Thank you!
Your support is sustaining the future of local news in our communities.
hvrhs sports

Sidelines shine with reborn Mountaineer cheer team

Sidelines shine with reborn Mountaineer cheer team

The Mountaineer cheer squad amps up team spirit in front of a pink-themed student section during rivalry night against Lakeview High School on Feb. 5.

Photo by Riley Klein

FALLS VILLAGE — Housatonic Valley Regional High School basketball games this year had more spirit than in years past thanks to the return of courtside cheerleaders.

Founded by senior captain Taylor Terwilliger, the Mountaineer cheer team was reformed this winter for the first time since 2005. When asked what inspired her to bring the squad back to life, she said, “I found my voice last year.”

From left, Taylor Terwilliger, Vi Salazar, Elizabeth Allyn and Soren Trivelli make up the newly reformed cheer squad at Housatonic Valley Regional High School.Photo by Riley Klein

Terwilliger began her cheer career two years ago, teaming up with Gilbert School and Northwestern Regional High School cheerleaders on the sideline of Gilbert/Northwestern/Housatonic co-op football games. She attempted to form a cheer team for HVRHS basketball games last year, but there was not enough interest in the school.

“We didn’t have enough and according to coach, she said that they’ve been trying to start one since my freshman year, which was 2021,” said Terwilliger.

Cheer coach Melissa Colman cheered on the last school squad in 2004-’05. She now teaches at Salisbury Central School.

This year HVRHS junior Elizabeth Allyn and freshmen Soren Trivelli and Vi Salazar joined the GNH cheer team. When the football season ended, Terwilliger kept the group together to bring back Mountaineer cheer.

“We practice twice a week,” Terwilliger said. “And before games too,” added Allyn.

Aspects of competitive cheer, such as vaulting, were incorporated into the group's routine.Photo by Riley Klein

The team began cheering for boys and girls basketball during the recent season. They performed halftime shows at home games and created new chants and choreography with some help from their coach, the GNH squad and the internet.

“We also had some influence on the themes,” said Trivelli, referring to coordination of themed outfits in the student section such as neon, pink-out and Hawaiian. “We made the themes really pop off,” said Terwilliger.

Cheerleading is a varsity sport in Connecticut with a minimum team size of seven needed to compete. Berkshire League schools will participate in a season of cheer meets next year and HVRHS is hopeful to take part.

Allyn mentioned an upcoming summer clinic with cheerleaders from across the region. It will be held at Northwestern Regional High School.

“It’s to recruit and let people get the feel of it,” said Allyn. “And just to get more experience,” Salazar noted.

Contact HVRHS Athletic Director Anne MacNeil at amacneil@hvrhs.org for more info.

Halftime shows returned to HVRHS basketball games this year.Photo by Riley Klein

Riley Klein

hvrhs sports

Latest News

Legal Notices - October 6, 2026

Legal Notices - October 6, 2026

TAX COLLECTOR TOWN OF SALISBURY CT LEGAL NOTICE

Pursuant to Sec. 12-145 of the Connecticut Statutes, the taxpayers of the Town of Salisbury are hereby notified that the second installment on the Grand List of October 1, 2025 is due and payable on October 1, 2026. Payments must be received or postmarked by November 2, 2026. If said Real Estate and Personal Property taxes are not paid on or before November 2, 2026 interest at the rate of 1 1/2% (18% per year) will be added for each month or a fraction thereof which elapses from the time when such tax becomes due and payable until the same is paid. Minimum interest charge is $2.00. Taxes can be paid by mail addressed to: Tax Collector, P.O. BOX 338, Salisbury CT 06068 or Town Hall, 27 Main Street, Salisbury CT. There is a drop box in the vestibule of the Town Hall available 9am-4pm, Monday - Friday or the 24-hour drop box on the back side of the building off Factory Street. Tax Office is open Mon and Wed, 9am-4pm and Friday 9am - 3pm closed for lunch 12:30pm -1:30pm. The Town is urging taxpayers to use the option to pay by credit card or e-check. Please go to the Town website salisburyct.us, View/PayTaxes Tab. Dated at Salisbury, CT this 2nd day of September, 2026. JoAnne D. Dodge, CCMC Tax Collector

Keep ReadingShow less

Classifieds - October 6, 2026

Classifieds - October 6, 2026

SERVICES OFFERED

Hector Pacay Landscaping, LLC. Residential & Commercial. Tree service, Painting, Masonry, Stone Walls, Lawn Mowing, Gardens, Construction. 845-636-3212. CT and NY.

REAL ESTATE FOR SALE

PUBLISHER'S NOTICE: Equal Housing Opportunity. All real estate advertised in this newspaper is subject to the Federal Fair Housing Act of 1966 revised March 12, 1989 which makes it illegal to advertise any preference, limitation, or discrimination based on race, color religion, sex, handicap or familial status or national origin or intention to make any such preference, limitation or discrimination. All residential property advertised in the State of Connecticut General Statutes 46a-64c which prohibit the making, printing or publishing or causing to be made, printed or published any notice, statement or advertisement with respect to the sale or:rental of a dwelling that indicates any preference, limitation or discrimination based on race, creed, color, national origin, ancestry, sex, marital status, age, lawful source of income, familial status, physical or mental disability or an intention to make any such preference, limitation or discrimination

Keep ReadingShow less

Oresta O. Szeparowycz

Oresta O. Szeparowycz

PINE PLAINS — Oresta O. Szeparowycz was born Nov. 17, 1938, in Lviv, Ukraine, and died on Aug. 26, 2026, in Dover Plains, New York, after a long, remarkable life. A talented artist, she passed away in her sleep, from cancer, just days before the opening of her inaugural sculpture exhibit in Millerton. She was 87.

The daughter of the late Daria and Omelian Szeparowycz, her birth name was Orysia but she changed it to Oresta in the early 1950s, soon after arriving in New York City from a displaced persons camp in Germany. Both names stem from the ancient Greek for “of the mountains.”

Keep ReadingShow less
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

Gretchen Rath Doolittle

Gretchen Rath Doolittle

WEST CORNWALL — Gretchen Rath Doolittle, former longtime faculty member and Director of Studies at both the Indian Mountain School in Lakeville, Connecticut, and South Kent School in South Kent, Connecticut, died quietly at home on Sunday, Sept. 20, after spending the day surrounded by family and neighbors. She had kidney cancer.

Gretchen Rath, who as a young adult took her mother’s name (Dewitt) as a middle name, was born on Oct. 26, 1933, in Washington, DC to Gordon Brandon Rath, a veteran of the Great War, and Dewitt (Gertrude) Norris Rath.

Keep ReadingShow less

Doug Tallamy’s work in progress: saving the planet one backyard at a time

Doug Tallamy’s work in progress: saving the planet one backyard at a time

Windacre, a 25-acre property in Millerton will be the site of “Work in Progress,” an afternoon with acclaimed entomologist, New York Times bestselling author and Homegrown National Park co-founder Doug Tallamy.

Provided

For nearly three decades, Doug Tallamy, a professor at the University of Delaware and co-founder of Homegrown National Park, has studied the intricate relationships between native plants, insects, birds and the ecosystems that sustain them. His books, including “Bringing Nature Home” and “Nature’s Best Hope,” have helped shift the conversation about conservation from something that happens primarily in parks and preserves to something ordinary people can practice on the land around them.

On Sunday, Oct. 4, Tallamy will bring that conversation to Windacre in Millerton for “Work in Progress: Toward Native Fields,” an outdoor gathering exploring both the possibilities and the complications of restoring private land for biodiversity.

Keep ReadingShow less
community

Celebrating Dick Hermans’ life built around community

Celebrating Dick Hermans’ life built around community

Dick Hermans in the Oblong Bookstore on Millerton\u2019s Main Street in 1985.

Provided
No matter what I’ve done, I’m trying to be useful to the communities I’m associated with.
— Dick Hermans

When Dick Hermans receives the Estabrook Community Leadership Award on Oct. 11, he will accept it for a lifetime of work that has taken many forms: bookseller, radio host, school board member, advocate for the Harlem Valley Rail Trail, business owner, volunteer and, perhaps most importantly, a person who has consistently looked for ways to be useful to the communities around him.

The Lakeville Journal and The Millerton News will present Hermans with the 2026 award at the annual Jubilee celebration at the Sharon Playhouse. The award honors outstanding leadership in community service and was inspired by Mary Lou and Robert Estabrook, former owners of the newspapers who believed that strengthening a community extended well beyond the work of publishing a newspaper.

Keep ReadingShow less
our community
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.