Vermont summers are short, but memories of the warm season are long. This month, VPR commentators reflect on the importance of the past in our series “Summer Times.”
Summer flight
Commentator Libby Sternberg recalls memories of summer dreams.
Memories of Little League
Commentator Jay Parini has tried to forget his memories of summer Little League.
Haying with my grandfather
Commentator Tom Slayton shares memories of haying in the Vermont of his youth.
Einstein at summer camp
Commentator Madeleine May Kunin met one of the greatest figures of the 20th century at summer camp.
Summer barn dances
Commentator Frank Bryan with that staple of Vermont summers not so long ago – the barn dance.
Summer with the Grateful Dead
Commentator Philip Baruth remembers guitarist Jerry Garcia. Garcia died in 1995, and with him died an entire culture built around the very sound of summer itself.
“On occasion”
Vermont State Poet Grace Paley shares a poem in which the past and the present come together in a summer garden.
Memories of summer camp
Commentator Willem Lange remembers childhood summers as a mixed blessing. Going to camp produced intense homesickness, but also amazing spurts of new growth.
Chinese summer visitor
Commentator Ruth Page recalls the summer visitor who had lots of questions about America – and helped weed the garden.
Summer inspired by Wordsworth
Commentator Peter Gilbert reflects on the power of childhood memories of natural beauty.
Plymouth summer
Commentator Alan Boye takes a summer stroll into the past at the Calvin Coolidge Homestead.
Meeting McCarthy
Commentator Edith Hunter recalls a memorable summer encounter with Ralph Flanders, the Senator from Vermont who spoke out against the McCarthy hearings.