This Week’s News
Names lost in Vermont, Part 36: Wideawake, Morris, Brooks, and Smart
Over twenty-five years ago, after reading one of Christian Wideawake’s by-lines from the Rutland Herald, I commented to George Valley, “I wonder if Wideawake is a Native American surname?” George, raised in a Francophone family, did not speak English until he went to school. He said, “I bet it was Leveillé.”
Brandon SB discusses housing, grants, and historic trees
The Brandon Selectboard convened for its regular meeting on Monday evening.
OV Football wins big in playoffs, moves to state semis
Isaac Whitney had a huge game, gaining 180 yards and scoring 4 touchdowns to lead the Otter Valley football team to a 46–14 playoff win over rival Mill River Saturday night under the new lights at Markowski Field.
Labor of love (and horseshoes): Brandon resident restores historic blacksmith shop
Back in the days of the horse & buggy, the blacksmith shop was central to daily life. Horses needed shoes. Buggies needed wheels and springs. And all sorts of other household goods were forged by hand at the local smithy.
Photos of the Week
Sports
OV, Proctor, Westside winter sports teams kick-off the season
The COVD-shortened winter of the 2020-21 high school sports season is behind us, and the teams at Otter Valley are happy about that. The pandemic forced the school’s basketball programs, like those elsewhere, to play abbreviated seasons, and wrestling was sidelined for the entire season.
OV girl’s basketball drops opener
In a hard-fought season opening game in which the teams traded game-changing runs, the host Middlebury Union girls’ basketball team put together the decisive surge to outlast Otter Valley, 35-28.
Six Otters named to Second Team All-Stars
After a successful season this fall, 10 members of the Otter Valley football team received postseason recognition from the Division III coaches.
OV beats Mill River in quarterfinal, 12-6
The third-seeded Otter Valley football team outlasted visiting No. 6 Mill River, 12-6, on Saturday in a Division III quarterfinal and will play No. 2 Fairfax in a semifinal this coming Saturday.
Proctor girls soccer shoots for 11th straight trip to finals
Going into the girls Division IV soccer playoffs, the question around the state is whether anyone can challenge two-time defending champions, the Proctor Phantoms.
