Coos Conversations

My favorite line of the week: Why thank you, I got it in Berlin, NH

I'm no John Edwards, but I will admit there have been times in my life when I paid $150 to get my hair done. And it looked good, but probably not THAT good. So, when I reached the point where I absolutely positively HAD to get a hair cut last week, I asked around for a referral and ended up at Spring, out on Rte 110 just past Isaacson Steel.
It's about as unlikely a setting for finding the best haircut of my life as you'll find, just off the road in what could just as easily have been an autobody shop building, but don't let appearances fool you. You walk into a delightful, clean and well organized salon and are greeted by Spring herself, who lives up to her name. She's sunny and warm and funny and bright and gives the best haircuts anywhere. I told her that I wanted my hair to  look "youthful" and "fun"  -- okay, I'll admit, I have a birthday coming up and I just learned that I'm the same age as the United Nations Building. Nonetheless, Spring was up to the challenge.
In less than an hour, for a tenth of the price I'd pay in Portsmouth, I walked out with the best haircut I've ever have, looking and feeling great. And the most fun, is that I'm now in Chicago and am getting tons of compliments from people used to paying $150 for a hair cut on Michigan Avenue. And I get to say, why thank you, I got it in Berlin, NH. Which is a great segue in to why Berlin is the undiscovered gem of New England.

The beautiful new Berlin

For some reason, since the stacks came down, Berlin has been blessed with some fabulous weather and spectacular sunsets. I've was out and about on Tuesday and posted the photos here.. what really struck me was the gorgeous view of Berlin from the East side. 

Stacia Roberge and The Main Street program should also be congratulated for the work they're doing to spruce up the downtown. It's really looking great.

The new vistas are in stark contrast with remaining stack. It makes you see the potential of the site. Now, look at these photos, and think what the town would be like with transmission lines humming thru the downtown. This is what it would look like.

 

Is Laidlaw the new Onassis?

In talking with people about the proposed Laidlaw biomass plant, I am reminded of the 1974 in Durham. I was home on a "senior study" break from college. All the talk in town was about Aristotle Onassis' plant to put an oil refinery in Durham and pump oil in from the Isles of Shoals. The town fathers were excited about the prospect, dreaming of tax revenues and jobs. The feeling among town the town residents was a little different.  Onassis had just offered my uncle $1 million for the rights to the farm. Uncle Phil told him to get lost. (Ironically that's about half of what its worth today. Not a bad offer for the 70s in Durham).  On Town Meeting day there was a referendum, and the Onassis plan was defeated 9 to 1. Thanks to the hard work of Dudley Dudley on the home rule bill, that vote actually meant something and Onassis took his refinery plans elsewhere.
As I read the front page of the Berlin Daily Sun today, I wonder if there isn't a lesson there? Is Charlie Bass this year's Aristotle Onassis?   

NHPR listens to the North Country

New Hampshire Public Radio is arguable the most authoritative source of news in the state, but there have been times when we've wondered if their coverage of the North Country is as frequent or a solid as their coverage of the southland. Well now we have a chance to put up or shut up. They've created an online suggestion box specifically about the North Country. Lets tell them whats important!

Ever wondered what Berlin would look like with no stacks at all?

Local photographer Marc Ducharme has taken what can arguably be called some of the best photographs of Berlin ever taken and he took some spectacular shots after last weekend. Thru the wonders of photo shop, he shows us what Berlin would look like with no stacks at all. Now isn't that prettier than a biomass plant?

 

Then he answered the biggest question we had which was: What would it look like with no stacks at all. Kind of pretty isn't it?

Link: Edit Page | Post | Citizens for a New Vision | Your Weblogs | TypePad.

Best photos ever of Berlin

In case you want to know what the NEW Berlin looks like, check out Mark Ducharmes photos here: Berlin Postcard . They are extraordinary.

Even better reflections on Saturday's historic event

Like many of us, Racheal Stuart wasn't born in Berlin. She didn't grow up here, never worked in the mill, and doesn't have family here. She just loves the place. And she captured the emotions of the day perfectly. Since I couldn't put it any better myself, here are her words:

I’m a newcomer to Berlin, and a part-timer. I’ve been making the drive up from Concord every weekend for going on 3 years, and from the beginning I’ve had mixed feelings about the presence of the Mill. So I just didn’t know if I would cheer or cry when the stacks went down.

But to tell the truth, I just hated the smell. Aside from that I liked the presence of the Mill in the center of town. For me it was a symbol of the romantic history of this place and the people who have chosen to live her for the last 100 years or so. It was a living, breathing presence, a great friendly beast, and a reminder of when

Berlin was famous for papermaking - “the best in the world”.  I’m a walker, and I especially like walking through the city neighborhoods in the early morning when the streets are still. Often I would have the feeling that, aside from me and the Mill, the whole City was sleeping. One morning I was surprised by another walker, a not-so-young man heading down School Street, lunch bucket in hand and heading to work.  And, as is typical in this city, he gave me a cheery hello and commented on the magnificent sunrise. “It’s a beautiful day” we agreed.

I have a particularly vivid memory of one Friday evening, heading north toward the City on the Berlin-Gorham   Road, my eyes scanning the valley for my first sight of the stately pillars and their ever-present plume. Crisp Canadian air, glittering stars. And suddenly there they were, rising in the night sky, luminous and almost ghostly under a full, late winter moon. But the plume was not there. This was 2006 and the Mill had been closed for the last time. I mourned for my friend.

So here it is, 9:00 a.m. on September 15^th. Behind the old Notre Dame School a small crowd of people is hunched under umbrellas against the gray drizzle, joking and laughing, greeting friends and neighbors. The 5-minute warning sounds, 3 long, low blasts of the horn. The crowd grows silent. It feels like a sacred moment. And suddenly I don’t have to wonder if I’ll cheer or cry because I am crying. And I keep crying. I have a vision in my head that I can’t get rid of - a century of men and women, carrying their lunch buckets, on their way to work. The best in the world.

But Berlin doesn’t just have a history, it has a future too. I may be newcomer, but I’m not a short-timer. I expect to be here for a long, long time. I keep asking myself: “What will we be ‘Best in the World’ at in twenty years?” What will the next generation be proud of, and the generation after them? The Mill was here because of the incredible northern forest, the world-class rapids of the Androscoggin, and the innovation and hard work of people who chose to come here from all over the world. All of these resources are still here - they haven’t gone away. We can – we must use them wisely to build a future for our children and grandchildren, and a new history for Berlin and the region.

Lots of symbolism going on in Berlin these days

The first thing I noticed when I pulled my camera out to take the last shots of the mill before the stacks went down were the birds.

Not sure what they were but I saw huge black birds with giant wing spans circling the  stacks in a graceful sad farewell. They were there the next morning in the pouring rain as well.
There there were the explosions as well, two out of three stacks, dropping as planned, and then the last, defiant, refusing to go down. So much like the determined, defiant, hard working residents of Berlin themselves. 
Finally there was this:

a perfect rainbow over Berlin, a sign of the future, of great things to come, with, we all hope, a pot of gold full of dollars brought in from eco-tourism, from clean industry, from whatever this amazingly beautiful place will become.

Reflections on an historic day in Berlin, NH

As much as the folks in Berlin have made me feel incredibly welcome, today I felt like an intruder at a funeral. It was the end of an era that I had very little knowledge about. To me it was the beginning of the new century, and there were many in the crowd who saw it the same way. But there were just as many tears for what was.
The day felt like one big block party for the entire city. It seemed like almost everyone in town turned out to watch the historic moment. The explosions were scheduled for 9, but cars started lining the better viewing spots as early as 7 am. In the poring rain, people had parties on roof tops, thrashed thru the puckerbrush, mounted ladders and vans, and did whatever they needed to do to capture the historic moment. Some came because they were merely curious, others came to say farewell to the symbols of an industry that shaped their lives, their families and the town they call home.
The night before had been one long wake. Former mill workers and residents drove in from as far away as Connecticut to witness the demolition. They gathered at traditional watering holes like Fagins Pub and the Millyard, to reminisce, connect with friends, and trade stories. When I asked them why they were here, most of the them started with words like "My grandfather/father/uncle/mother worked in the mill and I wanted to witness the end of an era." All were excited about the prospect of a new Berlin, sans smell, and sans stacks. Which of course generated lots of questions and discussion about the proposed Laidlaw biomass plant.
At 8:50 Saturday morning, just when the downpour was at its worst, the first of three warning whistles was sounded. Then there was a one minute warning and finally a deafening BOOM, and the first of the stacks went down in spectacular display, falling neatly in a plume of dark dust. Unfortunately it was raining so hard most of my pictures are pretty awful, but with luck someone else will have better ones, given the hundreds of camera shutters that went off.

A few minutes later, there was a second warning siren, and the oldest of the four stacks, collapsed in an even bigger cloud of dust.

Then it was time for the last, newest and tallest of the three stacks. The warning came, the sirens sounded, the boom reverberated thru the valley. And nothing happened. By this time I had run 4 miles in the rain to get to the site, and was pretty thoroughly soaked, and frozen through and through. So after waiting about 20 minutes I started heading back to our office. I passed the VIP tent, where I ran into Mary Wagner, one of our star employees, who also happened to have worked in the mill as an engineer. Coming from a third generation mill family, and married to the former GM at the mill, there are few people anywhere who know more about that mill.

According to Mary, the inside scoop was that they hadn't put quite enough dynamite in that third stack, so they were adding more. Mind you, this enormous stack was already compromised, but the brave (or crazy) demolition experts headed down to the base to add more dynamite. An excavator was called in and there was a bunch of activity around the base for the next half hour or so.

By this time, as you can see, my camera was pretty wet and I was so cold my fingers could barely work the buttons. But nonetheless I was ready when the warning siren went off. Poised perfectly to capture the demise of this last and final stack. I was much closer this time, and the explosion was deafening. And the stack didn't move.

Now in merry old England, when the hangman's noose failed to kill the criminal, his or her sentence was commuted, figuring that god or fate had stepped in. I figured, fate was intervening in the life of this particular stack, so I headed into the office. I hadn't been there for more than ten minutes when we heard another roar and felt a rumble, only to look out the window and see that the stack was no longer there. Gravity had done its work.

But now this day had gone from merely a minor embarassment for North American Dismantling, to a real disaster. The demolition crew had apparently been cutting rebar on the base when the stack gave way, falling unexpectedly on power lines and sending debris flying. Not only were several of the demolition crew injured but the debris flew through nearby windows, damaged cars and sent a total of 7 people to the hospital.

I took one last picture of the now horizontal stack (unlike the other ones that had crumbled in to a pile of rubble, this one was still intact) and headed for a hot shower. On the way out of town I drove across the bridge just north of town, and was stunned by what a difference the loss of those three towers made to the skyline. I don't know what I was expecting, but I had no idea that it would make such a difference to Berlin cityscape. But then I thought of the first time I saw ground zero. As someone who was born in New York, I'd gotten used to the skyline with the distinctive twin towers of the World Trade Center, so I was shocked into a stunned and reverential silence when I first saw the skyline of New York without them. Today's events were minuscule compared to the events of Sept 2001. But everything is relative. To the 12,000 residents of Berlin, I'm guessing that September 15, 2007 will be a day that will be remembered for just as long. For more pictures check out my flickr set.

Best places to watch the stacks come down

In case you were wondering where to watch the stacks fall tomorrow morning, the insiders tell us that if you go over to the East side, onto Hutchins Street, near the Carberry Land Fill you'll get a bird's eye view of all three stacks tumbling down.
And no, we didn't win the the raffle, so we'll be looking on from there..