Mini-Organ Festival

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The closing recital in the Mini-Organ Festival at the First Congregational Church in Marion, Massachusetts, will be given by noted organist Steven Young on Sunday, November 15 at 4:00 pm. The recital will feature the church’s historic mechanical-action George S. Hutchings pipe organ.

In addition to works by J. S. Bach, Young will perform music of Vincent Lübeck, Henry M. Dunham, William Bolcom, and John Knowles Paine.

Steven Young is the organist and music director at the Episcopal Church of St. Thomas in Taunton, Massachusetts, and serves as professor of music and director of choral activities at Bridgewater State University. Young has performed throughout the United States and Europe as an organ soloist and accompanist and has presented recitals, workshops, and clinics for regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists and the Organ Historical Society. He earned degrees in organ performance from Barrington College and New England Conservatory of Music, as well as the doctor of musical arts from Boston University. He holds the associate certificate from the American Guild of Organists. In 2009, Young recorded the first volume of the organ works of Henry M. Dunham, a major figure in the Boston area at the beginning of the 20th century, on the AFKA label.

The First Congregational Church in Marion was built in 1841. In 1883, with support from local philanthropist Elizabeth Taber, a new organ by George S. Hutchings was commissioned and installed in 1884. Hutchings was prominent among American organ builders and built organs for the old Boston Music Hall, the Old South Church, and Symphony Hall.

Tickets for the recital may be purchased at $10 at The Bookstall on Front Street in Marion and at the door. For more information and reservations, call 508-748-2067. The First Congregational Church is located at 28 Main Street at the corner of Front and Main Streets in Marion and is handicapped accessible.

Parents’ Weekend

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Parents’ Weekend is an annual event at Tabor Academy that is greeted with much anticipation and anxiousness. The campus itself looks its best with flowerpots on every path and perfect weather. Many parents arrived on Friday night from all over, traveling across the country or even internationally, to visit their children and learn more about the Tabor lifestyle.

Parents’ Weekend is kicked off by a cocktail party on Friday night where all the parents can mingle and get to know each other. Then, there are mini-classes on Saturday, in which parents are invited to sit in on 15-minute versions of each of their child’s classes. They meet with advisors, get a sense of what their child’s teachers are like, and can attend different lectures about college, changes in administration, and the “teenage brain.” Parents of upperclassmen can also meet with college counselors during these days.

“I loved going to her classes and seeing everyone eager to learn,” said Melissa Buell, mother of new sophomore Madison Buell. “It was my first time coming to Tabor, and it was really amazing seeing her in her new life.” Madison added, “The teachers were beyond accommodating. They let my sister sit through classes and now she wants to apply, too.”

For underclassmen, especially those whose parents live far away, Parents’ Weekend is both a great time to catch up with family they haven’t seen in a while, and also for parents to explore what life at Tabor is like for their child.

“My parents have come up every Parents’ Weekend since I arrived sophomore year,” said senior Bridget Lattimer. “I’m from Connecticut, so it’s not as far, but they still love watching me play field hockey and meeting all my teachers.” Susan Lattimer, Bridget’s mother, said, “This year, Parents’ Weekend is bittersweet. It’s the start of the countdown to an exciting graduation and the prospect of having to say goodbye.” Despite this, however, Susan noted how fun parents’ weekend is. “We were lucky to be able to cheer on Bridget’s friends at a cross country meet, then watch football, and then watch Bridget play field hockey and even catch the girls’ soccer game. It was all very exciting.”

All the sports games are home on Saturday, so the campus is teeming with visiting athletes and parents. The turf fields are packed with games and parents and fellow students watching Tabor teams compete with other schools.

“I loved seeing Madison at cross country with all her new friends,” said Buell. “I was so impressed with the dedication and passion of the coaches during the meet, and the team was incredibly supportive of each other.”

At this point in the year, most of the homesickness that new students face has dissipated, and they are just excited to show their parents around their dorms, their classes, and all other aspects of their life here at Tabor.

By Madeleine Gregory

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ORRJHS Senior Citizen Thanksgiving Banquet

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The 25th annual Thanksgiving Dinner for Tri-Town (Marion, Mattapoisett, and Rochester) senior citizens, sponsored by the 8th grade class of Old Rochester Regional Junior High School, will be held on Sunday, November 22 at 12:00 pm in the ORRJHS cafeteria. Doors will open at 11:15 am. Three hundred tickets will be available – 100 per town – distributed through the local Councils on Aging. Shut-in meals will be available. Please notify your local Council on Aging with the names and addresses of the intended recipients. Any individual or local business interested in making cash contributions or donating door prizes should call the junior high at 508-758-4928 and speak with Mr. Kevin Brogioli, Principal. As always, we look forward to the continued support of the Tri-Town communities.

Civics Quiz Night

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The Mattapoisett Democratic Town Committee is sponsoring a Civics Quiz Night at The Inn on Shipyard Park, 13 Water Street, Mattapoisett, on Wednesday, November 18 from 7:30 – 9:00 pm. Why not put together a team of 2-4 friends or family and compete for a $25 gift certificate? The winning team will also be able to donate the proceeds from the event to their favorite charity. Registration fee for each team is $10.Whatever your political affiliation, we hope you will come and enjoy the fun. You can pre-register your team by emailing your team’s information to mattdemtc@gmail.com or by registering at the door the night of the event. If you have any questions or need further information, please email the Mattapoisett committee at mattdemtc@gmail.com.

A Holiday By Any Other Name

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Once upon a time, there were two holidays and one festival whose names evoked joy. The holidays were Thanksgiving and Christmas. The festival that preceded them was known as Halloween.

Then a frighteningly terrible thing happened – the power of mass marketing coupled with the retail engines of commerce blended them all together. Now we have one massive commercial blitz that begins in early October and ends in mid-January. Maybe we should give it a new name in keeping with what it does to the human psyche: Hallowthanksmas.

Regardless, it does seem, at least to this aging child, that there was a kinder, gentler time when we paced ourselves and enjoyed these consecutive events as separate, individual, and unique.

Back in the day, mass media wasn’t in full swing. TV was a new invention and even radio commercials were tiny tame tidbits that didn’t invade one’s enjoyment of programming. Now the programming punctuates the marketing space.

Halloween was a time to use one’s imagination, to dream up costumes a kid and a parent could make out of whatever was laying around the house. Ghosts from old white sheets, pirates with a cardboard eye patch, Zorro with a eye pencil mustache, or cowboys with a bit of rope and a broomstick horse were fun and cost next to nothing.

Trick or treating from house to house in neighborhoods where everyone participated and where safety wasn’t an issue but was taken for granted really did exist.

And no one, no one at all, was thinking about Thanksgiving or Christmas in October. We absorbed ourselves in thinking about our homemade outfits, decorating pumpkins, and eating our stash of candy slowly over the following days.

Thoughts of Thanksgiving began about two weeks before the actual day.

In the neighborhood I grew up in, people were simply glad to have the day off from work to enjoy a feast with their family and friends. It was a time to be at home together with the mouthwatering smells of turkey and pie. Simple, uncomplicated tables were laid out with cranberry sauce, stuffing, and gravy. Leftovers were a highlight in the days that followed, and a sense of peace prevailed.

And then came Christmas!

It seemed to take forever to arrive. The days leading up to Christmas morning were full of cards being sent and received in the mail, homemade gifts being hidden from prying eyes, and dreams of stockings filled to overflowing with fruits and candy. Religious celebration wasn’t a significant part of my family’s dynamic, but years of Sunday school lessons drove home the point of the holiday: the baby Jesus. The one that stays with me most today is the importance of kindness.

These three consecutive events were like waves, with each successive wave slightly larger than the one before and with Christmas being the largest. And each stood on its one merits, contained its own magic, and was enjoyed each in its own way. Now, it seems, they are melted into a hodge-podge of non-stop visual and audio noise.

A neighbor a few doors down from me seems to have made his yard a statement of the insanity – the front lawn displays witches and Santa Claus. Oh yeah, and one rather strange pink pig with wings. A final comment on “the holidays” possibly – when pigs fly.

It’s like that Tim Burton movie, The Nightmare Before Christmas. Was Burton’s intention to show how far marketing has gone in making us dance to the tune of shareholder’s value versus the value of family and tradition?

I don’t know. But what I do know is that kids today are missing out on something significant: the joy of anticipation. It’s almost as if kids don’t get to experience the gradual easing into each cold season event, savoring them as special and sweet. They, like the grown-ups around them, are swept up in the frantic pace of non-cash transactions seasoned not by sugar and spice, but by black-Friday pricing.

Give me the good old days when construction paper greeting cards were labored over on dining room tables piled high with pipe-cleaners and glitter, when baking from scratch was the only kind of baking known, and when joy was found in the simple, blissful reading of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. And, one of my personal favorites, see if you can also remember driving down the main streets of town to “see the lights.” It was considered a highlight of the season.

One person I discussed this massive holiday mash-up with said, and I quote, “Why not make it just one day? Put gifts around a pumpkin, stuff one bird, and dress up in costumes for a holiday parade that includes a Santa seated in front of a Christmas tree tossing candy corn and turkey legs to innocent children!”

No, those days are gone, at least for the time being. Just give me the good old days when October, November, and December held very different and very special occasions to celebrate the family – not the value we represent to multi-national conglomerates.

I wish we could go back in time to when everything was closed on Thanksgiving Day except for warm kitchens filled to overflowing with delicious home-cooked foods and love. Still, for the present time as the season nears, I look forward with memories that wait for me every year, ready to be unwrapped again like little gifts that cannot be bought in the Hallowthanksmas aisle.

By Marilou Newell

 

Gateway Youth Hockey

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Pee Wees: Gateway Pee Wees played their toughest game against the number one Walpole Express in a nail biter on Sunday morning with goalie Ryker King stopping goal after goal to end the game in 5-5 tie. In the end, Walpole would remain number one, but Gateway would still remain undefeated. The teams fought hard through most of the first period when Walpole scored 14 minutes in. Gateway tied the game 39 seconds later when Nate Ribeiro scored off of an assist by Michael Parker and Ben Demoranville. Walpole scored again about a minute later, but Gateway’s Demoranville answered with a goal 19 seconds later to end the first at 2-2. Walpole took the lead early in the second period, but Gateway scored two more off of goals by Demoranville and Matt Paling who were assisted by Tyler Lovendale, RJ Vickery, and Austin Fleming to take the lead going into the final period. The fast-paced action continued in the third with Walpole tying late in the game, but Gateway shot back to take the lead off of a goal by Paling, assisted by Demoranville. Walpole put one final puck in the net to end the game in a 5-5 tie.

Middle School: The Middle School Jr. Vikings finally got into the win column with a lopsided win against Westwood, 10-4. The front line of Robert Ramsay, Quirino doCanto, and Tyler Lovendale, along with defenseman Seth Tomasik, led the way with two goals a piece. doCanto also added three assists, Ramsay added two, and Lovendale and Tomasik each added one. RJ Vickery and Dan Flynn added the other goals, while Jordan Boucher and Zack Barris chipped in with assists. Overall, the Jr. Vikings played a well-rounded game and got some good goal tending from Jake DeMoranville and Alex DeMarco.

Marion Council on Aging

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The Internal Revenue Service issued another strong warning for consumers to guard against sophisticated and aggressive phone scams. The IRS will always send taxpayers a written notification of any tax due via the U.S. mail. The IRS never asks for credit card, debit card or prepaid card information over the telephone. Potential victims may be told they are entitled to big refunds or that they owe money that must be paid immediately to the IRS. When unsuccessful the first time, sometimes phone scammers call back trying a new strategy. Please, if it sounds too good to be true, it ALWAYS is!

Tickets are now available to the annual Thanksgiving dinner at the Old Rochester Regional Junior High School to be held on November 22. Transportation will be provided and meals will be delivered for the home bound. Please call the office to reserve a spot on the van or for a home-delivered meal.

The Marion Council on Aging is now participating in the Greater Boston Food Bank program called the Commodity Supplemental Food Program (CSFP). The CSFP is a monthly food distribution program for income-qualifying individuals 60 years old or older. Each month, the qualifying person is provided with two bags of groceries. If you would like to be included, please call the COA so we may help you complete the application and provide any other details. To register for groceries in the month of December, the COA must know of your interest by November 30.

Soap Box Derby

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Marion Cub Pack 32 invites you to our bi-annual Soap Box Derby for a cause. The Cub Scouts are collecting non-perishable food donations as well as gently used and new toys for local families in need. Collection points are the Marion Police Department and First Congregational Church of Marion until 10:00 am on November 14. On November 14, the scouts will participate in a Soap Box Derby on Holmes Street where they will continue to collect food and toys as well as show off their racing skills. Please bring a food item and watch the scouts’ race.

Boys in grades 1-5 interested in joining scouts can come, meet the scouts, try one of the derby cars out after the races are finished (approximately 2:00 pm), and hang out in the “pit” with the scouts. There will be parents to answer questions and register new scouts!

Elks Student of the Month

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The Elks of Wareham Lodge No. 1548 sponsors the Elks Student of the Month and Student of the Year Awards for students enrolled in local area high schools. The criteria used in nominating a student includes a student who excels in scholarship, citizenship, performing arts, fine arts, hobbies, athletics, church, school and community service, industry and farming. Faculty and staff of the high school nominate and select students.

We would like to congratulate Senior Class President Bailey Sweet of Marion for being selected as October’s Elks Student of the Month. Bailey is a quiet, kind and compassionate young lady who is also a very talented and committed ballet dancer.

Aquaculture Farm Approval Still Pending

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Applicant to establish an aquaculture farm off Ram Island Shea Doonan will have to wait further for the Marion Conservation Commission to grant, or not to grant, his Request for Determination of Applicability for the project.

Continued from October 14, the public hearing was again continued until November 18 until Doonan, annoyed abutter Michael Moore of Ram Island, the harbormaster, and the Marion Board of Selectmen can further come to an agreement on placement of markers of Doonan’s proposed shellfish farm.

On October 28, the commission again expressed its discomfort voting on a determination for Doonan’s application until further talks can resolve Moore’s issues, the selectmen’s concerns, and now neighboring aquaculture farmer Catherine Brodeur’s concerns.

After hearing from Doonan and Moore, Brodeur approached the podium to say that Doonan’s project would be close to her site, thus inviting the possibility of cross-contamination should a disease outbreak occur. She also commented that the eastern markers encroach an area utilized by boat traffic.

“I would’ve thought it would be nice if you had come and introduced yourself,” said Brodeur to Doonan. “We could’ve spoken a little bit.”

Brodeur also said she thought Doonan’s RDA application lacked pertinent information.

Moore continued with his enduring concerns over how Doonan pursued the project without consulting him, leaving him still unable to condone the project out of spite for Doonan’s lack of communication.

“He has addressed my comments,” stated Moore, “But we haven’t agreed that the addressing thereof is satisfactory in my point of view.”

Moore apologized to the commission for behaving “forcefully” during the last meeting, saying it was because he had only known about the project for 24 hours. He said he was reacting then, but now, calmly addressing the commission, he has had some time to think about the matter.

Moore handed out an aerial image of the site, maintaining that the aquaculture farm would encumber boat traffic, even with the subsequent changes made with the assistance of the harbormaster.

“Nothing’s really changed in my perspective,” said Moore.

Although Doonan wanted the commission to vote to determine the RDA, Chairman Normal Hills preferred to continue it, should further changes be made to the plan in the meantime. Hills told Doonan the selectmen have the final say on the future of the aquaculture farm whether the commission acts that night or not.

Commission member Cynthia Trinidad candidly told Doonan that she plans to vote ‘nay’ on the project just because of Doonan’s attitude.

“These gentlemen are a lot nicer than me,” said Trinidad, gesturing to the other commissioners. “I would vote ‘no’ already. I will probably continue to vote ‘no’ for this project.”

Trinidad said she did not reject the idea of an aquaculture farm; rather, she resented Doonan’s attitude towards the project, calling him “lackadaisical.”

“There were emails [between Doonan and the commission] … that had Mr. Moore’s email on it, so you knew that we wanted you to make some kind of approach to him.”

The commission members, at the end of the meeting, agreed that Doonan should have “handled the situation” differently.

Also during the meeting, the Conservation Commission granted both a positive and negative determination (no Notice of Intent required) for different aspects of a plan to repair a residential septic system for Robert Nau at 53 Piney Point Road.

John Almy received a negative determination for the demolition of two decks to be replaced by two new larger decks at 93C Piney Point Road.

The Sippican Lands trust received a negative determination for an Eagle Scout to install a wooden boardwalk through some wetlands at the White Eagle property off Parlowtown Road.

The commission issued a three-year extension to Shay and Christine Assad at 31 Cove Street to remove invasive species from the property.

The next meeting of the Marion Conservation Commission is scheduled for November 18 at 7:00 pm at the Marion Town House.

By Jean Perry

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