Chili Cook-off raises alarm with Torrington Area Health District

CORNWALL — In a last-minute intervention, Torrington Area Health District put a lid on last weekend’s Chili Cook-off, extinguishing any would-be-fiery competition.

Fast-acting Park and Recreation volunteers pivoted and salvaged the evening that was hailed as “one of the best nights out” by an attendee.

Just days prior to the March 1 event, Cook-off organizers were alerted by TAHD representatives that, according to TAHD’s Food Code (which was made to conform to federal standards in 2023), the...

Equus Effect: healing with horses

SHARON — Every day, approximately 20 United States military veterans take their own lives. It was an awareness of this statistic that led Jane Strong and David Sonatore to found the Equus Effect, an equine experiential learning and coaching facility in Sharon, in 2012. Since then, over 1800 veterans, first responders, and others who live or work in high-stress environments have moved through the Equus Effect’s curriculum, acquiring — through contact with horses — the tools to improve communicati...

Cornwall Days highlights creativity, culture and community

From Aug. 9 to 11, residents and visitors of “Connecticut’s Greenest Town” gathered to celebrate Cornwall Days — a weekend-long festival dedicated to “Cornwall and all its eccentricities.”The townwide occasion, staged at a scatter of Cornwall institutions and green spaces across the town’s wooded sprawl, featured live music, theater, film, art, food, shopping, and more.Spanning all three days and providing the weekend’s structural and cultural backbone was the enduring Rose Algrant Art Show, now...

Cooking up natural nourishment in Cornwall

CORNWALL ­— Friends of Wellspring Commons gathered at the parish house of the United Church of Christ in Cornwall on Friday, Aug. 2, to taste, explore, and rejoice in the myriad possibilities of local forest cuisine.Wellspring Commons, a land stewardship and environmental outreach nonprofit initially co-founded by Keetu Winter to “spearhead the protection of 650 acres of land in Litchfield,” hosted the sylvan celebration as the opener of a three-day Forest Festival: the experiential culmination...

Academy Building bat population going strong

SALISBURY — Devaughn Fraser loves bats, and she wants you to love them, too.Fraser, a mammalian biologist with the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP), vowed to “change some minds” about the oft and unfairly maligned flying mammals at the third annual Bat Talk and Count on Thursday, July 25, in Salisbury.“Bats aren’t flying rats, they don’t want to drink your blood, and they don’t get stuck in your hair,” Fraser informed the audience gathered at Salisbury’s Scovi...

Young Salisbury dancer takes national title in Beyond the Stars Dance Competition

SALISBURY — Earlier this month, a rising talent cemented her place in the firmament of competitive dance when Addison Aylward-Vreeland placed first at the national level of the Beyond The Stars Dance Competition. Aylward-Vreeland, a rising fourth grader at Salisbury Central school, secured top marks among a field of twenty-four regional winners in the solo jazz dance category. Her routine, “Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch,” was her first solo performance at the national competition level since she began...

Sanctifying spokes and spirits in Salisbury

SALISBURY — In early afternoon on Sunday, June 16, the quiet rustling of leaves gave way to the roar of engines as a curving column of motorcyclists arrived at All Saints of America Orthodox Church in Salisbury.The bikers — nearly 60 riders between 44 bikes and trikes — journeyed from throughout Connecticut and neighboring New York to receive the church’s seventh annual Blessing of the Bikes.A prayer opened the event, with bikers and regular parishioners assembled in the road alongside the stret...