(in alphabetical order)

Art Bell, Burlington, is part of our post-production team.

Art's company, Dreamlike Pictures ( www.dreamlikepictures.com ), focuses on independent features, documentary, political, and motion graphics production. His 2006 experimental short, Ride , played numerous festivals including Nantucket and, at the invitation of Michael Moore, Traverse City. In 2004 Bell won Best Short, Experimental at the Woods Hole Film festival and produced a new PBS Series: Adirondack Outdoors . He has created and produced political commercials for Scudder Parker's gubernatorial campaign, for Howard Dean's presidential campaign, and for the National Death with Dignity Act. Bell is working on The Green Movie , an independent feature comedy about the future of the planet, with John O'Brien of Bellwether Films (Nosey Parker, Man with a Plan). He has done camerawork for the BBC, PBS, Fine Living and CBS, The Survivor. Bell is responsible for product design and development of 3D software used in 26 of the top 50 grossing films of all time, including Toy Story, Terminator 2, The Lion King, Jurassic Park, and Beauty and the Beast.

Susan Bettmann, Middlesex: Art, culture and spirituality: How does Vermont and its land affect artists and how do they affect Vermont?

Sue will connect art and culture in Vermont to spirituality and to the land. Among other artists, she will interview Peter and Elka Schumann, of Bread & Puppet Theater in Glover and bakers Helen and Jules Rabin of Plainfield. Both couples have a long history of outspoken commitment to grass roots political work, culture, bread, Vermont history, and connection to the land. 

Susan Bettmann comes to filmmaking after a long career in theater. She was a member of the Bread and Puppet Theater’s international touring company, and co-founded Dragon Dance Theatre. She worked on Nora Jacobson’s 2002 feature film, Nothing Like Dreaming, as script consultant.  In 2004 Beyond Eighty-eight Keys, The Music of Michael Arnowitt, her debut film, won the Vermont Film Commission’s Goldstone Award.  In 2005 she produced a short narrative film, The Singers, based on Ivan Turgenev’s short story.

Kate Cone, Thetford, is on our technical team.

Kate started her career with a video documentary about domestic violence for the Cambridge YWCA. The Soviet - American Sail , her next documentary, was aired nationally. She has since worked for Dartmouth College, Northland Video Production Company, and then started Windy Bluff Productions. Today she continues to produce video programs in the Educational, Scientific, Medical, and Courtroom worlds. She was Asst Unit Manager for Jay Craven's Where the Rivers Flow North and worked on pre- production for Nora Jacobson's films My Mother's Early Lovers and Nothing Like Dreaming . Her recent work includes a promotional DVD for Cindy Pierce, a local comic.

Jay Craven, Barnet: Vermont was the first state to ban slavery, but what is the truth about race relations in Vermont?

The Abolitionist movement, race issues. Vermont was the first state to abolish slavery and, because of its proximity to Canada, it played an important role during the underground railroad movement to support the flight of slaves. Former Peacham Academy teacher Thaddeus Stevens went onto a distinguished career as a Pennsylvania representative in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he led the abolitionist fight.  Jay’s section will explore how abolition and the underground railroad impacted the state--and what role Vermonters played--on all sides of the issue.

Jay is an award-winning director, writer, and producer whose narrative films include High Water (1989); Where the Rivers Flow North (1993); A Stranger in the Kingdom (1997); In Jest (1999); The Year That Trembled (2003), and Disappearances (2006). Craven also directed, produced, and co-wrote the 2005 Emmy Award-winning public television comedy series, Windy Acres (2004). His documentaries include After the Fog: Interviews with Combat Veterans (2006), Dawn of the People (1984), and Gayleen (1985). Craven's films have played 345 U.S. cities and towns; 52 countries; and more than 60 film festivals, including Sundance, South By Southwest, Vienna, Vancouver, San Francisco, Havana, and The American Film Institute's AFI Fest. Also, television broadcasts on the Disney Channel, Sundance Channel, Starz, Encore, PBS affiliates in eleven states, and syndication to more than 150 commercial U.S. TV stations. Craven also founded and directed Catamount Arts (1975-91) in St. Johnsbury and directed its wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary film and performing arts producing, presenting, and educational program. He has served as a panelist for The National Endowment for the Arts, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the Bush Foundation, and the Vermont Council on the Arts.

John Douglas, Charlotte, is helping with graphics and animation.

John is known in many international film circles for his 1960s and early '70s collaborative work with the innovative activist documentary filmmakers the Newsreel Group, and with his friend and creative associate Robert Kramer. After a little art and architecture at Harvard, and then the army, Douglas went to Mississippi to make a movie. With Kramer he co-directed the documentary People's War, 1969 , filmed in North Vietnam, and the epic narrative feature Milestones , 1975. He edited Kramer's 1988 film, Route One . His film in the early eighties, Grenada: The Future Coming Towards Us , was a history of the Grenadian revolution. John Douglas initially moved to Putney, Vermont in the late 1960s. He moved back to Charlotte, VT in the mid 80's to try and get "computer video out". Very much a citizen of the world, his films and videos reflect that worldview with clarity, integrity, and vigor ( www.nokilling.org)

Deb Ellis, Burlington, is on our post-production team.

Her documentary, Howard Zinn: You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train , was short-listed as a 2005 Academy Award nominee. Earlier work includes Skin Deep , an examination of the development and promotion of the sub-dermal contraceptive, Norplant; The FBI's War on Black America , examining targets of COINTELPRO, an FBI program instituted in the 1960's to "prevent the rise of a Black Messiah;" Unbidden Voices , about the immigrant Indian woman's experiences working in Chicago; and Doris Eddy , portrait of a Vermont woman living alone on her farm with 50 horses. Ellis is developing a documentary about Iraq war veterans AWOL in Canada. She maintains a strong interest in emerging technologies, and is particularly interested in how media is used to create community. Ellis also creates video projections as part of theatrical productions. She actively participates in the Vermont independent film community, currently serving as President of the Vermont International Film Festival. She is on the faculty at Middlebury College.

Jeff Farber, Middlesex: Act 250: a landmark piece of legislation aimed at maintaining Vermont's rural character.  

This momentous occasion was, however, not a bolt of lightning upon the populous, but the culmination of a conservation ethic that understands that the natural world had an intrinsic value in not only economic terms but also in terms of the human psyche.  This segment will look at the threads of Vermont history that led to the enactment of Act 250, and the continuing ramifications that Act 250 is having on Vermont's natural, economic, and political landscape to the present day.

Jeff Farber is a veteran award-winning independent producer, director and cinematographer. His documentaries include Brother Bread, Sister Puppet (1992); Beyond 88 Keys: The Music of Michael Arnowitt (2004, with Susan Bettmann), Living The Autism Maze, (2005, with Anne Barbano) and Living On The Fault Line (2007).  For ten years Farber was a senior producer/director at the University of Vermont.

Nora Jacobson, Norwich, is our project producer and is creating a segment on how the 1960's affected Vermont. Who are the utopian predecessors of the hippies?

 The 60s in Vermont, and back-to-the-land movement: In addition to creatively coordinating the project, Nora is working on a segment about communes and other agrarian experiments in Vermont such as Helen and Scott Nearing's community in Jamaica. What happened when the communes ended?  Some of the people left Vermont. Others settled here and applied their utopian ideals to grassroots activities in their communities and beyond.

Nora Jacobson's first feature film was Delivered Vacant, about gentrification in Hoboken, N.J. (New York Film Festival, Sundance, Golden Gate Award). She went on to make My Mother's Early Lover’s, (Jury Award, Film Fest New Haven, Audience Award, Maine International Film Festival), and Nothing Like Dreaming (Best in Fest, Lake Placid Film Festival, Hearts & Minds Film Festival), both shot in her native Vermont.  She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment of the Arts Media Fellowship, and a Lef Foundation grant.

Dina Janis and Sue Rees, Dorset: “Everywhere stone is gaining.  Whiteness.”--Samuel Beckett 

Samuel Beckett’s words written about the stone and quarries of hischildhood-will serve as a catalyst for our short film. The tread of thestory will follow marble from its original location, through extraction, torefinement, to final usage. We will “follow the vein” of marble, focusing onthe process and the people involved in the extraction and transformation,and look at a variety of usages for the material: included in this journeywill be views on the material characteristics of the material from ageologists, to a stone cutter to an architect and others along the route. We will investigate how this practice has influenced the look andtemperament of our state, with regards to both the landscape, and theimmigrants who arrived to work the quarries. 

Dina Janis teaches theater and acting at Bennington College.  An original member of The Steppenwolf Theater Company, Janis is also a lifetime member of The Actors Studio, appearing in Milk Train Boogie with Christopher Walken; The Homecoming, directed by Frank Corsaro; and Love Divided By, directed by Carlin Glynn. Her directing credits include Zelda, Scott & Ernest by George Plimpton, Somnoliques at the Actors Studio, and Her Say at the Polaris Theatre. Her numerous film credits include Melanie Jones’ The Needs of Kim Stanley, Nora Jacobson’s Gone,written by Stephen Goldberg, Little Noises, and Petranella's Daughter for PBS. She has taught at Bennington College since 2000.

Sue Rees has worked for theater and dance companies producing sets, video and animated projections as well as interactive pieces. Additionally, she received a Senior Fulbright Grant to produce a video documentary of temple festivals in Tamil Nadu, India in 2001-2002 and has over the last 6 years been documenting the Kattaikkuttu Youth Theatre School in Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu. Her video work has been shown at a number of festivals and the work with theater and dance companies performed throughout the United States, England, Poland, Germany, Belgium, India and Uganda. She teaches Media arts, Animation and Set Design at Bennington College.

Rob Koier, Burlington: Who are the mysterious masons, and why did the anti-mason party flourish in Vermont?

Anti-Masons, Masons and the Grange: Born out of the mysterious death of an ex-mason threatening to go public with Masonic secrets, the Anti-Masonic party was the first third party in US National politics.  Finding strong support in the state of Vermont, the Anti-Masonic party successfully elected their candidate for Governor for two terms in 1832 and 1834.  Within a decade, the organization was in decline, it’s members uniting with the National Republican Party and the Whig Party. Founded in 1867 by Oliver Hudson Kelley, an active mason and seven co-founders, the Grange was created to bring farmers together and advance their interests.  Active within the Women’s Suffrage and The Temperance Movements, they also fought railroad monopolies and pushed for rural mail deliveries.  The Grange borrows some of it’s rituals and symbols from Freemasonry.  In the last 15 years, membership in the Grange has dropped 40%.Dating back to the late 16th century, Freemasonry currently boasts a worldwide membership of 5 million people.  Freemasonry first came to Vermont in 1774.  Today over ninety lodges are listed as active by the Vermont Grand Lodge. Our current Governor is a high standing member of the fraternity and was awarded The Grand Lodge Medal of Honor in 2003.  In 2007, Vermont’s Grand Master launched The Proud To Be A Mason Program, an initiative to encourage a renewed level of pride in the organization and discover new membership prospects.What is the relationship between these organizations?  What is their significance and possible influence on contemporary Vermonters lives?

Rob Koier was the first graduate of the Burlington College Film program. Since then he has taught college-level classes on editing and editing theory.  He has written and directed several award winning documentaries and short films. He also co-directed the dogma 95 inspired feature length film, Quantum Wave (2000), with the filmmaking collective Group Seven Cinema. He currently owns and operates Black and Blue Productions, which produces promotional videos for Non profit and for profit companies. He is also in development on two feature length films; The Little Death, a darkly comic horror film with the heart of a romantic comedy and Animal Highway, an existentialist road movie about new lovers stealing their way across America.

Eleanor Bobbie Lanahan and Orly Yadin : Is it a coincidence that the two founders of AA, Dr. Bob Smith, and Bill Wilson both hail from Vermont?

 Alcoholics Anonymous:  founded by two Vermonters, Bill Wilson of East Dorset and Dr. Bob Smith of St. Johnsbury, in 1935--one year after the end of Prohibition. The incredibly successful 12 Step Program stands as one of the most important, under-recognized social revolutions of the 20th century. The filmmakers go in search of the personal histories and background of these two men using animation and live action.

Bobbie was born and raised in Washington D.C., attended art school in Rhode Island, and has lived in Vermont for the past 35 years. After spending three decades doing commercial illustrations for the dairy and ski industry, for children's books and guide books, she wrote Scottie, The Daughter of... , a biography of her mother, which was published by Harper Collins in 1995. That project led to her compiling a book of her grandmother's art, Zelda, An Illustrated Life , published by Harry Abrams Inc. in 1996. Her interest in combining writing and painting led naturally to the making of an animated movie, The Naked Hitch-Hiker (Goldstone Award, 2006 VIFF), a project which occupied her for the last seven years. Concurrent with these projects she has served as trustee of her grandparents' estate, Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, a role which demands a moderate amount of time.

Orly Yadin is an archivist, film researcher, filmmaker and producer of both documentaries and animation films and series. Since 2001 she has been Managing Director of Footage Farm – an archival footage collection. Earlier she set up and ran independent animation production companies, as well as developing historical documentary films. Several of her animation films won international awards at festivals, and one was short-listed by the Academy Awards.  Orly‘s films include Treasure (2001, producer – 26-part animated sitcom), Journey Through the Night (2000, producer – short drama); Andares in Time of War (1998, producer – animated fiction); Silence (1997, co-producer/director – animated documentary), The Word of a Film Archive (1996, producer/director – documentaryGotta Get Out (1995, producer – animated documentary); Blind Justice (1986-87, producer – animated documentary series); and The March of Time (1984-85, writer/director – 20-part documentary series).

Linda Leeman, Montpelier: America's most celebrated educator, John Dewey, came from Vermont and was the inspiration behind one of the most innovative institutions of higher education, Goddard College.

 Goddard College: Educational reform and nascent ecological awareness found welcome homes in Vermont. John Dewey's educational philosophy was the foundation for Goddard College's alternative education programs. Murray Bookchin, the founder of the social ecology movement and one of the first to combine the socialist tradition with ecological awareness, made his home at the Institute for Social Ecology, located for many years at Goddard College. We will explore these two institutions and use the video resources available through Goddard College and the Institute for Social Ecology to tell the story.

Linda Leehman heads the Video Activist Lab of Vermont. For the last 14 years, Linda has co-produced with Esther Farnsworth a cable access video program, Down by the Riverside. Linda videotapes, edits and creates DVDs of events, talks, music & plays that are organized by groups working for peace and economic and social justice.  

Robin Lloyd, Burlington: How the people of Vermont defeated a highway through the Green Mountains.

In 1935, the Green Mountain Parkway was proposed to stretch along 260 miles along the ridge of the Green Mountains. Vermonters ultimately rejected the idea in a statewide referendum in 1936. Using period documentary footage and some dramatic recreation, the segment gives a historical perspective on Vermonters' respect for the land and the history of Vermont environmentalism. It will examine the fight over the Green Mountain Parkway, the problems that sparked the project, the role of the Green Mountain Club, citizen opposition, and the Town Meeting votes in 1936 that led to abandonment of the plan.

Robin Lloyd, director of Green Valley Media, has been making films and videos for 25 years. From her early experimental films to her more recent videos on people's struggles what it takes to create a more just and peaceful world. She is also the publisher of Toward Freedom, an international news web journal. In 1998, she won the Burlington City Arts Award for Humanistic Cinema. She is founding member of the Peace and Justice Center in Burlington, Vermont, and serves on the advisory board of the Vermont International Film Foundation.

Louise Michaels, Shelburne: Barre was the home of stone cutters and a hotbed of radical thought and action.

In Barre, Vermont, the Socialist Labor Party Hall and its members formed a community at the turnof the 20c. Set in a very rural state, Barre Vermont experienced a huge population growthover 30 years (1880 – 1910) from 2000+ to 10,000+. The influx of immigrants fromEurope and Canada was diverse. The Hall’s activities allowed new and old residents,union members, family members, workers in varied industries to come together andcollaborate on multiple levels. Their lives were enriched and supported through theformation and building of the hall and its membership.The Hall represents Vermont’s participation in the Industrial Revolution, a complexupheaval of people’s lives over two centuries that threw people together from homelandsthousands of miles away and apart. While this is not unique to Barre, it is unique withinVermont to have an historic landmark of working people’s efforts to inform and uphold their own dignity and community.

Louise Michaels  is multi media web designer, graphic designer, photographer and filmmaker. She also teaches media and technology at highschools across the state and mentors students.

Rick Moulton, Huntington: The secret behind Vermont's special brand of "republicanism"

People simply declare that Vermont was a rock ribbed Republican state… But this generalization hides a much more complicated and diverse political truth. Lincoln’s party, home to abolitionists, prohibitionists and fiscal conservatives was not a monolithic force. It had branches, was diverse with dissenters and factions within its ranks. This segment will trace elements of Vermont’s Liberal Republicans from the tumultuous Bull Moose campaign of 1908, with Teddy Roosevelt leading a revolt from the Party's nominee, Howard Taft.  Reflecting upon my own family’s politics, I’ll bring this story through the 60’s when George Aiken, the senior Republican in the US Senate, said we should “declare victory and leave” Vietnam. His brand of Republicanism was not shared by my father who was waving the flag, but it was carried on by Jim Jeffords whose ties to this liberal wing came directly from his father who was a Gibson Judge appointee. Jim is not up to being interviewed these days but two of his close lieutenants Howard Coffin and Susan Boardman Russ will be able to reflect upon how this Vermont Liberal Republicanism came to end in Washington in 2002 when Sen. Jeffords declared his independence.

Rick Moulton has been a filmmaker for over 30 years. His filmmaking began in the 1960s with the making of Freeform and Oceans, surf movies made in Hawaii and California. He came back east with his wife Melinda and worked for Vermont Public Television in the 1970s. As an independent filmmaker in the early 80s, his film Legends of American Skiing won the Baniff Mountain Film Festival and was nationally released on PBS.

Mira Niagolova, Burlington: Have newcomers changed the face of Vermont?

 Welcome to Vermont: This segment excerpt will focus on people from different ethnic backgrounds who have made Vermont home and on how these newcomers have changed the  'face' of Vermont. The piece will make a historical review of the predominant ethnic groups who have come to Vermont for the past 100 years until the present influx of Bosnian and Somali refugees. Which traditions they have kept, which were abandoned and why?  What are their dreams, hopes, fears?  Does Vermont have a welcoming tradition, has it changed with time, and if so, how?  How accepting have generations of Vermonters have been to new cultures? By interweaving reflections of adults and children from diverse ethnic backgrounds with archival footage and other visuals, the piece will take a close look at issues of identity, assimilation, diversity, and the stages of Vermont's multiculturalism.

Mira Niagolova is an internationally recognized, award-winning documentary, with more than 20 years experience in the film and television industry. She worked as a producer, anchor, and programmer with the Cinema Department of the Bulgarian National Television. In the early 90’s, she moved to Montreal and worked on different projects with the International Program of the National Film Board of Canada. In 2001 Mira moved to Vermont and was Executive Director of the VT International Film Festival. In 1999 Mira made her debut as an independent producer/director with the award-wining Trafficking Cinderella, about the trafficking of women and forced prostitution. The film has been broadcast in more than 30 countries worldwide. Her next film, A Parallel World, about a life in a refugee camp has won many awards and was also distributed worldwide. Presently she is working on an experimental video-essay on the effects of the hyper-sexualized media environment on adolescent girls.

John O'Brien, Tunbridge, creative consutant

John directed The Tunbridge Trilogy -- three films about life in Tunbridge. These include Vermont is For Lovers, Man With A Plan, and Nosey Parker . He is currently finishing The Green Movie , an environmental comedy starring teenagers from Sharon Academy. In addition to making films, he raises sheep in Tunbridge, Vermont.

Meghan O'Rourke, and Dan Higgins,Burlington: How does Public Access TV reflect Vermont's independent spirit and what do Vermonters think about Vermont Yankee?

 One of this country's oldest nuclear power plants, Vermont Yankee, is set to be decommissioned in 2012. Entergy, the out of state company that now owns it, is lobbying tokeep it going beyond that date. Anti-nuclear activists and environmentalists are organizing a grass roots fight to keep the decommissioning on schedule. This segment will look at public access TV in Vermont and in the role played by the network in keeping the public notified about the ongoingstruggle against nuclear power in Vermont.

Meghan O'Rourke  is a videographer and educator at CCTV/Channel 17 government access TV. Dan Higgins is a photographer and independent videographer.

Roz Payne, Richmond, archivist and creative consultant

Roz was an original Newsreel film group member starting in l967. Newsreel made over 50 political documentary films and distributed them. She is an Archivist of the Sixties. She has compiled an index to 350,000 FBI documents on the Black Panther Party. She is the producer of What We Want, What We Believe: Black Panther Library DVD published by AK press in 2006 (12 hour box set), and previously of the video O' Little Town , the story of a battle in Bethlehem between young students and Israeli soldiers. Payne is a graduate of UCLA and received a Masters degree from CCNY in 1968. She was a member of the Red Clover and Green Mountain Red Vermont communes, and part of Free Vermont Movement. She has been a law clerk and mycologist, and a professor at Burlington College in History, Mycology and Newsreel Films.  

Kenneth Peck, Charlotte:A famous Vermont governor talks with a Vermont farmer of French Canadian descent: Phil Hoff and Yvan Plouffe.

Two interview/profiles. Taken together, they are a study in contrasts that reveal different perspectives but, frankly, much in common about the changes in our state in over the last 60 years.  Phil Hoff was born in 1924 in northwestern Massachusetts and served as Vermont governor from 1963 to 1969, the first Democrat elected since 1854. Many contemporary historians look to his terms of office as the turning point in making Vermont distinct from other northern New England states, and, some would argue, the rest of the nation. He pioneered unprecedented environmental, development and social welfare programs. He was the first Democratic Governor to split with President Johnson over the Vietnam War. Among his long-lasting accomplishments were the removal of billboards from Vermont highways and state acquisition of old railroad lands toward recreational parks. In the 1980’s he served three terms in the State Senate. He returned to private legal practice and, at 83, still works part time at the Burlington law firm, Hoff Curtis, which he founded almost 20 years ago.

Yvan Plouffe was born in the late 1930’s on a farm in East Charlotte to French-Canadian parents. His father died suddenly when he was a boy and the responsibility of running the family farm became his. In the course of his life, all around him, farms have disappeared and developments have sprouted where tractors once ran. On the old family farm, there are now a group of private residences, a town park, businesses, and the town dump. The farm still operates, if on a smaller basis, and Yvan manages considerable greenhouses where he grows his locally esteemed roses and other flowers. He has the perspective of someone who has watched old agricultural Vermont change while his own life has continued its course independently. The perspectives of a lawyer/politician and a country farmer are different. One from the south (Massachusetts) and one from the north (Quebec), between the two of them, something of contemporary Vermont is defined in both specific and general, even poetic, terms.

Kenneth Peck, Ph.D., is a writer, filmmaker, professor, media host and arts consultant. He is currently working on several documentary and narrative projects. He has taught at Marlboro College, UVM, CCV and Burlington College, where he founded and chaired the film studies program. He is host of a town park VPT’s weekly program, Reel Independents: Vermont's Film Showcase, and the Key Sunday Cinema Club at Burlington’s Roxy Cinemas. He is the coordinator of the Filmmakers Forum for the Vermont Film Commission in Montpelier.  

Andy Reichsman, Kate Purdie, Marlboro: How  an old Vermont farm family adapts to new ways of farming.

Local food: “The average forkful of food in the US has traveled 1,300 miles to the dinner plate.”  This statistic irks many Vermonters, who feel that utilizing local and sustainable food supplies is a crucial opportunity to address a multitude of issues. Through a radical upending of the U.S. agricultural super-size-me paradigm, one could cut greenhouses gases, reduce the environmental impact of mega-farming, re-establish community and improve nutrition for all.  Vermont is an unlikely place to be at the forefront of this movement because of its comparatively short growing season, yet Vermonters are finding ways to successfully scale down the agricultural status quo while ensuring profits and long-term success to small time family farmers.  Where Vermont leads, will America follow?

Andrew Reichsman has worked in film and video for 25 years.  He has produced, among other projects, a feature film, Signs of Life, with a cast including Arthur Kennedy, Kathy Bates and Mary Louise Parker; a PBS special with Laurie Anderson; an HBO special with Eric Bogosian; and documentaries on many subjects, including Duke Ellington, Leonard Bernstein, Dashiel Hammett and Hollywood Film Music; TV commercials; rock videos; live webcasts; and industrials.  He was production manager for the award-winning documentary, Crumb.  He currently writes, produces, shoots and co-directs documentaries and other projects with his wife Kate Purdie at Ames Hill Productions in Marlboro.

Kate Purdie studied with renowned filmmaker Ricky Leacock at MIT’s Film/Video.  She entered the professional world as a film editor, working on many diverse projects with, among others, Robert Drew, Bill Moyers and David Grubin.  Eventually she became a staff editor at CBS’s 60 MinutesSince moving to Vermont, she has been a freelancer editor and as the staff editor at Ames Hill Productions.  Recent credits include a film series on African Christianity; and a project for the Yale School of Divinity.  She teaches film/video at Bennington College.

John Scagliotti, Guilford and Matt Bucy, White River Junction: How and why did Vermont become a sanctuary and refuge for gay people?

Gay culture:Vermont's recent history is steeped in change brought on by a large lesbian/gay/bi/trans community that has come out or moved to the state. Civil Unions naturally come out of that community but it also has fostered cultural changes which John will focus on: the bars, the gay swimming holes, the Radical Faeries building community in Grafton, the marches, the AIDS walks, and Roonnie Squires, the first "out" Vermont legislator who died of AIDS. Ronnie's mother, Shirley,  kept his spirit alive by raising more than $150,000 dollars over the past 17 years at the annual Vermont AIDS walk for life, bringing in all types of Vermonters support  over the issue of AIDS; foundations like Samara created scholorships for many young Vermonters on the issues of human rights . It was part of the hippie movement surely but many of the gay folks came to Vermont between 1969 to 1980 because they could enjoy a rural experience, be lesbian or a gay man, and be safe here.

John Scagliotti is an award-winning filmmaker, television producer, radio broadcaster, and the creator and executive producer of In the Life, the first gay and lesbian national series on PBS, which began in 1991. Today the 17th season of In the Life is carried by more than 100 PBS stations, including the top 25 markets in the nation. As News and Public Affairs Director of WBCN-FM in Boston in the early 1970s, Scagliotti was one of the pioneers in multi-sound mix documentaries and received two Major Armstrong Awards ("FM's Oscars") for his work. In 1973, with his late partner, the journalist Andrew Kopkind, Scagliotti produced The Lavender Hour the first gay and lesbian variety program on American commercial radio.  In 1985 Scagliotti released the documentary film, Before Stonewall, a history of the making of the gay and lesbian community in America, the first documentary ever to receive major funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. After its national broadcast on PBS in 1986, it won two Emmy Awards as well as other honors including first place at FILMEX in Los Angeles.  After Stonewall (1999) chronicles the history of the lesbian and gay movement from the riots at Stonewall to the end of the 20th century, chronicling the hard work, struggles, tragic defeats and exciting victories experienced in the 30 years following the riots.  In 2001 Scagliotti released a documentary on gender differences in children entitled Oliver Button.  In 2003 he directed and released Dangerous Living: Coming Out in the Developing World, chronicling the lives and struggles of gays and lesbians in Africa, Asia, Latin America. The film won the silver plaque from the Chicago International Television Awards, and audience awards at Alternatives Hartford, Brussels and Barcelona Film Festivals. Scagliotti is program director of CineSlam, a glbt film festival of shorts in Brattleboro, and he is presently working on the prequel to Before Stonewall, Before Homosexuals, From Ancient Times to Victorian Crimes.

Matt Bucy is a filmmaker, architect and developer. In addition to renovating the old Tiptop bread factory in downtown White River Junction for artist studios and commercial activities, he is currently turning another White River Junction building  into a film production studio, and building the Radical Faeries Camp lodge.

Bill Stetson: Vermont land or landscape? What's missing in this picture? Billboards!

The anti- billboard law: when it was proposed in the Vermont legislature by young legislator Ted Riehle in the 1960s, lobbyists fought against it firecely, saying that banning billboards would mean the end of free enterprise in general and Vermont's lucrative tourist business in particular. But it was suppoprted by "Lady Bird Johnson's federal Highway Beautification Act of 1965. And today Vermont remains one of only four states that have banned billboards entirely.

It willl look at the work of the Vermont Natural Resources Council, the history of VPIRG and the issues--bottle bill, drug pricing, ski areas, and energy, and Vermont's commitment to the environment, The segment will cover how Vermont has been an innovator in a variety of fields affecting environmental and land use issues, including act 250, billboard legislation and history. What is the history of water quality legislation and activism?

Bill Stetson served as an advisor for the HBO movie Earth and the American Dream, and co-produced Citizen Suits, a PSA starring Alec Baldwin and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He co-executive produced Nora Jacobson's award-winning feature film, My Mother's Early Lovers, and was the co producer of the AIDS documentary, A Closer Walk, directed by Academy Award nominee Robert Bilheimer and narrated by Glenn Close and Will Smith. Also in 2006, Stetson executive produced the acclaimed video/DVD archive What We Want, What We Believe: The Black Panther Party Library. For over 20 years, Mr. Stetson co-produced Environmental Insight, the nation's longest running, radio talk show on the environment.

Dorothy Tod, Warren: Water in Vermont and the stories that water tells  about our history.

Water: Dorothy will concentrate on the role of water in Vermont, and how it has linked the white settlers to the native population that already lived here. She will explore her own heritage through her great great great-great-great-great-great grandfather, Col Benjamin Bellows, who was a surveyor in the military, was active in building a road through the Northeastern wilderness and in defending the Connecticut  River settlements from the Abenaki. Bellows Falls is named for him. She will link that history to her own arrival in Vermont, her life on the banks of the Winooski River, and her friendship with a local Abenaki man, Holly Greenslit, who taught her how to live here: what tools do what jobs, what's that coming up in the garden, how to be one step ahead of each season's tasks, build stone walls, hand mow her field, graft apple scions on the roots, took her for perch on Lake Champlain near the mouth of Otter Creek.

Dorothy Tod of Warren worked as a film editor for Maysles Films & Leacock-Pennybaker, and she produced and edited over 300 short nature films for Sesame Street.  Her What If You Couldn't Read? won the 1980 DuPont-Columbia Citation in Broadcast Journalism. Warriors' Women aired nationally on PBS and won the Grand Prize at the New England Film Festival.  Since the Mad River flooded her house in 1998, Dorothy has focused on water issues and dams, filming in Vermont and in India.

Holly Stadtler, Richmond: Contemporary water issues in Vermont

Dorothy Tod’s piece for the Vermont Movie explores her personal journey with Vermont’s water and it’s historical significance as she reveals the connections to Champlain, the Abenaki and others in the 1700-1800’s.  My aim is to help show the present and future of our water needs to round out Dorothy’s piece.  To do this we are using the local story of East Montpelier to help illustrate the bigger picture of the importance of protecting our ground water. This story shows how the local system of town meeting can impact state legislation. Faced with the possibility of a major bottling operation drawing millions of gallons of water from an important spring in East Montpelier, citizens spearheaded by Carolyn Shapiro took action.  They organized and informed citizens about the issues asking who owns the ground water?  As a result of their efforts, there is now a 3 year moratorium on withdrawing large amounts of water (57,600 gallons/day) in Montpelier.  (By comparison the average household uses 70 gallons/day).  This moratorium had a tremendous impact in the state house.  Within 3 months, Vermont had a new law placing groundwater as a public trust.  Philosophically, this means the state, rather than individuals, is responsible for the shared resource.  And practically, it means that companies that want to sell groundwater have only a limited right to use it.In the verdant mountainous state of Vermont, water is a natural resource often taken for granted.  But with 66% of Vermonters getting their drinking water from the ground, the state has a responsibility to protect our access to this life sustaining resource.  Oddly enough, in comparison with our neighbors in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut as well as many other states, Vermont is one of the last to adequately protect our underground supply from overconsumption.  But we’re working on it….

Holly Stadtler began her career at NBC Nightly News where she spent six years and worked as a Production Manager.  In 1990 she joined Discovery Channel and worked as an Associate Producer, Coordinating Producer, and Producer on over 100 hours of programming for Discovery and TLC.   She worked on shows in all genres from history to science and technology with a particular emphasis on wildlife films.In 1996 she directed THE MAKING OF THE LEOPARD SON for Discovery and went on to create Dream Catcher Films, Inc.  Since then she has produced and directed documentaries for the Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, TBS Superstation and National Geographic Television as well as 2 independent films.  Her awards include 5 CINE Golden Eagles, 3 Golds, 2 Silvers, and a Bronze from Houston Worldfest,  Gold award at the Chicago TV Fest,  Silver Medal at the NY Film Festival, and a National News & Documentary Emmy nomination plus many others. 

Jill Vickers, Burlington and Kathie Wheatley, Middlebury: Invention in Vermont

From gunsmithing days to the present, Vermonters have made significant contributions to the way work gets done. What part has independence, community and other qualities of life here played in inventors' lives? We'll explore those connections through the lives of a 19th century inventor from Windsor's foundry whose work led to the use of interchangeable parts and that of a contemporary inventor whose energy efficient refrigeration system is gaining a foothold in today's green economy. 

Jill Vickers comes to video documentaries after a long career in teaching language arts. Jill earned her BA in English from Wellesley College where she ran the film series and student film festival. She shoots and edits for Middlebury Community TV. Jill produced, co–directed and co–edited "Once in Afghanistan", the story of the Peace Corps group she was part of.

Katherine Wheatley, after concentrating on raising a family and producing high–fired stoneware pottery for local and metropolitan markets, matriculated at Middlebury College. She graduated magna cum Laude in 1991, majoring in classics with a minor in creative writing, and it was there she discovered video. In 2004 she purchased her first camcorder and began freelancing as a videographer and independent video producer. Katherine founded Middlebury Video Production Service in 2006 and did all the video and sound recording for "Once in Afghanistan".

Rob Williams, Waitsfield: Can Vermont ever be independent again?

For fourteen years (1777 – 1791), Vermont existed as an independent republic, before joining the United States as the 14th state in March 1791. In recent years, the effort to re-cast Vermont as an independent  republic has taken shape. This segment will focus on the creative tensions between groups  calling for secession and political independence (as advocated by Thomas Naylor and the Second Vermont Republic), and individuals and organizations that practice what Bill McKibben calls "functional  independence." (which includes economic sustainability, relocalization, and self- reliance). For more than three years, Vermont Commons newspaper has  married an exploration of both political and economic independence, and publisher Ian Baldwin is an important figure in bridging the gaps between the two points of view. The segment will explore both political and economic independence, , and it will show the work of people putting these ideas into action. 

Rob Williams is a Vermont-based  historian, journalist, media educator/maker and musician who teaches at  Champlain College and Sacred Heart University; runs a media education/ video production organization called MemeFILMS (www.memefilms.org);  edits Vermont Commons newspaper (www.vtcommons.org); and serves as  board co-president of the Action Coalition for Media Education  (www.acmecoalition.org). He also co-manages Vermont Yak Company  (www.vermontyak.com) in the Mad River Valley, a farm business raising  grass-fed yaks for meat, fiber and agri-tourism.   

Nat Winthrop, Montpelier, our project co-producer and archival researcher

Nat is an independent videographer and freelance writer living in Montpelier. He is former publisher of the Vanguard Press and Vermont Times in Chittenden County, and has had feature articles published in the Rutland Herald/Times Argus Sunday Magazine, Seven Days, Boston Phoenix, Boston Globe, and Vermont Magazine . He studied documentary filmmaking at MIT and Goddard College under Ricky Leacock and Ed Pincus in the 1970s. He has co-produced two documentaries -- Rookies at The Road , about Thunder Road in Barre, and Act of Faith, The Making of (Jay Craven's) Disappearances -- that aired on Vermont Public Television's "Reel Independents."