VPR News

New campaign filings in the race for U.S. Senate tell a tale of two war chests. Sen. Patrick Leahy has more than $3 million to work with in his bid for reelection. Republican challenger Scott Milne meanwhile has all of $83. Milne, however, insists that his stark financial disadvantage will be his chief political strength.

Renaissance fairs pop up all over the country in the summertime, attracting so-called "rennies" donning their period garb and talking like Shakespeare. For this installment of our "Summer School" series, we spent some time at the Vermont Renaissance Faire in Stowe to learn how to get medieval.

Much of the focus is on the convention hall speakers at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, but delegates are also hearing from party figures in more intimate, informal settings.

David Budbill’s 76th birthday celebration featured readings of his plays and poetry by actors, scholars, and others who have long treasured this poet’s work. It was a truly memorable evening, marred only by the fact that David is now quite ill with a neurological disease.

Vermont prides itself on being out in front on a lot of issues. That includes prohibition, which was enacted in 1852, 70 years before the federal law prohibiting the sale of alcohol. Vermont's temperance lasted until 1902.

VPR's John Dillon is in Cleveland with the Vermont delegation to the Republican National Convention. Throughout the week, he'll provide color, background and observations in his reporter's notebook.

I’ll never forget the first time my parents came to visit us, twenty-somethings with a new baby, on our newly purchased property in the Champlain Valley. They pulled into our dirt driveway, just as our neighbor was herding his Holsteins to summer pasture beyond our land. Surrounded by dozens of cows, they were surprised and stalled as the animals moseyed through. But this was still farm country, after all and dairy was king. Thirty five years later the valley is still farming – but now it’s for

One hundred years after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous speech saying, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

A pair of hands, black and covered with soot, bound together with rusty iron chains and chiseled by decades of inhumane treatment, represents the injustice of racism in our nation. Sadly, the remnants of the chains remain to this day.

In 1930 in Marion, Indiana, two lifeless black bodies in ragged and tattered clothes hung from separate tree branches, their faces and bodies beaten and bloody. Below them, a separate crowd of well-dressed white men and women stood smiling and looking at the corpses. Not one person had an expression of sorrow or remorse – not a single hint of regret.

The outcome of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland is predetermined: Donald Trump will get his party’s nomination for president. But there was controversy nonetheless for the 16-person Vermont delegation.

On July 1, Vermont became the fourth State to fund pre-Kindergarten for all its 3 and 4 year old children. It’s a good first step and speaks to an important need. According to Governor Shumlin, for 70% of the children in Vermont under the age of 6, both parents are in the labor force.

Even as it's under construction, the natural gas pipeline in Addison County continues to draw criticism for its price tag and environmental impact. Monday on Vermont Edition, we talk with Don Rendall, the president and CEO of Vermont Gas, and with one of the pipeline’s top critics, AARP Vermont State Director Greg Marchildon.

New state water quality rules could soon apply to all of Vermont's farms. The rules will cover not just dairy farms, but also other livestock operations, as well as vegetable and crop farms.

Earlier this summer, thousands of members of the Rainbow Family of Living Light, a loose affiliation of peace activists, made their way to the Green Mountain National Forest for their annual celebration of nature and hippie culture. This year’s festivities peaked around the Fourth of July, but the gathering is still winding down.