
Photo by Danny Fields
Duncan Hannah was cool his whole life, which is pretty impressive considering most people aren’t even cool for a year. He also stayed cool while living in Connecticut, which is a bit like breathing on the moon.
I first met Hannah on a snowy morning in 2018, during a bitterly long New England winter that would last through May. I was at his home in West Cornwall, a short walk from the covered bridge, to interview him on the release of “20th Century Boy,” a published collection of the personal diaries he kept from 1970 through 1981.
In old photos next to Debbie Harry and Andy Warhol, Hannah appears as the portrait of effortless youth; smooth chest, bedroom eyes, a cigarette dangling from his lip. When not painting, he lived it up among the luminaries of New York’s grimiest decade, bumping shoulders in the dirty downtown bathrooms of Max’s Kansas City, CBGB, The Mudd Club. “A great cross-section of lunatics and rock stars,” Hannah told me.
At 65, layered in a pink button-down, olive sweater vest, and corduroy suit, he had settled into the out-of-time style of the old prep establishment, just the kind he had bucked against. There was a playful wit to this later life style (perfectly captured in a 2019 Esquire Magazine spread) a puckish nod to an Anglo-mania academia dress code that doesn’t exist anymore — least of all in today’s prep school teachers.
We sat in striped club chairs against walls lined with hardbacks, Saki and The Secret History, Tom Wolfe and Tom Swift. Hannah showed me a fan letter he had received from a girl at Phillips Exeter Academy. She had read his diary excerpts printed in The Paris Review that autumn.
The entries start in 1970 when 17-year-old Hannah was a real life angel-faced Holden Caulfield, flung out of his private boys’ academy and into the hallways of a Minnesota public school. He grows out his hair and distributes his own dirty 'zine, records all he takes in: the concerts, the albums, the film — The Stooges, David Bowie, “Chloe in The Afternoon.” He gets into Bard and discovers de Kooning, gets hit on by Allen Ginsberg, loses 20 pounds and fakes a lurid gay life to dodge the draft, struggles with his art professor’s criticism, meets many girls, and has sex the way no one born after the mid-80s has sex anymore, which is to say, thoughtfully. "We get horizontal, a nudging cunnilingus, she tastes like the sea," he wrote in 1973.
“I was thinking, it’s so funny, " Hannah told me as we talked about the fan/love letter, "she knows better, but she thinks she’s writing to the 20-year-old kid.”
What’s so obvious to me now is exactly why the girl at Exeter was swept away by the diaries, that voyeuristic view into the inner life of the ghost of a boy long gone. No 21st Century boy could write the way Hannah did, because no one has a private life anymore. Our diaries exist online, soullessly and self-consciously curated, eager to be discovered by an audience as we posture and pretend. If you don't take photo of yourself reading Keats, did it happen? But in sharing so much, we have lost the personal connection to ourselves. The dangerous thrill the girl experienced was reading secret, literary, lively written by a boy her age, lustfully connected his life, to himself, to his inner world of screw-ups, eroticism, beat poetry, and artistic discovery, none of it ever meant to be shared.
“Duncan Hannah finds himself in the very modern predicament of painting pictures that seem infuriatingly attractive. He has been called “the Barry Manilow of the New Wave” and the prophet of “the Age of Valium,” Glenn O’Brien wrote in the Summer 1984 issue of ArtForum. “He makes beautiful paintings that, like beautiful boys and girls, look like they should be popular. If he’s the prophet of anything it’s that living and painting well is revenge enough.”
His titillating oil paintings were as sincere as his diaries, Hopper minus event a hint of loneliness, a subdued pastel playground of coy pleasure, gamine elegance, and an endless array of perfect breasts — the dreamworld of a dreamboat.
Hannah died this year of a heart attack at 69. When I heard, I opened my copy of “20th Century Boy” and found a piece of hotel stationery he had slipped in, telling me to go read Tim Dlugos.
Dlugos was an openly gay young poet in the 1970s New York scene who continued to write as he died of AIDS complications at the end of the 1980s. In his most famous work “G-9,” named after his hospital room, Dlugos writes, “Duncan Hannah visits, and we talk of out-of-body experiences. His was amazing.” He recalls Duncan’s drunk nightmare in his dormitory at Bard, waking to find an imagined naked boy sleeping on the floor. “He struggled out of bed, walked over to the youth, and touched his shoulder. The boy turned; it was Duncan himself.”
“Collected Works by the Late Duncan Hannah” is now on view at The Cornwall Library in Cornwall, Conn., through Nov. 27.
Photo by Danny Fields
Photo by Danny Fields
Photo by Danny Fields
GREAT BARRINGTON — Attarilm Mcclennon woke up on Tuesday morning to see a man standing on the fire escape and talking on the phone outside his apartment building in Barrington House.
When Mcclennon stepped out into the hallway that connects Main Street with the Triplex parking lot, he saw another man lingering there.
Mcclennon, who works at his family’s Momma Lo’s Southern Style BBQ downstairs, said he stepped outside to the unfolding commotion in the parking lot as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested two immigrants who live and work in the building.
But soon Mcclennon realized something — the man on the fire escape and the other one in the building looked a little familiar.
“I realized those two dudes have been walking through this hallway all week,” he said, adding that it was during the daytime.
Mcclennon’s brother, Ahmed Mcclennon, said that he also noticed a similar type of surveillance of the building last summer that he believes may have been ICE or other law enforcement.
Attarilm Mcclennon right, saw the arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Tuesday morning unfold at the Barrington House apartments where he lives and works.HEATHER BELLOW — THE BERKSHIRE EAGLE
The May 6 arrests are the latest to rattle the Berkshires as federal authorities pursue President Trump’s aggressive mission to deport or otherwise remove undocumented immigrants. A March crackdown resulted in the capture of at least 10 people in the Berkshires — and 370 statewide.
While the administration has said it would target undocumented people with criminal records, there have been numerous examples of agents detaining people who have never been charged with a crime.
It is unclear why ICE targeted these men. An ICE spokesperson did not respond to requests for information.
Tuesday’s raid took place on a busy morning in the heart of downtown. It shook bystanders and drew people out from Rubi’s Cafe and The Triplex Cinema.
Videos shared with The Eagle show people videotaping the arrests and asking ICE officers questions about warrants and due process. Others taunted the officers, most of whom were masked and heavily armed. Avery Ripley, who works at Rubi’s captured video, including that of a drone overhead.
As officers walked one of the men they arrested down the fire escape from his apartment, one person was heard saying they “love America,” and thanked the officers for “doing their jobs.”
Mcclennon said that one of the men arrested works at Fiesta Bar and Grill, which is across the hall from Momma Lo’s, and asked the Mcclennons to call his boss.
Great Barrington Police Chief Paul Storti said the department received a phone call from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security around 5:30 a.m. to let them know that they were in the area.
Barrington House owner Richard Stanley said he did not know the tenant personally, and expressed dismay at what he called “gestapo” tactics he says are meant to “intimidate.”
Ben Elliott, a Select Board member who works at The Triplex Cinema, was arriving at work when he saw the commotion. He also videotaped one of the arrests.
Elliott said he had heard that ICE also may have also arrested someone off Bridge Street near Quick Print and the Berkshire Food Co-op around 7:30 a.m.
The ICE arrests involved multiple unmarked vehicles, some heavily armed law enforcement officials and a drone.
Seeing that one of the officers had a battering ram to break the apartment door down, the building’s maintenance director Sean O’Brien got his keys ready. But that turned out not to be necessary, he said.
“None of that came to pass,” O’Brien said. “They knocked on the door and he opened the door and surrendered himself.”
Some bystanders confronted O’Brien, thinking he was helping ICE — which he and witnesses and Barrington House tenants said that was far from the truth.
“They turned on me,” O’Brien said. “It just ruffled my feathers up a little bit because they had the completely wrong idea of what happened."
“A woman was screaming into the window, ‘You called them, you called them,’” O’Brien said of the accusation that he had called ICE.
O’Brien did call local police to keep the peace and stop the trespassing.
Hearing this, Mcclennon’s brother Ahmed Mcclennon, said of O’Brien, “He’s the coolest man in the world. He would be the last person to do that.”
And O’Brien said that ICE officers were “very polite and professional to [the tenant],” and “were not abusive or anything like that.”
He also said that one of the men arrested is, “to the best of my knowledge, a very, very nice guy and a hard worker.”
“I would be very surprised,” O’Brien said, “if he were guilty of some extra crime that brought their attention to him.”
Heather Bellow is a reporter for The Berkshire Eagle.
LAKEVILLE — ARADEV LLC, the developer behind the proposed redesign of Wake Robin Inn, returned before Salisbury’s Planning and Zoning Commission at its May 5 regular meeting with a 644-page plan that it says scales back the project.
ARADEV withdrew its previous application last December after a six-round public hearing in which neighbors along Wells Hill Road and Sharon Road rallied against the proposal as detrimental to the neighborhood.
Landscape Architect Mark Arigoni, representing the applicants, said the new proposal’s page count is due to it being “very comprehensive and complete,” built in response to feedback from P&Z at a January pre-application meeting.
Much of P&Z’s criticism of the initial proposal revolved around its size and intensity, which commissioners said was incongruent with the neighborhood.
Arigoni briefly summarized the major changes of the new application, saying the number of cottages had been decreased from 12 to four, though each will now span about 2,000-square-feet as opposed to the maximum of 1,100 square feet of the earlier proposed array.
An “event barn,” which was one of the more contentious aspects of the initial application, has been relocated to be a part of the expanded main inn building, as opposed to its previous position as a detached structure.
Arigoni highlighted that a noise study — the lack of which was one of P&Z major criticisms of the first proposal — had been conducted in February and March, analyzing the levels of slamming car doors, traffic, waste collection vehicles and other ambient noise components of an active hotel site. He also explained that a new architectural firm had been contracted: “I think you will all see the changes to the plan, in terms of context and character.”
P&Z Chair Michael Klemens stressed that no action would be taken at the May 5 meeting. ARADEV will appear before the Commission again at its May 19 meeting, where P&Z will discuss the application’s completeness and potentially schedule a public hearing, which “will come a lot later,” Klemens said.
The application comes in the midst of ongoing litigation against the Commission relating to ARADEV’s first application. Angela and William Cruger, Wells Hill Road neighbors of the Inn who formally intervened in the 2024 hearing, filed a restraining order against the Commission in February alleging that it engaged in unlawful “spot zoning” that favored the Wake Robin expansion when it altered a regulation in May 2024 to allow for hotels via special permit in the Rural-Residential 1 zone.
Klemens announced that P&Z is opposing the restraining order. If it is approved by the judge, though, the May 2024 regulations would be declared invalid and the Commission would not be able to review applications pertaining to them, which includes ARADEV’s proposal.
FALLS VILLAGE — Housatonic Valley Regional High School girls lacrosse kept rolling Tuesday, May 6, with a decisive 18-6 win over Lakeview High School.
Eight different players scored for Housatonic in the Northwest Corner rivalry matchup. Sophomore Georgie Clayton led the team with five goals.
The Mountaineers' record advanced to 5-1 with a cumulative 41-point goal differential halfway through the season. The lone loss came at Watertown High School on April 10.
Georgie Clayton draws four Lakeview defenders. She scored five goals in the game May 6.Photo by Riley Klein
"We will be playing [Watertown] in the championship on the 28th of May," declared Coach Laura Bushey at the midway point of the 2025 season. Last year, HVRHS lost to St. Paul Catholic High School by one point in the Western Connecticut Lacrosse Conference championship.
The game against Lakeview May 7 went on despite ominous cloud cover at starting time. Rain earlier in the day made for a wet field, but the clouds parted by the second quarter for a sunny afternoon of lacrosse.
HVRHS wasted no time setting the tone. Georgie Clayton repeatedly sliced and diced her way through midfield to create offensive opportunities for the Mountaineers, who took a 7-1 lead in the first quarter.
Tessa Dekker elevates for one of her three goals against Lakeview May 6.Photo by Riley Klein
The lead grew to 11-3 by halftime. Seniors Lola Clayton and Tessa Dekker created a one-two punch on attack with Dekker setting up plays from behind the net as Clayton cut to the crease. The pair combined for five goals in the game.
Once the lead extended to double digits in the second half, the clock ran continuously. Lakeview found scoring chances but HVRHS sophomore goalie Sophia DeDominicis-Fitzpatrck saved more shots (7) than she let by.
The game ended 18-6 in favor of HVRHS.
Lola Clayton bounces a shot past the Lakeview defense.Photo by Riley Klein
The following players scored for the Mountaineers: Georgie Clayton (5), Tessa Dekker (3), Lola Clayton (2), Islay Sheil (2), Katie Crane (2), Annabelle Carden (2), Mollie Ford (1) and Chloe Hill (1).
Lakeview's goals were scored by Layla Jones (2), Isabelle Deforge (2), Juliana Bailey (1) and Caroline Donnelly (1).Goalie Sophia DeDominicis-Fitzpatrick secures the ball.Photo by Riley Klein
Participating students and teachers gathered for the traditional photo at the 2025 Troutbeck Symposium on Thursday, May 1.
Students and educators from throughout the region converged at Troutbeck in Amenia for a three-day conference to present historical research projects undertaken collaboratively by students with a common focus on original research into their chosen topics. Area independent schools and public schools participated in the conference that extended from Wednesday, April 30 to Friday, May 2.
The symposium continues the Troutbeck legacy as a decades-old gathering place for pioneers in social justice and reform. Today it is a destination luxury country inn, but Troutbeck remains conscious of its significant place in history.
A showing of student artworks within the theme of linking the past with the present opened the symposium on Wednesday evening. Each work of art had to draw on historical research to foster an informed dialogue between the artist and the contemporary audience.
The second day was devoted to student research presentations, showcasing teams from the region’s leading public and private schools with strong programs aimed at cultivating engaged young historians. Primary source materials and live interviews with descendants were included in the process.
Topics were divided into blocks with guest commentators providing reactive response as each block of student presentations concluded. Serving as commentators were Dr. Hasan Kwame Jeffries, Ohio State University, and Dr. Christine Proenza-Coles, University of Virginia.
Resistance in the face of oppression and stories of resilience that spanned generations formed an important theme as students presented the stories of area settlers and residents who suffered but endured.
As a sampling, The Taconic School teamed up with The Salisbury School to unearth untold stories of Boston Corners. The Hotchkiss School looked into the activities of the Ku Klux Klan in Connecticut. The Cornwall Consolidated School students stepped up with their untold stories of early Cornwall women.
Other presentations explored criminal justice — witchcraft trials — dealing with society’s “undesirable” elements, individuals in history who took action, people and movements that formed resistance, and various forms of discrimination.
Praising the work of the students, Dr. Jeffries identified a theme of resistance and survival.
“The war ended but the resistance did not,” Jeffries said. “We don’t take indigenous people seriously,” he added. “White supremacy happened in our own back yards.”
“We saw the evolution of research,” said a Cornwall Consolidated School representative. That project moved into civic engagement by the students that moved beyond the classroom.
“This is not the past; this is part of the present,” said Dr. Proenza-Coles.
A panel discussion among educators whose students had participated in the 2025 Troutbeck Symposium was held on Friday, May 2, to offer reflections on the symposium, its value and future development. Panelists from left to right were Jessica Jenkins, Litchfield Historical Society;Wunneanatsu Lamb-Cason, Brown University; Morgan Bengal, Old New-Gate Prison; Frank Mitchell, Connecticut Humanities; and student representatives Dominik Valcin of Salisbury School, and Shanaya Duprey of Housatonic Valley Regional High School. Leila Hawken
The third day invited area history educators to assemble and share ideas for redesigning elements of history education, a day of reflection.
The panel included Jessica Jenkins, Litchfield Historical Society; Wunneanatsu Lamb-Cason, Brown University; Morgan Bengal, Old New-Gate Prison; Frank Mitchell, Connecticut Humanities; and student representatives Dominik Valcin of Salisbury School, and Shanaya Duprey of Housatonic Valley Regional High School.
Valcin reflected on his work as a shared project within The Salisbury School, one where the inquiry would seek to find “the deeper story behind a base story.”
Duprey also spoke of process and the educational value of engaging with historical inquiry.
Each representing a profession that brings them into contact with historical inquiry, the panelists recounted tedious history classes of past decades. Jenkins described her own career as “public history.”Lamb-Canon’s experience began with choosing history electives in college. Bengal spoke of community engagement and the power of involvement with history.
“History is not the opposite of scientific inquiry,” said Bengal.
Significant discussion centered on the possibility of offering the Troutbeck Symposium model to a wider audience of school systems throughout the U.S.
“A community approach to education,” was a characterization offered by Troutbeck owner Charlie Champalimaud, commenting during a brief interview at the end of the symposium on Friday, May 2. She encouraged a push toward increasing even more the number of participating schools, their educational communities and symposium sponsors.