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Middlebury, VT Middlebury College, Route 125, occupies a 1,200-acre campus on the southwest edge of Middlebury. It is notable for the consistent use of gray limestone in its buildings as well as for its summer foreign language schools. Founded in 1800, the college has evolved from the lower Old Chapel-Painter Hall row to the hillside beside Le Chateau. Now more than 2,000 undergraduates are enrolled at one of the top-ranked liberal-arts colleges in the country. Hundreds of graduate students flock to the eight Summer Language Schools and the Bread Loaf School of English, where 250 writers attend the annual Bread Loaf Writers Conference, the oldest and largest in the country (Robert Frost is remembered as "the godfather of Bread Loaf"). The college library has excellent collections in its Robert Frost Room. Middlebury's $16 million Center for the Arts is a state-of-the-art showplace for the performing arts, five galleries housing the Middlebury College Museum of Art, the college's top-flight concert series and even a café called Rehearsals. Vermont State Craft Center/Frog Hollow, 1 Mill St., Middlebury. Just off Main Street in the center of Middlebury, this is one of our favorite crafty places anywhere, and 150,000 visitors a year agree. With windows onto the Otter Creek falls, it's a fine showplace for sculpture and pottery. Inside the renovated mill is a 3,000-square-foot treasure trove of pottery, stained glass, pewter, quilts, pillows, wall hangings, jewelry and stuffed and wooden toys, all by Vermont artists. We managed to resist some great sculptures of dogs and bunnies ($450 to $675). We could not resist a woodcut print by artist Sabra Field, a Middlebury grad with a wonderful sense of design, and for years now her "Apple Tree Winter" with chickadee perched on a branch has been ensconced in our dining room. The nation's first state craft center has expanded to locations in Burlington and Manchester. (802) 388-3177. www.froghollow.org. Open
Monday-Saturday 9:30 to 5, also Sundays 11 to 4, spring through fall.
Free. Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History, 1 Park St., Middlebury Bachelor Henry Sheldon bought the brick 1829 Judd-Harris House opposite Cannon Park and opened it as a museum in 1884, advertising it with a twenty-foot sign that read "Sheldon's Art and Archeological Museum." It was the first village museum in the country, our guide said. The place is a find, filled with all sorts of odd but interesting items like a mousetrap that kills a rodent by drowning it in a cylinder of water, a pair of shoes worn by Calvin Coolidge as a child, newspapers from the 1800s and a collection of old dentist's tools, including a primitive ether bottle. There's even a stuffed cat – it seems that Sheldon, the town clerk, saved everything. The highlights of one of the most exemplary museum collections in Vermont are exhibited in room settings in the elegant Federal house built by local marble merchants. Middlebury's garden clubs have created an early Victorian garden next door. Changing history and art exhibits are shown in the Cerf Gallery. The Fletcher Community History Center, a wing connecting the museum and the Stewart-Swift Research Center, replaced the old summer kitchen and woodshed. (802) 388-2117. www.henrysheldonmuseum.org.
Open Monday-Saturday 10 to 5. Adults, $4. UVM Morgan Horse Farm, 74 Battell Drive, Weybridge. Col. Joseph Battell of Middlebury, whose name graces three college dormitories, established this farm, just northwest of Middlebury past the covered bridge. It is now managed by the University of Vermont. The Morgan, America’s first breed of horse, is Vermont’s state animal. Most of the Morgan horses alive today can be traced to this site, where they are bred, trained and sold. You can tour the stables on the hour, watch a twenty-minute video show and observe the horses as they are trained. At the right time of day, you can even hear the horses neighing and see them waiting for their hay, which slides down a trough into their stalls three times a day. The lush lawns include a picnic area. The 1878 barn is on the National Register of Historic Places. (802) 388-2011. Tours daily on the hour,
9 to 4, May-October. Adults, $4.50. Robert Frost Interpretive Trail, off Route 125 between Ripton and Middlebury's Breadloaf campus. "Please take your time and leave nothing but your footprints," urges the sign at the start of this easy-to-walk, three-quarter-mile trail blazed in 1976 by the U.S. Youth Conservation Corps. Several benches are strategically placed for creative contemplation. This is a thoroughly delightful way to spend an hour or two, reading some of Frost's poems mounted on plaques en route. Meadows, woods, groves of birches and streams are traversed and identified. Frost lived and worked within a mile of here; the fields and forests were the inspiration for his poems and mentioned in many. Nearby is the Robert Frost Wayside Area with picnic tables and grills in a grove of red pines that Frost pruned himself. Up a dirt road is the Homer Noble Farm, site of the log cabin where Frost spent his last 23 summers. One of our favorite bookstores anywhere is the neatly jumbled Vermont Book Store, whose former owner knew Robert Frost. It has one of the country's largest collections of Robert Frost works, including out-of-print collector's items. Also along Main Street you'll find funky women's clothes at Wild Mountain Thyme, antique jewelry and vintage apparel at Bejewelled, and kitchenware and housewares at Dada. Greenfields Mercantile is a showcase for the clothing, bags and accessories of American designers working in hemp and other sustainable and recycled fibers. Sweet Cecily, billed as “a country store for today,” stocks great cow pottery, cow placemats and painted cabinets among its folk art and fine crafts. Forth ’n Goal is a sporting goods store that features the Middlebury Collection of college clothing and accessories. Other shops are found in restored mill buildings around Frog Hollow, site of the Vermont State Craft Center. Fun gifts and accessories are among the eclectic stock at 4 Dogs & a Wish, “a store for eccentric people and their pets.” The Otter Creek Craft Gallery is located in the old Star Mill. Middlebury Mountaineer carries outdoor sporting gear and apparel. Great Falls Collection (up a staircase beside the Otter Creek falls) has unusual jewelry, home accessories and nature and garden items. From Frog Hollow a 276-foot pedestrian bridge across Otter Creek yields a view of the falls and connects with the Marble Works, a collection of businesses, offices and specialty stores in old white marble factory buildings. Local producers back up their trucks and tailgates to the parking lot for the small farmer’s market (where we bought some delicious bread, corn and salsa) beside the falls on Wednesday and Saturday mornings. Here also is the showroom for Danforth Pewterers, where we ogled all the pewter products from thousands of buttons for $1 to dinner plates for $72. A dolphin on a corded necklace for $12 caught our eye. The new American Flatbread Restaurant sells gourmet pizzas to go and is open for dinner Friday and Saturday evenings. Restaurant seating is in the oven room where diners can see the fire as bakers and cooks prepare each flatbread to order. Stop for a beer at the Otter Creek Brewery, 85 Exchange St., where tours are given daily at 1, 3 and 5 and you can sip free samples and browse through the brewhouse gift store. Open daily 10 to 6.
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