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Discovering Lake Champlain

By Maria Burt
Fair Haven Union High School, Grade 9

Vermont’s history is full of discoveries. Throughout time, people have discovered slate, granite, marble, maple, arrowheads, fossils and, if we look back far enough, we even have evidence of the discovery of our largest body of water, Lake Champlain. The saying holds true, you can find anything if you just dig deep enough.
The best way to explain the discovery of Lake Champlain is to elucidate some things about the person who discovered it. After all, the lake is named after him. Do you know who I’m talking about? If you said Samuel De Champlain, you are absolutely correct.

Horses in the Meadow

By Olivia Powell
Woodstock Union High School, Grade 10

My speckled dog trots up ahead
Her tail twitching back and forth
Clueless, while she sniffs deer tracks, as to what this walk is worth.
The sunshine sifts between the leaves
Dangling off the limbs
That weave to form a canopy, making the sunlight dim.
I wander in between white trees
Quick feet on the moss
And when I reach the ancient wall we both jump swiftly across.
Chickadees twitter, dry twigs snap, a cool breeze on my face I sense
And then I notice with startled eyes, before me is a fence!
My pace gets faster, she swiftly looks up
And what soon comes in view
Is a green, glorious and glistening meadow, sparkling with morning dew.
She pokes her furry brown head through the fence,
I turn my head to look below
And there, sleek and stunning, two horses I see in the meadow.
A symphony of feelings arises in me
When I comprehend what I’ve seen

The Elusive Rendezvous

By Damian Coburn
Chelsea Public School, Grade 12

Has there ever been one word that you never knew how to pronounce or what it meant, and always forgot to look up or ask about? The word that was kept under my radar until this summer was “rendezvous.”
I first encountered this elusive word when I became interested in automobiles. One day, while riding through Barre City with my grandparents I saw this very nice-looking Buick SUV. On the back hatch it said, “Buick Rendezvous.” This word became very problematic for me because I had no idea of how to pronounce it. The whole word was difficult and confusing. R-e-n-d-e-z-v-o-u-s. I finally decided after some thought that the correct pronunciation of the word was rend-ze-vous, not ron-day-voo, as it is supposed to be.