The Planning Board’s hearing of the VAC plans was delayed, and the Valley News gave the sense that some town residents wanted the Board to step outside its role and begin acting as an architectural review commission. But approval was not seriously in doubt when the hearing did take place (The Dartmouth, Valley News).

Town residents’ opposition seems to be consistently varied: some say the building is too urban, some not urban enough (or is inconsistent with the new-urbanist town plan). Some say it is too modern, some say it is not modern (or original) enough. The most interesting quote in the VN story is the criticism that the building is “a shameless copy of architecture that has existed in this country for decades.” Those words are usually used against traditional styles such as neo-Georgian (sometimes “pseudo-Georgian”) architecture as seen in buildings like Brewster Hall, which is being demolished for the Visual Arts Center.

In February, DHMC postponed plans for new buildings, including the C. Everett Koop Medical Science Complex, but not the offsite Outpatient Surgery Center (2008-2010, SBRA) (Dartmouth Medicine; press release; mention in Vermont Today). The building presents an interesting study in urbanism: instead of adding the needed operating rooms to its existing medical complex, the hospital is placing them in a freestanding low-rise building very near by, either because the main hospital has run out of space (!) or because surgeons in training need an experience like that of a private practice.

An aerial film made for promotional purposes shows the campus nicely.

An oral history of Dartmouth in World War II is available from the archives.

UPNE has published The Great River about the Connecticut River (UPNE, Valley News).

A photograph from this website showing Yale’s Book & Snake temple is the frontispiece in Stephen White’s new novel The Siege, set at Yale University.

The state of Samson Occom’s grave in New York is lamented in The Dartmouth.