Veterans remembered, along with attack on Riva Ridge

SALISBURY —Veterans Day ceremonies and activities got started a day early, on Thursday, Nov. 10, with an assembly at Salisbury Central School (SCS).Eleven veterans attended: Gail Clark (Air Force); Bob Mather (Marines); Tracy Kaufman (Army); Gerry Baldwin (Air Force); Frank Winters (Army); Bullet Sherwood (Army); Wayne Neville (Navy); Norman Sills (Navy); Charlie Savage (Navy); Priscilla Rossiter (Army); and Edward “Nick” Nickerson (Army).SCS teacher Helen Mahoney told the audience that “service is a key principle,” allowing Americans “to live in a democracy.”The students lined up to shake hands with the veterans to end the assembly. Nickerson said he was surprised at the number of children present; Rossiter, sitting next to him, was similarly struck, saying that when she attended grammar school in Lakeville (in the building that now houses the post office) there were only a handful of children.On Friday morning, there was a ceremony honoring veterans by the war memorial at Town Hall. Jason McGarry (Navy) organized the event, and Bill Becker (Army), Paul Brazee (Air Force), James Brazee (Army) and Brandon Hakulin (Marines) formed the color guard. The Rev. Diane Monti-Catania from the Salisbury Congregational Church offered the prayer. About 50 people, including the Cub Scouts, who served hot drinks, attended.Later on Friday, at Noble Horizons, after a luncheon, another nice-sized crowd assembled in the Learning Center for an 18-minute video narrated by Tom Brokaw about the 10th Mountain Division of the U.S. Army, which fought in the Italian Alps in World War II.The 10th was formed from the ranks of skiers, mountaineers and other outdoor enthusiasts (some of whom went on to establish major ski areas such as Aspen and Vail, and to popularize the sport). Nickerson and Crosby Wells were part of the 10th, and both were in attendance, resplendant in blazers bearing the divisional crest.Nickerson delivered a few impromptu remarks before the video, explaining that the assault on Riva Ridge was an essential part of the overall strategy to move into the strategically important Po valley that lay beyond the mountains.Nickerson, who was part of the assault on Mount Belvedere the day after Riva Ridge, described the Riva Ridge action as a “diversionary attack.”The attack was at night, straight up the steep mountains. “It was not quite vertical, but close enough,” Nickerson said.“It was one of the few times we really used our skills as mountain troops.”

Latest News

South Kent School’s unofficial March reunion

Elmarko Jackson was named a 2023 McDonald’s All American in his senior year at South Kent School. He helped lead the Cardinals to a New England Prep School Athletic Conference (NEPSAC) AAA title victory and was recruited to play at the University of Kansas. This March he will play point guard for the Jayhawks when they enter the tournament as a No. 4 seed against (13) Samford University.

Riley Klein

SOUTH KENT — March Madness will feature seven former South Kent Cardinals who now play on Division 1 NCAA teams.

The top-tier high school basketball program will be well represented with graduates from each of the past three years heading to “The Big Dance.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Hotchkiss grads dancing with Yale

Nick Townsend helped Yale win the Ivy League.

Screenshot from ESPN+ Broadcast

LAKEVILLE — Yale University advanced to the NCAA men’s basketball tournament after a buzzer-beater win over Brown University in the Ivy League championship game Sunday, March 17.

On Yale’s roster this year are two graduates of The Hotchkiss School: Nick Townsend, class of ‘22, and Jack Molloy, class of ‘21. Townsend wears No. 42 and Molloy wears No. 33.

Keep ReadingShow less
Handbells of St. Andrew’s to ring out Easter morning

Anne Everett and Bonnie Rosborough wait their turn to sound notes as bell ringers practicing to take part in the Easter morning service at St. Andrew’s Church.

Kathryn Boughton

KENT—There will be a joyful noise in St. Andrew’s Church Easter morning when a set of handbells donated to the church some 40 years ago are used for the first time by a choir currently rehearsing with music director Susan Guse.

Guse said that the church got the valuable three-octave set when Harlem Valley Psychiatric Center closed in the late 1980s and the bells were donated to the church. “The center used the bells for music therapy for younger patients. Our priest then was chaplain there and when the center closed, he brought the bells here,” she explained.

Keep ReadingShow less
Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Penguin Random House

‘Picasso’s War” by Foreign Affairs senior editor Hugh Eakin, who has written about the art world for publications like The New York Review of Books, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and The New York Times, is not about Pablo Picasso’s time in Nazi-occupied Paris and being harassed by the Gestapo, nor about his 1937 oil painting “Guernica,” in response to the aerial bombing of civilians in the Basque town during the Spanish Civil War.

Instead, the Penguin Random House book’s subtitle makes a clearer statement of intent: “How Modern Art Came To America.” This war was not between military forces but a cultural war combating America’s distaste for the emerging modernism that had flourished in Europe in the early decades of the 20th century.

Keep ReadingShow less