March - 2017

Granite State of Mind, #47: The Flume, Lincoln

Joe Pace

Mar 19, 2017

Granite State of Mind, #47: The Flume, Lincoln

The Flume is New Hampshire's real-life Rivendell, eight hundred feet of waterfall-carved Conway granite walls looming eighty feet up and less than twenty feet apart, draped with lush green ferns and mosses. A boardwalk threads throughout a landscape that feels more like the Pacific Northwest or Middle-Earth than New England. Formed by underground basalt flows rather than glacial carvings, The Flume is one of New Hampshire's more surreal, beautiful, and cherished natural treas

Granite State of Mind, #46: Saunders at Rye Harbor, Rye

Joe Pace

Mar 18, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #46: Saunders at Rye Harbor, Rye

In putting this list together I've been a little surprised and not a little sobered to realize how many entries don't exist any more. I can remember my parents and grandparents telling stories when I was younger, and often the tales would be punctuated by asides about defunct or demolished or repurposed establishments. I suppose now, in my forties, I've inherited a share of that mantle. Memories are now often equal parts personal recollections and collective archival preserva

Granite State of Mind, #45: Exeter Country Club, Exeter

Joe Pace

Mar 17, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #45: Exeter Country Club, Exeter

First off - and anyone who's been on a course with me knows this - I am a horrific golfer. A military golfer (left-right-left-right) with a scorecard full of snowmen, mainly suffering from a "loft" problem (lack of f#$%ing talent). I can break 80, but only on a nine-hole course like Exeter. Still, despite my ineptitude on the links, I enjoy spoiling a good walk with friends like Paul Scafidi or Ben Wheeler, Keith Thomas Paine or Matt Carlyon, Jonathan Tyson or Darrien Tucker

Granite State of Mind, #44: Mrs. Gowen's Kindergarten, Great Bay Road, Greenland

Joe Pace

Mar 16, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #44: Mrs. Gowen's Kindergarten, Great Bay Road, Greenland

I've attended my share of schools in New Hampshire - UNH, Exeter High, Exeter Junior High, Stratham Memorial School. We'll get to all of them in turn, some of them more than once. But the first one, the first school I ever knew, was Mrs. Gowen's little private pre-school and kindergarten on Great Bay Road in Greenland. I spent two years there, polishing all those social and academic skills one needs for elementary school. I can vividly recall the agony of learning to tell tim

Granite State of Mind, #43: The Newington Mall, Newington

Joe Pace

Mar 15, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #43: The Newington Mall, Newington

It's all shiny and new over there now, between the Fox Run Mall and the Crossings at Fox Run, with the huge cineplex and all the brightly-lit storefronts. But there was a time, in the 1970s and 80s, when the mall meant the Newington Mall, anchored by Bradlees at one end and Montgomery Ward's (Monkey Ward's) at the other. In between there was a Shaw's, a modest movie theater, a Porteous, and a few dozen other stores. As a youngster I can vividly remember clothes shopping at Br

Granite State of Mind, #42: Main Street, Wolfeboro

Joe Pace

Mar 14, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #42: Main Street, Wolfeboro

I've always been partial to Water Street in Exeter as the quintessential New Hampshire downtown (I know Portsmouth has its adherents, and many of my civic-hearted friends will argue for their own local favorites). But there's something to be said for Wolfeboro's Main Street, especially in summer. The stretch from Brewster Academy to the Wolfeboro Inn along Winnipesaukee's idyllic Wolfeboro Bay is a rightfully iconic New Hampshire locale. It's always been a summer destination

Granite State of Mind, #41: Wiggin Memorial Library, Stratham

Joe Pace

Mar 13, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #41: Wiggin Memorial Library, Stratham

Yeah, I know. That's the Stratham Historical Society Building now. The town library is over on Bunker HIll Ave, part of the municipal complex that used to be the elementary school (more on SMS another time). But that little stone structure on the corner of Winnicutt and Portsmouth Ave, just in front of the fire station, will always be the Wiggin Library to me. That's where my mother would take us to - her love of books is something she passed on to both my brother Al and me,

Granite State of Mind, #40: The Chocolatier, Exeter

Joe Pace

Mar 12, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #40: The Chocolatier, Exeter

Some of the businesses along the Water Street stretch of Exeter's downtown have come and gone, and some are longtime staples. The Chocolatier, thankfully, is among the durable mainstays. Founded in 1978, it's been around as long as I can remember, and that first step through the front door never gets old. Patrons are enveloped by the warm, delicious smells inside that tiny storefront - tiny, but bursting with a immense selection of handcrafted treats. The glass case has many

Granite State of Mind, #39: Hitchcock Hall, University of New Hampshire, Durham

Joe Pace

Mar 11, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #39: Hitchcock Hall, University of New Hampshire, Durham

Hitchcock Hall was built in 1959 and named after Leon Whitney Hitchcock, a longtime professor of electrical engineering. There's some delightful symmetry there, given that my memories of the place are inextricably linked to a latter-day electrical engineer/rock god, my roommate Joel Mellin. The second floor of Hitchcock was our lair for the first two of our four years of undergraduate cohabitation, and I have many fond memories of that southwestern portion of the Upper Quad.

Granite State of Mind, #38: Storyland, Glen

Joe Pace

Mar 10, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #38: Storyland, Glen

Storyland opened in 1954, the same year as Disneyland. One of the two theme parks became the insatiable predatory juggernaut of family entertainment, while the other remained a quaint, humble, mildly creepy attraction in the sleepy hamlet of Glen amidst the White Mountain National Forest. As the story goes, Bob Morrell, a veteran of the US Army 10th Division skiing soldiers in World War II, was living in Germany with his wife Ruth when they befriended an old woman named Frau

Granite State of Mind, #37: The Old Salt & Lamie's Restaurant and Inn, Hampton

Joe Pace

Mar 9, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #37: The Old Salt & Lamie's Restaurant and Inn, Hampton

There used to be a restaurant down at Hampton Beach called the Old Salt, but in 1999 it burned to the ground. The owners, the Higgins family, did business for a while as The Whale's Tale at the Hampton Beach Casino, and in 2001 bought Lamie's Inn at the corner of Lafayette Road and Route 27 in Hampton. Parts of the Lamie's complex dated back to 1740, and the new Old Salt swiftly blended into the historic structure, creating a comfortable, family-oriented restaurant. My favori

Granite State of Mind, #36: Market Square, Portsmouth

Joe Pace

Mar 8, 2017

Granite State of Mind

Granite State of Mind, #36: Market Square, Portsmouth

In 1762, a public lottery provided funding for paving the Market Square in Portsmouth, where Congress Street and Pleasant Street and Market Street converge. It made sense - the area was near the beginning of an eighteen-year run as the seat of colonial government in New Hampshire, with the old State House located there until 1776. In the century to come, the square would become dominated by red-brick Federal-style buildings and iconic architecture including the Athenaeum, Mer

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