Danville Vermont hosts Danville Quebec on Fair Day

Sun­ny weath­er, good com­pa­ny and Danville Fair–how could one beat that? After seri­ous plan­ning by His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety Pres­i­dent, Paul Chouinard, and gra­cious peo­ple in our com­mu­ni­ty say­ing “yes” to his pro­posed itin­er­ary, quite a day was in store for our return vis­i­tors from Danville, QC. And the group’s will­ing­ness and good humor through­out the whole expe­ri­ence made it a plea­sure to car­ry out the plans laid out by Paul and his Danville hosts and hostesses. 

At around 9:30, the Cana­di­an group met with our Select Board and Town Admin­is­tra­tor, as well as Kate Beat­tie and Bet­ty Calkins, for cof­fee, juice and warm muffins (a la Kate) at His­tor­i­cal House. While the two groups got to know one anoth­er, Paul excused him­self to dec­o­rate the Sug­ar Ridge camp­ground wag­on upon which mem­bers of a merged con­tin­gent would short­ly ride in the parade. 

When he returned, Paul gath­ered those who would ride in the wag­on, and the rest of us walked to the parade site. The Fair Com­mit­tee had gone all out to wel­come our French Cana­di­an guests. The Town Hall was dec­o­rat­ed with both nation­al flags and the streets were lined with fair­go­ers. The six-hitch Sug­ar Ridge team car­ry­ing the con­tin­gent wait­ed with patience and pow­er in front of Dia­mond Hill store as our guests were wel­comed by our nation­al anthem, fol­lowed by the Cana­di­an anthem, in both Eng­lish and French. 

Pierre Gri­mard, pres­i­dent of the large art sym­po­sium that is host­ed in Danville, QC, was vis­i­bly moved and asked, “Who was that?” 

“Toby Balivet,” I answered, “He is our Town attor­ney and a mem­ber of our recent del­e­ga­tion to Danville, QC.”

“Per­fect,” said Pierre. “Per­fect.”

After the parade, the group moved to Alice Hafner’s house on Danville Green, where she host­ed a lun­cheon for the group and a mix­ture of oth­er Danville guests in her love­ly great room. Adding ambiance to the lunch, she had set a fire, which was most wel­come. A chill wind, hint­ing that sum­mer doesn’t last for­ev­er, was blow­ing. Mak­ing a spe­cial effort to pay a vis­it to the Cana­di­ans were Danville, VT, artists Jeff Gold and Nan­cy Diefen­bach, who have attend­ed the art sym­po­sium in Danville, QC.

After lunch, the group moved in two cars to Greenbank’s Hol­low, where David Hous­ton and Hol­lis Pri­or, lead­ers of that site ren­o­va­tion, gave a short tour and talk about the mill site. Pack­ets pro­vid­ed to the group includ­ed pho­tos of the for­mer huge tex­tile mill locat­ed there. David and Hol­lis are experts at explain­ing where the mill sat and how the water was direct­ed through the huge stonework walls to pro­vide the pow­er for the mill. One could almost see the mill working.

Then it was off to Joe’s Pond along the Harvey’s Hol­low, Keis­er Pond and Onei­da roads, then along the wind­ing pond roads to Jane Milne’s camp. Chip, her son, was there wait­ing for us as cap­tain of Jane’s com­fort­able pon­toon boat. “We’re going on the water?” exclaimed Robert Lemire, an Eng­lish speak­ing his­to­ri­an. “I don’t like the water much.” But he was encour­aged by all and was a good sport. We loaded the boat. By pre­vi­ous arrange­ment Chip head­ed to Priest’s Island. Just a week before, North Star read­ers read Jane Brown’s arti­cle about the very islands we were to see. Chip drove us by Sam Whittier’s man­made island and then he head­ed to Priest’s Island, where we were greet­ed gra­cious­ly by a sur­prised Abel Toll. We were pleased to go into the lit­tle tem­ple there. It is beau­ti­ful­ly kept and qui­et, the columns giv­ing it an air of grandeur for its small size. On the way back to shore, the loons made their appear­ance, not at all fear­ful as the boat slipped right by them. Robert was glad to be back on “ter­ra fir­ma,” and we said good­bye to Chip and Joe’s Pond. 

Com­ing back through Danville, it was onto Hill Street and out to North Danville where Mol­ly Newell was host­ing a tea for our guests at the ele­gant and his­tor­i­cal Broad­view Farm bed and break­fast. After a guid­ed tour of the house by Molly’s friend Car­ol Ottinger, Mol­ly poured tea and cof­fee into chi­na cups and guests were invit­ed to par­take of an assort­ment of deli­cious items from the table. The late after­noon sun and breeze made the large porch a relax­ing respite for qui­et conversation. 

After tea, it was off with Sue and Dick Strifert lead­ing the way to the Old North Church. Sue and Dick are direct­ing the most recent ren­o­va­tions to the build­ing. Dick led the tour through the build­ing, explain­ing the work that is being accom­plished now in ren­o­vat­ing the win­dows and plas­ter walls as well as the his­to­ry of the ear­li­er ren­o­va­tion and care that the Old North Church com­mit­tee has car­ried on for so many years. Some of the group climbed the stairs to the bal­cony where Dick point­ed out the unusu­al slight­ly bowed tim­bers that cre­ate the great strength of the span across the building.

The group returned to Danville around 6:00 p.m. It had been a won­der­ful­ly busy day, full of learn­ing and cama­raderie. Before depart­ing, Maier Hemond pre­sent­ed Paul a gift to the Town. Like the George Cahoon pho­to that now graces the Town offices in Danville, QC, we now have a 150 year cel­e­bra­tion token of our sis­ter town hang­ing in our Town Hall. It depicts their clock tow­er. Like ours, it still keeps good time.

To view a com­plete pho­to album of the event click here.

This arti­cle was first pub­lished in the Sep­tem­ber issue of The North Star Month­ly.