How Botelle (Carefully) Uses AI for Learning

By Avice Meehan For more than three decades, children visited the fictional town of Frog Creek, Penn., home to two children named Jack and Annie. With the help of a magic tree house, the pair are whisked away to distant places where they have adventures, solve problems and, perhaps, learn a thing or two. Like […]

Chance Comment Yields Historic Gown

By Avice Meehan It was a hot August day, nearly six years ago, when Barry Webber found himself inside a dumpster in Litchfield looking for something unexpected: An evening gown commissioned in the 1870s by a young Alice Eldridge from the House of Worth in Paris while she and her sister, Isabella, were on a […]

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Norfolk but Didn’t Know Where to Ask

By Colleen Gundlach There really is no longer any reason for Norfolk residents to not know how the town operates, who is on any given board or committee in town, or what was discussed and decided at such board and committee meetings. If you have a computer and internet access, the whole town is an […]

Choral Singing Meets Bluegrass

LCCU welcomes all ages to sing new styles By Andra Moss The Litchfield County Choral Union (LCCU) is entering its 127th concert year with decidedly youthful energy. Under the direction of Music Director Dr. Gabriel Löfvall, the LCCU will convene a youth choral festival in Norfolk in late spring; offer a series of choral seminars […]

Winter Weekend In Norfolk

It was a cold and blustery weekend, but that didn’t stop the hardy from coming out on Feb. 21 and 22 for Winter WIN, the weekend for enjoying all things Norfolk in the winter season. The photos below show a story of a town that came together to strut its stuff for the world to […]

Norfolk Children’s Foundation is a Living Legacy of Dorothy Satherlie

Dorothy “Dottie” Jane Satherlie, a woman whose life spanned over a century of profound change and even more profound service, passed away peacefully at her home on Jan. 29, 2026. At 102 years old, Dottie leaves behind a legacy defined by her unwavering commitment to education, her deep-rooted faith, and a family that stretches across […]

Greening of Norfolk

Vernonia, the Weed You Need By Jill Chase It’s sad that some of the best garden plants go unknown just because of bad PR. Purely on name alone, how can baneberry, snakeroot or ragwort compete with the angelic sounding meadowsweet, Queen Anne’s lace or foxglove? Some of the best plants have the word “weed” built […]

Cook For Goodness Sake

America The Melting Pot By Linda Garrettson In celebration of the 250th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence, it seems appropriate to dedicate my food column this year to America, who we are, and what we eat. Get ready for some history lessons, and perhaps surprises that might enlighten you to what we call American […]

Be Careful, Very Careful

An expert team from the Glass Source Stained Glass Studio spent nearly six hours in cold mid-January weather care-fully removing a cathedral stained glass window from Battell Chapel at the United Church of Christ before transporting it to their studio in Seymour for restoration. In this photo, Michael Skrtic balances one section of the window […]

Piping in the Storm

Ahead of the major weekend storm, a hardy group of 35 devotees of the Scottish poet Robert Burns gathered in Battell Chapel on Saturday, Jan. 24, for a bit of music, poetry and haggis. Ken Storrs (pictured above) piped in the guests. Andrew Thomson recited the traditional “Address to the Haggis” and word is that […]