EXETER Beatrice Cooper held up a cup of water to show off the tiny brook trout she was preparing to release into the Exeter River.
“I’m going to miss him,” the fourth-grader from Lincoln Street School said. “But I’m happy he’s going to be in the wild.”
Beatrice was among a group of students from teachers Keith Schmitt and Hallie Estle’s classes who helped raise brook trout this year. They started with about 200 eggs in December, which were then hatched, and carefully raised by the students, before the 40 strong who survived were ready to leave the tank for the river.
EXETER For the past 23 years, Jim Kaplan has been one of the hardest-working employees in Exeter Hospital’s cafeteria.
The 52-year-old arrives for a shift from 11 a.m. until 2 p.m. five days a week, during which he clears and washes dishes. He can be a man of few words with strangers, but everyone at the hospital knows him.
“Whenever I’m at Exeter Hospital and see any doctor there, they always know Jim from the cafeteria,” his sister Lisa Press said. “My father joked once that more people know Jimmy than the CEO.”
When Jim was born with Fragile X syndrome, a genetic disorder characterized by mild-to-moderate intellectual disability, his mother Sue was determined to help him live as independently as possible. At the time, there were no schools for children with disabilities and she placed an ad in the Exeter News-Letter seeking other parents of children with challenges. Maureen Barrows, Jane McFarland, Mildred Wool and Sue Dillenbeck answered her call.
EXETER In the world of crossword puzzles, the puzzles in the New York Times are widely considered the best of the best.
Getting one of your puzzles placed in the NYT is a tremendous achievement. But getting a puzzle you constructed placed in the Sunday NYT is considered the penultimate accomplishment in the puzzling world.
Lisa Bunker, 58, of Exeter, this week saw a puzzle she constructed in Sunday’s Valentine’s Day paper, a dream she’s been working toward for decades.
“Getting a Sunday grid in the New York Times is the apex of this geeky profession,” Bunker said. “This week I arrived as a puzzle constructor; it’s been my lifelong dream. I first conceived of getting a Sunday puzzle in the New York Times 30 years ago.”
And that’s where Benny, a 14-year-old black cat, enters this story.
Seven years ago, Benny vanished from Nancy and Dave Bryant’s home in Rochester, N.H. The couple had taken Benny into their family in 2011 after a friend’s daughter, who was in the military, needed to find a home for him.
Nancy and Dave are animal lovers. They have a cat, Squeaky; a rescue dog from South Carolina named Maezie; a guinea pig named Lily; and a cockatiel, Henry.
“They are our family,” said Nancy, 65, who is retired.
Benny was a loving cat and immediately stole their hearts. But one day, he went outside and never returned. They were heartbroken. They put up posters and searched around their neighborhood and in the woods across from their home, but there was no sign of him.
And that’s where Benny, a 14-year-old black cat, enters this story.
Seven years ago, Benny went missing from Nancy and Dave Bryant’s home in Rochester. The couple had taken Benny into their family in 2011 after a friend’s daughter, who was in the military, needed to find a home for him.
Nancy and Dave are huge animal people. Their pets include a cat, Squeaky; a rescue dog from South Carolina named Maezie; a guinea pig named Lily; and a cockatiel, Henry.
“They are our family,” said Nancy, 65, who is retired.
Benny was a very loving cat and immediately stole their hearts. But one day, he went outside, and never returned. They were heartbroken. They put up posters, and searched around their neighborhood and in the woods across from their home, but there was no sign of him.