballet company is to perform in front of others and you can see it on display this weekend.That’s when they’ll put on their spring...
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...
Drum roll please. . . . The 2016 Cappies!
We know it hasn’t been easy the last few weeks, patiently waiting to see who would be named winners in this year’s Cappie Awards. But you no longer have to ask perfect strangers how they voted in an attempt to put together some sort of exit poll – the wait is over. All you have to do is keep reading. That’s right, as you’ll soon see, the votes have been collected, counted and double checked, and it’s time to announce the winners. The...
Since it’s the Cappies, we had to check out a few of the winners
Insider staffAs you probably know by now, this is the Cappies Issue. The time of year when we celebrate the best the Capital region has to offer. There’s some pretty cool stuff in here that if you just passed right by, we urge you to go back and take a closer look.Because after we did (on many occassions putting this whole thing together), we set out to visit a few of these winners to see if you got it right when it comes to the...
Destination Imagination sure is going places
Five kids sitting on a floor paddling invisible canoes. A detailed lesson on leaf-tailed geckos in Madagascar. A virus disguised as an office desk nameplate. These are all products of the imaginations of some kids around here who are going places – to the Destination Imagination Global Finals in Knoxville, Tenn., specifically. Destination Imagination is a nonprofit whose goal is to create the next wave of leaders and innovators in the...
Tucker’s is the new gig in town, so we went
Whenever there’s a new eatery in town, an alarm goes off in the Food Snob office and continues ringing until we go check it out. For the sake of our co-workers’ eardrums, we decided to go hit up the newly opened Tucker’s, in the spot where the Corner View operated for a couple decades. Tucker’s already had locations in Hooksett and New London, but we had never been to either, so this would be a truly novel Food Snob experience. The...
Don’t forget, Rock ‘N Race is Thursday
Amid all the hooplah surrounding the Cappies, you may have forgotten one big important event going on in Concord this week: The Rock ‘N Race. That’s right, the annual musical road race is Thursday starting at 6 p.m., and you don’t want to miss it. Online registration has closed, but you can print a form at goo.gl/6sQCAV that you can then bring to the Bektash Temple (189 Pembroke Road) on Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. or to the...
All fun and games at the Kiwanis Spring Fair
The Kiwanis Spring Fair rung in its 61st year with a bang this past weekend. The Everett Arena parking lot was full of rides, games, food and people having a good time.
Pick up some knowledge at How-To Festival
Insider staff We all pride ourselves on knowing how to do stuff.Whether it’s framing a wall, baking a cake or changing the brakes on a ‘57 Chevy, we all have that one thing (or many) we could adequately teach someone else how to do.But there sure are a lot of things we don’t know how to do. Only if there was a place where we could go and learn some new skills? Well, actually there is. It just so happens that the Concord Public Library...
Best place to take a visitor? The State House
Insider staff When we got a sneak peek at the winners of this year’s Cappies, like most of you will do, we scanned the list to see who came out on top.As we went down the list, a few categories stood out. One being the “Best Place to Take a Visitor.” Concord has a lot of cool stuff, so it was interesting to see that the State House earned the top spot.But why not? It’s got a lot of history, cool statues and a golden dome that will...
Tasty Brews: Stoneface IPA at The Draft
After finding out that The Draft is the best place in Concord to watch sports according the Cappie Award voting, we figured why not head down there for a beer. With 24 taps, projection screens upstairs and too many flat screens to count in the bar area, there had to be something good to report back about. This is, after all, called Tasty Brews, not “we tried a gross beer, but now we have to write about it.” So after scanning the draft...
Expo of flicks at Red River
Insider staff Everybody loves movies, but in today’s world, so few people have the attention span to sit through a whole feature-length film.Luckily, Red River Theatres is hosting a festival Saturday at noon that is perfect for today’s film fans: It’s called the New Hampshire High School Short Film Festival, and as the name suggests, it’s a display of a bunch of short films created by New Hampshire students.This will be the ninth year...
Get out for a leisurely walk – with the mayor
For the Insider Sitting disease. Have you heard of it? The average American is sitting nine to 11 hours per day. As a matter of fact, we’ve engineered activity right out of our life. What that means is sitting is now one of the biggest risk factors for preventable diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and certain types of cancer.Research has shown that when we sit, electrical activity in the legs shuts down, our calorie burning...
TITLE Boxing Club is about to turn 1
TITLE Boxing Club Concord is celebrating a big milestone this weekend – one year at its Storrs Street location. So of course they’re having a birthday extravaganza to celebrate. TITLE will be offering 60 minute power hours in both boxing and kickboxing. On Saturday, classes will be offered at 8 a.m. (boxing), 9:30 a.m. (kickboxing) and 11 a.m. (boxing). On Sunday, there will be a boxing class at 9 a.m. and a kickboxing workout at...
