Erwin King's nieces and nephews accept a diploma on behalf of the World War II casualty. King left school to join the Marines in 1942 and died in battle. See more photos here.
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Drury High School graduates were urged to consider failure just another step in reaching their goals.
"I'm sure that everyone here at some point, has had dreams about what we want in our lives to be like, but achieving dreams can be harder than we might want," said valedictorian Colin Daly. "It takes a lot of persistence and effort to give yourself a chance, and still, your success is not completely in your control. While it is certainly possible to overcome difficulties, it's even more certain that doing so isn't easy. It is easier to fail at your dream than achieve."
Plenty of successful people have had failures along the way — Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein, Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, and Michael Jordan — Daly told his classmates on the high school stage.
"The answer is that by chasing the perfection we imagine, we achieve the dreams we really want," he said. "If you can't quite finish a marathon, even if you fall miles towards the finish line, you still have gone great distance."
Daly used the example given by a Navy SEAL in a commencement speech, of how a trainee can quit by ringing a bell at the camp three times. All the class would at one point want to ring that bell, he said.
"Life is not easy, no matter who you are or where you come from," he said. "But no matter how hard it is, we must always remember that we can never ring the bell, because by ringing the bell, you give up on your dream, and you can never, ever give up on your dream."
There were 72 graduates of the class of 2025 but 73 would graduate on Thursday night.
The family of Marine Pvt. First Class Erwin Shaftsbury King of Clarksburg were presented with his diploma, 83 years after King would have graduated from the high school. He dropped out in January 1942 to enlist in the Marines, and was killed at Guadalcanal the following September.
Bradley Chapman and Noah Wilhelm introduced the presentation, saying 173 high school students had taken part in the memorial service King last September in Southview Cemetery across the street. The presentation was accompanied by a color guard and the band played the "Marine's Hymn."
Daly later said his speech that it was an honor for the class and that "we are grateful for his example of courage, patriotism and sacrifice." He also asked the class to remember Alison Felix, a 2020 Drury graduate, who was killed in a car accident last December.
The presentation of diplomas was made by Mayor Jennifer Macksey, Superintendent Barbara Malkas and Principal Stephanie Kopala. Abigail Hamilton lead the Pledge of Allegiance, Class President Jacinta Felix welcomed the gathering, and Jaime Hamilton presented the scholarships.
The yearbook was dedicated to Kellie Lahey, family outreach and attendance coordinator, for her "kindness, compassion and caring," and the senior class made a special acknowledgement to Ashley Mirante, for going "above and beyond every day to make students feel welcome and safe."
Salutatorian Atlas Lescarbeau noted the ups and downs the class had had through its four years of high school. "Some of my defining moments in high school are tainted by stress," he said, but also found thrills and life and laughter.
"If I could go back to 7-year-old Atlas, before I even was Atlas, I would take his hands and tell him everything was worked out OK. ... I would tell him he has a lot to learn about others in the world around him, certainly, but also about himself. The people of Drury, unique and vibrant are not meant to be terrifying. People change. The people around him will change, and he will have to learn to deal with that. We are all still learning to deal with that still."
Lescarbeau said he it would be good if they all think of their younger selves -- when they first entered Drury "maybe bright-eyed and ambitious, timid and shy, reckless and wild." Would that younger you be proud of you?
"I assume many of us would like the answer to be yes, but I believe it's more complicated than that," he said. "Maybe the younger you needed to better yourself or learn something important. I hope through high school, we have all gotten a little wiser, or at the very least a little kinder to both ourselves and those around us. ...
"The answer doesn't have to be yes, and that's OK. We don't need to follow what our younger self first thought, perhaps, instead of it's better to ask, am I, the person I am now proud of myself. I hope for each and every one of you, the answer is and always will be 'yes.'"
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Main & Mill: A Vibrant New Restaurant on Main Street
By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — You can now enjoy another eatery on Main Street by well-known restaurant siblings Colleen and Sean Taylor.
Their restaurant Main & Mill opened for the first time Tuesday, bringing their vision of creating something vibrant and new to downtown North Adams.
"We have created Main & Mill to be part of our day. It's very seasonal ingredients, thoughtful cooking, beauty, beautiful presentation and dishes. And we really wanted to be part of the community, the downtown area, and start a vibrant area on this end, which has been shuttered for a while," said Colleen.
The building is owned by Ginko on Main Street LLC, which has granted 20 years exclusive possession of the property to Latent Builds as the developer. Jack and Suzy Wadsworth, behind Ginko, are development partners with Karla Rothstein and Salvatore Perry of Latent.
The bank closed in early 2021 and was purchased by Ginko late that year. Plans for the property unveiled three years ago envisioned a restaurant, retail, a park and rooftop bar.
Colleen saw potential and said she initially wanted the building when it first went up for sale. Being good friends with Rothstein and Perry, she helped them design the kitchen and the bar before learning in March that she could lease it as a restaurant space, something she told them would be a great idea.
She said one of the most important things about the restaurant was the collaboration between Rothstein, Perry, and the Wadsworths, who put a lot of time and energy into the building.
"If Sean and I had done it, we would not be able to do what the collaboration supported. The collaboration of the three of us being able to really have that kind of money to put in down here. The design that the architecture firm that Carla and Sal own is stunning," she said. "The time and effort, everyone came together to do this in a really trusting manner."
The two wanted the restaurant to be an all-day venture, so people could eat at any point throughout the day, all week long.
"We wanted it to be open for coffee and socialization in the morning where people can meet, have their cup of coffee, have a quiche, a vegetarian quiche, or croissant or yogurt. Something intentional with their coffee," she said. "Then move into a lunchtime for the downtown business or anybody, and then go into supper, dinner, with drinks later into the evening. So have it really be open all day long, so that there wasn't a void on any particular day."
They also wanted to do something different than the other restaurants they owned.
"We didn't want to mimic any other restaurant in town. We wanted to bring something that was inspiring, something that had some familiar things that people would see, and other things that we would bring to them for them to experience," she said.
As a woman business owner, Colleen said she wanted to bring a female chef into the kitchen.
Colleen brought on Chef Anna DeRose, who she said puts twists on a lot of her dishes.
"So we have a creme brulee, but our creme brulee is topped with marshmallow," she said. "Our creme brulee is like almost two desserts in one. It's a s'mores creme brulee. So you could have a s'mores, and you could have a creme brulee - but when you put both of them together, fireworks go off."
Jake Eberwein showed the committee sections of the nbess.org website, including the resources page, which will be key to keeping residents informed about the study’s findings and collecting information from those residents. click for more
The planes were paper, the buildings cardboard and Main Street was a hallway at Colegrove Park Elementary School, but the setup represented nearly two weeks of creative research and design by the pupils in the public schools' 21st Century Summer Program.
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