Hancock Shaker Village's Food for Thought Dinner Returns Oct. 14

HANCOCK, Mass. — Hancock Shaker Village’s popular Food for Thought dinner returns Friday, Oct. 14, with Come To Your Senses, an exploration of eating for good health and healthy vision.

The dinner and relevant discussion will be served in the Believer’s Room at Hancock Shaker Village at 6 p.m. on Friday, Oct.14. Hancock Shaker Village welcomes authors ranging from Stacy Schiff to Elisabeth Kolbert to discuss far-ranging subjects of relevance or interest today.

The dinner will begin with a guided stroll through the heirloom medicinal herb and vegetable gardens, enjoyed over a glass of wine. Guests take home Dr. Johanna Seddon’s Eat Right for Your Sight, which includes recipes by Jacques Pépin, Alice Waters, Ina Garten, and others.

Reservations required, limited seating. Tickets $95/per person or $90 for members. More information can be found here.

This Food For Thought dinner is sponsored by October Mountain Financial Advisors and American Macular Degeneration Foundation

Hancock Town Meeting Votes to Strike Meme Some Found 'Divisive'

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
10:40PM / Monday, May 06, 2024

Hancock town meeting members Monday vote on a routine item early in the meeting.

HANCOCK, Mass. — By the narrowest of margins Monday, the annual town meeting voted to strike from the town report messaging that some residents described as, "inflammatory," "divisive" and unwelcoming to new residents.

 

On a vote of 50-48, the meeting voted to remove the inside cover of the report as it appeared on the town website and in printed versions distributed prior to the meeting and at the elementary school on Monday night.

 

The text, which appeared to be a reprinted version of an Internet meme, read, "You came here from there because you didn't like it there, and now you want to change here to be like there. You are welcome here, only don't try to make here like there. If you want to make here like there, you shouldn't have left there in the first place."

 

After the meeting breezed through the first 18 articles on the town meeting warrant agenda with hardly a dissenting vote, a member rose to ask if it would be unreasonable for the meeting to vote to remove the meme under Article 19, the "other business" article.

 

"No, you cannot remove it," Board of Selectmen Chair Sherman Derby answered immediately.

 

After it became clear that Moderator Brian Fairbank would entertain discussion about the meme, Derby took the floor to address the issue that has been discussed in town circles since the report was printed earlier this spring.

 

"Let me tell you about something that happened this year," Derby said. "The School Department got rid of Christmas. And they got rid of Columbus Day. Now it's Indigenous People's Day.