Category: Cover Stories

NH coffee roasters discuss how they craft the perfect cup of joe

To understand and appreciate specialty coffee is to experience it. I didn’t know what a coffee cupping was prior to writing what you’re about to read, but when Kevin Clay of Mill City Roasting Co. invited me to partake in just that, I nonetheless felt compelled to accept his offer.

As I’d come to find out, a coffee cupping is kind of like a wine tasting — but for coffee beans. And as far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing better than that crisp smell of freshly ground coffee beans ready to be brewed in my morning’s cup of joe. I knew that I’d be in for a treat.

I arrived at Mill City’s Londonderry facility just in time to witness Clay pour three seemingly identical — but, in actuality, very different — freshly roasted coffees into a series of three small cups on a table. Two additional cups, one empty and one filled with water, accompanied them.

“They’re all going to smell and taste like coffee,” Clay told me, “but there’s definitely going to be subtle little differences in the taste and the flavor.” I must admit that this was where a trepidation on my part began to creep in — what if they all just smell and taste like the same cup of coffee and my senses overlook the intention of this exercise? I was pleasantly proven wrong.

Following Clay’s lead, I picked up a spoon and gently removed the residual film on the top of each cup, rinsing it in the cup of water in between. I then placed my nose right up against each coffee to test its aroma, starting with a Brazilian roast before following suit with a Colombian roast and an Ethiopian roast. After that, it was time to do some tasting.

“Basically, you want to aerate it as you bring it over your palate, [which] tastes things differently in different parts of your mouth,” Clay said. “You should get different characteristics.”

Tasting each of the three coffees one by one — slurping them from my spoon like a sommelier might slurp wine — I was surprised to find that, yes, I actually did pick up some variations, albeit very subtle. The Colombian coffee, for instance, tasted slightly sweeter and cleaner than the Brazilian coffee, while the Ethiopian coffee gave off a sensation that a dry wine might give your palate, a kind of full-bodied mouthfeel.

As Clay would tell me, this process of cupping is a popular industry technique among coffee roasters. It helps him and others make decisions about which coffees to purchase in larger quantities to prepare for roasting. It’s also an effective method for them to check on their own consistency by way of sample-sized roasts.

“Coffee, no different than wine, country to country and even within region to region of a given country, is going to have differences in the characteristics because of the micro-climates,” he said. “Everything that we do is focused on having the best cup of coffee that we can.”

Our coffee cupping exercise complete, I sat down with Clay to get his insight on the growing specialty coffee scene in New Hampshire. What follows are even more stories of how local coffee roasters and cafe and coffee bar owners have joined the specialty coffee movement, as well as where you can go to get that freshly roasted cup of joe.

A changing landscape

When Clay founded Mill City Roasting Co. in 1996, things were a bit different.

“The industry has really changed,” he said. “When we first started, our major competitors were New England Coffee out of Malden, Massachusetts, and then Green Mountain Coffee was the biggest one on the block. They’re still here and do a lot of business in our market, but mostly in convenience stores. … A lot of that specialty business is really gone.”

Starbucks, meanwhile, had yet to really make a stamp on the East Coast, only just opening its first store in Washington, D.C., a few years prior.

“Starbucks was primarily on the West Coast at the time, and they were really a phenomenon,” Clay said. “We used to travel out west to find out just what those guys were doing that was so different, because there really weren’t cafes here. There was a Gloria Jean’s around that used to sell bulk coffees and they had an espresso machine, but they really weren’t there to sell coffee drinks. They were selling sweet stuff.”

Clay estimates that you probably could have counted the number of coffee roasters in New Hampshire on one hand — such as around three, maybe four — back in the mid-’90s.

“When I first started in ’96, I thought to myself, Manchester is going to have espresso cafes on every corner in the next five years and we’re going to be right in the middle of it,” he said. “That didn’t happen.”

But what has happened — albeit, somewhat slowly and gradually — is a growing trend in specialty coffee roasters at home. Their stories for jumping into the coffee roasting world may vary, but they all had one thing in common: a desire to ditch the mass-produced stuff in favor of a really fresh, high-quality cup of coffee.

“When my husband and I ended up moving to New Hampshire, there just really weren’t coffee shops around, and if they were, it was Green Mountain Coffee or Dunkin’,” said Emeran Langmaid, founder of A&E Coffee & Tea, which operates a roastery in Nashua and a cafe in downtown Manchester. “Having that intentional coffee … was something that was very missing on the landscape. It was missing the point of development of the connection between the grower, the producer, and its quality. … And also, the sustainable elements of coffee and having a social impact, because coffee can do that.”

In Milford, Union Coffee Co. is another great example of how that connection can be made. Current Union owner and head roaster David Cianci had been working in the Peace Corps in Paraguay, eventually going from there to Colombia, where he was introduced to the work of coffee farmers.

“That’s where I got into coffee. … [I was] working on a coffee farm and understanding the coffee harvest, and just the processing and what it takes to get it from the plant to a product that’s ready for export,” Cianci said. “We were purchasing whole-bean coffee [at Union] … but then, you get to a point running a cafe when you’re just using so much whole-bean roasted coffee and you’re paying a lot for it, that it makes sense to start to finance your own roasting equipment. You do that and then it becomes a whole other revenue stream of selling your coffee.”

And on that note, Cianci said there are all different styles of available roasters.

“There are fluid bed roasters, which are pretty much like big warm pans that coffee sits in, and there are air roasters, where … you’re basically using hot air to roast the coffee,” he said. “The super-traditional one is what we have, which is a drum roaster. It’s either stainless steel or cast iron, and there are heating elements below it, and the drum spins around and the coffee cooks. After that, you reach a certain point where it will split open and you drop it out of the drum.”

A&E operates two Diedrich brand drum-style roasters, Langmaid said — the smaller of the two, a black roaster nicknamed “Black Betty,” is reserved for smaller and more complex coffee batches, while a much larger golden-colored roaster nicknamed “Big Honey” is used for larger batches. The differences, Langmaid said, have to do with each roaster’s air flow.

For some local roasters the coffee journey has been a little more unconventional. Mike Brown of Hometown Coffee Roasters in Manchester recalls first dabbling in coffee roasting with a popcorn popper he bought at a secondhand store.

“At the time, I was drinking Dunkin’ or just coffee you get at the grocery store, and I never thought it was all that great, so I just kind of started researching coffee in general and I came across an article on how you can roast coffee at home,” Brown said. “So I started roasting out of a little popcorn popper in my garage and then it turned out to be a great cup of coffee, even compared to the stuff you find on the shelf at a large grocery chain.”

Fast forward just a few short years and Brown now operates his own coffee bar on Old Granite Street in Manchester, also wholesaling to dozens of accounts including some local Hannaford Supermarkets. And in case you’re wondering, yes, he has graduated from the popcorn popper to a Diedrich brand roaster, capable of producing two dozen-pound batches at a time.

A deeper mission

Coffee is the seed of a fruit that, not unlike the apple, comes in all kinds of varieties.

“With apples, obviously sometimes they are green, sometimes red, sometimes they are sour, or some are better for baking. They have all of these different characteristics. Coffee is exactly the same way,” Langmaid said. “We’ve always had coffee come basically from all of the main growing regions around the world, so [that includes] Central and South America, Africa, and then the Asia-Pacific.”

According to Cianci, where coffee is grown, what altitude it’s grown at and what kind of harvest season a farmer has experienced are all important factors to consider when purchasing coffee.

“After coffee is picked, there are different ways to separate the coffee cherry from the bean that’s inside of it,” he said. “With natural processed coffee, it’s like a raisin, where it’s picked and put directly into a drying bed to dry in the sun. … That’s going to be where you get a lot of potential for those really funky interesting fruity flavors. Because the bean is in contact with the cherry, it has higher carbohydrates and sweetness content in general.”

Coffee roasters typically get their hands on the beans — known as green beans, not the vegetable but the industry term referring to unroasted beans — in one of two ways. Most producers, Langmaid said, are part of member-owned cooperatives and will sometimes sell their beans under their own name.

“The pros of doing that is if it’s a good quality, you can establish a name for yourself, and then you can negotiate higher prices with the buyer,” she said. “The drawback is if you don’t have those connections, or people just don’t pick your coffee, then it can just sit there. … The alternative is to sell coffee that’s just all blended together from all the producers, and that is sold on the co-op level so it’s sold by the co-op name.”

Langmaid said that A&E will purchase its beans both of these ways, via blends or what’s called single-origin, meaning there’s only one coffee from one place in your cup.

As for Union, Cianci said that about 70 percent of all their coffee is acquired through direct purchase agreements with farms in countries like Colombia and Guatemala.

“The fewer intermediaries there are, the more money is going to the farmer, the actual producer of the coffee,” he said. “That’s the bottom line.”

It’s understanding the importance of those relationships and maintaining a sense of transparency, Clay said, that makes purchasing single-origin green coffee beans so paramount.

“I’ve stood at a co-op … and I’ve watched a guy bring two or three bags of coffee beans on a donkey in Colombia. They take a sample of the bag and they put it out on the table and grade it, and he, that farmer, gets paid on the consistency and quality,” Clay said. “What I love about Colombia … is that the Colombian Coffee Federation is actually owned by the farmers. … So I look at that and I think, OK, they really have an opportunity to impact their lives and their income. People would not comprehend just how much work goes into it.”

From bean to cup
You’ve probably heard the terms “light roast,” “medium roast” and “dark roast” when it comes to coffee, but what do those mean when it comes to the drink’s production process? Emeran Langmaid of A&E Coffee & Tea said it all has to do with a roast’s time and temperature.
“A lighter coffee is just in the roaster for a shorter time period, and potentially at a little lower temperature,” she said. “Then, the longer you leave the coffee in the roaster, the higher the temperature you go. … Generally speaking, a lighter coffee is going to be a greater perceived acidity, so the more you develop that in terms of roasting, the more you diminish the acidity and develop sweetness as well. You’re caramelizing your sugars from fruity components into more lactic, chocolate or caramel components.”
David Cianci of Union Coffee Co. in Milford said there are two major events in a roast cycle: “first crack” and “second crack.”
“‘First crack’ is when the beans will reach a point where they’ll split open and a burst of water vapor comes out. You’ll hear them cracking, almost popping like popcorn,” he said. “After that, if you leave the coffee in long enough and you roast it dark enough, it will go through ‘second crack,’ where it will almost puff out a little more, even more like popcorn. … We actually use roasting software to track all the data from each roast, and when we hear the beans crack, we’ll mark that in the data.”

Get roasted

Just about everybody I spoke with for this story agreed that specialty coffee is on the rise in the Granite State, even just within the last few years. And that doesn’t only apply to the roasters themselves, either — it’s also on the consumer side.

“When I originally started roasting coffee about six years ago, I always wondered if specialty coffee was popular in New Hampshire … but I’ve come to find out that there’s a real desire for it and there’s a desire for consumers to want to learn about it,” Brown said. “I’m right there in the shop every day roasting coffee and I have at least two or three people a day coming over and asking me questions about it. And even to my surprise, a lot of people know a lot about it, but then there’s also a lot of people who just think of it as a cup of caffeine to wake them up in the morning. But then once you educate them on the journey that it takes from seed to cup, they are mesmerized by it.”

I was admittedly one of those people once upon a time. You can go into the coffee aisle of any major grocery store chain and see the roast date printed on any bag of whole bean or ground coffee. Sometimes that date is many weeks or even a month or more before the day you’re there.

“The stuff we do on our website is usually shipped the day it was roasted,” Clay said. “So, freshness in coffee is huge, and you’re just not going to get that at Dunkin’ or at Starbucks.”

Langmaid said that, while the espresso coffee shop culture remains most popular among younger generations, she believes the effects of the pandemic have altered that.

“Obviously a lot of people had to start drinking coffee at home and experiencing it in a different way,” she said. “There’s a trend, I think, across the board of being a home barista. And that isn’t necessarily getting an espresso machine, but maybe it’s just taking a few minutes to make your coffee at home, and investing in a good grinder. It’s kind of a swing in terms of how people are purchasing coffee and how they are experiencing it.”

New England Coffee Festival
A two-day event celebrating specialty coffee culture, the New England Coffee Festival debuted in downtown Laconia earlier this year. It’s presented by Wayfarer Coffee Roasters and packed with local speakers, workshops, vendors, samples and even a competitive “latte art throwdown.”
“Our goal … was to have a community event that brings coffee professionals and coffee consumers together, and really to build relationships and get people to try locally made products,” Wayfarer Coffee Roasters co-owner and festival organizer Karen Bassett told the Hippo in May. “We want to kind of give awareness to what specialty coffee is, and how there actually really is a lot of really good high-quality coffee right here in New England.”
According to Bassett, the inaugural event was a huge success, drawing around 5,000 attendees to the area and featuring more than 50 local vendors. Plans are already underway for the festival to return for a second year in 2023, to be held on Friday, May 19, and Saturday, May 20. That event will feature even more hands-on workshops and outdoor vendors, as well as a latte art throwdown in front of a grand audience on the Main Stage of Laconia’s Colonial Theatre.

Local specialty coffee roasters

Here’s a list of local cafes, coffee shops and small-batch roasters offering specialty house roasted coffees. Do you know of a coffee roaster based in the Manchester, Concord or Nashua area that’s not on this list? Let us know at [email protected].

A&E Coffee & Tea

1000 Elm St., Manchester; 95 Northeastern Blvd., Nashua, 578-3338; aeroastery.com

Established in 2001 by Emeran Langmaid, A&E was the first USDA-certified organic coffee roaster to come to New Hampshire. The company sources all types of single-origin coffees from around the world with an emphasis on sustainability. In addition to a cafe in downtown Manchester, A&E operates a roastery in Nashua where bagged beans and teas are sold.

Blue Harbor Coffee Co.

446 Lafayette Road, Hampton, 601-8802, blueharborcoffee.com

Coskun Yazgan’s family has been roasting their own coffee beans for more than three decades at Caffe Kilim in Portsmouth. Arriving in downtown Hampton in late 2019, Blue Harbor Coffee Co. became Yazgan’s own space to create his own unique coffee blends and baked goods. The small-batch roaster of artisan coffees sources its beans from all over the Coffee Belt, including Central America, Africa and even Papua New Guinea.

Bonhoeffer’s Cafe & Espresso

8 Franklin St., Nashua, 883-6879, bonhoefferscafe.com

Just steps away from Main Street in downtown Nashua, Bonhoeffer’s serves its own house-roasted direct trade coffee, plus a food menu of crepes, breakfast sandwiches and burritos, paninis, wraps and salads. Profits from the sale of Bonhoeffer’s roasted coffee go to the cafe’s sister nonprofit organization, Hope and Life for Kids.

Breaking New Grounds

50 Main St., Durham, 868-6869, bngcoffee.com

Founded in 1993 in Portsmouth, Breaking New Grounds has been a go-to spot in Durham for its in-house roasted coffees since 1997. Beans are often roasted three to four times a week and have origins in multiple major growing regions in Central and South America as well as Africa.

Caffe Kilim and Market

163 Islington St., Portsmouth, 436-7330, caffekilim.com

In addition to brewed coffees and a full espresso bar of drinks using its own roasted beans, Caffe Kilim is known for its Turkish market, featuring a variety of specialty and natural foods.

Cindia Jackson’s Fine Gourmet Coffee

650 Amherst St., Nashua, 345-5566, cindiajackson.com

With more than 2,000 coffee varieties, Cindia Jackson’s is known for featuring one of the largest coffee lines around. According to owner Jim Flowers, the business is named as a tribute to his mother, who became interested in coffee way back in 1949, at the age of 12 — working as a waitress with her mother, who was a cook, Jackson took it upon herself to add vanilla, maple syrup, honey and other sweet ingredients to brewed coffees. It’s with that creative spirit that Flowers and his wife have carried on her legacy. Coffees are roasted just a block up the road from the Cindia Jackson’s retail shop on Amherst Street in Nashua, with just about every flavor imaginable. There’s even a “Booze Brew” line of more than 30 alcohol-flavored coffees (which, of course, are non-alcoholic).

Clarena’s Coffee

Laconia, clarenascoffee.com

Based in New Hampshire Lakes Region, Clarena’s Coffee is known for sourcing its beans entirely from women-owned farms in Colombia and Brazil. Locally, you can find custom blends and roasts at Dancing Lion Chocolate (917 Elm St., Manchester).

Coffee Coffee

326 S. Broadway, Salem, 912-5381, coffeecoffeenh.com

Coffee Coffee owner Barry Goldman has been roasting coffee beans from all over the world since 1966. Located on South Broadway in Salem near the Methuen, Mass., state line, the shop has a special organic coffee roaster Goldman uses to roast thousands of beans from around the world every day. Coffee Coffee even makes its own coffee ice cubes, blended with several different types of roasted coffees.

The Coffee Factory

55 Crystal Ave., Derry, 432-6006, mycoffeefactory.net

Established by the Yorke family in 2008 in their hometown of Derry, The Coffee Factory roasts its own beans on site to produce a full line of hot and iced coffees and espresso drinks. The spot also offers breakfast and lunch sandwiches, and regularly maintains a schedule of open mic events.

Critical Mass Coffee

Manchester, criticalmasscoffee.com

Ryan Connor was a 22-year veteran of the engineering industry before he and his wife, Leah, got into coffee roasting, originally as a hobby. Founded in 2018, Critical Mass Coffee is an organic coffee roastery based in Manchester that sources its beans from all over the world’s major growing regions. In addition to operating an e-commerce website, Critical Mass Coffee sells to some area restaurants, cafes and independent retailers. They’re also a featured vendor at the Made in New England Expo, due to return to the DoubleTree by Hilton Manchester Downtown on Saturday, Dec. 3, and Sunday, Dec. 4.

Farmhouse Roasters

163 Main St., Salem, 458-7172, farmhouseroasters.com

Roasting its own beans from a variety of growing regions, Farmhouse Roasters always offers fair trade, organic and other certified coffee options. Its cafe features a full line of hot and iced drinks in addition to breakfast and lunch sandwiches, baked goods and more.

Flight Coffee Co.

209 Route 101, Bedford, 836-6228, flightcoffeeco.com

Claudia Barrett’s experience in specialty coffee stretches back more than 30 years. Flight Coffee Co. got its start more than a decade ago with one small commercial coffee roaster in the garage of Barrett’s Bedford home. Since then, her company has expanded — now offering everything from specialty coffees and espresso drinks to bagels and pastries — and has experienced recognition at the national level, winning multiple coffee competition awards and being featured in the coffee industry trade magazine Roast several times. In 2013 Barrett became the first Certified Q Grader in New Hampshire, a professional coffee cupper accredited by the Coffee Quality Institute. She would soon launch a coffee roastery on Harvey Road in Bedford, eventually turning an adjacent space into what she called a “satellite cafe.” Last year she moved all operations to a new flagship space across town, taking up a portion of the former Harvest Market store on the corner of Wallace Road and Route 101.

Granite Ledge Coffee

Canterbury, graniteledgecoffee.com

Christopher Evans got his start in the coffee world when his beans were roasted in iron skillets, brought to temperature in an electric oven. Over the last few decades, Granite Ledge Coffee has grown to now offer all kinds of specialty roasted coffees sourced from farmers across the world. Coffee by the pound is available for sale at the Concord Farmers Market, which wraps up its outdoor season on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Capitol Street.

Hometown Coffee Roasters

80 Old Granite St., Manchester, 703-2321, hometownroasters.com

Mike Brown started Hometown Coffee Roasters as a hobby in the garage of his Bedford home, eventually expanding it into a commercial roastery. In October 2018 he moved the business into his current space in Manchester, where he also launched a coffee bar by the summer of 2020. Brown sources his coffee beans from all of the major growing regions, including Central and South America and Africa.

Horseshoe Cafe (Kozuma Coffee Co.)

171 Main St., Newmarket, 292-5280, find them on Facebook @horseshoecafenewmarket

Norihiro Kozuma, who’s originally from Japan, and his wife Sarah of the Kozuma Coffee Co. opened the Horseshoe Cafe back in 2017, after Norihiro became interested in home coffee roasting. The cafe features a variety of hand-selected artisan coffees roasted in house, along with a menu of small-batch baked goods and pastries, and sandwiches on scratch-made breads.

Java Joe’s

59 Route 27, Raymond, find them on Facebook @javajoesraymondnh

Paul Lynn of Raymond launched this drive-thru shop, which offers specialty coffees, teas and various breakfast items, in 2015. Lynn built the 300-square-foot drive-thru himself and roasts his own coffee beans in house, which include Colombian, Sumatran and several other varietals. Java Joe’s also features a full line of espresso drinks, including macchiatos and chai lattes, and egg and cheese sandwiches available on English muffins, bagels or croissants.

King David Coffee Roasters

48 Bridge St., Nashua, 577-8899, kingdavidcoffee.com

Using a traditional drum roaster, Sam Brest of King David Coffee Roasters can produce up to 30 pounds of roasted coffee at a time. Brest got his start in the coffee roasting industry back in the early 2000s, owning his own sandwich shop in Nashua for about 14 years before. His beans are only single-origin, coming all over the major growing regions of Central and South America, Africa and Indonesia. Brest also operates a commercial kitchen, producing and selling his own kettle corn.

La Mulita Coffee

15 Sagamore Road, Rye, 858-1019, lamulitacoffee.com

This Rye coffee bar and roastery is unique for highlighting multiple growing regions in Colombia — it’s the brainchild of Max Pruna, who himself was born and raised in the Colombian city of Medellín. Pruna’s coffee roasting journey began in his own home garage before he opened La Mulita in September 2019. In addition to serving specialty Colombian coffees and espresso drinks, La Mulita partners with several local businesses to offer food items like bagels, doughnuts and scones.

Lucas Roasting Co.

7 King St., Wolfeboro, 605-5484, lucasroasting.com

Offering both single-origin coffees and gourmet blends, Lucas Roasting Co. is a small-batch roastery in Wolfeboro that also features a small walk-in cafe space where you’ll find a hot and cold beverages as well as assorted food items.

Miles to Go Coffee Roasters

Chester, 887-4343, milestogocoffee.com

Ed Karjala of Chester turned his hobby of home coffee roasting into a business in late 2018. Miles to Go Coffee Roasters, run by Karjala with the help of his wife, Christi, will usually have six or seven different coffee products available — some are single-origin, while others are blends of two or more origins. Bags of Karjala’s coffees are available for sale at the Chester General Store (2 Haverhill Road) and via his website.

Mill City Roasting Co.

Londonderry, millcityroasting.com

Kevin Clay has decades of experience in the specialty coffee industry, having founded Mill City Roasting Co. in 1996. Sourcing its beans from several major growing regions across Central America, South America and Africa, Mill City Roasting Co. operates a production facility in Londonderry, roasting and selling its coffees under the brand names Cafe Du Jour and Java Tree Gourmet Coffees. Coffees are sold in several restaurants and stores across southern New Hampshire and, as of 2020, now available for sale direct-to-consumer through an e-commerce website.

Natalie’s Coffee

Derry, nataliescoffee.com

Based in Derry, the family-run Natalie’s Coffee has been roasting fresh gourmet coffee on demand since 2001, according to its website. You can also find their coffee used exclusively at Janie’s Uncommon Cafe (123 Nashua Road, Londonderry).

New Hampshire Coffee Roasting Co.

7 Sumner Drive, Dover, 740-4200, nhcoffee.com

This small-batch coffee roaster sources its beans from all of the major growing regions around the world. At the start of 2020, the Barretto family of Dover took over all of the company’s operations. You can find New Hampshire Coffee Roasting Co. in several area restaurants and specialty stores, as well as for sale online or at its Dover factory outlet.

Porcupine Coffee Roasting

Pembroke, porcupinecoffeeroasting.com

Amber White had been roasting her own coffee beans on and off for a few years as a hobby prior to transitioning into a commercial business. Porcupine Coffee Roasting, she said, started during the Covid lockdowns of 2020 — White is now mainly based online, although she is a featured vendor at a few local farmers markets in the summer, and you can also find her coffees at Sweet River Farm (175 North Road, Deerfield). Currently in her roastery, White has beans sourced from countries like Mexico, Colombia, Sumatra, Peru and Ethiopia.

Port City Coffee Roasters

801 Islington St., Portsmouth, 433-3011, portcitycoffee.com

Established in 1992, Port City Coffee Roasters sources its own beans from multiple growing regions around the world with an emphasis on sustainability. In addition to offering coffees at its own cafe, Port City Coffee Roasters partners with area restaurants and cafes that use its roasted beans.

Revelstoke Coffee

100 N. Main St., Concord, revelstokecoffee.com

Revelstoke Coffee came to downtown Concord in December 2018. Owners Alex Stoyle and Lyndsey Cole became inspired to open their own shop following an overnight stay the previous year in the Canadian community of Revelstoke, a small city roughly between Vancouver and Calgary. With a menu of freshly roasted coffees and teas, along with a rotating lineup of baked goods and breakfast sandwiches, Revelstoke Coffee is a shop built on the themes of travel and discovery.

Riverwalk Bakery & Cafe

35 Railroad Square, Nashua, 578-0200, riverwalknashua.com

Riverwalk Bakery & Cafe uses an old-school Turkish drum roaster to produce its small-batch roasted coffees. According to owner Rachel Manelas, a wide array of different beans are roasted, with origins from Colombia and Brazil to Ethiopia and Kenya. Roasted beans are available for pickup or can be shipped out through Riverwalk.

Stone Hammer Coffee Roaster

Concord, [email protected]

Chris Wible started experimenting with small batches of test roasts in the late spring of 2021, officially launching Stone Hammer by the end of that summer. An avid cyclist, Wible offers several single-origin coffees that are bike-themed in name, and he’ll make local deliveries via bicycle. Other spots where you can find Stone Hammer’s coffees include Georgia’s Northside (394 N. State St., Concord) and The Country Spirit (262 Maple St., Henniker) — both eateries also incorporate Wible’s coffees into their menu items.

Union Coffee Co.

42 South St., Milford, 277-3181, unioncoffee.co

A stone’s throw away from the Milford Oval, Union Coffee Co. came to town in 2014. Prior to joining the Union team in 2017, current owner David Cianci spent two years with the Peace Corps working with farmers in South America, where he developed an understanding of the coffee harvest and the processing of the beans. About 70 percent of Union’s coffee beans are acquired through direct purchase agreements with farms in countries like Colombia and Guatemala.

Wayfarer Coffee Roasters

626 Main St., Laconia, 527-8313, wayfarerroasters.com

A producer of small-batch house-roasted coffee blends with two cafe locations in Laconia, Wayfarer Coffee Roasters sources its beans from all over the world. In addition to their cafes, you can find Wayfarer’s coffees in more than 30 locations across central and northern New Hampshire, and they ship all across the country through their online store. Wayfarer co-owner Karen Bassett also organizes the New England Coffee Festival, which is due to return to down town Laconia for its second year next May.

White Heron Tea & Coffee

601 Islington St., Portsmouth, 294-0270, whiteherontea.com

Established in 2005, White Heron is known for roasting a wide variety of its own organic coffees, sourced from several different growing regions.

White Mountain Gourmet Coffee

Epsom, wmgconline.com

Formerly operating a cafe on Pleasant Street in downtown Concord, White Mountain Gourmet Coffee is now exclusively an e-commerce website and wholesale specialty coffee roaster. Its own roasted coffees are available in several restaurants, country stores, cafes and gift shops across the state.

William & Sons Coffee Co.

Loudon, wsonscoffee.com

William & Sons Coffee Co., which came to Loudon in 2021, originally began as a small boutique roaster in the city of Porto Alegre, Brazil. A variety of roasted coffees are available, sourced from regions in Colombia, Tanzania, Rwanda and other countries.

Witching Hour Provisions

905 Main St., Hopkinton, 505-8107, witchinghourprovisions.com

Witching Hour Coffee began as a small-batch roaster in the fall of 2020. By the following summer, the business became a regular vendor at local farmers markets before Witching Hour Provisions would open in Hopkinton that December. In addition to offering freshly roasted bags of its coffee, the shop sells a variety of home and personal care products.

Woodshed Roasting Co.

116 Hounsell Ave., Laconia, 737-2000, woodshedroast.com

Woodshed Roasting Co. started in 2010 with a small sample roaster and has since grown into a retail storefront that’s open five days a week. Its coffees are also available in several restaurants, stores and other businesses in the Granite State.

Featured photo: Photo courtesy of Critical Mass Coffee.

Halloween events for everyone from the littlest trick-or-treaters to the oldest Rocky Horror fans

A tale of two haunts

To scare or to be scared — that is the question

By Katelyn Sahagian
[email protected]

Earlier this year, I was invited to Spooky World presents Nightmare New England by the haunt’s owner, Michael Accomando, to get dressed up in costume and scare people. I decided to take him up on his offer. So, if anyone was at Spooky World on Monday, Oct. 10, and saw a clown with white hair roaming the midway, that was me.
There was something about getting into costume and scaring people that was extremely tempting. Accomando said that he himself doesn’t dress up that often — not unless his son wants to — but it doesn’t change the fact that he adores hearing the stories the actors tell about their recent “spook” victories.
“A look … is sometimes enough to freak people out,” Accomando said, adding that spooking people is therapeutic. “You take … all your aggression out on everyone else and they’re paying you to do that.”
Accomando said he knew he wanted to bring a haunted attraction to Mel’s Funway Park in Litchfield as soon as he purchased it in 2007. He wanted something seasonal to keep people coming back for more fun, as opposed to just hosting a summertime crowd.
He said that something about the land and layout of Mel’s was begging for some scary fun times. The woods and land stretch on far enough that Accomando thought it made sense to have some indoors and outside scares. In 2008, he saved a well-loved Massachusetts haunt that was closing for good and moved it across the border to New Hampshire, turning it into what is now Spooky World.
At first, Accomando said, he thought it would be easy to do a haunt. He thought it was just throwing up a few buildings, putting together a light show and hiring some actors. Now he knows better.
Accomando said that he and Chase DeNamur, Spooky World’s director of operations, will spend all year long coming up with new ideas, visiting haunted attractions across the country and going to national trade expos, like TransWorld’s Halloween & Attractions Show in St. Louis.
“The next [haunt] we go to will be the day after the show ends,” DeNamur said. “The planning never stops.”
While walking through haunts, Accomando said, the team will see what they might want to change or expand on.
Layering, or putting many elements in a scene, is something Accomando said he is always thinking about. Whether this means adding a new animatronic doing something an actor can’t — like bashing their head into a wall over and over again — or getting a new prop or adding a gross smell, Accomando said that new layers are implemented every year.
This year the hayride received a lot of attention, DeNamur said. He said that new lights and screens were added to parts of the haunt to further achieve a larger-than-life experience.
In addition to the layering and the props, there are professional makeup artists and costume designers making sure that everyone looks terrifying. The three artists dress people up for the hayride, getting about a dozen actors ready in an hour — they do everything from muscle structures to spider faces, creepy clowns and “cannibal” hunters.
After the attraction opened, it took no time at all for me to be taken over to the costume designers and put in a costume by one of the crew members. I was dressed up in a rainbow-striped onesie and matching ruff that I wore over my jeans and shirt.
Brittany Champagne, a longtime scarer at Spooky World, painted my face with a white base, red and orange diamonds over my eyes, a green nose and an eerie blue smile. The makeup went on cold and wet, but very quickly. When it dried it felt like regular face paint, slightly sticky and tight on my skin.
A white wig and small “blood”-covered horn completed my ensemble. While the wig itched and fell in my eyes and my fingers and toes burned due to the cold weather, the night was ripe for us to get scaring. Champagne told me performers end up walking so much that the night air soon no longer even feels cold to them anymore.
Champagne and Jillian Labonte, another long-time Spooky World scarer dressed as a bloodthirsty escaped prisoner, showed me around the midway, the area outside the haunts where experienced actors get to improvise and sneak up on customers when they think they are safe.
This whole feeling is a stark change from the Friday before, when I was a guest at Fright Kingdom in Nashua.
The anticipation walking up to Fright Kingdom was like nothing else. Whereas at Spooky World, it was still Mel’s Funway Park on the outside, Fright Kingdom was a short walk through an empty parking lot, where an 18-wheeler was parked at a loading dock. Once I rounded that corner, I saw a giant, shadowy clown towering over the rest of the guests.
Fright Kingdom owner and founder Tim Dunne greeted me outside by the loading truck bed, smiling widely as he watched people get scared by his creation.
“It’s about the art of horror, Halloween and all things creepy,” Dunne said. “It’s a celebration of all of that.”
Dunne, who grew up in Florida, was originally drawn to The Haunted Mansion ride at Disney World whenever he would take trips there. To this day, after making many different haunts, he said his favorite is still Bloodmare Manor, the Victorian haunted house that this year is filled with “cannibals” looking for their next meal.
While Dunne had high hopes that I would walk through the whole interior, the second he said he was going to leave me to do the amusement alone — immediately after an actor scared me, I might add — I lost my cool. I promised that I would come back next year with my sister (who loves scary things) and maybe a group of people to push me through.
Being scared isn’t my thing, but scaring others seems to be right up my alley.

Haunted houses, outdoor trails and more:
The Dark Woods at Trombly Gardens
150 N. River Road, Milford, 465-DARK (3275), thedarkwoodsnh.com
Hours: Friday, Oct. 21, Saturday, Oct. 22, Friday, Oct. 28, Saturday, Oct. 29, and Sunday, Oct. 30; the gate opens at 6:30 p.m. and the last ticket is sold at 10:30 p.m. A walkthrough without actors, called a “trauma-free experience,” is also available on Sunday, Oct. 23, with ticket times at 7 and 8 p.m.
Cost: $23 for the traditional scares, $13 for the trauma-free experience

Fright Kingdom
12 Simon St., Nashua, 809-1173, frightkingdom.com
Hours: Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays; 7 to 10 p.m. or 7 to 10:30 p.m., depending on the day of the week; see website for details. Haunts are available through Saturday, Nov. 5.
Cost: $29 for a traditional haumt and in-the-dark haunt, $10 for hardly haunted

Haunted Overload
DeMerritt Hill Farm, 20 Orchard Way, Lee, 868-2111, hauntedoverload.com
Hours: Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, now through Oct. 30, as well as on Monday, Oct. 31; most haunts start at 6:30 or 7 p.m. and last through 8 or 9 p.m., depending on the day of the week.
Cost: Main event tickets are $31, “Fright Night Lite” tickets are $17.50, Blackout Night tickets on Halloween are $20, and tickets for a day walk are $11

The Salisbury Woods
19 Franklin Road, Salisbury, 496-2334, app.hauntpay.com/events/salisbury-woods
Hours: Fridays and Saturdays throughout October; opens at 7 p.m.
Cost: $15

Screeemfest
85 N. Policy St., Salem, 893-3506, canobie.com/screeemfest
Hours: Fridays 9 to 11 p.m., Saturdays 3 to 11 p.m., and Sundays 1 to 9 p.m.
Cost: Date-specific tickets range from $32 to $59 for adults, and from $32 to $35 for visitors under 4 feet tall and for seniors ages 60 and over. There are also add-ons available to purchase, like a “screeem express haunt line cut pass” for $25 or a “Monster B’Gone” light-up necklace that tells actors to avoid the wearer.

Spooky World Presents Nightmare New England
454 Charles Bancroft Hwy., Litchfield, 424-7999, nightmarenewengland.com
Hours: Fridays and Saturdays, 7 to 11 p.m., and Sundays, 6:30 to 10 p.m.
Cost: $49.51 general admission and $74.53 VIP admission

Little spookies

Events for kids that are more treat than trick

Compiled by Angie Sykeny
[email protected]

• Kids age 12 and under are invited to the Aviation Museum of New Hampshire (27 Navigator Road, Londonderry) on Saturday, Oct. 22, between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., when they can meet the ghosts of aviation past, enjoy Halloween treats and receive their “Broomstick Pilot License.” The experience is free with admission to the museum; admission costs $10 for visitors age 13 and up. Visit aviationmuseumofnh.org or call 669-4820.
• Franklin’s Halloween Extravaganza is on Saturday, Oct. 22, starting with a party at Bessie Rowell Community Center (12 Rowell Drive) from 2 to 3 p.m., followed by a costume parade heading into downtown at 3 p.m. and a trunk-or-treat at Marceau Park on Central Street from 3:15 to 5 p.m. Visit franklinnh.org.
• The Educational Farm at Joppa Hill (174 Joppa Hill Road, Bedford) is having a family trick or treat on Saturday, Oct. 22, from noon to 4 p.m. Families are invited to wear their costumes and hunt for treats around the farm. The cost is $15 per family, and registration is required. Visit theeducationalfarm.org.
• Visit the Chester Public Library (3 Chester St.) on Saturday, Oct. 22, at 11 a.m. for a Halloween costume party with music, games and sugar cookie decorating. Visit chesterlibrary.com or call 887-3404.
• Island Pond Baptist Church (26 N. Salem Road, Hampstead) will host a Trunk or Treat event on Saturday, Oct. 22, from 1 to 3 p.m. in its parking lot, where there will be candy, games, costumes, animal balloons, a bouncy house slide and food trucks. Admission is free. Visit islandpondbc.com or call 329-5959.
• Sanbornton will have a Halloween costume party for kids in grades 4 and under on Saturday, Oct. 22, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. in the Sanbornton Central School gym (16 Hunkins Pond Road). There will be food, games, crafts and surprises. The town will also have a trunk or treat in the school’s parking lot on Sunday, Oct. 30, from 2 to 4 p.m. Park at the Sanbornton Public Library (27 Meeting House Hill Road) and enjoy a spooky story walk and decorated path that leads to the event. Visit sanborntonnh.org.
• Charmingfare Farm (774 High St., Candia) will offer its Children’s Trick-or-Treat experience on Saturdays, Oct. 22 and Oct. 29, and Sundays, Oct. 23 and Oct. 30, with start times available on the hour between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. (a 3 p.m. start time is also available on Saturday, Oct. 22 only). In addition to trick-or-treating, families can meet a friendly witch, see wildlife exhibits and barnyard animals, take a horse-drawn wagon ride, decorate pumpkins, ride a pony and watch a juggling show. Tickets cost $22 per person — admission is free for children under age 2 — and must be purchased online in advance. Visit visitthefarm.com.
• Children ages 3 through 6 are invited for some pumpkin fun in Merrimack, including a pumpkin science program on Monday, Oct. 24, at 10 a.m. and a pumpkin decorating and crafting program on Thursday, Oct. 27, at 4 p.m. Both events will take place at the Function Hall (116 Naticook Road) and each costs $15. Register online at merrimack.recdesk.com.
• The Brickyard Scare in Epping’s Brickyard Square takes place on Thursday, Oct. 27, from 4 to 7 p.m. There will be trick-or-treating and other Halloween activities for kids of all ages. Visit brickyardsquarenh.com.
• Salem’s annual town Halloween event and costume contest is on Friday, Oct. 28, from 5:30 to 8 p.m. at the Ingram Senior Center parking lot (1 Sally Sweet’s Way). Resident families with children ages 12 and under are invited to enjoy a trunk-or-treat, a haunted forest, pizza, games, music and dance performances, in addition to the costume contest. RSVP to [email protected] by Monday, Oct. 24.
• Join the Nesmith Library (8 Fellows Road, Windham) for a Halloween party on Friday, Oct. 28, at 10:30 a.m. Kids of all ages and their caregivers are invited for a morning of stories, singing and dancing, a costume parade and trick-or-treating around the library. Admission is free, and there’s no registration required. Visit nesmithlibrary.org or call 432-7154.
• Milford’s Trick or Treat on the Oval returns to the Oval Gazebo area on Friday, Oct. 28, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Downtown businesses and nonprofits will hand out candy to trick-or-treaters as supplies last. Visit milfordrec.com.
• The Bookery (844 Elm St., Manchester) will host a kids’ Halloween party on Friday, Oct. 28, featuring a storytime and interactive sing-along with illustrator Julieann Hartley at 5:30 p.m., followed by a book signing, costume parade and prizes starting at 6:15 p.m. Visit bookerymht.com.
• The Spooktacular Downtown Manchester Fall Festival takes place on Friday, Oct. 28, from 3 to 6:30 p.m. Families can enjoy trick-or-treating at downtown businesses, a photo booth, games and activities, pumpkin carving, a coloring contest, a decoration station for a lighted display and more. Costumes are encouraged. Visit manchesternh.gov.
• Hudson’s Best Trunk or Treat will take place Saturday, Oct. 29, from 10 a.m. to noon at the Hudson Mall (77 Derry Road in Hudson) with a costume contest, raffles, a haunted house and more, according to hudsonnhsbest.com, where you reserve a timeslot in advance.
• The New Hampshire Fisher Cats will host a Trick-or-Treat at the Ballpark event at Northeast Delta Dental Stadium (1 Line Drive, Manchester) on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. All festivities are free and include a kids’ dance party, a costume contest and more. Visit nhfishercats.com or call 641-2005.
• Exeter’s annual Halloween parade and costume contest will take place at Swasey Parkway (316 Water St., Exeter) on Saturday, Oct. 29, with costume judging at 10:30 a.m. and the parade at 11 a.m., followed by trick-or-treating downtown. Visit exeternh.gov.
• Raymond’s Trunk or Treat returns to the Raymond Shopping Center (15 Freetown Road) on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Vehicles will be adorned with Halloween decorations and stations filled with candy to trick-or-treat. Visit raymondareanews.com.
• Join the Children’s Museum of New Hampshire (6 Washington St., Dover) for its annual Not So Spooky Halloween Spectacular on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 9 a.m. to noon or 1 to 4 p.m. The event features a costume parade, science experiments, take-home crafts, photos with props and a pumpkin scavenger hunt. All activities are included with the cost of admission to the museum, which is $12.50 for adults and children over age 1 and $10.50 for seniors age 65 and up. Register in advance online at childrens-museum.org.
• Bow will have a trunk or treat in the Bow High School parking lot (55 Falcon Way) on Sunday, Oct. 30, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. Visit bownh.gov.
• Merrimack Public Library (470 Daniel Webster Hwy., Merrimack) hosts a trunk or treat in the parking lot on Sunday, Oct. 30, from 1 to 3 p.m. There will be decorated vehicles with candy, crafts, stickers and more for trick-or-treaters. Park at the Town Hall across the street. Visit merrimacklibrary.org.
• Local children’s musicians Mr. Aaron will host his annual Halloween Bash at the Bank of NH Stage (16 S. Main St., Concord) on Sunday, Oct. 30, at 11 a.m. The event features Halloween arts and crafts, a costume contest with prizes and a special spooky musical performance by the Mr. Aaron Band. General admission tickets cost $10 per person. Visit ccanh.com/show/mr-aarons-halloween-bash.
• The Palace Teen Apprentice Company presents Zombie Prom: Atomic Edition on Wednesday, Nov. 2, and Thursday, Nov. 3, at 7 p.m., at the Palace Theatre (80 Hanover St., Manchester). Tickets cost $15 for adults and $12 for children. Visit palacetheatre.org.

Neighborhood trick-or-treat times:

Halloween treats for everyone

Events for the spooky-season fan in all of us

Compiled by Amy Diaz
[email protected]

• The Concord Public Library (45 Green St. in Concord; concordpubliclibrary.net) is holding a Halloween Photo Scavenger Hunt throughout the month. Pick up a scorecard at the library and return the completed form for a sweet reward between Oct. 24 and Oct. 31, according to the website.
• J&F Farms (124 Chester Road in Derry; jandffarmsnh.com) has a Halloween-themed corn maze through October. The maze is open Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The cost is $8 per person.
• Allenstown is holding its Halloween Lighting Contest now. Go to.allenstownnh.gov for a list of participating homes. Between now and Thursday, Oct. 27, at 5 p.m. vote on the website for the best decorations. At the Halloween Lighting awards ceremony on the Town Hall lawn on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 4 p.m., a first, second and third place winner will be announced, according to the website.
• Root Up & More (Concord, rootupconcord.com) is holding Ghost Tour Stories in downtown Concord on Friday, Oct. 21; Saturday, Oct. 22, and Saturday, Oct. 29, with short tours at 6 p.m. (30 minutes) and hour-long tours at 8 p.m. The cost is $10 per person for the short tours, $20 for the long tours; see forms.gle/9SssGtuxdpAkCSpD7 to RSVP.
• Before there was Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Opera there was Lon Chaney’s take on the classic horror character. Chaney starred in the 1925 silent big screen adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera, which will screen Friday, Oct. 21, at 7 p.m. at the Derry Public Library (64 East Broadway in Derry; 432-6140) featuring live musical accompaniment by Jeff Rapsis. The event is free and open to the public.
• Chunky’s Cinema Pub (707 Huse Road, Manchester; 151 Coliseum Ave., Nashua; 150 Bridge St., Pelham, chunkys.com) will hold a “props allowed” screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show (R, 1975) on Friday, Oct. 21, at 9 p.m. at Chunky’s in Manchester, Nashua and Pelham. Costumes are encouraged. Tickets are $10.
• As advertised, the Pumpkin Smash at the Portsmouth Farmers Market (City Hall, 1 Junkins Ave. in Portsmouth) will offer you the opportunity to smash a pumpkin from 8 a.m. to noon on Saturday, Oct. 22, to raise money for the Portsmouth Halloween Parade. Pick your pumpkin to smash and use available mallets and other implements, according to portsmouthhalloweenparade.org.
• Get Halloween Photos with your dogs on Saturday, Oct. 22, from 9 a.m. to noon at Trombly Gardens (150 N. River Road in Milford; tromblygardens.net). The event is held by Sato Heart Rescue of Milford, which is suggesting a minimum donation of $10, according to the rescue group’s Facebook page.
• The Harvest Festival at Applecrest Farm (133 Exeter Road, Hampton Falls) is going on every Saturday and Sunday in October, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with pick-your-own opportunities, a corn maze, live music, tractor rides, barnyard animals and more. Admission is free. On Sunday, Oct. 23, to see the Great Pumpkin Carve, where a master carver will take on an 800-pound jack-o’-lantern. The musical lineup for the upcoming weekends is Unsung Heroes on Saturday, Oct. 22; Bolt Hill Band on Sunday, Oct. 23, and Taylor River Band on Saturday, Oct. 29, according to applecrest.com.
• Saturday, Oct. 22, from 6:30 to 9 p.m. is Flashlight Night Maze at the corn maze at Coppal House Farm (118 N. River Road in Lee; nhcornmaze.com). The cost is $12 for ages 5+ (buy tickets online). Daytime hours for the maze are Monday, Thursday and Fridays from noon to 5 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission for daytime costs $9 for 13+, $7 for kids ages 5 to 12 and seniors, military and college students (kids ages 4 and under get in for free).
• The Deerfield Police Department will hold its 6th Annual Haunted Stables event — “a night of terror and fright” according to the Department’s Facebook post — on Saturday, Oct. 22, from 7 to 10 p.m. Free to all town residents, the event takes place at the horse barns, Gate B at the Deerfield Fairgrounds, the post said. Food will be available for purchase at the event.
• Join To Share Brewing Co. (720 Union St., Manchester) for Pints and Pumpkins on Sunday, Oct. 23, from 1 to 3 p.m., featuring pumpkin painting with all the necessary supplies (and a pint of beer) for $12 per person. Visit tosharebrewing.com.
• O’neil Cinemas at Brickyard Square (24 Calef Hwy. in Epping; 679-3529, oneilcinemas. com) has some spooky films on the schedule. Bram Stoker’s Dracula (R, 1992) will show on Sunday, Oct. 23, and Thursday, Oct. 27, at 7 p.m. On Saturday, Oct. 29, get a double feature with Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and Phantom of the Opera (1943), which starts at 1 p.m.
• Director Jordan Peele’s Get Out (R, 2017) will finish up Red River Theatres’ (11 S. Main St. in Concord; 224-4600, redrivertheatres.org) October Scary Film series on Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 6 p.m. A discussion will follow the film.
• The Cat and the Canary (1927), a silent horror film presented with live musical accompaniment by Jeff Rapsis, will screen on Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 7 p.m. at Rex Theatre (23 Amherst St. in Manchester; palacetheatre.org). Tickets cost $10.
• Author Alice Hoffman will head to the Music Hall Lounge (131 Congress St. in Portsmouth; themusichall.org) on Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 7 p.m. to discuss her work including The Book of Magic, which is now in paperback and is the final installment in the Practical Magic Series. Tickets cost $35 and include a book.
• The Witch of Weston Tower will haunt McIntyre Ski Area (50 Chalet Court in Manchester; mcintyreskiarea.com, 622-6159) Thursday, Oct. 27 through Sunday, Oct. 30, according to a press release. Take a scenic chairlift ride to the summit of McIntyre Ski Area and travel the treacherous trail to the Witch of Weston Tower to see “the most spooktacular views of Manchester,” the release said. On Saturday, the event will include a Trunk-Or-Treat, costume contest and more, the release said. The cost is $20 for ages 13 and up for lift ride and the witch ($10 for ages 6 to 12 and free for kids 5 and under), the release said. Bring money for food trucks, face and pumpkin painting, live music and more.
• Manchester will hold its Spooktacular Downtown Manchester Fall Festival from 3 to 6:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 28, with downtown trick-or-treating, a photo booth, kids’ games and activities, limited pumpkins available for carving and more. See manchesternh.gov.
• Intown Concord will cap off a month of Halloween-themed events with its Halloween Howl on Friday, Oct. 28, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Main Street in downtown Concord. The evening will feature community trick-or-treating along Main Street with a “Not so Scary” dance party with Nazzy, costume contests, games and family activities as well as a Trunk or Treat on North Main Street, according to intownconcord.org. There will also be a carved pumpkin contest at the Concord Co-op (drop off pumpkins Oct. 24 through Oct. 28, when pumpkins will be on display and people can vote), the website said.
• Park Theatre (19 Main St. in Jaffrey; theparktheatre.org) has some spooky films on the schedule. On Friday, Oct. 28, at 7 p.m. catch the 1959 film House on Haunted Hill, starring Vincent Price. On Saturday, Oct. 29, at 2 p.m., Jeff Rapsis will play the organ to accompany a screening of Nosferatu (1922), the silent horror film from director F.W. Murnau starring Max Schreck. At 6:15 p.m. on Oct. 29, catch the 1988 horror comedy from director Tim Burton Beetlejuice (PG), which starts Winona Ryder, Geena Davis, Alec Baldwin and of course Michael Keaton. George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead will screen at 8:15 p.m. on Oct. 29. On Sunday, Oct. 30, the theater will screen director Ed Wood’s Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959) at 7 p.m.
• The Rocky Horror Picture Show (R, 1975) will screen at the Red River Theatres (11 S. Main St. in Concord; 224-4600, redrivertheatres.org) on Friday, Oct. 28, and Saturday, Oct. 29, at 9:30 p.m. Costumes are encouraged at this 18+ event but props will be provided by the theater only. Tickets cost $20.
• Goffstown Ace Hardware (5 Depot St. in Goffstown) will hold its Spooktacular Dog Costume Contest on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. with treats, toys and photo ops for dogs, according to a post on the store’s Facebook page.
• Exeter will hold its Halloween Parade & Costume Contest followed by a downtown trick-or-treat on Saturday, Oct. 29, according to exeternh.gov. The costume contest in Swasey Parkway will be at 10:30 a.m., followed by the parade at 11 a.m. Downtown trick-or-treating will run from noon to 3 p.m., the website said.
• Hocus Pocus on Hanover will take place at the Spotlight Room (96 Hanover St. in Manchester) on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission costs $5 online, $6 at the door. Described as a “spiritual fair featuring readers, healers, artists and metaphysical goods,” the event is presented by Soul and Shadow Emporium (22 Hanover St. in Manchester). See shadowandsoulemporium.com.
• The Wilton Main Street Association will hold its The Haunting of Wilton on Saturday, Oct. 29, with scary stories at the Wilton Library at 11 a.m., a costume parade down Main Street at noon, trick-or-treating with downtown merchants from 1 to 2 p.m., a murder mystery clue game with downtown merchants from 2 to 3 p.m. and a costume dance in Main Street park with a DJ, according to the schedule at visitwilton.com. Get the spooky weekend going with the haunted trail behind the Wilton police department, running Thursday, Oct. 27, and Friday, Oct. 28, from 6 to 9 p.m. Admission costs $5.
• The Bizarre Bazaar at Prayers of Nature Studio (33 Howard St. in Wilton) will run Saturday, Oct. 29, from noon to 7 p.m. and will feature a “bootique” filled with art, gemstones, decor, artisan jewelry and apparel, according to a press release. The day will also feature divination readers and Laurie from the Eclectic Green Witchery. See prayersofnature.com.
• Merrimack will hold its 30th annual Halloween Party in Wasserman Park on Saturday, Oct. 29, from noon to 3 p.m. The event will include games, crafts, face painting, food for sale, a scavenger hunt, a costume contest and more, according to merrimackparksandrec.org.
​• The Dover Zombie Walk & Evening Movie will be held Saturday, Oct. 29. The Zombie Walk will start at 2 p.m. and head down Central Avenue from the Dover Chamber of Commerce parking lot to the Rotary Arts Pavilion, according to Dover Main Street’s Facebook page. Wear zombie outfits or other Halloween costumes. Participants get a grab bag of goodies and the day will include games and a costume contest, the post said. The Woodman Institute Museum will also have a Victorian exhibit about mourning, according to the post.
At 7:30 p.m. at the pavilion stage, Ghostbusters (PG, 1984) will screen; bring lawn chairs and blankets, the post said.
• Beaver Brook Association (Maple Hill Farm, 117 Ridge Road in Hollis; beaverbrook.org) will hold its Enchanted Forest Family Halloween Event on Saturday, Oct. 29, with arrival times starting at 4 p.m. Tickets cost $12. The event will feature “stars, stories, songs and s’mores,” according to the website, which bills the event as “non-spooky fun” with a wildflower trail featuring pumpkins, learning about New England wildlife and more.
• Nashua will hold its Halloween Boo Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 4:30 to 7 p.m. at the Bandshell in Greeley Park. The evening will feature a haunted house, hay ride, bonfire and, at 6 p.m., a silly scary movie, according to the Nashua Parks and Recreation Department. See nashuanh.gov.
• The Concord Parks & Recreation Department will hold an adult Halloween Dodgeball Tournament on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Citywide Community Center. The cost to register is $50 per team of six players who must be dressed in themed or matching Halloween costumes, according to concordparksandrec.com where you can register.
• The Amherst Orthodontics Trick or Trot 3K will be held on Sunday, Oct. 30, in Arms Park in Manchester. A kids’ Halloween Festival starts at 9:30 a.m. and Stonyfield Lil’ Pumpkin Fun Runs start at 10:30 a.m. The 3K begins at 11 a.m. Registration costs $25 in advance, $30 on race day for adults; $20 in advance, $25 on race day for ages 12 to 20; $15 in advance and on race day for kids ages 9 to 11 and $10 for kids 8 and under in the Lil Pumpkin Runs, according to millenniumrunning.com.
• See Rocky Horror Show Live at the Seacoast Repertory Theatre (125 Bow St. in Portsmouth; seacoastrep.org) on the evening of Sunday, Oct. 30 (the show begins at 11:59 p.m.) and at 9 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 31, after the Halloween Parade. This is an encore performance of the theater’s summer production of Rocky Horror. Tickets cost $27 to $54. See the website for rules about what not to bring.
• Portsmouth Halloween Parade steps off on Halloween, Monday, Oct. 31, at 7 p.m. with community members who want to march in costume gathering at Peirce Island by Prescott Park (no sign-up is required), according to portsmouthhalloweenparade.org, where you can find the rules of what to wear if you want to be in the parade and the route if you’d like to go watch.

Eat, drink and be scary

Costume parties, drink specials and more grown-up Halloween fun

By Matt Ingersoll
[email protected]

• The fifth annual Boos and Booze event will kick off at Bonfire Country Bar (950 Elm St., Manchester) on Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 5:45 p.m. Costumes are encouraged during this run or walk cemetery tour from Bonfire to Valley Street Cemetery. The cost is $10 per person, and attendees 21 and up will receive a ticket for one complimentary brew. Visit bonfiremanch.com.
• From Thursday, Oct. 27, through Sunday, Oct. 30, To Share Brewing Co. (720 Union St., Manchester) will host beer and Halloween candy pairings while supplies last. Visit tosharebrewing.com.
• Enjoy an Undead Beat Night at Portsmouth Book & Bar (40 Pleasant St.) on Thursday, Oct. 27, from 7 to 9 p.m. In addition to an open mic of “poetic ramblings,” according to the Portsmouth Halloween Parade’s website, there will be raffle prizes, beverages, special costumes and more. Visit portsmouthhalloweenparade.org.
• Join LaBelle Winery Derry (14 Route 111) for an adults-only Spooktacular Halloween party on Friday, Oct. 28 — the festivities begin at 7:30 p.m. and go until 11 p.m. inside the Vineyard Ballroom, featuring a local DJ, appetizers, snacks and desserts included for late-night munching. Costumes are encouraged (although not required), with prizes being awarded for the best Halloween costume. The bar will also be open all night, featuring themed cocktails available for purchase, as well as wine, beer and mixed drinks. Tickets are $35 per person (18+ attendees only). Visit labellewinery.com.
• Eleganza Dance Co. will hold the second annual Halloween Spooktacular at XO Bistro (827 Elm St., Manchester) on Friday, Oct. 28, from 9 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. Drinks and food will be available for purchase, and there will be a photo booth set up for pictures. Costumes are encouraged, with a contest and the chance to win prizes. Salsa lessons, dancing and music will be featured, courtesy of DJ Jersey. The cover charge is $15. Visit eleganzadance.com.
• Diz’s Cafe (860 Elm St., Manchester) will host its annual Nightmare on Elm Street crawl on Friday, Oct. 28, beginning at 5 p.m. with food and drink specials, prizes, a zombie parade downtown and more. Visit dizscafe.com.
• Join Angel City Music Hall (179 Elm St., Manchester) for a Halloween show with Cat 5 on Friday, Oct. 28, at 9 p.m., followed by its second annual Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m., featuring a performance by DJ Sam Smoove. Visit angelcitymusichall.com.
• Greg & The Morning Buzz presents a Brews & Boos Halloween party at The Hill Bar & Grille (50 Chalet Way, Manchester) on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 8 to 11 p.m. Costumes are encouraged at this 21+ event, which will also feature specialty appetizers and brews. Tickets are $25 per person, granting you entry into a costume contest. Visit mcintyreskiarea.com.
• An Interactive Nightlife Halloween Party will take place on Saturday, Oct. 29, at the Bank of NH Stage (16 S. Main St., Concord), from 8 p.m. to midnight. The night will include a costume contest, aerialist, drag performers, karaoke with DJ George Cox, burlesque performances and more, according to the website. Tickets are $39.75 general admission, $68.75 for VIP in advance; $50 general admission and $90 VIP at the door, plus fees. Visit ccanh.com.
• The Shaskeen Pub and Restaurant (909 Elm St., Manchester) holds its 16th annual Halloween Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 9:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., featuring a night of costumes, drinks, dancing and live music from DJ Myth. Prizes will be awarded for the best costumes. Visit theshaskeenpub.com.
• Join The Farm Bar & Grille (1181 Elm St., Manchester) for its annual Get Haunted Costume Party on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 9 p.m., featuring costume contests, giveaways, live entertainment and half price drink specials. Visit farmbargrille.com.
• Join Chunky’s Cinema Pub in Manchester (707 Huse Road) for its annual live “Ghouling” Pianos event on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 9 p.m. A special Halloween edition of Dueling Pianos, the event features the professional piano players positioned on stage in front of the theater and decked out in costume. Tickets are $20 per person. Visit chunkys.com.
• See a live witches dance on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 3 p.m. outside The Hop Knot (1000 Elm St., Manchester) which will also offer drink specials. Visit hocuspocusonhanover.com.
• Pipe Dream Brewing (49 Harvey Road, Londonderry) will hold a Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 6 to 10 p.m., featuring a live performance from DJ Ache, as well as a full food menu and more than 28 taps of beer available. Costumes are encouraged. Visit pipedreambrewingnh.com.
• Averill House Vineyard (21 Averill Road, Brookline) is hosting a Spooktacular Halloween Comedy Show on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 5:30 to 7 p.m., to be held outside, with headliner comedian Bill Simas and a few other guest comedians. The wine bar will be open with more than 15 wines to choose from, and charcuterie boards and wine cream ice cream will be available for purchase. Tickets are $5 per person (event will be held rain or shine). Visit averillhousevineyard.com.
• Join The Chop Shop Pub (920 Lafayette Road, Seabrook) for a Halloween Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 6:30 p.m., featuring costumed contests, cash prizes, spooky drink specials and a live performance by Casual Gravity. Tickets are $25. Visit chopshoppub.com.
• Fody’s Tavern in Derry (187½ Rockingham Road) has a Halloween party on the schedule for Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m., featuring music by Brian House. Visit fodystavern.com.
• Saddle Up Saloon (92 Route 125, Kingston) will hold a Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m., featuring costume contests, spooky drink specials, giveaways and a live performance from Bite the Bullet. Visit saddleupsaloonnh.com.
• Enjoy a Halloween party and costume fest at Area 23 (254 N. State St., Concord) on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 8 to 11 p.m., with music from the Dalton Gang. Visit thearea23.com.
• Tandy’s Pub & Grille (1 Eagle Square, Concord) will hold its 13th annual Halloween Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 9 p.m., with cash prizes awarded to the three best costumes, along with Jack Daniel’s and Deep Eddy drink specials, and music from DJ Lance. Visit tandyspub.com.
• Makris Lobster & Steak House (354 Sheep Davis Road, Concord) is planning a Lobster Mash Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, from 7 to 11 p.m., featuring a costume contest with first, second and third place winners, a 50/50 raffle benefiting the Make-A-Wish Foundation, a Sam Adams Oktoberfest stein hoisting competition, giveaways, food and drink specials, live music and more. Visit eatalobster.com.
• Red’s Kitchen + Tavern (530 Lafayette Road, Seabrook) will hold a Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, featuring a spooky night of live music, food and drink specials, dancing and prizes awarded for the best costumes. Visit redskitchenandtavern.com.
• Join The Wild Rover Pub (21 Kosciuszko St., Manchester) for its annual Halloween costume party on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 10 p.m. Cash prizes will be awarded for the best costumes. Visit wildroverpub.com.
• Don’t miss the annual Halloween Monster Bash happening at Derryfield Country Club (625 Mammoth Road, Manchester) on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m. Cash prizes will be awarded for the best costumes, and there will also be live performances from Mugsy and D-Comp. Tickets are $25 per person. See “2022 Halloween Monster Bash” on Eventbrite to purchase them.
• Block Party Social (51 Zapora Drive, Hooksett) is holding a Sam Adams Halloween Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m., featuring an adult costume contest with prizes awarded for the best costumes, along with sampling, drink specials, prizes and giveaways. Visit blockpartysocial.com.
• Wally’s (144 Ashworth Ave., Hampton) hosts its 13th annual Halloween Bash on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m., featuring national recording and touring act Prospect Hill. Prizes will be awarded for the best costume. Tickets are $20 in advance and $25 at the door. Visit wallysnh.com.
• Join Feathered Friend Brewing Co. (231 S. Main St., Concord) for a Halloween party on Saturday, Oct. 29, which will include live music with Andrew North & The Rangers from 5 to 8 p.m. Visit featheredfriendbrewing.com.
• It will be time for Halloween Scaryoke at AJ’s Sports Bar & Grill (11 Tracy Lane, Hudson) on Saturday, Oct. 29, at 8 p.m. Prizes will be awarded for the best and scariest costumes, and there will be Ice Pik vodka and Rocky Peak whiskey tastings. Visit ajs-sportsbar.com.
• Join 603 Bar & Grill (1087 Elm St., Manchester) for a Hip-Hop Halloween Bash on Sunday, Oct. 30, at 8 p.m., which will include a full lineup of live local hip-hop performances, along with prizes awarded for the best costumes. Tickets are $10 in advance online and $15 at the door. See “Hip Hop Halloween Bash” on Eventbrite or visit 603barandgrill.com.
• Catch a special Halloween drag brunch and costume contest at The Big House Nightclub (322 Lakeside Ave., Laconia) on Sunday, Oct. 30, at 9:30 a.m. Tickets start at $40 general admission and are available at the door or via Eventbrite. Visit bighousenightclub.com.
• There will be a Halloween brewery crawl in Derry on Sunday, Oct. 30, kicking off at Daydreaming Brewing Co. (1½ E. Broadway) at noon before going to Kelsen Brewing Co., From the Barrel Brewing Co. and Rockingham Brewing Co. Costumes are encouraged. Visit daydreaming.beer.

Finding Hercule Poirot, becoming Mr. Toad and other tales of actors getting into their fall show roles

New Hampshire is in the thick of fall theater season, with professional and community productions filling the schedule with musicals, dramas, comedies and productions with young performers. We talked to several local actors from some upcoming shows who will be hitting the stage over the next month about how they are getting into character and what makes their shows a must-see.

Connor Weeks, as Mr. Toad

The Community Players of Concord presents The Wind in The Willows, a children’s theater project featuring 24 young actors,at the Audi Concord (2 Prince St.). Showtimes are Friday, Oct. 14, at 7 p.m., and Saturday, Oct. 15, at 2 p.m. Tickets are $15. Visit communityplayersofconcord.org.

What is The Wind in the Willows about?

The Wind in the Willows is about a group of animals, specifically a toad, a badger, a mole and a rat, [who] go on a bunch of wild adventures together.

Describe the character you’re playing.

I’m playing the role of Mr. Toad. He’s a very posh and very energetic toad who will spring for the new thing when it comes out. He’s a little self-centered but he doesn’t show it. He tries to pride himself on being Mr. Toadwithout sounding too cocky.

What attracted you to this show?

I [wanted] to be in this because I’ve done a ton of shows with the people who are working on [it] and they’re really nice. Also, my uncle had read the book and he said it was a really good show, so that’s why I’m doing the show.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

One of the challenging parts about being Mr. Toad is [that] I have to do an onstage costume change in a very short amount of time, and I haven’t really gotten the chance to practice that yet a lot, and that’s really kind of difficult.

What do you like most about playing this character?

What I like most about playing Mr. Toad is his enthusiasm, being around my friends and just being myself and singing.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I’m most looking forward to being around all my family and friends, and being on stage and showing Mr. Toad off.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

They should come to the show and they might enjoy it because it’s really fun. It has a lot of songs that are really fun to dance to, and all of us worked so hard, and I believe the final outcome is going to be so much better than anyone had imagined.

— Mya Blanchard

Izzy Bedy, as Edgar

The Peacock Players (14 Court St., Nashua) presents Disney’s The Aristocats Kids, performed by kids and teens in grades 2 through 12, from Friday, Oct. 14, through Sunday, Oct. 16, and from Friday, Oct. 21, through Sunday, Oct. 23. Showtimes are at 7 p.m. on Friday, 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Saturday, and 2 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets range from $12 to $18. Visit peacockplayers.org.

What is The Aristocats Kids about?

It’s based on a Disney movie about a family of cats. They live with Madame, their owner, and Edgar the Butler, who is me, and Edgar is the bad guy. He wants to get rid of them so he takes them away and they have to try and find their way back to Paris.

Describe the character you’re playing.

[Edgar is] a Disney villain, so lots of the songs are … big songs about being evil, and he hates the aristocats. His goal in life is to get rid of them. Madame is his boss and he always tries to impress her. It’s a very fun role because you can be over the top and everything.

What attracted you to this show?

Well, I love theater. I’ve been doing it for five years. I was looking at the new shows, and I was in the age range for this one. I thought, ‘Oh, that might be fun. I think I have an audition song, so I might as well try out.’

What have you been doing to prepare?

Well, I’ve watched The Aristocats a couple times, like, clips from it, especially with Edgar in them … and I’ve read the script over more times than I can count. … If you think about the goal, your character’s goal in life, or like, what your character is thinking or probably doing in the moment, then it can really help you … decide how you’re going to say your lines and how you’re going to show the audience what you mean with those lines and those lyrics. Facial expressions are also everything. So if you practice how you’re going to look at the audience or who you’re going to look at when you’re saying a certain line, it really helps show the character and the personality of the character.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

The most challenging part is probably because it’s a character that’s very different from me, or from most people you will meet in real life. Disney villains are these evil people and they’re very, very over the top and exaggerated in their emotions. It’s hard to find exactly who that person would be in real life.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I really look forward to our finale and our prologue or opening scene. We have almost the entire cast in both of those numbers and we’ve worked on them for a long time. It was [one of] the first things we started working on, and I think they look really good and everyone is doing a great job of showing their character and their … vocal and acting skills.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

Musicals are known for having these big over-the-top numbers and having these characters with very big personalities. There’s so much going on in a musical, and it’s a musical based on a Disney movie, so it’s [so] lively and energetic that it’s really hard to forget it.

— Katelyn Sahagian

Nancy Rosen, as Ida Straus

The Manchester Community Theatre Players presents Titanic — performed by actors playing both historical figures and characters that were invented by the show’s writers — at the North End Montessori School (698 Beech St., Manchester) on Friday, Oct. 14, and Saturday, Oct. 15; and from Friday, Oct. 21, through Sunday, Oct. 23. Showtimes are at 7:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and at 2 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets are $20. Visit manchestercommunitytheatre.com.

What is Titanic about?

It’s a musical that was written around the time of the movie. … The subject matter is the Titanic, but it differs in that there’s no Rose and there’s no Jack. The musical is all about the music. … It’s a real musician’s musical. It’s all kind of classical sounding.

Describe the character you’re playing.

Her name is Ida Straus and she was born in the mid-19th century in Germany. She came over to America and married her husband, Isadore. He was a successful businessman. They were very much in love throughout their 40-plus years of marriage. They were traveling back from spending some time in the south of France. They were supposed to take separate ships coming home, but because of a coal strike, they ended up coming home together. They never made it home, because the Titanic hit an iceberg and sank. Isadore, even though he was an older gentleman, said, ‘No, there are younger people that need to go [on the lifeboats], not me,’ and Ida just says, ‘I’m not going, either.’ Their relationship kind of became a symbol to many at the time of true love and total dedication.

What attracted you to this show?

I was asked if I would be interested and I said absolutely. I thought that this is a nice challenge … of a role.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I look at the lines and then I try to think, ‘How do I parallel this woman?’ My parallels are [that] I’m not married 40 years, I’m married 32, and I try to envision how I feel about my husband. … So it’s just total dedication. I just try to make it real. You have to find elements of ‘How do you connect to the person?.’

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

Because it’s not a huge role and there might be a line coming in and out, [it’s] the one-liners when you’re walking across [and] just getting the timing of lights and the chronology of certain things.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

Just running it from top to bottom, [and] just getting the flow going with the music. We’ve been in a rehearsal process where we can start and stop a lot. But when the show starts, when we start doing actual performances, it’ll be nice just having a flow going, anticipating what happens next. Just being able to live in the show will be nice.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

I think they’ll be swept up by the music and the story. Most people know the story and they know, of course, the inevitability. And the music is the emotion of this grandiose ship. People will be swept up in the whole preparation of the launching of the thing and how it was once in a lifetime. They’ll be swept up in the story of it.

— Katelyn Sahagian

Sam Rogers, as John Proctor

The Seacoast Repertory Theatre (125 Bow St., Portsmouth) presents The Crucible, which runs various dates from Oct. 13 through Nov. 5. Tickets start at $27. Visit seacoastrep.org.

What is The Crucible about?

It takes place in the Puritanical time. The girls are found in the woods at the beginning of the play and they’re doing some kind of dance so that they can talk to the dead. Mr. Paris, who is the minister of the church, catches them in the woods and then they start getting sick. So the girls are sick and everybody in the town is freaking out because they think it’s witchcraft. But the girls know the truth. They know that they were out in the woods and they were dancing naked around in the woods. So they say that it was because of witchcraft and that there were so many people in the town that were sending their spirits out on them and they’re just like these victimized girls. … Eventually things start going to court, and that’s when John and Elizabeth Proctor come in. Elizabeth’s name has been mentioned in court. John is livid. He fights in court as hard as he can, but the court there is just so bloodthirsty and they don’t want any sort of undermining to happen because they’ve sent so many people to death. … Eventually, John gets taken away even though he fights super hard.

Describe the character you’re playing.

I’m playing John Proctor. … He’s the kind of a character that I get really excited about as an actor because he has so many complexities. Something that I really like about him that makes him kind of easy for the actor is that he makes a very clear choice in the middle of the play, in terms of where his storyline is going to go. He has a very important choice to make and he makes it and then that fuels the rest of the play.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I think that something that really helps me prepare for a role as an actor is thinking about the relationships that the character has to the other characters. I know that there’s a lot of things that people can do, but for me, understanding where John’s heart lies with the other characters, like who he trusts, who he doesn’t trust, and who he has faith in.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

In terms of physicality, like, a personal thing for me is that … I’m pretty naturally inclined to … make faster, quicker movements. Like, you know I’ll move across a room quickly or I’ll make … just, like, quicker jolty or movements with my body. And that’s not really what this character is like. … Also just the last scene where he sees Elizabeth again in the jail is really difficult to get to that place emotionally.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I just love to act. … I’ve been working on a bunch of musicals this whole year, which has been great … but obviously a musical is a different beast than a play. … I really love completing a character’s journey. I really like being in a different place at the end of a play than I was at the beginning.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

It is definitely a classic. Arthur Miller is a great writer, so people obviously just like it for that reason. However, it’s timeless because it kind of speaks on … our own history. I think that people like to see things that talk about what we’ve actually been through as a country and things that have happened for real. It’s like, you watch it and you’re like, ‘Oh my God, I can’t even believe that that happened.’

— Katelyn Sahagian

Sean Bushor, as Lord Farquaad

The Epping Community Theater presents Shrek the Musical at the Epping Playhouse (36 Ladd’s Lane) from Friday, Oct. 21, through Sunday, Oct. 23; and from Friday, Oct. 28, through Sunday, Oct. 30. Showtimes are at 7 p.m. on both Fridays and on Saturday, Oct. 22; and 2 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 23, Saturday, Oct. 29, and Sunday, Oct. 30. Tickets range from $15 to $20. Visit eppingtheater.org.

Describe the character you’re playing.

Lord Farquaad is a tiny tyrant who is an unscrupulous pragmatic opportunist, a charismatic bully who has gotten to the top with wit, charm and above all else, fear. He is ‘that’ boss who sweet-talks you into working the weekend of your child’s birthday, and angrily berates you for not being a team player, all while upper management or the home office hasn’t heard a peep of his antics. … On a deeper level, Lord Farquaad is that little voice inside all of us that keeps us from chasing our dreams, telling us that we are too little, too ugly to make it, that we should either conform to an impossible standard of perfection or wallow in an oozing mud pit in resignation.

What attracted you to this show?

Lord Farquaad is a funny little villain. If you look at all the great villains, most people will name one who is powerful, who is able to directly put the protagonist into mortal danger. Lord Farquaad’s power is completely illusory, a sham. Shrek goes along with Lord Farquaad’s demands because it is the path of least resistance, which I think is hilarious. … That’s the satire behind Lord Farquaad — we’re all pitted against each other to the benefit of tiny little men whose only power over us is itself a fairy tale. Therefore, the part needs to be played big and extra large to signify how Lord Farquaad is himself overcompensating for his own self-imposed limitations.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I’ve been watching as many different interpretations of Lord Farquaad as I can. I’ve always been a big fan of John Lithgow. … I also love Christopher Sieber’s performance on Shrek the Musical on Netflix. … I’ve pored through YouTube and watched a myriad of other interpretations, both to see how they actually moved [and] what props they used, and what I thought did and didn’t work. I’ve used some open-source audio software to record my lines and add in the rehearsal tracks, and instead of my normal music, I’ve been just listening to my lines on repeat while I work.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

I spend most of the show on my knees. … There’s also a part where I am practically running while singing. However, these challenges are also really fun to do, and I think the audience will really get a kick out of it.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I have a few silly bits that I think the audience will love. It’s also super fun being in a show with my family. My kids are [playing the] fairy tale creatures, and my wife is working backstage. I have an older daughter who isn’t in the show, but I was in a different show [with her] before, so now I’ll have done a show with my whole family, which I think is pretty cool.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

There is this timeless aspect to Shrek that is hard to put a finger on. There are still memes being made about Shrek to this very day, for a movie that came out over 20 years ago in 2001! … Also, like an onion, Shrek the Musical has layers. We have simple slapstick comedy, which for me, never gets old. We have puns and dad jokes, and as a dad myself, that is also another genre that never gets old. There is comedy where we have to explain to the kids in the cast how to do the joke because they don’t get it, but we adults think it’s funny. … Aside from the jokes being funny, there’s also the underlying themes of the show, which I think really gives it that timelessness aspect — that heroes can be found in unlikely places, [and] that you can find true love even if you look like an ogre. The importance of standing up for yourself and not just waiting for wishes to come true. There is strength in diversity, unity, friendship, and in forgiveness. And sometimes, the people who speak out against fairy tale creatures the most are deeply in denial of being a fairy tale creature themselves.

— Matt Ingersoll

Hadley Harris, as Janet Van de Graaff

The Riverbend Youth Company presents The Drowsy Chaperone at the Amato Center for the Performing Arts (56 Mont Vernon St., Milford) from Friday, Nov. 4, through Sunday, Nov. 6. Showtimes are at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, 2:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, and 2:30 p.m. on Sunday. Ticket sales are TBA. Visit svbgc.org/amato-center.

Describe the character you’re playing.

Janet Van de Graaff is a glamorous showgirl giving up the stage for marriage. She is incredibly dramatic and loves attention and praise. But Janet also has a soft, affectionate side and would do anything for love.

What attracted you to this show?

I’ve been participating in shows with the Riverbend Youth Company for about five years now, this being my final season as a senior in high school. I knew I would be in the fall musical, but when I saw the directing team and title, I knew I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. The Drowsy Chaperone is such a fun title because it combines elements of old Broadway, but possesses the entertaining qualities of a modern musical. And, of course, MaryEllen [Stevenson], Meg [King] and Henry [Kopczynskie] are such incredible directors to work with.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I’ve been doing a lot of stretching and endurance training. Before being cast as Janet, I didn’t know just how physically demanding the role would be. There is quite a bit of singing with high-energy dancing. Additionally, I’ve been researching 1920s fashion and performance to get a better sense of the show’s setting.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

While I’m similar to Janet in a lot of ways, we’re also quite different. I hope to have just half the confidence and presence she does. I also feel challenged by Janet’s fast-paced and upbeat numbers, which include lots of tricks and intense acting.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I can’t wait to see it all come together. Undoubtedly, the costumes and lighting will be spectacular. The Drowsy Chaperone is such a layered show, so it takes time to come together. But, as with any production, once the pieces click, it’s like magic. The interactive set and fun direction — including roller skating, tap dancing, encores and a power outage — make this show so full of energy and joy.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

I can’t wait for audiences to share in the joy that is The Drowsy Chaperone. I love the “show within a show” trope and think our audiences will find it very entertaining. Ben Erdody, playing Man In Chair, is such a fantastic actor, and I think he is the piece of the puzzle that makes the story come alive. His skillful narration allows the audience to truly dive into the story with him. Altogether, this title builds such lovable characters that I’m ecstatic to share.

— Angie Sykeny

Hannah Shepherd, as The Chaperone

Describe the character you’re playing.

The Drowsy Chaperone is an over-the-top performer. The world is her stage. The Chaperone is rough around the edges and does what she thinks is best.

What attracted you to this show?

I’ve been performing with the Riverbend Youth Company for many years. I was looking forward to the fall season, but I wasn’t familiar with the title of the show and was interested in learning more about it. I listened to the soundtrack, and I loved the 1920s setting and feel. This past March, I was in a production of Chicago where I realized how much 1920s musicals have to offer. Old shows are replete with grand dance numbers and musical ballads. These numbers make for fun choreography and impressive vocal tracks.

What have you been doing to prepare?

The directing team has compared my character of the Chaperone to many other characters in shows and other musicals. For example, Karen in Will and Grace. I’ve watched many clips of Megan Mullally as Karen to observe her acting style. When practicing my track, I’ll sing it to myself in the mirror, trying out different stances and facial expressions. Then, at rehearsals, I’ll try what I’ve worked on to see what feels the most natural.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

The most challenging part of playing The Chaperone is the fact that she pays no mind to the other characters on stage. In other words, their problems aren’t her problems. The Chaperone is also a very monotone character. Naturally, I have a bubbly personality and feel emotions deeply, so I’ve learned that I have to put Hannah aside for the shows in order to step into the character.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I’m looking forward to seeing what we’ve rehearsed all put together. One of my favorite parts of any show is seeing what we’ve worked on for months finally together on stage. [With] this one especially, I feel each actor individually has put an immense amount of effort into making these characters come to life.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

I think audiences will enjoy this show because of its clever comedic timing and fun choreography. Meg, our choreographer, has worked hard to create amazing dances that challenge us as actors and entertain the audience.

— Angie Sykeny

Sean Damboise and Zakariah Tber, as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Lend Me a Theatre presents Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead at the Hatbox Theatre (270 Loudon Road, Concord) from Friday, Nov. 4, through Sunday, Nov. 6; Friday, Nov. 11, through Sunday, Nov. 13; and Friday, Nov. 18, through Sunday, Nov. 20. Showtimes are at 7:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and at 2 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets range from $16 to $22. Visit hatboxnh.com.

What is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead about?

Damboise: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are two … kind of small characters in Hamlet. Basically their role is just to kind of spy on Hamlet for the king and queen. Halfway into the show they have to take him to England. The original letter to the English king says, ‘OK, here’s Hamlet, you get to take his head off.’ Unfortunately, Hamlet got the letter twisted around so that when they show up in England, it says, ‘We’re supposed to cut your heads off.’ And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern die. … It’s basically Hamlet from their perspective. And at the same time, they’re kind of floating around going, ‘Something doesn’t seem right here. … We’re being pushed around and asked to be doing weird things,’ and they’re basically just trying to puzzle their way through it.

What attracted you to this show?

Tber: I like that both characters are constantly pondering their situation in the storyline and it’s almost weirdly metaphorical. They’re trying to talk about what’s the meaning of a person, what is existence.

Damboise: These guys are just sorting their way through trying to say, ‘OK, why were we chosen to die? Why can’t we actually change our destiny? Why is it that we have to die?’ But they’re still stuck.

What have you been doing to prepare?

Tber: I watched the movie. I took a look at certain scenes. This show is so heavy on lines, and this show is so heavy on [the question of] what is the true meaning of what they’re trying to say. Every rehearsal, I figure out why I’m saying certain things. Sometimes I don’t know why I’m saying certain things in this show because the language is different.

Damboise: And it does shift from modern speech to actually reciting lines from Hamlet. So now they’re jumping from, ‘Hey, what’s going on here,” to iambic pentameter, and then back again to the regular speech. The constant shifting is a little difficult.

What is the most challenging thing about playing these characters?

Tber: Unless I’m flowing, unless I start the scene and then I move from a motion to a motion seamlessly, I can’t start back up again. So, if I pause and then we give it a director’s note or if I pause and then we resituate something, I’m going to lose it and then I’m going to have to come back.

Damboise: The hardest part for me is [not that it’s] difficult to … flow through the emotions so much as actually trying to pull them out. Going from frustration to happiness, and there are a couple of scenes where he has to shift. It’s very difficult to try and make such a dramatic shift so quickly.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

Tber: There is a director’s note that says there’s only two times this show has failed. And it was when they decided to make it serious. Yes, it’s supposed to be a comedy.

Damboise: Yeah, it’s a comedy at heart. If you go deep, you’re not going to have a decent show because it’s way too much. These characters are not deep. They’re just incidentals in Hamlet’s. And now they’ve got a little bit of depth and background and they’re trying to figure themselves out. But if you try to go too deep, you’re just going to lose the point, which is following these two schlubs through Hamlet.

— Katelyn Sahagian

John Jenks Seymour, as Claudius

John Jenks Seymour, playing Claudius, will also perform in Lend Me a Theatre’s production of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

Describe the character you’re playing.

The character I’m playing is Claudius. He’s the king. He’s not a really nice guy. Just kind of a person who’s out for his own interests.

What have you been doing to prepare?

My training was as a method actor. I try to find some feelings that I’ve had, that I can recall. That’s a lot of fun when doing a character who’s a really nasty, rotten guy.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

I haven’t really been in the rehearsal process that long, so honestly it’s really just kind of fun.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

It’s a very, very funny play, and it’s a lot of just crazy humor, but it’s also very intelligent humor. You can take things at a couple levels. There’s some stuff that’s just silly and kind of slapstick, but there’s also some very deep humor.

— Katelyn Sahagian

TreVor Nantel, as Spike

Bedford Off Broadway presents Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike at the Old Town Hall (3 Meetinghouse Road) from Friday, Nov. 4, through Sunday, Nov. 6; and from Friday, Nov. 11, through Sunday, Nov. 13. Showtimes are at 8 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, and at 2 p.m. on Sundays (doors open one hour before curtain). Tickets are $15 general admission, and $12 for children, students and seniors. Purchase them at the door or at brownpapertickets.com.

What is Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike about?

Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike is about three adopted siblings in their 50s, two of which — Vanya and Sonia — live a miserable life together, while their other sibling, Masha, is a very … renowned, famous actress. … Enter Spike, and he is a 29-year-old stud that Masha has picked up across the way, and she introduces Spike to already regretful siblings. The family goes through some hardships and they learn to live and love each other along the way.

What attracted you to this show?

This is my first ever play, but I consider myself to be a natural actor. … My dad, Rick Nantel, has performed [in] many shows here [throughout] the years. He read this script hoping to get Vanya, and suggested that I audition, as he thought I fit this role perfectly. I decided to give it a shot on the last night of auditions. … What attracted me to do the show was the kind of character Spike is. I feel like he is a very fun role.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I had some fun nights out with a friend and my girlfriend, and we would read lines and I’d constantly get scrutinized for getting them wrong, yet they were very supportive. … It came down to my girlfriend reading lines with me, and me sitting in my work van during the day and constantly reciting them in customers’ yards. … I was hoping they wouldn’t look out the window and see me talking to myself in a dramatic manner.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

The most challenging part of playing Spike is the expectation of fulfilling who he really is in the playwright’s eyes, but I’m having fun and the cast has been amazing.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

To be able to impress the audience, while making my friends, family and girlfriend proud.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

I think the audience will enjoy the show for the raw comedy, and the fact that they will be able to relate to a lot of the content.

— Matt Ingersoll

Greer Danzey, as Curly

The Kids Coop Theatre presents Oklahoma! at the Derry Opera House (29 W. Broadway). Showtimes are Friday, Nov. 18, at 7 p.m.; Saturday, Nov. 19, at 7 p.m., and a matinee on Sunday, Nov. 20, at 1 p.m. Tickets are $15. Visit kidscooptheatre.ludus.com.

What is Oklahoma! about?

Oklahoma! is a musical that was made [in the] late 1940s through 1950s by Rodgers and Hammerstein. It is about a cowboy during 1906 who is in love with [a] farm girl named Laurey Williams, and [he] wants to get her to marry him. [Laurey is] described as [being] the most beautiful girl in town, [and] she doesn’t know much about him. [The town is] very small, [and] everybody knows each other. With her being known by everybody, many people are after her in a romantic way. She has a love triangle with the lead, Curly McLain … and her farmhand named Jud Fry. Now, this farmer and the cowboy do not get along very well and it’s made very apparent throughout the whole show that they are romantic rivals. On the other side of the story you have a … different cowboy [named] Will Parker, [who’s] in a love triangle as well with this girl named Ado Annie … and a peddler [named] Ali Hakim. The story is a romantic comedy drama [about] these two love triangles happening in early America. It’s very interesting, [and] some parts are darker than others. Overall it’s quite an experience.

Describe the character you’re playing.

Curly is a curly-headed cowboy [with] a big ego. He’s very energetic, [and is] always trying to pitch in on a conversation. He likes to be engaged, [and is] very prideful. His biggest strength is also his biggest weakness [because] it’s what gets [him] in trouble, but it’s what people love about him. Not everybody always agrees with what he does [because] he’s very sporadic, but that energy is what makes him lovable, yet annoying.

What attracted you to this show?

I had seen Oklahoma! once before and I enjoyed the show. I saw the movie version [and] I thought the characters were really fun. The lead cowboy, Curly McLain, was very funny because he has a very big ego, and my friends always made fun of me for having a big ego, so I [decided I’d] go try for it. When I was researching, I started [to get] more into the show, I learned more about it, and I started to feel more connected to it.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

He has a more serious tone to him and when it’s used it’s hard to separate that from his energetic side. You only see it a few times, but when you do it’s like you’re seeing a whole other person. It almost feels like you’re playing two different characters [and] it’s hard to understand that he’s the same guy that everybody loves, but he has this much darker, serious tone to him. Then there’s also the accent that goes with it. They have a silly Southern accent that makes it sound ridiculous so it’s hard to portray a serious tone when you’re talking like you just got scared.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

I’d probably say I’m [most looking] forward to having stage interactions with a lot of my friends. [My friends and I] have been this little group who have been doing shows [together] for a while. [We] always audition for the same shows and always get characters that … interact with each other, and it’s always been really fun. Having that chemistry with each other and getting to put it on stage is always so much fun. We’ll talk to each other about who’s going to get this role, who’s going to get that role, and then if our predictions come out right everything just works out because in our rehearsal process we’ll just feel comfortable with each other and we know that in the end our stage production will feel very true to all of us.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

It’s funny [because] it’s very different from today. It seems like a lifetime ago which, really, it was. It takes place over a century ago, but the story itself has been adapted [into] so many other ways that it seems very relatable. Oklahoma! is very similar to the plot of West Side Story, which is another very popular musical. It’s similar to Grease, which is another great show. It has that classic spin to it that a lot of audience members would feel connected to and just be able to catch on [to] very easily.

— Mya Blanchard

Jim Gocha, as Hercule Poirot

The Community Players of Concord present Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express at the Audi Concord (2 Prince St.). Showtimes are Friday, Nov. 18, and Saturday, Nov. 19, at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, Nov. 20, at 2 p.m. Tickets are $20 for adults and $18 for kids and seniors. Visit communityplayersofconcord.org

What is Murder on the Orient Express about?

It’s a murder mystery. … It’s a story about a murder that takes place on a train. One character, a man named Sam Ratchett, is stabbed in the middle of the night multiple times … and then it becomes a matter of who did it.

Describe the character you’re playing.

I am playing Hercule Poirot, the main character [and] the very famous detective. [The investigation] turns to me, and so I’ve got to try to figure out what the heck happened.

What attracted you to this show?

Oh my gosh — who would not want to perform as Hercule Poirot? I mean, he’s one of the most famous detectives in all of literature. I couldn’t pass that up. … He’s such a great character, so iconic, and it’s just a matter of putting your own little twist on playing him. So I jumped at the chance, and I was actually surprised that I got it. … I went to school for theater for a while, but … eventually I switched to teaching English. That’s my main job now, but I’ve been doing theater again for probably a good 10 to 12 years now.

What have you been doing to prepare?

I did some background [research] on Poirot, not only from the original text written by Agatha Christie, but also looking at other versions of the character. There’s a famous film with Albert Finney playing him and, more recently, Kenneth Branagh, and also David Suchet on television. … So I looked at all the different versions that they did and how they put their own little twist on a character that is so iconic. … I also read some other information about him from the other Agatha Christie books, just to get an idea of who he is, and how he functions and how he is, not only physically but also just his background. He’s actually from Belgium, not France. … A lot of people make that mistake because he speaks French. But he’s from Belgium, and that actually becomes a joke throughout the show.

What is the most challenging thing about playing this character?

The most challenging thing for me is getting everything right about him. … For example, he has a limp and he walks with a cane. So it’s making use of that physical attribute, along with making sure that I get the accent right. … I’m a stickler for accents, and if you’re going to do an accent, you’d better do it right. … I’ve actually been working on that quite a bit, just looking up videos on how people speak with a French accent and, in particular, how Poirot would speak with a French accent, since he is Belgian.

What are you most looking forward to about being in this show?

As with any show, I look forward to the group that we work with. We’ve got such a really fantastic group of actors, and [I love] the camaraderie that takes place when you’re putting a show together that is such an ensemble piece. … Yes, Poirot is … supposed to be the main [character], but it doesn’t matter what I do if I don’t have these other people to rely on. … So that’s the part I look forward to the most, is interacting with the other folks on the stage.

Why do you think this is a show that audiences will enjoy now?

I think this show in particular is one that people would enjoy anytime, partly because it is such a well-known show. … I mean, Hercule Poirot and the story itself … are so well-known that it’s almost like visiting an old friend. … I think people will have a good time seeing that, remembering and comparing our show to somebody else’s but also [seeing] the twist that we’re going to add. It’s written by Ken Ludwig, and he added a few twists here and there. … So people [will] enjoy the little changes that he has made to the story.

— Matt Ingersoll

Featured photo: The cast of Murder on the Orient Express, to be performed by the Community Players of Concord. Photo staged by Nora McBurnett.

Find the local roller derby or kickball team to root for, local boxing matches with crowd appeal and the high school and college teams to inspire your young athletes

The thrill of watching a live sporting event does not require a long drive and a big payout.

If you want that “Friday night lights” experience, you can check out a team at your local high school — Hippo sports writer Dave Long has some suggestions for football and men and women’s soccer games worth saving the date for. Or head to a local college to introduce your budding athlete to big-kid basketball, ice hockey and lacrosse games. And remind yourself that sports aren’t just for students by checking out amateur adult competition, from high energy roller derby bouts to an upcoming disc golf tournament.

Time to find your team and start cheering.

Cheer on the home team

Dave Long recommends high school games to delight sports fans & inspire the kids

By Dave Long

[email protected]

One of the great things about the local high school sports season is that it gives those who love to sit outside and watch a game all sorts of options. You can watch a game in the daylight on a beautiful afternoon, or watch under the lights on a Friday night.

Ditto for kids at the beginning of their sports journey. Fall schedules give ample opportunities for them to watch and learn from the big kids — who likely seem like grown-up stars to them — while also giving them room to throw or kick a ball around while the game is going on or at halftime.

Here are some upcoming local games where high schoolers will be competing.

Football — Bishop Guertin at Londonderry, Friday, Oct. 7, 7 p.m. (Londonderry High School, LHS Stadium Field, 295 Mammoth Road in Londonderry)

It’s the defending D1 state champion Lancers taking on the perennially contending Cardinals on a Friday night in Londonderry. The competition for entertainment would have to be pretty good for football fans to pass on this one.

Girls Soccer — Portsmouth at Goffstown, Tuesday, Oct. 11, 4 p.m. (Goffstown High School, 27 Wallace Road in Goffstown, the field behind the school)

This offers a chance to see top-ranked-in-Division 1 Portsmouth in their last local game of 2022.

Boys Soccer — Memorial at Nashua North, Tuesday, Oct. 11, 4 p.m. (Nashua High School North, 8 Titan Way in Nashua)

Our second great boys’ match-up, where two of the top teams in Division 1 square off for the second straight week in Nashua.

Girls Soccer — Oyster River at Hollis-Brookline Saturday, Oct. 15, 11 a.m. (Hollis Brookline High School, 24 Cavalier Court in Hollis)

This must be the year for teams from the coast, as the visitors from Durham sit atop the D2 standings. This game features teams with only one loss between them as they entered October. While the drive out west is nice, out-of-towners may need the GPS to find the field once they get there.

Football — Bedford at Bishop Guertin Saturday, Oct. 15, 6 p.m. (Bishop Guertin High School plays its varsity football games at Stellos Stadium, 7 Stadium Drive in Nashua)

If the first three weeks of 2022 are any indication, this will be an offense-vs.-defense battle. Bedford takes Route 3 to Nashua after giving up just 29 points in its three games, while the Cardinals scored 128 in three wins, which included a 68-3 thumping of Goffstown.

Boys Soccer — Central at Nashua North, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 6 p.m. (Nashua High School North, 8 Titan Way in Nashua)

For the third week in a row we’re in Nashua, this time for Manchester Central’s clash with Nash North.

Boys Soccer — Bedford at Bishop Guertin, Thursday, Oct. 20, 6 p.m. (Bishop Guertin High School plays its varsity soccer games at Stellos Stadium, 7 Stadium Drive in Nashua)

Finally a game outside the Gate City, but it does include one team traveling from there. Given the high level of talent in D-1 it’s hard to say who’ll have the upper hand in the standings. But each team will be trying to cement its seeding for the playoffs ahead.

Girls Soccer — Bishop Guertin at Bedford, Friday, Oct. 21, 4 p.m. (Bedford High School, 47 Nashua Road in Bedford)Arivalry game where both teams are in the thick of the playoff race. Given that, it may not be the last time they see each other, so it could be a playoff preview.

Football — Central at Pinkerton, Friday, Oct. 21, 7 p.m. (at the Pinkerton Academy campus, 5 Pinkerton St. in Derry; the game is played at Memorial Field)

Are you a fan of uniforms? These teams have the two best in the state. At first glance the Astros make you think for a second you’re in Columbus, Ohio, watching Ryan Day’s Buckeyes, while the silver and green of Central just look cool. Then there’s the familiar feeling that it seems like these teams have played each other a million times, many in big games, and this could be another.

Girls Soccer — Playoffs start the week of Thursday, Oct. 27, to Thursday, Nov. 3 at the site of the higher seed.

Boys Soccer — Playoffs start the week of Thursday, Oct. 27, to Thursday, Nov. 3 at the site of the higher seed. With Memorial, Nashua South and Concord looking strong entering November there will likely be action in the three major southern New Hampshire cities.

Football — Souhegan at John Stark, Saturday, Oct. 29, 2 p.m. (John Stark Regional High School, JSR Football Field, 618 North Stark Highway in Weare) This is a game for folks who like high-scoring football, as if the trend continues for the Sabers after scoring 60, 41 and 41 in their 3-0 start that’s what could be in store in each team’s regular season final.

Football — Playoffs in all divisions of football will be getting started Friday, Nov. 4, and end on Saturday, Nov. 12.

Thanksgiving Day football — Not quite the draw it once was, when 10,000 spectators would pack Gill Stadium for the unofficial Manchester city championship contest between the schools with the two best regular season records. But the tradition continues as there are festive mid-morning rivalry games played all over southern New Hampshire on the big day. All offer fun for returning alumni and regular team followers before they scatter to be on time to enjoy turkey and the fixings with family and friends.

Then it’s on to the winter sports season.

Be part of the crowd cheering for student athletes

New Hampshire’s colleges offer inspiration for the next generation of players

By Hannah Turtle

[email protected]

You don’t have to go to a college to be a fan of its teams.

“For the student athletes, they absolutely love playing in front of a larger crowd,” said Eric Coplin, director of athletics communications at Southern New Hampshire University. All regular season Penmen games on campus are free to attend, he said, and most of the teams participate in youth programs, such as camps, that help to connect the Penmen athletes to kids who play those sports in the community. The men’s soccer team, for example, has designated youth soccer nights at most home games — the Oct. 8 game is Manchester North soccer night (find the complete schedule at snhupenmen.com). The kids from those sports programs get to accompany the SNHU players onto the field, Coplin said. The little kids get to see where they could be in 10 or so years and the Penmen get to remember where they came from, he said.

“Our guys feed off that energy,” Coplin said.

Karen Pinkos, head women’s basketball coach for the SNHU Penmen, runs camps in the summer for girls in grades 2 through 9. Penmen players work at the camp, which gives them an opportunity to give back to the community and gives the girls strong confident women to look up to, she said.

When kids come to a women’s basketball game, “they’re going to see [the Penmen team] work hard … work hard in terms of teamwork, working together,” Pinkos said. And, especially for girls watching the women’s team, they get to see these young women being strong.

Many SNHU basketball games are played as double headers, with the men’s games following the women’s games. Pinkos said that over the years some in the crowd have started to come for both games. In the days before Covid, the games also often featured youth groups who would come and play the court at halftime or act as ball girls, which offered more opportunities for players and young fans to interact.

New Hampshire has two NCAA Division I schools — Dartmouth College in Hanover and the University of New Hampshire in Durham. Southern New Hampshire University in Manchester competes at the Division II level, and New England College in Henniker competes at the Division III level.

“It means everything for [student athletes] to represent the state and university and to have fans backing them,” said Mike Murphy, associate athletic director of marketing and communications for UNH. “It’s a real fun time to be out on a college campus and experience what UNH sports are all about.”

New sporting events such as esports (short for electronic sports) have cropped up in recent years for schools to battle each other in various multiplayer video games. Games between schools and tournaments are not usually held in person but can be streamed online via Twitch. To view esports schedules and stream games for SNHU, visit twitch.tv/snhuesports, and for NEC, visit twitch.tv/necesports.

Katelyn Sahagian, Amy Diaz and Matt Ingersoll contributed to this story.

Southern New Hampshire University

Regular season games for Penmen teams on campus are free to attend. See snhupenmen.com

Ice hockey
The SNHU Penmen hold home games at the Ice Den Arena (600 Quality Drive, Hooksett).
• Friday, Oct. 28, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Saint Anselm College
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Post University
• Saturday, Nov. 26, at 1:40 p.m. vs. Tufts University

Men’s basketball
SNHU holds home games at the Stan Spirou Field House (2500 N. River Road, Manchester).
• Tuesday, Nov. 22, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Bentley University
• Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Adelphi University
• Saturday, Dec. 31, at 3:30 p.m. vs. Assumption University

Women’s basketball
SNHU holds home games at the Stan Spirou Field House (2500 N. River Road, Manchester).
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 6 p.m. vs. Saint Anselm College
• Saturday, Nov. 12, at 6 p.m. vs. Dominican University of New York
• Tuesday, Nov. 22, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Bentley University
• Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Adelphi University
• Friday, Dec. 9, 5:30 at p.m. vs. Post University
• Sunday, Dec. 18, at 1 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Saturday, Dec. 31, at 1:30 p.m. vs. Assumption University

Women’s field hockey
SNHU holds home games at the Dr. George J. Larkin Field (2500 N. River Road, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at 4 p.m. vs. Mercy College
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 1 p.m. vs. University of New Haven
• Tuesday, Oct. 25, at 4 p.m. vs. St. Michael’s College
• Saturday, Nov. 5, at 4 p.m. vs. St. Thomas Aquinas College
• Wednesday, Nov. 9, at 6 p.m. vs. American International College

Men’s soccer
SNHU holds home games at Penmen Stadium (Victory Lane, Hooksett)
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 7 p.m. vs. Bentley University
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at 7 p.m. vs. Southern Connecticut State University
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 7 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Tuesday, Oct. 25, at 7 p.m. vs. American International College

Women’s soccer
SNHU holds home games at Penmen Stadium (Victory Lane, Hooksett)
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 4 p.m. vs. The College of Saint Rose
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at 4 p.m. vs. University of New Haven
• Wednesday, Oct. 19, at 6 p.m. vs. Saint Anselm College
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 4 p.m. vs. Pace University

Women’s volleyball
SNHU holds home games at the Stan Spirou Field House (2500 N. River Road, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 1 p.m. vs. American International College
• Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 7 p.m. vs. Saint Anselm College
• Friday, Nov. 4, at 7 p.m. vs. Le Moyne College
• Saturday, Nov. 5, at 1 p.m. vs. The College of St. Rose

Men’s and women’s lacrosse
The season typically runs from February or early March through the end of April. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

Men’s baseball
The season typically runs from February or early March through early June. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

Women’s softball
The season typically runs from February or early March through early May. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

Saint Anselm College

Tickets for Saint Anselm Hawks sporting events are $10 each and available online or at the door. For more information, visit saintanselmhawks.com. Stay tuned for announcements regarding their basketball seasons for the year.

Men’s football
Saint Anselm hosts its football games at Grappone Stadium (100 Saint Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Saturday, Nov. 5, at noon vs. Assumption University

Men’s ice hockey
Saint Anselm hosts its hockey games at the Sullivan Arena (100 Saint Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 29, at 4 p.m. vs. University of Southern Maine
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 7 p.m. vs. Assumption University
• Friday, Dec. 2, at 7 p.m. vs. Southern New Hampshire University

Men’s basketball
Saint Anselm hosts its basketball games at the Stoutenburgh Gymnasium (73 College Road, Manchester).
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 3:30 p.m. vs. Bentley University
• Sunday, Nov. 27, at 1 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 1 p.m. vs. Adelphi University
• Saturday, Dec. 17, at 1 p.m. vs. Jefferson University
• Monday, Dec. 19, at 3 p.m. vs. University of Bridgeport

Women’s basketball
Saint Anselm hosts its basketball games at the Stoutenburgh Gymnasium (73 College Road, Manchester).
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 6 p.m. vs. Southern New Hampshire University
• Sunday, Nov. 13, at 1 p.m. vs. Dominican College
• Wednesday, Nov. 16, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Bentley University
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 1:30 p.m. vs. Adelphi University
• Friday, Dec. 2, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Le Moyne College
• Tuesday, Dec. 6, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Sunday, Dec. 18, at noon vs. Daemen University

Women’s field hockey
Saint Anselm hosts its field hockey games at Grappone Stadium (100 Saint Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 1 p.m. vs. Southern Connecticut State University
• Wednesday, Oct. 19, at 7 p.m. vs. Southern New Hampshire University
• Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 7 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Saturday, Nov. 5, at 5 p.m. vs. Molloy College
• Monday, Nov. 7, at 7 p.m. vs. Assumption University
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 6 p.m. vs. Southern Connecticut State University

Women’s ice hockey
Saint Anselm hosts its hockey games at the Sullivan Arena (100 St. Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Friday, Oct. 7, at 3 p.m. vs. Quinnipiac University
• Friday, Oct. 14, at 7 p.m. vs. Sacred Heart University
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at 3 p.m. vs. Sacred Heart University
• Friday, Oct. 21, at 7 p.m. vs. Long Island University
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 2 p.m. vs. Long Island University
• Friday, Nov. 4, at 7 p.m. vs. Stonehill College
• Saturday, Nov. 12, at 2 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University
• Saturday, Nov. 26, at 4 p.m. vs. Dartmouth College
• Saturday, Dec. 31, at 5 p.m. vs. Merrimack College

Men’s soccer
Saint Anselm hosts its soccer games at Melucci Field (100 St. Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at noon vs. Adelphi University
• Wednesday, Oct. 19, at 3:30 p.m. vs. Franklin Pierce University

Women’s soccer
Saint Anselm hosts its soccer games at Melucci Field (100 St. Anselm Drive, Manchester).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 3 p.m. vs. American International College
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at noon vs. Adelphi University
• Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 3 p.m. vs. Southern Connecticut State University

Men’s and women’s lacrosse
The season typically runs from February or early March through the end of April. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

Rivier University

Tickets to Rivier Raiders events cost $3 for adults (free for children). See rivierathletics.com.

Men’s ice hockey
Hockey games take place at the Conway Arena (5 Stadium Drive, Nashua).
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 7 p.m. vs. SUNY Canton
• Tuesday, Nov. 15, at 7:10 p.m. vs. Southern New Hampshire University
• Friday, Nov. 18, at 7 p.m. vs. SUNY Morrisville
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 7 p.m. vs. Framingham State University
• Tuesday, Dec. 6, at 7:10 p.m. vs. Westfield State University

Women’s ice hockey
Hockey games take place at the Conway Arena (5 Stadium Drive, Nashua).
• Friday, Oct. 28, at 6 p.m. vs. Curry College
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 3:40 p.m. vs. Nichols College
• Saturday, Nov. 26, at 6:20 p.m. vs. Assumption University

Men’s basketball
Basketball games take place at the Muldoon Fitness Center (440 Main St., Nashua).
• Thursday, Nov. 10, at 5 p.m. vs. Lesley University
• Tuesday, Nov. 15, at 7 p.m. vs. Plymouth State University
• Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 7 p.m. vs. UMass Boston
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 3 p.m. vs. Dean College
• Wednesday, Dec. 7, at 7 p.m. vs. Norwich University

Women’s basketball
Basketball games take place at the Muldoon Fitness Center (440 Main St., Nashua).
• Thursday, Nov. 10, at 7 p.m. vs. Nichols College
• Thursday, Dec. 1, at 7 p.m. vs. Framingham State University
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 1 p.m. vs. Dean College
• Wednesday, Dec. 7, at 5 p.m. vs. Norwich University

Men’s soccer
Soccer games take place at Joanne Merrill Field (420 S. Main St., Nashua).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 1 p.m. vs. Anna Maria College
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 3:30 p.m. vs. University of St. Joseph
• Sunday, Oct. 23, at 1 p.m. vs. University of Maine at Presque Isle
• Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Lasell University

Women’s soccer
Soccer games take place at Joanne Merrill Field (420 S. Main St., Nashua).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 3:30 p.m. vs. Albertus Magnus College
• Wednesday, Oct. 12, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Emmanuel College
• Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 5 p.m. vs. Lasell University

Men’s and women’s lacrosse
The season typically runs from February or early March through the end of April or early May. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

New England College

Visit athletics.nec.edu for details on New England College Pilgrims teams.

Men’s ice hockey
Hockey games take place inside the Lee Clement Arena (38 Grove St., Henniker).
• Tuesday, Oct. 25, at 7 p.m. vs. Stonehill College
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 7 p.m. vs. Skidmore College
• Saturday, Nov. 12, at 4 p.m. vs. Castleton University
• Tuesday, Nov. 15, at 7 p.m. vs. Anna Maria College
• Saturday, Nov. 26, at 4:40 p.m. vs. UMass Dartmouth

Women’s ice hockey
Hockey games take place inside the Lee Clement Arena (38 Grove St., Henniker).
• Friday, Oct. 28, at 4 p.m. vs. Neumann University
• Friday, Nov. 4, at 6 p.m., vs. UMass Boston
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 3 p.m. vs. Worcester State University
• Friday, Dec. 2, at 6 p.m. vs. University of Southern Maine
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 3 p.m. vs. Salem State University
• Friday, Dec. 9, at 4 p.m. vs. Chatham University

Men’s basketball
Basketball games take place inside the Bridges Gym (14 Grove St., Henniker).
• Saturday, Nov. 12, at 4 p.m. vs. Lasell University
• Wednesday, Nov. 16, at 7 p.m. vs. Clark University
• Tuesday, Nov. 22, at 7 p.m. vs. Rivier University
• Tuesday, Nov. 29, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Colby-Sawyer College

Women’s basketball
Basketball games take place inside the Bridges Gym (14 Grove St., Henniker).
• Tuesday, Nov. 8, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Husson University
• Tuesday, Nov. 15, at 5 p.m. vs. NVU Johnson
• Tuesday, Nov. 29, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Westfield State University
• Thursday, Dec. 1, at 5:30 p.m. vs. Plymouth State University
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 1 p.m. vs. Mount Holyoke College

Men’s rugby
Rugby games take place at Laurie Cox Memorial Field (121 Western Ave., Henniker).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 1 p.m. vs. Nichols College
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 1 p.m. vs. Merrimack College
• Saturday, Oct. 29, vs. Curry College; time TBA

Women’s field hockey
Field hockey games take place at New England College’s Field House (64 Grove St., Henniker).
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at noon vs. University of Maine Farmington
• Tuesday, Oct. 18, at 7 p.m. vs. Nichols College
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 11 a.m. vs. Husson University
• Saturday, Oct. 29, at 4 p.m. vs. Thomas College

Men’s wrestling
• Friday, Dec. 2 (time TBA) and Saturday, Dec. 3, at 9 a.m., New Standard Corporation Invitational (location TBA)

Women’s rugby
No more home games remain for the 2022 season. Check back on the website for updates.

Men’s and women’s lacrosse
The season typically runs from February or early March through the end of April or early May. See website for updates on the spring 2023 season.

University of New Hampshire

Wildcats hockey home games take place at the Whittemore Center Arena (128 Main St., Durham), while football, soccer and lacrosse games all take place at Wildcat Stadium (155 Main St.). Basketball games take place inside the school’s Lundholm Gymnasium. Tickets vary in priceby sport. To reserve tickets for games, visit unh.edu.

Football
• Saturday, Oct. 8, at 3:30 p.m. vs. Stony Brook University
• Saturday, Oct. 22, at 1 p.m. vs. Elon University
• Saturday, Nov. 12, at 1 p.m. vs. University of Rhode Island

Men’s hockey
• Saturday, Oct. 15, at 7 p.m. vs. Boston College
• Friday, Oct. 21, at 7 p.m. vs. Army at West Point
• Tuesday, Nov. 15, at 7 p.m. vs. Harvard University
• Friday, Nov. 18, at 7 p.m. vs. UMass Amherst
• Friday, Dec. 2, at 7 p.m. vs. Boston University

Women’s hockey
• Friday, Oct. 14, at 6 p.m. vs. Boston University
• Friday, Oct. 21, at 2 p.m. vs. Providence College
• Saturday, Oct. 29, at 2 p.m. vs. College of the Holy Cross
• Friday, Nov. 4, at 6 p.m. vs. Northeastern University
• Friday, Nov. 11, at 5 p.m. vs. Merrimack College
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 2 p.m. vs. Boston College
• Friday, Dec. 2, and Saturday, Dec. 3, at 2 p.m. vs. UConn

Men’s basketball
• Monday, Nov. 7, at 7:30 p.m. vs. Brandeis University
• Sunday, Nov. 20, at 1 p.m. vs. Boston University
• Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 7 p.m. vs. Sacred Heart University
• Monday, Dec. 12, at 7 p.m. vs. St. Joseph’s College of Maine
• Monday, Dec. 19, at 7 p.m. vs. College of the Holy Cross

Women’s basketball
• Monday, Nov. 7, at 5 p.m. vs. Colby-Sawyer College
• Saturday, Nov. 19, at 1 p.m. vs. Northeastern University
• Sunday, Nov. 27, at 1 p.m. vs. Boston University
• Saturday, Dec. 3, at 1 p.m. vs. Stonehill College
• Monday, Dec. 5, at 5 p.m. vs. Wagner College

Play on

Amateur sports offer just as much fun as professional sports

By Katelyn Sahagian

[email protected]

With the advent of fall comes the beginning of several competitive sports seasons. Basketball, football and soccer games, as well as baseball playoffs, will consume fans’ attention. But while these most popular sports have plenty of spectators, there are other sports that are growing in New Hampshire. One of those sports is roller derby.

“[It] started out as the [World Wrestling Entertainment] of women’s contact sports,” said Lily Fritz, a member of the Concord-based Granite State Roller Derby, who has been playing the sport for 10 years. “It was an overly exaggerated production.”

Fritz got her start playing roller derby in California after watching a bout. She said that after the event, she got to talking to some of the players.

When Fritz said she wanted to start, one of the players brushed her off, implying that Fritz’s short stature and slight build would make her a bad player. It was those words, she said, that motivated her to be involved even more.

When Fritz started in 2012, roller derby was still a somewhat cliquey experience, she recalls. But today, she said, the sport is anything but; it’s more inclusive than it’s ever been. There are groups including transgender and nonbinary players as well as co-ed teams, men’s teams and youth teams.

“There’s no judgment,” Fritz said. “You come in [how] you are … and let everything go when you’re out on the track.”

Fritz, whose derby name is “Nor’Eastah,” started playing in Boston but later moved to the West Coast and kept at the sport. In California, she said, it’s hard to visit any town and not find at least one bout going on.

While roller derby is not that pervasive in New Hampshire, it has been around here for a couple decades, and it’s growing in popularity thanks to organizations like Granite State Roller Derby and the Manchester-based New Hampshire Roller Derby.

Jena McClary — known as “Pixie Bruiser” with the New Hampshire Roller Derby — met her husband through roller derby. McClary has been playing for 15 years.

“It’s not just a hobby anymore. It’s become a part of my life,” said McClary, adding that her husband and stepchildren also play, the family always heading out to practice or play in bouts. “Every weekend is something derby.”

McClary said that back in the 1970s and ’80s roller derby was more like professional wrestling as a sport. Often the action would be for show and there would be a predetermined winner. Now the sport has official rules, hits and scoring.

According to Fritz, the goal of a team is for their jammer to lap the blockers and jammer on the other team. Fritz is a jammer on her team and said that it’s common for her to get hit hard, but that’s one of her favorite parts of playing.

McClary advises people new to the sport to do some research. There’s a lot of action at a fast pace; she said it can get confusing for people who are new. Today’s roller derby is “based on the old roller derby of the ’70s when that was popular,” she said, “but they took basics from that and turned it into a real sport,”

“Watch some YouTube videos before you head out,” McClary said.

Fritz said a good way to learn the sport is to talk with players when teams go out for beers and pizza or burgers after a bout.

Another sport in its popularity infancy in New Hampshire is boxing. Julio Peña runs the only golden gloves boxing gym in the state, Thrive Boxing & Martial Arts Center, in Londonderry.

Peña said that he’s one of the few people running any type of boxing shows in the state. His first show, five years ago, was a struggle to get off the ground.

But since then Peña has hosted shows with amateur teens and adults as well as semi-professional matches. One of his students, Jaydell Pazmino, who won his weight class in the New England Golden Gloves competition in 2020, has decided to become a professional.

“Jaydell started his career and in his mind he wants to be a world champ. He came to me when he was 15, and he just turned 21 and has won pretty much everything in New England,” said Peña, adding that the matches are better between amateurs because they are passionate about the sport.

While boxers will throw punches to win rounds, there are strict rules in place to protect a fighter during a match. According to the Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports, boxers will be penalized for intentionally or unintentionally injuring their opponents, and if a match is stopped after the fourth round, the boxer causing the foul will be declared the loser of the match.

Peña said that he wants people to realize that boxing isn’t just about fighting, throwing punches, and knocking heads together. He believes the sport teaches discipline, respect and confidence.

“Sometimes people look at boxing as some low type of sport where you’re just doing violence,” Peña said. “It’s way more than that. The more you know in boxing, the less you fight in the street. Your level of self-confidence goes up because you don’t have to prove anything anymore.”

Pick your team

Find a local team to cheer on at these area amateur sports. Know of a sport that welcomes a cheering crowd not mentioned here? Let us know at [email protected].

Basketball
• New England Sports Center’s Men’s Basketball League
Where: 7 A St., Derry
When: Mondays and Wednesdays, 6 to 11 p.m.
Visit: nesportscenter.com

Bowling
• My Social Sports Co-Ed Bowling League
Where: Yankee Lanes, 216 Maple St., Manchester
When: Mondays; games typically start at either 7 or 8 p.m.
Visit: mysocialsports.leagueapps.com

Boxing
• Thrive Boxing & Martial Arts Center
Where: 109 Hillside Ave, Unit J, Londonderry
When: An amateur night match is coming up at the end of October. More information about it will be posted on the website closer to the event.
Visit: thriveboxinggym.com

Cornhole
• Manchester Sports and Social Club Cornhole League
Where: Murphy’s Taproom, 494 Elm St., Manchester
When: Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays with match start times from 6 to 9 p.m.
Visit: manchesterssc.com

• My Social Sports Cornhole League
Where: Chunky’s Cinema & Pub, 707 Huse Road, Manchester
When: Tuesdays, starting at 6:30 p.m.
Visit: mysocialsports.leagueapps.com

Disc Golf
• Nashua PAL’s Disc Golf Tournament
Where: Birch Park, 11 Baboosic Lake Road, Amherst
When: Saturday, Oct. 8, 9 a.m.
Visit: nashuapal.com

Football
• New England Sports Center’s Men’s Flag Football League
Where: 7 A St., Derry
When: Sundays, 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Visit: nesportscenter.com

Hockey
• Power Play Hockey Southern New Hampshire Men’s League
Where: Locations vary; see website for full schedule
When: Games vary throughout the week, with the regular season running through December
Visit: powerphockey.com
• Power Play Hockey New Hampshire Women’s League
Where: Locations vary; see website for full schedule
When: The season ended in August. The 2023 season will start next May.
Visit: powerphockey.com

Kickball
• Manchester Sports and Social Club Kickball League
Where: Brown & Mitchell Field, 229 W. Mitchell St., Manchester
When: Wednesdays; games start at either 7 or 8 p.m.
Visit: manchesterssc.com

• My Social Sports Co-Ed Kickball League
Where: New Hampshire Sportsdome, 10A Tower Lane, Goffstown
When: Tuesdays starting at 6 p.m.
Visit: mysocialsports.leagueapps.com

Roller Derby
• Granite State Roller Derby
Where: Douglas N. Everett Arena, 15 Loudon Road, Concord
When: Right now, the team is holding rookie training. The roller derby season starts in April.
Visit: granitestaterollerderby.org
• New Hampshire Roller Derby
When: Contact the team through the form on the website. Right now, the team is not having any bouts. The roller derby season starts in the spring
Visit: nhrollerderby.com

Soccer
• New England Sports Center Co-Ed Soccer
Where: 7 A St., Derry
When: Thursdays, 6 to 11 p.m.
Visit: nesportscenter.com

Softball
• Manchester Sports and Social Club Softball League
Where: New Hampshire Sportsdome, 10A Tower Lane, Goffstown
When: Thursdays, game start times are between 7 and 8 p.m.
Visit: manchesterssc.com
• My Social Sports Co-Ed Softball League
Where: West Junior Deb Field, 1 Electric St., Manchester
When: Mondays; times TBA
Visit: mysocialsports.leagueapps.com

Volleyball
• Manchester Sports and Social Club Volleyball League
Where: New Hampshire Sportsplex, 68 Technology Drive, Bedford
When: Wednesdays; game start times are between 5:30 and 6 p.m.
Visit: manchesterssc.com

Featured photo: Courtesy photo.

Manchester’s Red Arrow Diner serves up 100 years of history

PLUS A peek at other area diners

A full century after David Lamontagne opened a lunch cart at 61 Lowell St. in Manchester, his legacy as the founder and original owner of the Red Arrow Diner continues to live on. A free outdoor community celebration will take place on Saturday, Oct. 15, commemorating the 100th anniversary of the original Red Arrow — the event will feature samples of a variety of the diner’s most iconic dishes for a small fee that will benefit Waypoint New Hampshire, along with raffle prizes, games, music, family-friendly activities and an onsite radio broadcast with DJs Nazzy and Marissa of Frank FM.

All year long, to celebrate its 100th year in business, the Red Arrow has been featuring monthly “Diner Dish of the Decade” promotions at each of its four locations, offering special discounts that have corresponded to various menu items that were or became popular during that time. There has also been an ongoing social media campaign highlighting notable moments in the history of Manchester — and the Granite State as a whole — over the past century.

During the block party-style event, Lowell Street between Kosciuszko and Chestnut streets will be closed to traffic. Diner fare is expected to include everything from the Red Arrow’s original “No. 1” hot hamburg sandwich to other eats of yesteryear, like fig squares and coffee Jell-O. American chop suey, tuna rolls and mashed potatoes with gravy will also all be available for sampling.

“The Lamontagne family is coming,” said Carol Lawrence, president and owner of the Red Arrow Diner since 1987. “The quality and the consistency that the Lamontagnes started way back when [is] what we keep striving for. If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t be here. … They are just so happy that it’s still going and still going strong, and I’m very proud of that.”

Throughout the years, the Red Arrow opened and closed multiple locations across the Queen City and other neighboring towns, and has endured everything from devastating fires and wars to, of course, a global pandemic. Here’s a look back on some highlights of the Red Arrow’s rich history that helped shape its now-celebrated status, along with a bonus list of even more southern New Hampshire diners where you can go to satisfy your next comfort food craving.

Humble beginnings

The year was 1922 — the United States was just four years out of World War I, Prohibition was still in effect nationwide and the stock market crash triggering the Great Depression was still seven years away. David Lamontagne — a French-Canadian immigrant who also happened to have a brief three-year run from 1919 to 1921 as a professional boxer — purchased a small shack at 61 Lowell St. and opened it for business on Oct. 9 as a lunch cart. According to a 2020 Yale University research paper the Red Arrow ownership team provided to the Hippo, student Daniel C. Lu writes that this shack would become the foundation for the Red Arrow Diner.

Lu writes that Lamontagne, who came to Manchester to work for the Amoskeag Manufacturing Co. when he was just 12 years old, eventually quit his job and retired as a boxer to work at the shack full-time, becoming the primary caretaker of his family.

“How he got the name Red Arrow, we think, was because at the time there was a Red Arrow Garage next door to the diner,” said Amanda Wihby, co-owner and chief operating officer since 2020. “That’s … as far as we can date back to where the name originated from.”

Lamontagne’s lunch cart proved to be a success, as additional locations would quickly follow. A second lunch cart opened at 39 Lake Ave. in 1925, with a third location arriving at 223 Main St. in Nashua by early 1929 — the latter, Lu writes, was home to the first electronic dishwasher that was installed in the city. A fourth spot, then known as Red Arrow Cafe, soon opened at 1195 Elm St. in Manchester, followed by a fifth restaurant, at 16 W. Merrimack St.

Even back then, the Red Arrow was known for being “always open” and “never closed,” an old advertisement dated March 30, 1929, boasts. An old menu from the 1195 Elm St. location that is now framed at the Red Arrow’s corporate office likely dates back to the 1930s, Lawrence said.

Lu writes that, in its very early years, the Red Arrow was best known for its basic American comfort food with a French-Canadian flair. Most of the sandwiches ranged from 10 to 40 cents a la carte, while the higher-end cost for some of the full-service meals — take, for instance, an “evening special” of grilled filet mignon with a fresh mushroom sauce, complete with sides, a vegetable salad and one’s choice of a drink and a dessert — was $1.25.

“It has always been a pretty big menu, but definitely not as big as it is now,” Lawrence said.

On Nov. 27, 1941, the first of two fires struck the Elm Street restaurant. Lu writes that Lamontagne ended up rebuilding it as a cafeteria, just in time for the United States’ entry into World War II. But a second three-alarm fire on Feb. 15, 1946 — dubbed the “city’s worst accident,” according to the City of Manchester’s website — ultimately destroyed that location.

Instead of rebuilding a second time, Lamontagne decided to open Red Arrow Bakery, which operated at 126 Amory St. on the West Side from 1953 to 1958. Also in the 1950s, Lamontagne was even known to establish and briefly operate his own milk distribution business.

According to a Manchester Union Leader newspaper clipping dated Oct. 2, 1963, Lamontagne sold his successful restaurant chain to University of New Hampshire graduate Kennard H. Lang — just three Red Arrow locations were still open by then, including the one in the original spot at 61 Lowell St. The sale ushered in a new era for the Red Arrow, which would change ownership three more times over the following two decades leading up to Lawrence’s tenure.

Levi’s Red Arrow

Just as David Lamontagne is cemented in Red Arrow Diner history, so is Levi Letendre, who worked at the restaurant for decades before eventually becoming the third overall owner.

At the very end of 1969, following extensive renovation of the 61 Lowell St. space, Letendre and his son, Mark, purchased and re-opened the restaurant as Levi’s Red Arrow, a newspaper clipping from December of that year shows.

Letendre, who was very well-known and connected across the Queen City, was also a longtime familiar face at the Red Arrow. He originally started working there as a cook in 1945, just after the end of the second World War. He then became a counter man at the diner for many years leading up to his ownership status. By 1978, not long after opening the short-lived Red Arrow Restaurant at 197 Wilson St. in Manchester, Letendre retired, but his son Mark would carry on the diner’s tradition as owner for a few more years. After his father’s death in February 1985, Mark decided to sell — Manchester city directory records and newspaper clippings show that Borrome “Bob” Paquet and Didi Harvey became the Red Arrow’s new owners that year.

But this next span of ownership — the fourth overall, and just the third change of hands for the diner in more than six decades up until that point — would prove to be by far the shortest. Even a Union Leaderstory dated Oct. 6, 1986, ran with the ominous headline “Is the Red Arrow Diner history?” after the establishment was allegedly “closed for renovations” for nearly two months. The fifth — and current — leadership team that was established that following year would later prove that, in many ways, the Red Arrow’s lasting legacy was still only just beginning.

National status

Carol Lawrence was just 23 years old when she bought the Red Arrow Diner in September 1987. Growing up in the restaurant business, Lawrence got her start in the industry as a teenager working at Belmont Hall on Grove Street, at the time owned by her father, George.

“I wish that I would’ve known more about the Red Arrow. … We even lived way up on the top of Lowell Street, but I never, ever went in there,” she said. “But then, when I was working there, I realized pretty early on how special the Red Arrow was.”

Lawrence recalls primarily working in the kitchen when she first took over. In her earliest days, the Red Arrow wasn’t yet back to being open 24 hours a day, either.

“We only opened until 2 [p.m.]. I’d get there at 5 in the morning,” she said. “On the specials board, we would put up these crazy things. Like, we had the hash brown special, which is something we just kind of made up and now it’s a staple on the menu. … Anything on the specials board would sell, and I was just amazed by that. That was how our menu got bigger.”

A pivotal point in Lawrence’s career — and consequently in the overall history of the Red Arrow — came in May 1998 when she decided she was going to go “smoke-free,” an action virtually unheard of in New Hampshire restaurants at the time. Lawrence recalls that everyone, even her own father, a local restaurateur in his own right, thought she was crazy for doing so.

“The smoke in there was horrible,” she said. “We had put in two smoke eaters: one where you first walk in the door right up on the ceiling, and then one toward the back. And I mean, it was yellow in there. I would question certain times taking my own kids in there because the smoke was so bad, and I’m not even a smoker. I never have been.”

Her decision to go smokeless stemmed from a 1998 visit from Randy Garbin, writer for Roadside Online and dubbed by Lawrence as a “diner guru.”

“I kind of idolized Randy Garbin … and next thing you know, I get an email from him saying that he visited the diner. He says, ‘I loved the atmosphere, I loved the staff, the food was great … but I will tell you I’ll never be back.’” Lawrence said. “And I go, ‘Well, what the heck does that mean?’ And he said, ‘Because the smoke was just too bad.’ And, he was kind of promoting smoke-free diners, and then he started sharing statistics with me, we talked a lot and I just thought that all of this totally made sense.”

The move turned out to be the right one — but not without immediate repercussions.

“People were so mad, like, it wasn’t even funny,” she said. “I had threats … [and] people were picketing in the early hours out front. So many people swore that they would never come back. It was ridiculous. … But the funny thing was that we started to notice an increase in sales. After a year, I think it was like 19 or 20 percent.”

By September of that year, USA Today, referencing the Red Arrow’s recent switch to going smokeless, named it one of “Top Ten Diners in the Country,” marking one of the first times it was propelled to national prominence. Two years later, in 2000, it was officially named a Manchester city landmark.

As for the Red Arrow’s reputation as a must-visit for political candidates on the campaign trail, Lawrence said that also came into its own during her tenure. This has always been in part due to New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary status, but Lawrence estimates it especially took off around the time of the Merrimack Restaurant’s closure in 2008.

“[The Merrimack Restaurant] was right on the corner of Merrimack and Elm streets,” she said. “All of the political people were going there … and then when they closed, they just started coming to the Red Arrow, and they’ve been coming ever since.”

Today, patrons at the 61 Lowell St. Red Arrow have included everyone from Presidents Obama, Trump and Biden to various celebrities with local ties, including Sarah Silverman, Seth Meyers and, of course, Adam Sandler, who used to frequent the diner with his dad.

The tradition continues

By the mid-2000s, George Lawrence retired as owner of Belmont Hall, selling it to his daughter — and Carol’s sister — Cathy, and dividing his time between New Hampshire and Florida.

“He says, ‘I’m sick and tired of riding a golf cart down in Florida. Let’s open another Red Arrow,’” Carol Lawrence said, “and that was how we bought Milford.”

On the Milford Oval, the Red Arrow operated from October 2008 to its closure in late 2019. A third location would open in February 2015 in Londonderry — Wihby noted that’s where all of the diner’s scratch-made desserts are now prepared — followed by a fourth, in Concord, in the summer of 2017. In early May 2020, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Red Arrow opened its largest spot in Nashua in the site of a former Friendly’s restaurant. Taking advantage of the onsite drive-thru window, this location started operating on a takeout-only model. Even today, all four Red Arrow Diners continue to utilize online ordering, a revenue stream Lawrence never thought they would have or benefit from.

One hundred years strong, the original site of the Red Arrow Diner at 61 Lowell St. may have undergone numerous changes, but Lawrence said there’s one important factor that has remained the same. It has not only kept the Red Arrow alive and kicking, but remains a staple for diners both across New Hampshire and the United States.

“Anywhere you go, the diner is the focal point of the community,” she said. “You get all walks of life that come in. You can sit there and be next to a city worker or a lawyer, and then there’s a doctor over there. … You just get to talk to such a variety of people.”

Mya Blanchard contributed to this story.

More nostalgic eats at NH’s diners

In addition to the iconic Red Arrow Diner, New Hampshire offers diner fans several places to stop for a cup of coffee and a classic meal. Here are some of the diners across southern New Hampshire, focusing on the establishments with the word “diner” in their name. Do you know of a diner in the Manchester, Nashua or Concord areas that isn’t on this list? Let us know at [email protected].

Airport Diner
2280 Brown Ave., Manchester, 623-5040, thecman.com/airport-diner
Hours: Daily, 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Established in 2005, the Airport Diner gets its name for its close proximity to Manchester-Boston Regional Airport. It’s one of several eateries owned by The Common Man Family.
Specialty of The House: The Airport Diner’s acclaimed tuna melt features Albacore tuna, tomatoes and Swiss cheese all on grilled Parmesan bread.
Most Decadent Dessert: Try the diner’s house peanut butter pie, featuring a graham cracker crust, creamy peanut butter, hot fudge and whipped cream.

Allenstown Country Diner
85 Allenstown Road, Suncook, 210-2191, find them on Facebook @allenstowncountrydiner
Hours: Monday, and Wednesday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Saturday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m., and Sunday 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Theresa Gelinas opened the Allenstown Country Diner in May 2015 with the help of several friends, her two daughters Sonya and Kristy and her son-in-law Josh. The diner is currently open six days a week for breakfast and lunch, featuring a menu of omelets, waffles, pancakes and French toast, plus drinks like pineapple orange or cranberry orange mimosas, and several flavors of house bloody marys.
Specialty of The House: House specials include the steak and eggs, featuring 10-ounce grilled sirloin steak with two eggs and toast; and the country breakfast, featuring two eggs and sausage on a buttermilk biscuit, topped with house sausage gravy.

Casey’s Diner
13 Plaistow Road, Plaistow, 382-3663, caseysdinernh.com
Hours: Monday through Saturday, 5:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., and Sunday, 5:45 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Casey’s Diner has been in business for more than two decades, serving home-cooked breakfasts and lunches seven days a week, along with daily specials.
Specialty of The House: Try the changeup scrambler, featuring three eggs scrambled with your choice of an omelet filling, melted cheese, toast and your choice of home fries, baked beans, hash browns or fruit.

Charlie’s Homestyle Diner
598 Daniel Webster Hwy., Merrimack, 262-5693, charlieshomestylediner.com
Hours: Monday through Wednesday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Thursday through Saturday, 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Known for its home-cooked breakfasts and lunches, Charlie’s Homestyle Diner also offers customized catering. On Fridays they’ll serve fresh haddock, while on Sundays they’ll serve breakfast only.
Specialty of The House: Try their poutine, made with hand-cut french fries, Canadian curd cheese and brown gravy on top.
Most Decadent Dessert: Charlie’s Homestyle Diner serves a baklava sundae, featuring their own homemade baklava with vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce.

The Derry Diner
29 Crystal Ave., Derry, 434-6499, find them on Facebook @thederrydiner
Hours: Monday, Tuesday, Friday and Saturday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Sunday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Breakfast and lunch are served five days a week at this neighborhood diner in Derry.
Specialty of The House: Comfort meal specials are served from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. — recent options have included open-faced meatloaf sandwiches, hot veggie and cheese wraps with fries, and chicken Parm with garlic toast and a cup of soup.
Most Decadent Dessert: Homestyle pumpkin pie has been a recent featured dessert.

The D.W. Diner
416 Daniel Webster Hwy., Merrimack, 424-1116, thedwdinertogo.com
Hours: Daily, 6 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
This Merrimack diner is known for serving up home-cooked breakfasts and lunches seven days a week.
Specialty of The House: Diner favorites include the hash and eggs, served with toast; the biscuits and sausage gravy, served with home fries, hash browns and homemade baked beans; and a specialty quiche of the day.
Most Decadent Dessert: Try the Belgian waffle sundae, topped with whipped cream and your choice of strawberry or chocolate sauce.

Frankie’s Diner
63 Union Square, Milford, 554-1359, find them on Facebook @frankiesdinermilford
Hours: Wednesday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Saturday, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
This Union Square diner is named in tribute to the late Frankie Bobola, a lifelong restaurateur who got his start in the industry in 1962 and whose career spanned decades before his death in 2018. His family also continues to run Bobola’s Family Restaurant, which has locations in Nashua and Dracut, Mass., as well as Stonecutters Pub, also in Milford.
Specialty of The House: House favorites at Frankie’s Diner include the roasted stuffed turkey dinners, the shepherd’s pie and the marinated steak tips.

Hanna’s Diner
83 Henniker St., Hillsborough, 464-3575, find them on Facebook @hannasdinernh
Hours: Monday, 6 a.m. to noon, Wednesday through Saturday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Formerly known as the Hillsborough Diner, Hanna’s is a classic spot known in town for serving freshly home-cooked breakfasts and lunches.
Specialty of The House: Try the Hillbilly, featuring two biscuits topped with Hanna’s sausage gravy, two patties, two hash browns, two eggs and cheese.
Most Decadent Dessert: A special pie of the day is always available, served with whipped cream.

Joey’s Diner
1 Craftsman Lane, Amherst, 577-8955, joeysdiner.com
Hours: Sunday through Thursday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Joey’s Diner serves breakfast all day as well as lunch and dinner options in a retro, 1950s setting.
Specialty of The House: Sticking with the 1950s theme, on the menu is the “Elvis Presley Breakfast,” featuring two eggs made any style with corned beef hash, home fries, toast and your choice of bacon, ham or sausage.
Most Decadent Dessert: Among their variety of desserts are xangos, or fried cheesecake chimichangas.

Margie’s Dream Diner
172 Hayward St., Manchester, 627-7777, margiesdreamdiner.com
Hours: Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Saturday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Calling itself “Manchester’s Best Kept Secret,” Margie’s Dream Diner is a great place to stop for breakfast or lunch and to enjoy Greek specialties.
Specialty of The House: At Margie’s Dream Diner you’re sure to find something you like. Their wide array of omelets and eggs Benedicts include the Southern Benedict, featuring poached eggs on freshly baked golden biscuits topped with a homemade sausage gravy.

Market Place Diner
4 Market Place, Hollis, 465-3209, marketplacediner.com
Hours: Daily, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Located in the village of Market Place in Hollis, this family-friendly diner serves up home-cooked breakfasts and lunches seven days a week.
Specialty of The House: Recent fall specials have included pumpkin nut pancakes and caramel apple waffles. Other menu specialties include omelets, pancakes, French toast, crepes, burgers and sandwiches.

MaryAnn’s Diner
29 E. Broadway, Derry, 434-5785; 4 Cobbetts Pond Road, Windham, 965-3066; 3 Veterans Memorial Parkway, Salem, 893-9877; maryannsdiner.com
Hours: Derry’s location is open Monday through Saturday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Windham’s location is open daily, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Salem’s location is open Monday through Wednesday, 6 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Thursday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Friday, 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Saturday, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., according to the website.
Originally opened in Derry in 1989, MaryAnn’s Diner now has two additional locations in Windham and Salem — all three are known for their home-cooked meals in a cozy, nostalgic setting.
Specialty of The House: MaryAnn’s Diner’s top hits include their marinated black raspberry barbecue steak tips, served with two eggs, toast and home fries.
Most Decadent Dessert: The dessert menu includes grapenut custard, a slightly sweetened egg custard laced with nutmeg and cinnamon with Grape Nuts cereal.

Moe Joe’s Country Diner
649 E. Industrial Park Drive, Manchester, 641-2993, eatatmoejoe.com
Hours: Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Saturday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m., and Sunday 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Diner favorites at Moe Joe’s include a meatloaf dinner and macaroni and cheese, with garlic bread and your choice of Buffalo chicken, diced ham or chourico (Portuguese pork sausage).
Specialty of The House: Moe Joe’s offers a Portuguese burger that’s topped with linguica, onions and peppers, all on a Portuguese muffin.
Most Decadent Dessert: Sweet items include frappes in a variety of flavors, including vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, coffee or mocha.

Murphy’s Diner
516 Elm St., Manchester, 792-4004, find them on Facebook @murphysdinernh
Hours: The diner is currently open Friday through Sunday, 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Founded by local restaurateur Keith Murphy of Murphy’s Taproom, this diner is directly adjacent to the eatery’s Manchester location on Elm Street. A sister establishment, known as Murphy’s Taproom & Carriage House, opened in Bedford in 2017.
Specialty of The House: Try the Captain Crunch French toast, the signature French toast dish at Murphy’s Diner that’s rolled in Captain Crunch cereal and topped with powdered sugar.

Northwood Diner
1335 First New Hampshire Turnpike, Northwood, 942-5018, find them on Facebook @northwooddinernh
Hours: Monday through Saturday, 5 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Sunday, 5 a.m. to noon
Breakfast is served all day at the Northwood Diner, with a menu that includes Benedicts, waffles, eggs, pancakes and more.
Specialty of The House: Try the steak and eggs, featuring six ounces of freshly cut Delmonico steak cooked to order, with home fries, toast and two eggs cooked any style.
Most Decadent Dessert: Pies, cakes and assorted pastries are baked fresh daily, with a rotating offering of selections.

Ober Easy Diner
416 Emerson Ave., Hampstead, 329-3430, obereasy.com
Hours: Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Saturday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Sunday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m. (breakfast only on Sundays)
Formerly known as Christina’s Country Cafe, this eatery assumed new ownership in January 2019 and was later renamed Ober Easy Diner after owners Susan and Tim Ober. Breakfast is served all day, including exclusively on Sundays, with a menu featuring Benedicts, omelets, sandwiches and more. For lunch, there are salads, sandwiches, burgers and soups.
Specialty of The House: Try the Western scrambler, featuring two eggs scrambled with peppers, onions, ham and cheddar cheese, served with toast on the side.
Most Decadent Dessert: Try the Belgian waffle banana split, featuring a house Belgian waffle topped with one scoop of vanilla ice cream, bananas, strawberries, chocolate syrup and whipped cream.

Poor Boy’s Diner
136 Rockingham Road, Londonderry, 432-8990, poorboysdiner.com
Hours: Monday through Saturday, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Stop in to Poor Boy’s Diner for a home-cooked breakfast, lunch, or dinner in a welcoming environment.
Specialty of The House: Grilled pork chops with applesauce on the side are among the menu staples.
Most Decadent Dessert: Dessert specials vary at Poor Boy’s Diner, the most recent being a sweet pumpkin pie just in time for fall.

The Red Arrow Diner
61 Lowell St., Manchester, 626-1118; 137 Rockingham Road, Londonderry, 552-3091; 112 Loudon Road, Concord, 415-0444; 149 Daniel Webster Hwy., Nashua, 204-5088; redarrowdiner.com
Hours: According to its website, the Manchester location is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The Londonderry and Nashua locations are open daily, 5:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. The Concord location is open Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, 5:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, 5:30 a.m. to midnight (temporarily closed on Mondays).
Established in Manchester in October 1922, The Red Arrow Diner is now an institution that reaches visitors far beyond the Granite State. For decades, it’s been known as a popular campaign stop for presidential candidates and other politicians. In 2000 it was named a city landmark.
Specialty of The House: The Red Arrow is known for its weekly Blue Plate specials, featuring home-cooked items like pork pie, lasagna, meat loaf, haddock and more.
Most Decadent Dessert: Freshly baked desserts are available all day long. Options include whoopie pies, cheesecakes, fruit pies, double layer cakes and Dinah fingers (think Twinkies).

The Red Barn Diner
113 Elm St., Manchester, 623-9065, redbarndinernh.com
Hours: Daily, 5 a.m. to 3 p.m., according to its website.
The Red Barn is a small nostalgic diner in an old train car, serving items like Angus beef, handcrafted original burgers and handcrafted desserts since 1930.
Specialty of The House: One of their original burgers is the Barn Burger, a cheeseburger topped with bacon, lettuce, tomato, grilled onions and the diner’s special Red Barn sauce.
Most Decadent Dessert: The Red Barn has all kinds of decadent homemade desserts, ranging from chewy brownie sundaes to fluffy strawberry shortcake.

Route 104 Diner
752 Route 104, New Hampton, 744-0120, thecman.com/route-104-diner
Hours: Sunday through Thursday, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Like its sister establishments, the Airport Diner and the Tilt’n Diner, the Route 104 Diner is owned by The Common Man Family, serving traditional home-cooked meals in a nostalgic 1950s-style setting.
Specialty of The House: Homestyle classics include the fried chicken and waffles, featuring a house-made Belgian waffle that’s topped with golden-fried, hand-breaded chicken tenders and served with your choice of New Hampshire maple syrup or white country gravy.
Most Decadent Dessert: Sweeter indulgences include cakes, pies, grapenut custard, bread pudding and The Common Man’s own ice cream available in five flavors.

Stubby’s Diner
26 Old Manchester Road, Candia, 483-5581, find them on Facebook
Hours: Monday through Saturday, 6 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Breakfast is served all day at Stubby’s, with a menu that includes Benedicts, omelets, sandwiches and more. For lunch, there are several burgers, sandwiches, soups and sides to choose from.
Specialty of The House: Try the Humongous Trashcan, a ham and cheese omelet with onions, peppers, chili, mushrooms and tomatoes. It’s served with toast, home fries or beans.

Suzie’s Diner
76 Lowell Road, Hudson, 883-2741, suziesdiner.com
Hours: Monday through Sunday, 5:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Suzie’s Diner, established in 1999, serves breakfast every day of the week, in addition to lunch starting at 11 a.m.
Specialty of The House: Each weekday, Suzie’s features a different lunch special, like fried clam strips, roast beef, steak quesadillas, meatloaf and jumbo shrimp scampi.
Most Decadent Dessert: Sweeter indulgences include an Oreo-filled waffle, topped with whipped cream, Oreo cookies and an Eclair ice cream bar.

Temple Street Diner
200 Temple St., Nashua, 521-7133, find them on Facebook
Hours: Daily, 6 a.m. to 3 p.m., according to its Facebook page
Temple Street Diner is known for serving breakfast and lunch seven days a week. A sister food truck known as The Roadside Diner is operating on Fridays and Saturdays, from 3:30 to 8 p.m., throughout October.
Specialty of The House: Favorites include lobster rolls, fried seafoods, chowders and other homemade specials.

Tilt’n Diner
61 Laconia Road, Tilton, 286-2204, thecman.com/tilt-n-diner
Hours: Daily, 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Tilt’n Diner, which opened in 1992, is one of three nostalgic diner establishments owned and operated by The Common Man Family. It has been called a “must stop” on the New Hampshire presidential primary campaign trail by The Associated Press, according to its website, and is also a popular stop for visitors of the annual Laconia Motorcycle Week or the next NASCAR race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon.
Specialty of The House: The diner offers several classic comfort food favorites, like baked shepherd’s pie, meatloaf, frappes and house-made pies.
Most Decadent Dessert: Try the classic bread pudding, which features a maple syrup glaze, or the chocolate, peanut butter or coconut cream pies.

Featured photo: Levi Letendre (right) owned the diner during the 1970s, then known as Levi’s Red Arrow. Photo by Patrick “P.J.” Audley, likely taken around 1976 (with added color on the cover).

A look at the popular sport where community is key

By Katelyn Sahagian

[email protected]

After getting a quick set of stretches in, friends Jessee Tardif and Meghan Richard write their names in separate squares of the free play boxes.

The two women are among the youngest of the pickleball players who gathered at Fields Grove in Nashua, but that fact doesn’t faze them in the slightest.

“I learned how to play a few years ago from a next-door neighbor, but I just started playing more regularly,” Richard said. “This is my third time back this week.”

This group meets every day at 9 a.m. and plays until noon. Instead of arriving with a doubles partner, players arrive with friends but play with whomever is present, often choosing different courts. This system of setting up games is called open play.

Pickleball, a sport invented less than a century ago, has taken southern New Hampshire by storm, with courts popping up all over the state’s public parks, tennis clubs and town recreation centers. It’s played on a court made from the same material as a tennis court — the players all have paddles that are reminiscent of ping-pong paddles, but much larger, while the ball itself is a plastic wiffle ball that is much slower than a traditional tennis ball.

While the game can be played in singles, it’s most often played in doubles. Each half of the court has three sections, a left and right zone and the no-volley zone, colloquially called the kitchen.

Pickleball versus tennis: the key differences
While pickleball was partially based on tennis, the rules differ in a few ways, according to the USA Pickleball Association. A full list of rules can be found at usapickleball.org.
• Points are scored only by the team serving
• The way a game is won is the team gets at least 11 points total, but must win by a difference of two points
• There is a “no-volley zone” called the kitchen, where players cannot stand when hitting the ball
• One server serves until they make a mistake that results in the stop of play, called a fault
• The second member of the team will serve until their team causes a fault
• All serves must be underhand
• There is a two-bounce rule, meaning the serve must result in a bounce to the receiver and the receiver must bounce the ball back to the serving team before points can be scored

Bob Hanek, one of the original members of the Nashua Pickleball Club, said that the game is meant to be social in nature. To demonstrate his point, he gestures to players hanging around the picnic benches next to the courts. Players mingle and chat, sipping water and eating light snacks, while watching friends they’ve made from the sport play.

“That makes it very, very positive because not only are you getting out, you’re doing some exercise, you’re developing a skill, but there’s people all around you to talk to,” Hanek said.

Players who are more serious about the sport tend to gravitate toward certain parks, Hanek said. He added that, in his opinion, the game was invented to be a way for people to have fun and get to make new friends.

West Coast origins

Pickleball was originally created in 1965 by three fathers from Washington state who were looking for a summer activity to entertain their active kids, according to information online from the USA Pickleball Association, the national governing body of the sport. The game has since taken off, gaining professional leagues across America — in March of this year, it was even declared the official state sport of Washington by Gov. Jay Inslee.

The sport had been played in every U.S. state by 1990, but its popularity didn’t start spiking until the mid-2010s, Hanek said. While he wasn’t a founding member, he joined the Nashua Pickleball Club before it even had a regular court to play at.

The public club in Nashua was started in 2013 by Doug Price and about 30 of his close friends. Price approached the city’s Parks and Recreation department, asking if they could use beat up and unused tennis courts for pickleball. Price and his friends fixed, cleaned and painted the old tennis courts, transforming them into pickleball courts.

“There’s an old park down in Fields Grove with a tennis court that nobody ever uses,” Price remembers his contact at the Parks and Recreation department saying. “Over the course of two or three years, [he] helped us get to where we are today.”

Price, a snowbird who spends half the year in Sarasota, Florida, started the group to continue playing his favorite sport in the summer months. Nearly a decade later, the group is now at more than 450 members.

Price said he never imagined that so many people would want to join and pick up a game. He has been so influential to the sport in Nashua that the city’s Parks and Recreation department named the courts at Field Grove after him.

“And so unbeknownst to me, they present me with that,” Price said as he pointed to the sign that hangs on the court’s chain link fencing. “This is our first home and everybody loves it here.”

Public parks with pickleball courts
• Barnard Park, South Mast Street, Goffstown
• Beaver Meadow Park, 42 Sewalls Falls Road, Concord
• Bedford Parks and Recreation, Nashua Road, Bedford
• Fields Grove, Fields Street, Nashua
• Foss Field, 88 Lehner St., Wolfeboro
• Hudson Community Center, 12 Lions Ave., Hudson
• Hudson Outdoor Pickleball Courts, 8 Melendy Road, Hudson
• Laconia Community Center (indoor venue), 306 Union Ave., Laconia
• Prout Park, 284 Young St., Manchester
• South Mill Pond Playground, Junkins Avenue, Portsmouth
• Stevens Park, 68 Bunker Hill Ave., Stratham

How pickleball got so popular

Denise Cascio Bolduc had first heard of pickleball at a professional women’s tennis event in 2019. She said that she and some of her friends tried the game and, from then on, she became hooked.

“It’s one of those activities that doesn’t feel like you’re getting exercise,” Bolduc said. “This just feels like fun. The fact that you’re getting exercise and burning calories is a huge bonus.”

She was surprised that there weren’t many places to play in the Manchester area, so she decided to change that. This led her to helping set up Rock On Pickleball. Bolduc became the founding president of the club, which now practices at Rock Rimmon Park in Manchester.

While she has since parted ways with the group, Bolduc still plays the sport. She just won two gold medals in Wolfeboro for the Pickleball All Stars tournament earlier this month.

Today, she continues to run a much more informal group at Prout Park in Manchester, and is the contact person for the courts at the park.

Bolduc isn’t the only tennis player to switch over to pickleball. Hanek said that many pickleball players have played other racquet sports in the past, and experience with tennis and badminton makes pickleball easier to pick up.

Hanek said he likes pickleball because the style of play isn’t as aggressive as tennis. He said that it’s a game of placement, not a game that requires players to plow through their opponent. In many ways, he said, the rules require some collaboration between the opposite sides. Things like the two-bounce rule and being responsible for calling one’s own fouls keep players responsible.

“I think that’s the magic [of] this,” Hanek said. “It’s social enough and it’s collaborative enough so that you don’t really feel bad being punished for your mistakes.”

Part of what makes pickleball special to Hanek is the camaraderie that forms. He said there is a focus on socialization that is lacking in other sports. Pickleball, especially open-play, means that there’s a limited number of courts, and an unlimited number of payers.

It’s a simple game to play, Hanek said — but to him, that isn’t why it’s so popular.

“It’s a multigenerational game,” he said. “Everyone of different abilities can play.”

Hanek said that he has shared the court with a three-generation family of players: a grandfather, son and 12-year-old grandson.

Hannah Turtle contributed to this cover story.

Where to play organized pickleball

There are groups and free-play options across southern New Hampshire. Visit places2play.org to find additional locations.

Bow Brook Club
Where: 144 Warren St., Concord
Membership: Full membership costs range from $650 to $720 annually, and associate membership costs range from $350 to $400 annually (members must be 21 years of age or older)
Visit: bowbrook.club

Executive Health & Sports Center
Where: 1 Highlander Way, Manchester
When: Half of the basketball court is available for open pickleball play on Sundays, from 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., and on Mondays, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Call 668-4753 to book court time outside of open pickleball hours.
Visit: ehsc.com/pickleball

Exeter Recreation Park Pickleball Pickup Program
Where: 4 Hampton Road, Exeter (games take place on the tennis courts)
When: Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, from 7 to 10 a.m., and Wednesdays, from 6 p.m. to dusk
Cost: $5 per person per session
Visit: exeternh.gov/recreation/adult-18-pickleball-pick

Health Club of Concord
Where: 10 Garvins Falls Road, Concord
Hours: Monday through Friday, 5 a.m. to 8 p.m., Saturday, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Visit: healthclubofconcord.com

New England Pickleball Club
Where: 6 Airfield Drive, Rye
Hours: Weekdays, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., and weekends, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Cost: $12 per hour
Visit: nepclub.com

Rock Rimmon Park Pickleball Courts
Where: Rock Rimmon Park, 264 Mason St., Manchester
When: The Rock On Pickleball Club plays every day at 8 a.m.
Contact: Nicole Mendola, 714-8394

YMCA of Downtown Manchester
Where: 30 Mechanic St., Manchester
When: Monday through Friday, 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., and Saturday 8 to 10 a.m.; also offered from 1 to 3 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and from 6 to 8 p.m. on Tuesdays.
Visit: graniteymca.org

Featured photo: Apple Hill Farm in Concord. Courtesy photo.