Norwich First Wednesdays
See the lineup of lectures for 2021-22 and sign up to attend via Zoom
*DIGITAL* History in Hot Water: Climate Change and the Shipwrecks of Lake Champlain
October 6
7:00 pm
Lake Champlain is home to hundreds of well-preserved shipwrecks that help tell the story of our region. But climate change is altering the lake’s underwater cultural heritage. Susan Evans McClure and Christopher Sabick from the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum consider the impact of historical objects changing before our eyes. (Registration required.) Read More »
*DIGITAL* What Should We Do? The Civic Question, and How More Americans Can Ask It
November 3
7:00 pm
Americans are now less likely to belong to groups that ask of their communities, “What should we do?” This decline weakens our society and threatens our democracy. Tufts University professor and author Peter Levine reflects on how we can reverse the trend and revive civic life. (Registrations required.) Read More »
*DIGITAL* Vermont Humor: “I Could Hardly Keep from Laughing”
December 1
7:00 pm
Author Bill Mares and cartoonist Don Hooper share drawings and tales that illustrate the understatement, comeuppance, and subtlety of Vermont humor. Enjoy this ramble through the decades as the pair show how Vermont’s true character shines in dry (and occasionally tables-turned) jokes and stories. (Registration required.) Read More »
*DIGITAL* Sherlock Holmes: The Game’s Afoot
January 5, 2022
7:00 pm
Scholar Barry Deitz looks at the life and times of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. He discusses the inspiration for Holmes and examines what other writers, actors, and directors have done with the character over the past 30 years. Read More »
*DIGITAL* My John Dewey Problem
February 2, 2022
7:00 pm
What are the ways that John Dewey, America’s greatest democratic philosopher, still speaks to us—or fails to speak to us—at a moment of great peril for our democratic society and political institutions? UVM professor Bob Pepperman Taylor explores the relevance of Dewey’s political and educational ideas in the 21st century. Read More »
*DIGITAL* From Little Jerusalem to the Lost Mural: Preserving Jewish and Immigrant Heritage
March 2, 2022
7:00 pm Norwich Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, Norwich
In 1885, a group of Lithuanian immigrants settled in Burlington’s Old North End, where they transplanted their religious traditions and culture. Archivists Aaron Goldberg and Jeff Potash describe the “Lost Mural,” a rare survivor of the lost genre of European painted synagogues, and tell the story of conserving the mural in Burlington. Read More »
*DIGITAL* Disability and the Poetry of Natural and Supernatural Worlds
April 6, 2022
7:00 pm
Four poets—Eli Clare, Judy Chalmer, Deborah Lisi-Baker, and Toby McNutt—reflect on the ways disabled poets write about natural and supernatural spaces. In this wide-ranging discussion, they consider how poetry invites us into an embodied experience, and how supernatural poetry can expand or question traditional understandings of the “natural.” Read More »
*DIGITAL* Civil War, Emancipation, Reconstruction and America’s National Parks
May 4, 2022
7:00 pm
Central Park and Yosemite Valley became public parks during the tumultuous years before and during the Civil War. UVM historian and former National Park Service superintendent Rolf Diamant explains how anti-slavery activism, war, and the remaking of the federal government gave rise to the American public park and the very concept of national parks. Read More »
Host: Norwich Public Library and Norwich Historical Society
Underwriters
Statewide Underwriters: The Institute of Museum & Library Services through the Vermont Department of Libraries; The Alma Gibbs Donchian Foundation.
Program Co-sponsors and Underwriters: Middlebury College and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Norwich Bookstore, Otto & Associates, University of Vermont Humanities Center
Library Sponsors: Friends of the Norwich Public Library, Norwich Historical Society, the Jack & Dorothy Byrne Foundation.
