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Hometown Heroes


OUR 2024 COMMUNITY PARTNER

While the challenges continue, so do the good works done by our neighbors, our teachers, our health care providers, our volunteers and so many others. This is their story. Ledyard National Bank is proud to support the 2024 Hometown Heroes, who were nominated by members of the community and selected by editors of the Concord Monitor.

Nominate your Hometown Hero today.


"She's the guardian angel for all of us:" Principal's secretary in Dunbarton goes above and beyond her job description
02-09-2025 8:00 PM

By SRUTHI GOPAL AKRISHNAN

For parents sending their kids off to school each morning, the worries never really stop. Is their kindergartener doing OK? Did they remember to pack that extra snack for the field trip?

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Known for “yankee ingenuity” and honest service, Weare Hometown Hero turns 100
02-02-2025 8:08 AM

By REBECA PEREIRA

Leon Taylor’s home in Weare has seen decades of family celebrations. On Sunday, Taylor expected to revisit the familiar rituals of those previous occasions — dinner, cake, ice cream and pleasant conversation — when his children brought him into his front yard.


Hometown Hero: In Warner, Rebecca Courser celebrated 250
01-26-2025 11:42 AM

By MICHAELA TOWFIGHI

The giant white birthday cake was hard to miss.


Creating change through kindness: Andrea Alexander’s Concord Kind Facebook group reshapes volunteerism
01-19-2025 7:55 PM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

When Andrea Alexander hit the “post” button in her new Facebook group, Concord Kind, back in September, she had no way of knowing that the virtual space she created would yield widespread impacts for so many in her community.


Hometown Hero: Knowledge about health insurance can be a lifesaver for people in need
01-13-2025 3:10 PM

By DAVID BROOKS

Like all Hometown Heroes, Donna Toomey is always ready to help somebody in need. In her case, however, the need is often very specific.


Constructing hope, building futures: Habitat for Humanity prioritizes home repairs and reselling affordable refurbished dwellings
01-06-2025 2:14 PM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

Back in September, a team of Habitat for Humanity volunteers began work on Beth Riley’s Loudon home, spending countless hours repairing the floors, plumbing, counters, doorways, stairwells, and exterior.Riley learned about Habitat for Humanity when a...


‘If I can make someone happy, then I’m happy’: 97 year-old woman crochets scarves for charity
12-29-2024 9:01 AM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

Lucienne Boisvert sat by the fireplace with her crochet hook, a skein of purple yarn, and a half-completed scarf. As she wove the hook in and out of holes at the end of the scarf and wrapped the yarn accordingly, the 97-year-old began to explain her...


Not a phase: Bow native creates community through emo concerts in Concord
12-22-2024 9:00 AM

By CHARLOTTE MATHERLY

It’s not a phase, Concord.At least, that’s what Starsea Deoss hopes for the city’s thriving emo scene. It’s a motto of sorts for a crowd of more than 100 people clad in skinny jeans, tattoos and lots of black clothing who flock to the Feathered Friend...


The power of perseverance: Epsom Girl Scout Megan Katsirebas restores old Scout House
12-15-2024 9:00 AM

by RACHEL WACHMAN

Megan Katsirebas joined Girl Scouts in second grade. Growing up in Epsom, it have her space to broaden her outlook and her interests.“I met a whole bunch of friends,” Katsirebas said. “But then once high school hit, everyone kind of left because they...


Hometown Hero: James “Jim” Marshall and three decades of selling Christmas trees for charity
12-08-2024 9:00 AM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

It takes James “Jim” Marshall three minutes to snip the netting off a Christmas tree, unwrap it, determine the price, put a ribbon on the top, and add it to the pile of trees to be sold. He’s perfected this skill over 38 years of spearheading...


‘Friends for life’: Concord woman becomes Best Buddies champion alongside high school buddy
12-01-2024 9:00 AM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

When Cheyenne Boucher decided to join Best Buddies in 2014, she had no idea her involvement with the organization would shape the trajectory of her life.Best Buddies had just come to the state of New Hampshire. The organization was looking for partner...


Hometown Heroes: Lawyers who help make land conservation work
11-24-2024 9:00 AM

By DAVID BROOKS

Preserving land from development is all about woods and streams and birds and beasts. That’s the fun part.But it’s also about laws and contracts and tax rules and finance. That’s the boring part – yet without it, the woods and beasts are in...


‘It’s a calling’: Hospice workers deliver care from their hearts
11-17-2024 9:00 AM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

Maria Pacelli remembers sitting at her father’s bedside as he took his final breaths. She was in college at the time and had, coincidentally, been taking courses on death and loss.She and her brothers held a vigil for the final four days before her...


Concord veteran finds connection through birds
11-10-2024 5:00 PM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

It started with a peregrine falcon. For Robert Vallieres, a veteran of the Gulf War, this was the bird that changed his life once he returned from combat.“They needed people to watch their natural habitats. It’s called nest-watching,” Vallieres said....


Dan Sylvester, the athletic director who is a legend in the making and elevated Franklin High School
11-03-2024 1:35 PM

By ALEXANDER RAPP

Jacob Adler, a junior lineman and middle linebacker for Franklin High School, walked into Dan Sylvester’s office to ask about meeting his community service requirements while also having a commitment to the football team practice before a big game...


Hometown Heroes: Making Halloween fun for the little ones
10-28-2024 1:44 PM

By DAVID BROOKS

For a holiday centered around ghosts, cemeteries, spooky creatures and all-around scariness, Halloween sure produces its share of simple pleasures.“It’s so fun seeing the kids’ eyes light up and watching their reaction,” said Dave Bastien of Concord....


‘It’s rewarding in its own self’: Monitor’s volunteer town criers receive award
10-20-2024 12:01 PM

By ARIANNA MacNEILL

Nearly 30 years ago, Cheryl Stinson decided to respond to an ad in the Concord Monitor looking for a Penacook town crier.A volunteer position, each town crier writes a short weekly column detailing community happenings, dubbed Talk of the Towns...


Hometown Hero: At Pembroke’s ‘fairy house,’ woman engages local kids in collaborative art
10-13-2024 12:00 PM

By RACHEL WACHMAN

To some in her Pembroke neighborhood, Lori Rowe’s home is known as the “fairy house” or the “fairy garden.” It started three years ago when she put out a display of hand-painted fairy houses with little gnomes and knick-knacks. Nestled into the base...


‘How do we serve them for serving us?’: Nonprofit Swim With A Mission aims to give back to veterans
09-22-2024 12:00 PM

RACHEL WACHMAN

Mark Aquilino and Todd Wheatley spent countless hours this summer organizing a fishing tournament unlike any other. They brought together veterans on the seacoast with the Yankee Fishermen’s Co-Op, a local fishing group, for a multi-day competition to...


Hometown Hero: Jim Milliken has spent 8 decades making Concord ‘a better place to live’
07-22-2024 9:02 AM

By SOPHIE LEVENSON

From his seat in a shaded booth at The Works, underneath a picture of wild blueberries, Jim Milliken gestures at Main Street. “I painted every parking meter you can see,” he says.He also changed the lightbulbs in traffic lights and touched up the...


Hometown Hero: Hats off to this Penacook woman, a crafts lover whose artistic, and altruistic, nature has benefited people with serious illnesses
04-21-2024 11:36 AM

By RAY DUCKLER

Nancy Peperissa’s secrets to help people involve cotton and rice, two items she uses to craft items with others in mind.She crochets cotton to make soft skull caps for chemotherapy patients. The rice she inserts into a doll’s midsection gives it...

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