The Fremont Area Chamber of Commerce invites the public to the Jingle Mingle Arts & Crafts Fair. The fair will be held on Saturday, November 11th from 9 am to 3 pm at the Fremont Middle School at 500 Woodrow Street. Organizers say that attendees will find many unique handmade gifts and crafts. A few of the vendors that have already registered are hand painted holiday ornaments, illustrated children’s books, hand crafted jewelry, soy candles, leather earrings, ceramics, handmade soaps and lotions, aprons, handmade pillowcases, fabric pumpkins, repurposed Vintage lamps, wood craft Christmas décor, mittens, quilted items, knitted bags, tumblers, wool hats and resin art, clothing for American Girl dolls, quilted items, local honey, chainsaw wood carvings and Michigan themed shirts and jewelry are just a few of the booths that you will find at the show. The “hot selling” item this year is crocheted animals and there will be a few vendors selling these as well! Organizers look to find unique handmade craft items to offer our shoppers for their holiday gift giving.  Fresh baked goodies, candies, peanut brittle, freeze dried candies, tamales, dips and spices, jams and jellies will be offered for purchase as well. Many of the shopper’s favorites will be there too! – Jane Lee’s Glazed Popcorn, the homemade butter cakes and St. Mark’s Episcopal Church’s cheeseballs! Pam’s Pantry with her dips to help make all your party treats taste fantastic will also have her usual corner so stop by! Holly, the “Candy Lady”, will be set up also! Enjoy lunch while you are at the Jingle Mingle. There will be other food vendors with a variety of food for everyone to enjoy. Two Hot Tamales will be there serving Mexican food, Dodgers Doggies will have hot dogs and our local boy scouts are offering pizza too with other food options for you as well! The Fremont Middle School is located at 500 Woodrow Street, Fremont. Easy directions to get there from Main Street are turn south on Gerber Avenue, which is the corner where Pizza Hut is located, follow Gerber south and it will turn into Woodrow and Fremont Middle School will be located on the south side of the street. Come start your holiday shopping early at the 2023 Jingle Mingle Arts & Crafts Fair! We look forward to seeing you there! 
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   The Haunted Heritage Museum Fundraiser is back! The Heritage Museum of Newaygo County, located in downtown Newaygo at the intersection of 37 north and Quarterline Road, is excited to announce the return of our popular haunted Museum, which we will host for the first time since 2019, and the first time in our new building! The event has a low admission price of $5 a head, or $20 dollars for groups of 5 or more, and all proceeds go to supporting our mission and improving the event for future years. A big group of volunteers have been working on decorating the museum for the past several weeks. This year, we will be splitting the museum into two different sections: One geared towards children, with a bright and colorful room with activities like face painting, coloring, a feel station with “eyes”, “brains”, and the like, and other fun spooky activities, and of course, lots of candy and goodies! The other haunted side is up to the parent’s discretion, as it is geared more towards the “adult” scary side of Halloween. We cannot thank our dedicated group of volunteers enough for the months of planning and the long hours put in to transform our space! In the past, we have had different scary scenarios in place, all done with the help of our amazing volunteers. The old building, with its long hallways, multiple small rooms, and natural maze-like structure, along with the dark and dated ambiance, lent itself well to a haunted museum. Our new facility, with its bright, modern colors, and spacious high-ceilinged rooms, proved to be a bit more of a challenge. Due to our innovative modular exhibit system, we were able to condense the exhibits down to a quarter of the gallery, so that visitors during the month of October were able to still enjoy our primary exhibits on topics such as the Fur Trade, Native American contributions, the Logging Era, Farming, and Tourism. This left the remaining three quarters of the vast room to be made over as a haunted Museum. A series of spooky rooms are anchored by scene setters using the mobile and collapsible wall systems developed by Armstrong Display Concepts, Inc., which is headquartered in Newaygo. With different graphics, these are in use during our regular operations as a way to separate the various exhibits, and they were easily and quickly converted to set the mood for a cemetery, a haunted gothic chapel, an abandoned hospital, and the edge of a field at night. After consultation with our artifact review committee and staff, we decided to utilize many items in the Museums extensive collections as “props.” Great care was taken when using these objects to ensure that they would not be harmed any more than may happen in the normal course of being on display in an exhibit. The use of objects from the collections add greatly to the unsettling feeling we were able to create for our visitors. As we are now fully operational in our new building, and very proud of it, we are hoping to hold this event annually as a way to raise awareness of our essential role in the community and to help raise the funds so vital to our operations through community support. Both sections will be $5 per person or $20 for groups of five and up. We will be open for two nights, Friday October 27th and Saturday October 28th from 6pm to 9pm. We look forward to seeing you all for a frightfully good time! 
  Fremont's Equestrian team came home with a 4th place finishn L-R Madison Andres, Ava Baker, Riley Chase, Hailey Thompsen, and Chloe Paulsen Story and photos by Georgia Andres Every once in a while a coach gets a chance to be around Greatness! Here at Fremont High School we are experiencing greatness. The Fremont Equestrian Team has talent, they’re smart, kind, trustworthy, honest, sweet, beautiful inside and out, and so many more positive characteristics. To be in their presence was so fun and exciting and to be honest there is nothing they cannot do. For the first time in decades, the Fremont Senior Equestrian Team was strong in every area of competition. Throughout District and Regional competition the team demolished their competition, and were awarded an invitation to compete at the Michigan Interscholastic Horsemanship Association state finals. The secret to their 2023 team success was the love and care for each other above themselves. They worked as a unit dispatching their competition. If one of them had an off class their partner won it for them and they celebrated success as a team. It was great fun to watch and be around as a Coach. We got to Midland on Wednesday October 11 to compete in the MIHA state Championship and by the end of the competition Sunday, the team won itself a fourth place finish. The fourth place finish was the highest placing that Fremont had ever received since they started competing in 1992. As coach it was a huge win for them and the three graduating seniors competed in the State Championship three of their four years, again something Fremont has never done before this group of Equestrians. The level of Equestrian skill is unmatched in this area. As Coach I am pleased with the final outcome and proud of the citizens and competitors we have had the chance to mentor this year.  he three seniors Left to Right-Holding the 2020- region and district champions- Victoria Ekkel, 2021 reserve district and reserve region champions-Chole Paulsen, and the 2023 district and regional champion trophies-Madison Andres  By Charles Chandler Publisher’s Note: Mr. Chandler has been contributing to the pages of NNN since its humble beginnings 7+ years ago. Possessing a keen eye for film as well as a discerning outlook toward life in out bipeninsular paradise, Mr. Chandler’s writings are always well received by his substantial readership as well as by the staff of N3World Headquarters. Enjoy, as we have. Let the poets and tourist bureaus try as they may to describe autumn in Michigan. I think not. Everyone around here has their own special loves and likes for this season. For me it is the Michigan blue sky and the cool breezes that hurry those big fat rain clouds along. Lately they have moved on before their meager contribution could freshen our rivers and lakes. In the fall we have a few little harvesting routines. It is buying apples for applesauce from Nelsons, mums and pumpkins from Midway Johns, and peppers, squash and green tomatoes from Magic Land. I don’t know where all the caramel apples were sourced. We have a couple of other fall routines that we also enjoy, one is decorating for Halloween and seeing a scary movie. When I say, see a scary movie I don’t mean, one of those screaming, slasher, talking murder dolls or clown things. This year it was A Haunting in Venice. This is a must-see movie if you are a true fan of Agatha Christie mysteries or the great detective Hercule Poirot. Sir Kenneth Charles Branagh British actor and filmmaker adaptations of Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile were excellent. Now in a very short time he has launched Haunting in Venice. A smallish work by AG but fun nevertheless. It is a mishmash of haunted house and murder mystery. A bit dark, but not jump out of your theater seat, can’t sleep without the light on, scary Halloween movie. This entertaining movie begins with the breathtaking vistas and vignette of incomparable Venice. Here we find the great detective Hercule Poirot (Charles Branagh) apparently retired after his last complicated case Death on the Nile. We are to believe that for the last 10 years he has been languishing in Venice with nothing more to do than wax his mustache, measure his breakfast soft boiled eggs and turn down uninteresting cases. The first thing we have to do is get the inscrutable Poirot interested in life again. Enter Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey), a mystery novelist from America and acquaintance of Poirot. She’s about to do a book on psychic Joyce Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh), who has thus far evaded exposure as a fraud. Hint, the devious, double dipper Oliver asks Poirot to determine if Reynolds is the real deal before she begins her book. Poirot, ever the skeptic, accepts the challenge. Without an ounce of humility sets about to debunk the famous psychic Reynolds. The reason for the enigmatic psychic Joyce Reynolds being in Venice is to help the beautiful retired opera singer Rowena Drake (Kelly Reilly) find closure after her daughter Alicia was found drowned in a canal. Reynolds holds the séance on All Hallows' Eve in Rowena Drake palazzo. This decaying gothic palazzo has a history of foul deeds too and is the perfect place for a Halloween themed "Whodunit". In true Agatha Christie fashion, soon all the cast of characters are in place, the candles are lit and the séance begins. A storm begins to build outside, lightning flashes, waves crash and the skullduggery is afoot. The séance is disrupted by Poirot. The frightened participants find they cannot leave the palazzo. A great chandelier falls and the body of Reynolds topples from an upstairs balcony. We are in the scary parts now, more bodies, spooky ghosts of children appear to Poirot. Everyone becomes a suspect, a new character appears, more mysteries within mysteries unfold. We chase red herrings and fake news down creepy hallways until we are totally confused. When we are afraid of every bump, and bang and completely exhausted Poirot the master himself assembles the survivors. With his flair for drama and brilliant logic he unravels the mysteries and identifies the killer for us. Of course, I had it all wrong. The bizarre twist and strange motives for the evil doers will leave you talking to yourself. This is a perfect movie for this wonderful Michigan season. Take the brood and go enjoy this excellent PG 13 Halloween movie. See how you think Tina Fey did in this period piece. As I said I love autumn in Michigan so much, however for me, it also comes with regrets because it is so ephemeral. I know that soon that ole north breeze will bring that first hint of wood smoke from my neighbor’s hearth. Autumn wood smoke always makes me wistful then followed by a heartfelt but undefined longing for something I can never describe. Maybe I want to migrate with those Canada Geese that live across the street in the mill pond. Could be to hitch a ride with one of the many seasonal campers that are draining south on M 37. Maybe I just need to go into the kitchen and make a pot of spicy Chili. For what it’s worth, from my kitchen table I can watch this Red Squirrel collecting every black walnut in my neighborhood. I know this because he is stashing them in my garden shed. Amazing to watch him, he can’t stop, won’t stop, such a mystery. What does he know that we don't? This grasshopper probably should take his frenetic efforts and the early Dark Eyed Juncos I saw this morning more seriously. Maybe a portend of things to come?  General Assembly at Dogwood on October 22
General Assembly Big Band will perform at the Dogwood Center on Sunday, October 22 at 3:00 p.m. The group is a full band performing the best of old and new music, and the musicians come from a wide area, including Reed City, Spring Lake, Grand Rapids, Ludington and Muskegon. The band has been operating with a roster of 16-17 members for generations, specializing in ’40s, ’50s and ’60s swing and big-band jazz. Instrumentation of five saxophones, four trumpets, four trombones, bass guitar, piano and drums provides for a great sound and big fun! Tickets are $12.50 for this main stage event and are available online at www.dogwoodcenter.com, at the Dogwood Box Office, or at NCCA-Artsplace in downtown Fremont or click here! The Dogwood Center Box Office is open Tuesday - Friday, 10:00 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. For information, phone 231.924.8885. The Dogwood Center is located one mile east of downtown Fremont.
A short list of happenings. Some near, some not so near.
Wednesday The Newaygo County Influential Women in Leadership Luncheon comes to Camp Newaygo Wednesday at 11am. This is the third year the event has been held and it is not just a great idea, (thank you, Kamille Massey) it has grown roots and become an annual gig. And with good reason. I recently was shown an old news clipping from the town I went to high school at. It was a photo of a group of women who were part of an organization of some sort. The caption listed them as “Mrs. John Doe, Mrs Joe Blow, Mrs, Ronald Roe, etc. etc. It was as if they had no names of their own other than Mrs. Granted we have come a long way since then but still, the recent Nobelist for Economics Harvard Professor Claudia Goldin won the prize for her research into the gender pay gap that still exists today for women who perform the same job as men. The reasons to honor the leadership of our local women are numerous, but there is one reason that stands out for me. They damn well deserve it. And full disclosure here, my favorite of the fourteen who will be recognized for their contributions to the community is also my favorite landscaper, and a source of perpetual pride to her parents. Here’s more on the event. https://www.nearnorthnow.com/the-pulse/i4-game-changers On Thursday, Zach Lentine will be sharing his musical talents at the RiverStop Cafe from 6-9pm. The Cafe’s Thursday night series has brought some fine music to town focusing on the talent we enjoy in our region. Now that summer has departed and outdoor venues have paused for the interminably lengthy non summer season we are entering it’s good to know there are still places around to hear live music. On Friday you can listen to budding musicians giving it a go at Flying Bear Books where Open Mike Night gives local folks a chance to develop some performance chops from 6-9pm. Montague has a cool thing going on Saturday with their Pumpkin Fest.We used to attend annually when Mrs. Ken DeL…uh…I mean my enduring spousal companion Lil, danced there with the Cedar Creek Cloggers. They have a great Pumpkin roll race down a steep downtown hill that is worth the price of admission itself. Well, the price is free but getting a pumpkin in the race will cost you $3. https://www.facebook.com/events/297400632703846/ And speaking of Montague…One of our favorite stops in the area is the downtown Book Nook and on Friday they are kicking off their Americana Music Festival, three days of music in what is truly an intriguing venue for performers and audience alike. The Blue Water Ramblers who played at Brooks Park last summer will be the opener hitting the stage from 7-9:30pm and old friend Bear Berends and the rest of the Ramblers will be capturing the Americana genre for what will surely be a grateful crowd. The rest of the lineup: 10am Saturday - Calabogie Road, 7pm Saturday - The Danny Seabolt Experience, 10am Sunday - B-Side Growlers. Saturday closer to home is another very cool event as White Cloud High School hosts its annual Quiz Bowl Invitational. Not familiar with QB? Think Jeopardy but faster, more difficult and without commercials. This competition showcases the talents of the local White Cloud QB team, who are defending state champs mind you, along with 28 other teams. Here’s the skinny: https://www.nearnorthnow.com/news/and-the-answer-is Years ago TI Editor Wheater would put together a team to scrimmage the WC QBers before they were to begin tournament play and I was often recruited as a team member, not as a mascot as some hinted at when I told them I would be on the squad. Talk about your humbling experience. Much of the time we would fumble around while the young competitors across from us would blitz us with rapid fire answers. Occasionally one of us would come up with a winning reply and there would be the requisite high fives and self congratulatory behavior among our foursome, but as it's said, ‘even a blind squirrel stumbles across the occasional acorn’. = There you go. A week's worth of doings. If you have an event coming up let us know and we’ll add it to the fray. -Ken De Laat  The cast at rehearsal LionHeart Productions has had a rather lengthy string of successful musicals. Admittedly I had never heard of Bright Star before LionHeart Productions announced it as their fall production but after learning it was written by Steve Martin and Edie Brickell and inspired by their bluegrass album “Love Has Come To You” I was intrigued. Learning that sometime N3 contributor, former standup comedian extraordinaire and tireless hiker Megan Wirts was in the show we reached out to her for a few questions. -Ken DeLaat How long has Bright Star been in rehearsals? We did a couple workshops over the summer, but the bulk of the work started September 5th. Tell us a little about the play and your role ? This is a coming of age story about a young soldier, Billy Cane, who has just come home from WWII and about the secrets that Alice Murphy carries. Their two lives are intersected in ways that surprise them both. I play Alice, a woman who has lived a life that has hurt her and taught her about faith, hope and forgiveness. The story is set in North Carolina in the small town of Zebulon. It begins in the 1940’s and then goes back into Alice’s memories in the early 1920’s when she was a teenager falling in love. When Alice is young, she’s a free spirited stubborn firecracker. She has her eyes set on Jimmy Ray, the mayor's son and when Alice decides she wants something, she goes for it. A jarring tragedy occurs and Alice needs to move forward with her life. In the 1940’s Alice is a strong, fierce woman, who runs a magazine. Being a strong independent woman was not always welcomed in the 1920s or 40s. She’s a woman before her time. Her ability to forgive those that hurt her and to grow into the woman she became is an inspiration. Tell us about the cast.’ I don’t think there are enough words to say how much I love this cast. One of the things I love the most about community theater is the “community” part of it. Some of my favorite LionHeart alums, like David Hatter, Jamie Evans, Devon Conley, Brenden Carroll, Jim Renney, Rosie Tomlinson, Anna Stephens, and many more are part of the cast. Then there are newcomers like Erica Wagner and Caesar Gonzalez that are such a gift to work with. The ensemble is one of the most important and hard working groups in this show and I’m so impressed with the work that every single one of us is putting into this. They all make me want to do better. Every day I am in awe of the talent that is grown right here in Grant. For a small community theater, we are truly blessed with big talent. The storyline seems to be one of love, loss and reunion. What do you find compelling about the character you play? The first song I heard when I started researching this show, was “If You Knew My Story”, the line “Many backs have broken from lesser weight I know, but I was born to carry more than I can hold” hit me like a brick. I looked at my husband and said, “Try to convince me that this song was not written for me to sing”. I connected to Alice on a deep level immediately. It feels like breathing for me to sing this music. I have been through my own personal struggles and to get here, to be able to be in a show like Bright Star and play a character like Alice, is a miracle in itself. Playing Alice has taught me that taking risks, holding on to hope and learning to forgive are worth it. She’s one of my favorite characters that I have ever played. Her strength and perseverance and feistiness are some of the things I love most about her. Putting together a musical is an enormous task. What have been the challenges for the cast and crew and you personally? It is definitely an enormous task! Everyone involved is a volunteer and has put in countless hours bringing this to the stage. The work behind the scenes is what makes a show happen. Our director Leslye Fries, along with Assistant Director Mellissa Hanes, have been doing an incredible job of helping us actors bring Leslye’s vision to life. Without the crew, the ones that set the stage for us actors, our shows would be bland and boring. The sound tech, light guru, set designer, costumer extraordinaires, musicians, choreographers and everyone else that pulls this all together is so important. One of the challenges for me personally has been not allowing myself to hold back and trusting myself. My own health struggles have been something I have been challenged with and I have worked diligently to overcome and adapt to. Three years ago, I was using a walker for mobility and I have pushed myself to be able to not just walk without assistance for short times, but to also dance and move freely and do it in heels! Alice takes us all on an extreme emotional journey and goes from a teenager to a 40 year old woman throughout this show. Digging into that has been a great challenge that I am loving. I think going back and forth between the two timelines can be a bit of a challenge for all of us. Steve Martin and Edie Brickell composed the music. Is there a particular song that stands out for you? Steve Martin and Edie Brickell have created one of my favorite musical soundtracks to date. It’s a blend of bluegrass, americana and contemporary country that will leave you humming the tunes as you leave. The story the music tells is so beautiful and compelling. My favorites range from the high energy Whoa, Mama, to the sweet love song Always Will and the emotional ballad I Had A Vision. You’ve long been a part of LionHeart. What is it that draws you to the stage and what would you say to readers who might consider being involved in community theater? Having a community theater in Grant like LionHeart is one of the best parts of living here. I have loved being on stage my entire life. I grew up singing solos at church and then I joined choir in middle school and that led to being part of the highschool theater program. For people like me, that didn’t leave their small town but still love to perform, having something this close is a gift. As I said before, the “community” part of community theater is what makes it so special. I have met some of my dearest friends through theater and it has helped me to grow a person. I encourage everyone to get involved with community theater in whatever way possible, whether it’s being on the stage, behind the scenes or in the audience. It’s a fulfilling and wonderful way to be part of a community. It’s also fun for the audience to see their highschool teacher, local pastor, next door neighbor or local librarian, up on the stage. Tell us what theatergoers should expect and why they should attend? Theatergoers should expect to laugh, cry and feel a sense of hope after seeing this show. This show is honest, heartfelt and has a beautiful story to tell. I hope that when people leave the theater that they will want to come back for more. Bright Star Showtimes Friday November 3rd—7:00 p.m. show Saturday November 4th —7:00 p.m. show Sunday November 5th—2:00 p.m. matinee Friday November 10th—7:00 p.m. show Saturday November 11th—2:00 & 7:00 p.m. show Tickets on sale now! https://grantfac.booktix.net/cart.php?action=show_pers...
 Rehearsing a scene
Full Cord at Dogwood on October 7
Full Cord will perform in the Dogwood Center's Black Box on Saturday, October 7 at 7:30 p.m. When it comes to movers and shakers in the bluegrass world, Full Cord is a super- group on the rise. After winning the prestigious 2022 Telluride Bluegrass Band Competition in Colorado, the Michigan-based group followed that with another much-coveted honor when the International Bluegrass Music Association named Full Cord its “Momentum Award Band of the Year.” While mandolinist Brian Oberlin notes the band’s music “is new and fresh to the ears of seasoned bluegrass fans,” the bluegrass traditions in Full Cord have deep roots. The group’s members – Oberlin, guitarist Eric Langejans, bassist Todd Kirchner and fiddler Grant Flick – boast decades of musical artistry, with experience in popular performing bands from Michigan to Oregon. And with the recent addition of award-winning, Colorado-based banjoist Ricky Mier, Full Cord is poised to take the next step in its journey as a bluegrass powerhouse. Full Cord’s songwriting has reached a new “tipping point,” manager Katie Kirchner suggests, enhanced by the group’s vast repertoire and robust experience in numerous band projects over the years. And Oberlin insists the band is “just hitting its stride”. Tickets are $12.50 and are available online at www.dogwoodcenter.com, at the Dogwood Box Office, or at NCCA-Artsplace in downtown Fremont or just click here! The Dogwood Center Box Office is open Tuesday - Friday, 10:00 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. For information, phone 231.924.8885. The Dogwood Center is located one mile east of downtown Fremont. |
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