If you are cruising through Lebanon or West Lebanon, and suddenly you glance in your rear-view mirror and notice flashing blue lights, you should pull over as quickly as possible. Don’t stress out. You’ll no doubt be greeted by one of the professional and friendly officers of the Lebanon police force.

Women in law enforcement is nothing new, but it has been a growing trend throughout the United States for some time and the City of Lebanon is certainly no exception. Just how long? Women have served in organized law enforcement in our country almost from the beginning. Today we are discovering the advantages of deploying both female and male officers, capitalizing on the synergy that develops when the gifts and talents of those crime fighters are combined.

Lebanon currently has three active female law enforcement officers and one on a leave of absence. That represents about 10 per cent of the total Lebanon force and the number of female officers is expected to rise in 2018. That blends well with the national scene for law enforcement.

You may have seen them around town, so the Lebanon Times is offering you an opportunity to meet our female officers up close and personal.

Officer Amy Jerome

Amy is a 32-year-old wife and mother of three children who currently reside in Claremont. She worked 4½ years for the Claremont Police Department before transferring to the Lebanon Police Department in June of 2017. Her husband Zachary works for the City of Charlestown. They have daughter Morgan (age 7) and Oliva (age 13) and a son Ethan (age 9). Amy was born in Denver.

Like many of her counterparts, Amy was attracted to a career in law enforcement at a very young age.

“My father was in law enforcement so I kind of grew up around it,” Amy explained. “I really enjoy the interaction with the people and here in Lebanon the community is very supportive. They make you feel welcome. I just love to come to work each day.

While Amy has taken the oath to serve and protect, she is quick to point out that law enforcement for both men and women offers a rigorous daily routine.

“Make no mistake. It is a tough job at times especially dealing with traffic. Lebanon has about 15,000 residents, but during the day the number of people passing through jumps to around 30,000. The training you get at the Police Academy is very demanding but essential. I recall when I applied only seven out of 60 applicants were accepted. However, Lebanon is a great place and I am happy to be here.”

Officer Emily Winslow

Emily is one of the youngest officers on the Lebanon Police force at the tender age of 23. She has been with the Lebanon Police force for 1½ years and has brought her youthful enthusiasm to the new endeavor.

“After I completed college at Suny Plattsburgh, NY. I started to consider my options” Emily explained. “I had Criminal Justice as my major and Political Science as my minor, but I was always leaning toward law enforcement. I think deep down it was something I had always wanted to do. I had never been to New Hampshire until I saw the opening here and applied for the position.”

Emily had lived in Warwick, NY. which is in the Hudson Valley area of New York and her transition to the Granite State and the Lebanon community went smoothly.

“I found the Lebanon area to be very busy, but a good type of busy. I have made good contacts here and now I am beginning to recognize people. I really enjoy talking to people and the community here is very active and very friendly. One thing in particular that I especially love about my work is that every day is unpredictable. I always try to treat people the way I would like to be treated.”

Emily is single and states that in her off-duty time she likes to keep herself “busy” as she explains and is fond of hiking. She definitely likes what she sees going forward.

“I can really see myself making this my career!”

Detective Callie Barrett

Callie Barret has been on the Lebanon force the longest of the three active female officers and will celebrate her eight-year anniversary in law enforcement. She is 30 years old and started out as patrol officer before taking the exam and being elevated to the rank of detective. Callie admits that she must assume additional responsibilities along with varied duties in her new position.

“My work schedule appears on the surface to be more stable with 9-5 work hours, but it is far from routine. There is a lot of behind the scenes work that involves conducting investigations, gathering evidence, and meeting with people for interviews. Often, I get that call in the middle of the night and I report for duty. One thing I do love about this job is the unexpected. You never know what you will experience each day.”

Callie is single and had purchased a house here in Lebanon back in 2012. She has developed a special relationship with the Lebanon area and the community at large.

“I really like it here in Lebanon. It is a very special place. I also enjoy being on the Lebanon Police force. We are a close-knit group and work very well together. As a detective, I am not as visible as the other officers. I log a lot of hours behind the computer and filling out paper work. Also, I have to appear in court to testify on current cases. However, I love law enforcement and intend to make it my career.”

For some, vacations abroad are spent on lavish cruises or sightseeing tours staged from behind the curtains of a comfortable hotel. But for Charlie Barker, this is missing the point of traveling. Once a firefighter, now a fire inspector with the Lebanon Fire Department, Charlie sees time abroad as an opportunity for adventure and all of the wonderful, unanticipated, and utterly real experiences that come along with it.

Charlie Barker presenting two Mexican fire fighters
with Lebanon Fire Department shirts

Most recently, this passion prompted him to join an aid trip to central Mexico run by John Markowitz. John, who works in the DHMC Emergency Department, has been going down to the area around Puebla City, Mexico to climb and to work with the Red Cross since 1999, and in that time he has done hands-on relief for various crises and established lasting friendships with local agents of change. This trip, he told me, had three purposes: to bring down equipment and supplies, to build bunk beds for a Red Cross station in Ciudad Serdan, and to get some climbing in if time permitted. For Charlie, it was the perfect combination.

“When John approached me,” he reflected, eyes lighting up, “I was like: Trip to Mexico? Do some work and get to hike a mountain? Yeah, yeah, let’s go!”

And Charlie, John insists, was exactly who he needed.

“It was Charlie who encouraged me to ask other firefighters to come,” John said, “and he asked if we could bring soccer balls and soccer shirts for the kids, and then Charlie talked to his mother, a former schoolteacher, and came back asking: ‘What about school supplies?’”

Volunteers in front of the ambulance, with Charlie at
the wheel

As soon as the team touched down in Mexico City, Charlie allowed his adventurous personality to take the reins, inspiring his peers to do lunch the local way, grabbing fresh fare from food trucks down the road. In Puebla the following day, he reveled in a chance to observe the Day of the Dead celebration, and to analyze the effects of the recent earthquake on the city. He shows me pictures of churches with no steeples, and of entire blocks of buildings braced to prevent collapse.

“For a firefighter,” he says, “this stuff is fascinating – to see what their people do for a disaster – because it’s different in every country.”

Stopping in at the Puebla City firehouse and its hospital revealed some of the more nuanced differences. Their equipment was similar but outdated, the hospital’s Emergency Department looking like the set for a 1950’s doctor drama, and the firehouse sporting old, mismatched bunker gear. Charlie proposed a future exchange between the two firehouses, but for the time being he settled for traded shirts from the Lebanon Fire Department with the Puebla crew in a show of camaraderie. Then it was off to the real work.

For the next 8 days the team established a home base out of an old soap factory in Tlachichuca, a small village at 8,000 ft. They distributed their supplies, aided the Red Cross in the construction of the bunk beds in Ciudad Serdan, and plotted a course to hike the gargantuan Mt. Orizaba.

Serdan is where all of the northbound trains pass, ridden by scores of Central American migrants fleeing oppressive, often deadly conditions in their home countries. When I asked Charlie what it was like seeing this on the ground, he told me the story of a boy who, when flung off a northbound train going 50mph, lost both of his feet at the ankles. “They’re gonna patch him up, and then send him right back,” said Charlie. “It’s heartbreaking.”

Charlie shares medical equipment and supplies that were
carried to the Red Cross in the city of Serdan, MX

But, he tells me, the experience was also eye-opening, allowing him to see the raw truth of a debate clouded by political agenda. “These are people,” he said. “All they want is a better shot at life, and I don’t think we here [in the US] often see it that way.”

On the final day, Charlie got up at 3:30am and hiked, with fellow Hanover firefighter Chris Sweitzer, halfway up the knees of Mt. Orizaba to an elevation of close to 14,500 ft. As the sun came up, Popo, an active volcano hoarding the horizon line, erupted with a cacophonous boom.

“It was awesome,” Charlie said.

John, who waited at a lower way station, echoed this sentiment, and lauded Charlie for his energy and enthusiasm, that day and every other.

“He helped make the trip,” John told me.

When I asked Charlie if he would ever do this again, or would recommend it to others, he flashed a genial smile.

“Definitely.”

Are you in the parking lot? I’ll come to the door.

That’s Sangwook ‘Sunny’ Nam – the Grammy-nominated mastering engineer – as I call him from the East Wilder Road parking lot of his studio, Jacob’s Well Mastering. Situated yards off the bank of the Connecticut River, the elegant but nondescript building has been the home of Sunny’s studio since 2012. As he opens the door and introduces himself, I step into a cozy, inviting meeting room. Sunny leads me around the corner into his studio and then steps to the side so I can admire his workspace. It’s certainly a space worthy of admiration: professional-quality speakers are built into the wall to my left on either side of a window overlooking the river, while Sunny’s custom console fills the space to my right, boasting a vast array of displays, knobs, sockets, and lights. His chair is in the middle of the room, clearing any obstruction to the sound while he works – even if this means he needs to turn around to listen closely as he’s working.

Grammy-nominated mastering engineer, Sunny Nam

Sunny grew up in Seoul, Korea, where he discovered a passion for numerous styles of music from the time he began learning both guitar and piano at age five. As a teenager he sang and played guitar in a rock band while also developing his skills as a classically trained choir singer and pianist. In Seoul National University he received an undergraduate degree in computer science, then returned to the Graduate School of Music to study music composition and theory.

In 1998, Sunny began his career in recording; within a few years he had established himself as a prominent producer and recording engineer in Korea, working with numerous well-known musicians and orchestras (he gives me some names: Young Ok Shin and Daejin Kim, as well as Polish National Radio Symphony and Nashville Symphony). This also exposed him to the mastering process, which drew his attention. In 2005 he began a mentorship with Doug Sax, the founder of The Mastering Lab in California, whom Sunny exalts as a “legendary mastering engineer.” Seven years later, after his wife accepted a position at Dartmouth College and he grew tired of the commute from family to work, he left The Mastering Lab and founded Jacob’s Well Mastering after finding a perfect building for his vision, right next to the river bank.

Even for audiophiles (of which Sunny is certainly one of the most dedicated), “mastering” may not be clear. Mastering is more than just “a process to make the music loud” so that it can be heard through headphones. Nor is it simply the conversion from professional media (which can be digital or analog) to consumer media. But those are both substantial elements of the entire process.

“Because each media has its own idiosyncrasy including the environment in which it is used, the mastering process needs to represent the idea of the artist or the producer at its best on different media,” explains Sunny. “For example, a song will be produced and mixed in a quiet and acoustically treated room on a high-quality media format. But audiences will listen to the music on the street, in the car, or even at the gym, through small ear buds. They are using media that compromise the quality. On this media, a full orchestra, for which the artist spent a fortune, might not be heard as intended unless the mastering engineer adjusts it so that it is represented well on that low-quality media in a very noisy environment.”

Sunny explains that this means he might master a track differently if it is destined for vinyl, or for iTunes download, or for CD. Thus, there will be multiple outputs for the same recording, which Sunny expertly fine-tunes to the expected listening environment and circumstances of its format. But that doesn’t mean he spends months on a single album. “When I worked in recording,” he says, “we would have the same artist come in sometimes for three months. With mastering, we can finish a project in a day or two.” In fact, this is part of what drew him to mastering: the quick turnaround time, coupled with the variety of projects seeking his service.

The arrangement of the room removes any interference between the speakers and
Sunny while he’s working.

The studio’s name comes from the Biblical location where Jesus has a conversation with a Samaritan woman; Sunny, a Christian, hopes to interface his faith with other people, and also to connect the various genres he enjoys by the common thread of his work. “I’ll listen to anything: classical music, rock, country… even metal.” Having new projects every day gives Sunny the opportunity to work within the full scope of these interests. His client list is no joke, either: from Alison Kraus to Paul McCartney to Sarah Jarosz to Ray Charles, Sunny has an impressive résumé.

His custom console is partly to thank for that. “Before the 1980s, all the studios built their own stuff,” he tells me. “That’s what we did.” The console in front of me is entirely custom made, designed by Sunny and built by Josh Florian of JCF Audio. The equipment, too, is from the ’60s and the early ’70s – the pinnacle of the audio industry. “You can call it vintage,” he muses, “but the reason I’m using it is that it’s just a better sound.” It’s certainly a part of his signature – his work has been cited by numerous professionals as producing the best sound quality in the States. He tells me that the main goal is to achieve the cleanest signal path, and that all the equipment – resistors, capacitors, wires, and switches – serves that one purpose. Sunny thanks his colleague Bill Schnee for assisting him in evaluating components for his console: “Whenever I was ready to do an evaluation, I flew back to L.A. and assessed the parts that I gathered with him.”

So what’s Sunny’s favorite project? To answer this, Sunny cites his “Catholic tastes” – he avoids taking a stance. “Whatever comes in the door is my favorite genre,” he quips, “as long as they pay!” He eventually cites a few projects, though, as being noteworthy – Sarah Jarosz’s “Follow Me Down” resulted in a Grammy nomination in the “Best engineered album” category, which is the only one that acknowledges all the engineer’s efforts. And “Giving It Up” by George Benson and Al Jarreau – another Grammy nominee. Sunny reflects: “Since we lost Al this year, this album stayed for a while in my playlist recently.”

When he’s not at Dartmouth College (he also teaches there, for the past three years) or in the studio, Sunny likes to play sports with his kids: skiing in the winter, baseball every other season, and PlayStation sports games when the weather keeps them inside. He loves food, too: Three Tomatoes Trattoria on the Lebanon Mall is his go-to for Italian, and Four Aces Diner is his top breakfast spot. And he attends various shows at the Lebanon Opera House when he can, he tells me, as he recalls in particular last year’s rendition of “Clara’s Dream: A Nutcracker Story” presented by the City Center Ballet. Despite his many other interests, music remains a significant passion for Sunny, and Jacob’s Well is his testament to that, mastering music from around the world in his studio in Lebanon, New Hampshire.

Tucked behind a downtown Lebanon playing field, the Canillas Community Garden is a bustling hub for longtime residents as well as Lebanon’s growing international community. The garden’s visionary founders are preparing to celebrate 10 years of success in ‘sowing the seeds’ for how to cultivate healthy soil, grow organic vegetables, and share wisdom and knowledge with the next generation of gardeners.

Pat McGovern, Helen Brody, Polly Gould, and Cherry Angell are the current coordinators of the Canillas Community Garden. Three of the team are founders, and have observed firsthand the evolution of the garden from its modest beginnings with seven raised beds and a spiral garden to an important community gathering place and educational collective with 35 beds and a reputation for innovation and welcoming gardeners of all ages and abilities.

Regular visitors: Jean Howe and her granddaughter, Melanie

According to the National Gardening Association based in Williston, VT, the number of households participating in community gardens in the United States has increased by more than 200% since 2008. The vast majority of new gardeners is comprised of young people in urban areas concerned with food security and healthy eating practices. Attracting younger gardeners is an important consideration for McGovern, who writes the Canillas Community Garden blog. “The organizing committee sees succession planning as a concern. We are taking responsibility for finding the next generation of gardeners.” McGovern points out that a lot of people come into the area for work, check out the garden, then move away after a few years. While many gardeners have been part of the organization since the beginning, roughly 10% of the group moves on each year. McGovern said that even with this natural turnover rate, “We have a waiting list right now and I don’t believe we will be able to meet the need.”

The garden is a shining example of a before and after success story. Located on what was formerly a dump site, early efforts to prepare the soil for the future gardens yielded some unwelcome surprises like rusted metal, glass and pottery shards and leaded soil. These findings led to a raised bed model, which involved trucking in tons of good soil and mulch to establish the beds and pathways rather than digging down into the existing soil. With support from the Carter Community Building Association which owns the land, Mascoma Savings Bank Foundation, Upper Valley HEAL, the Unitarian Church, and many hours of volunteer labor, the garden was born in 2009.

Co-founder Polly Gould points to the reasons she continues to be involved. “I don’t like meetings,” says Polly. “But I saw that there were fun things to do in a group, and I enjoy the social aspects of the garden.” Polly and her husband Frank designed and installed the ‘spiral garden’, which appeals to both children and adults, but in different ways. “Adults don’t have the same sense of how to use the spiral garden as children do. The children weave in and out of the spiral, exploring freely, touching and smelling the flowers,” says Polly.

Volunteers pose in front of the new garden shed

Outreach activities to member gardeners and the greater Lebanon community are one of the primary ways knowledge is shared. From horticultural tips about soil health and cover crops to pest management and ecological concerns like climate change, Pat considers the garden to be a place that promotes all aspects of healthy living. “An issue that is important to me is pesticides,” says Pat. “What being an organic gardener means is educating others about how to grow food safely.” The negative effects of chemicals on children’s cognitive and physical development as well as the disruption of water quality and pollinators are growing national concerns. Pat notes, “Because we are attempting to grow healthy food, we have become a voice for change.”

The Canillas Community Garden’s ‘voice’ extends into mutually beneficial partnerships with local organizations including students from the Regional Resource Center at Hartford High School who helped build a storage shed after a wheelbarrow left outside became a makeshift home for a mother duck and her chicks. Last summer, volunteers began the installation of a Mascoma Greenway pocket park pollinator garden behind Goss Logan Insurance, and two ‘easy access’ raised beds have been funded by the DHMC Aging Resource Center to accommodate gardeners who need a little extra height for planting and harvesting. Last year’s Arbor Day Celebration featured refreshments and the planting of an oak and maple tree in collaboration with the City’s Recreation & Parks Department.

Garden Girls Becky Perkins, Pat McGovern, Polly Gould,
and Helen Brody

Cherry Angell, a long-time volunteer who is at the community garden every day during the season, was brought up with the idea of giving back to the land if you take from the land. Known by many as the “Angel of the Garden”, Cherry spearheaded the new leaf mulching operation, which uses truckloads of leaves collected and delivered by the City, guaranteed not to have been sprayed. “I’ve always gardened – it’s my daily workout, and I love flowers – the irises that bloom in the spiral garden each spring are gorgeous. People bring friends to see what is going on and we give them tours.” Cherry works with gardeners who have surplus vegetables to share the bounty with visitors, which is especially important for children as they learn about how their food is grown. This spring, the children’s garden will become more edible with snow peas and cherry tomatoes, complementing several beds of decorative perennials and annuals.

Author and co-founder Helen Brody, who lives at nearby Emerson Place agrees educating children is vital. “The children’s garden is so important. I have met college students who did not know that carrots were grown in the ground,” says Helen, who is planning to install an edible children’s garden for the 2018 season. As a recipe developer, Helen is fond of sharing her favorite recipes from garden harvests, and believes that the international members of the community garden bring a rich variety of greens and unusual vegetables to the table. Gardeners from Mexico, India, France, Peru, Russia, China, and Korea share their cultural gardening tips, and the diversity is exciting for the native New Englanders working alongside the international members of the garden.

Welcome to our community garden

So what’s new for the spring? Building up the new ‘hugelkultur’ (German term meaning “hill culture”), with organic coffee grounds from the Lebanon Co-op, decomposing logs, brush, and leaves which act like a sponge storing rainwater until it’s needed by the plants. Last year the hugelkultur produced significant yields of winter squash, tomatoes and other crops. The gardeners will also be watching out for bees, wasps, hummingbirds, butterflies, and moths who will visit the new pollinator garden, and education of gardeners new and old will most certainly continue.

As Pat notes, “I see what we do to the land as critical to the health of our planet. We want to focus on soil health, relying on soil/water ecosystems to remove CO2 from the air and sequester it in soil, thereby adding nutrients to the growing plants. In our own small way we can experiment with minimal tillage, using ground covers and mulch, and adding organic matter to absorb water. Regenerating the soil carbon sponge is where the hope is.”

An artistic rendering of Pat McGovern, Helen Brody, and Cherry Angell with garden
flower arrangements