When Tom’s alarm rang at 6:00am on Monday August 10, 2026, I knew this had all the makings of a day of reckoning. The reason was because just eight hours earlier, shortly after my companions had retired for the night in our room at the Mountain Sports Inn in Killington, Vermont, my photographer accidentally busted his eyeglasses. To make matters worse, his wife pulled a muscle in her rib cage as she scrounged around on the floor looking for Tom’s frames that flew off the nightstand. As funny as those two incidents may seem, both put the rest of our trip in serious peril. From my position alongside the television set in our room, I watched with cautious optimism as my two companions readied themselves for the new day.
Once my photographer got dressed in his new ‘Superman’ tee-shirt, he went out to the Jeep to retrieve his trusty bobble head repair kit. During that early morning excursion, however, Tom discovered his key fob did not work properly when he attempted to re-lock our vehicle. In his mind, that was more proof the ‘Curse of the Titanic’ was still alive and well in Vermont.
Back in the room, after Tom complained to his wife about the key fob fiasco, I watched him meticulously place the right lens back into the broken frames – then he applied a small drop of Gorilla Glue to the affected area. And just like Tom does when he performs surgery on me, he added a small strip of medical tape to the bottom of the frames for reinforcement while the glue dried.
Vicki, on the other hand, seemed to be moving in slow motion that morning. I wasn’t sure if her lack of enthusiasm was due to her tender ribs, or if the intense sightseeing the previous day had simply wore her out. After she popped several Advil tablets to ease the pain, however, my photographer’s wife’s zeal seemed to improve; especially after Tom mentioned there was a chance we’d see a black bear behind the building during breakfast.
Breakfast at the Mountain Sports Inn was lackluster, and that was mainly due to Tom not wanting to spend extra time waiting for the staff member on duty to cook him up something special from the menu. And as far as spotting the black bear, the three of us had a better shot at seeing a Sasquatch that morning. But I wasn’t about to complain – Tom’s glasses were temporarily fixed, the pain in Vicki’s ribs had subsided, and our ‘Trip of Dreams’ was still on schedule – although we got on the road about a half hour later than usual due to the extracurricular activity.
Our late start wasn’t crucial to the overall success of our day as Tom’s agenda, which featured an afternoon filled with “freestyling” in Northern Vermont, was very light. However, my photographer was a bit disheartened as our day’s first stop at Plymouth Notch Cemetery was the second of Tom’s five advertised $25 give-a-ways. In other words, the first person to meet us at the grave of Calvin Coolidge at 8:30am and says, “Hey, it’s the bobble head guy” would be handed twenty-five dollars in cash. But since we were running late, that potential meeting had been put in serious jeopardy.
The morning temperature was a cool 63 degrees with very low humidity; and the sky was mostly sunny with a few scattered clouds. In other words, it was an ideal morning with no chance of precipitation. I was excited as I was about to make my third visit to the grave of Calvin Coolidge. The first two visits came on July 11, 2017 and then again on June 7, 2023.
After a short 12-mile drive from the ski lodge, Vicki drove the Jeep onto the gravel pull-off along the shoulder of Lynds Hill Road where we found ourselves almost directly in front of the Coolidge family plot, which was located about halfway up a steep grassy hill in Plymouth Notch Cemetery. We had arrived at 8:50am, which meant we were twenty minutes later than Tom had anticipated, and the three of us were alone – which wasn’t a surprise to Vicki and me.
My photographer, on the other hand, tried to look at the situation as though the glass was half-full rather than half-empty. I heard him say to his wife as the three of us headed on foot towards the Coolidge family plot, “There’s no doubt in my mind the people who were here to collect their money had already left. I imagine there was a line of folks at exactly eight-thirty, but when we didn’t show up, all of them took off.” I just shook my head in disbelief, and I noticed Vicki rolled her eyes as the two of us listened to those words roll off my photographer’s tongue.
Tom carefully carried me up the twenty-or-so concrete steps to the Coolidge family plot where the President and First Lady’s simple headstones were flanked by the graves of their two sons, Calvin, Jr. and John.
Before my photographer had me pose on President Coolidge’s gravesite, I stood in silence near the grave of Calvin Coolidge, Jr. – the President’s son who tragically died at the age of 16 on July 7, 1924. It turned out both of the President’s sons, Cal Jr. and his older brother John, decided to play tennis on the White House tennis courts after a family photo was taken on June 30, 1924. Because of the heat, young Cal played the game without wearing socks, which eventually caused him to develop a blister on the third toe of his right foot. In the days that followed, the blister became infected; and since penicillin hadn’t yet been discovered, Cal’s foot rapidly turned into fatal sepsis or blood poisoning, and he died in his father’s arms at 10:30pm on July 7th at Walter Reed Hospital.
As I looked at the grave of Calvin Coolidge, Jr, I was overcome with sorrow as I envisioned how grief-stricken the President was when his favorite son was laid to rest 102 years earlier. My grief quickly turned to concern, however, the moment Tom set me on top of the President’s four-foot-high head stone. Although there was no indication of a breeze in the still morning air, I waited for the ‘Curse of the Titanic’ to show up and knock me off the monument. Fortunately for me, nothing out of the ordinary happened – which was a complete surprise.
While on top of the President’s headstone, a vision popped into my hallow resin head. For a few minutes, it was as though I was transported back in time to January 7, 1933, which was two days after Coolidge’s death at his home in Northampton, Massachusetts. I watched as six U.S. Deputy Marshals carried the President’s casket up the steep hill in the heavy rain to the freshly dug grave below me. In keeping with Coolidge’s modest character and the family’s wishes, the graveside rites were brief, quiet, and simple, matching the surrounding rural Vermont landscape where generations of his ancestors were laid to rest.
Once I had paid my personal respects to President Coolidge, Tom placed me on the headstone that marked the final resting place of First Lady Grace Coolidge. Unlike her husband, Silent Cal, Grace was the life of the party in the White House and became a very popular First Lady. In fact, Grace did her best to open the Executive Mansion up to as many guests from all walks of life as possible and went out of her way to invite folks who were deaf, including Helen Keller, who was a frequent guest at the White House.
Grace Coolidge outlived her husband by 24 years, and in widowhood, she broke some of the strict rules the President had set for her throughout their lives together. On July 8, 1957, the former First Lady passed away at the age of 78 from heart disease at her Northampton home known as Road Forks. A few days after her death, Grace was laid to rest alongside her husband at Plymouth Notch Cemetery.
At roughly 9:15am, the three of us began the 65-mile pilgrimage to the Capital City of Vermont, Montpelier, which is the least populous state capital in the United States. After a scenic drive North, which took us along the tree-lined corridor of Interstate 89, Vicki pulled the Jeep in front of the historic State House after finding a great parking place along State Street.
The Vermont State House was built 193 years ago in 1833, although the 136-foot-tall dome wasn’t gilded in gold until the early 20th century. Compared to other State Capitol Buildings in our nation, Vermont’s ranks as the tenth smallest in height. But what it lacked in size was made up for in the building’s simplistic, yet beautiful architecture that was constructed of gray granite and rose up above the meticulously landscaped grounds. As I posed in front of the State House for a few images, I was surprisingly awestruck. What I saw on the small hill before my painted eyes was a Greek Revival structure that featured a very impressive Doric portico across the front entrance. I was anxious to get a closer look.
I listened as my photographer huffed and puffed his way, one step at a time, up the countless number of concrete stairs before the two of us and Vicki made it to the front entrance. Once there, we saw a large marble statue of Ethan Allen, one of Vermont’s founding fathers, standing sentinel just to the right side of the huge entry doors.
During most of our visits to State Capitol Buildings, Tom usually takes me to the rotunda where I get to see the inside of the dome, and then I go to the governor’s office. And at times, he also takes me to other historically significant places within the building. But as soon as the three of us had made it through the security system in the Vermont State House, my photographer discovered there was no rotunda – the dome was simply an exterior ornament instead of capping an open interior central hall.
But there was a governor’s office, however, and when Tom brought me to that second-floor area, the first thing I noticed was the historically significant chair situated behind the governor’s desk. That ornate chair, which was carved from timbers salvaged from the famous U.S. Navy frigate U.S.S. Constitution, was gifted to the state in 1858 by Captain Horace B. Sawyer, a Vermont native and naval officer who once served aboard the U.S.S. Constitution during the War of 1812.
I would have given my right arm for the chance to pose on the Constitution Chair, but my photographer left his balls at security and refused to cross the velvet rope barricade at the office entrance. But perhaps he made a wise decision – just a minute or two after Tom snapped a photo of the room from behind the rope, a janitor came out of nowhere and began to clean the desk. Had we been inside that office and near the governor’s desk, the two of us would’ve been caught red-handed and security would have swarmed the office like flies on a rib roast. And to add insult to injury, Tom would have had some ‘splaining to do as Vicki never approves of my photographer’s “illegal activities”.
The three of us were inside the Vermont State House for about 30 minutes before we made the longer-than-usual hike back to the Jeep. Once there, I nearly fell out of my camera case when out of nowhere my photographer axed his wife if she was ready to tantalize her taste buds with BJs. I think the question also caught Vicki by surprise as well, especially when she replied, “Have you completely lost your mind? Those days are long gone and they’re not coming back anytime soon.” That’s when my smart-aleck camera guy looked his wife straight in the eyes and said with a smirk on his face, “So you’re not interested in going to the Ben and Jerry’s Factory for some ice cream? Your taste for ice cream is long gone? If that’s the case, then I guess TJ and I will be the only ones enjoying some Americone Dream!”
Before we began the drive to Ben and Jerry’s in Waterbury, which was roughly 14 miles Northwest of Montpelier, Tom decided to find a Chrysler dealership near the Capital City where he could get a new battery for his key fob. After a quick search on his phone’s internet, my photographer found a place called Preston’s Dodge, Jeep, Ram of Barre – and although that dealership was about nine miles off the beaten path, Tom figured it might his last chance to find a dealership since the Northern part of Vermont seemed to be fairly desolate.
Vicki pulled our Jeep into Preston’s parking lot at roughly 10:45am and I watched as Tom disappeared into the building. Twenty minutes later, my chunky friend returned to our vehicle with his newly powered key fob in one hand and a bag of fresh popcorn in the other. I listened as my photographer raved about the friendly service he received at that Chrysler dealership.
“I couldn’t have been treated any better. One of the mechanics who wasn’t working on another car at the time took me to the service desk and he inserted a new battery into my key fob. When I axed him how much I owed for the service, he said with a smile, ‘You don’t owe anything. It’s what we do here at Preston’s for our customers.’ When I mentioned I was from Michigan and in the area on vacation, he said it didn’t matter – the battery was free and he told me to grab a bag of popcorn for the road. Now that’s what I call incredible customer service. Oh, and so much for that Titanic Curse; it looks like that damned thing is finally over. We’re now headed for calm seas for the rest of the trip – I believe the worst is behind us now.”
After my photographer’s wife retraced our route past Montpelier, it seemed to take us forever to get to the Ben and Jerry’s Factory that was located along a desolate two-lane highway a few miles North of downtown Waterbury, Vermont. When Vicki pulled into the parking lot at precisely 12 noon, it was obvious Tom wasn’t the only one with BJs on his mind as the place appeared to be overrun by tourists who were horny for ice cream.
It had been just over nine years since our last visit to the Ben and Jerry’s Factory, and that was primarily because of the company’s decision to donate a percentage of the proceeds from their sales to the Black Lives Matter cause, a program which began in 2020. In fact, because that Vermont-based company had waved the BLM flag, my photographer has boycotted their ice cream for the past six years because of their support for that racist and corrupt cause. Suddenly, on that tenth day of August in 2026, Tom felt it was time to end his protest – even though Ben and Jerry’s was obviously still “woke” all the way up to their eyeballs.
Once my companions and I had made the long, uphill hike from the parking lot to the seating area near the Ben and Jerrys Factory Ice Cream Shop, Tom plunked his fat ass at a table while Vicki stood in line to buy their ice cream. When she returned ten minutes later, I heard my photographer’s wife say, “You better enjoy every bite of this ice cream. It just cost me over sixteen bucks for your three scoops of Americone Dream and this sugar cone filled with a single scoop of Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream.”
I watched with envy as my camera guy savored every spoonful of his Americone Dream ice cream. After all, it had been six long years since he tickled his palate with the vanilla ice cream chock-full of fudge-covered waffle cone pieces with a caramels swirl. I couldn’t help but laugh to myself when I watched this guy, who was on his second month of fat pills, as he filled his face with three scoops of high-calory ice cream. For a fleeting moment, Ben and Jerry’s support of BLM, transgenders, and illegal immigrants didn’t seem to matter because Americone Dream was a dream come true for my photographer.
At 12:40pm, my photographer’s gut was filled with Ben and Jerry’s ice cream as the three of us began the agonizing descent back down the hill to the visitor’s lot where the Jeep was parked. Once inside, I listened as Tom explained to Vicki about the next site we were headed for, which was just over 70 miles to the North.
“I know this drive you’re about to make will seem to take forever, but it’ll be worth it when we get there. Our destination is the historic Fisk Farm, and it was where Theodore Roosevelt was visiting when he first learned President McKinley had been shot in Buffalo, New York. We’ll be crossing several bridges as our route will take us over a couple of islands situated in the Northern portion of Lake Champlain. The scenery should be amazing, and there’s a slim chance we might catch a glimpse of Champ, the reputed cousin of the Loch Ness Monster. In a nutshell, this is a very important Presidential site for me and T.J., and I can’t wait to get there. One more thing – I do believe the grounds are open to the public today. If not, I can either sneak in or capture a few images from the public road.”
Vicki appeared to be in good spirits for the first forty-five miles of the seemingly endless journey, but her demeanor seemed to change once we crossed the Sand Bar Bridge and onto Grand Isle. What was advertised as a potential scenic drive by her husband became a monotonous, slow-speed adventure that took us along a two-lane road to nowhere. And by the time we finally made it to Isle La Motte, which was where the Fisk Farm was located, my photographer’s wife was at her wits end. The three of us hadn’t seen much of Lake Champlain; we certainly didn’t see any sea monsters; and nothing we saw on the island chain provided Vicki with the ‘wow factor’.
The clock on the Jeep’s dashboard read 2:00pm when Vicki turned off West Shore Road and onto the two-track driveway entrance of the historic Fisk Farm. I was certain my photographer had breathed a sigh of relief when he saw a sign at the entrance that stated, ‘Art Barn Gallery Open’ – in his mind, that meant we could walk the grounds legally and without the fear of being shot for trespassing.
Once we had made it to the alleged parking area in a mown field where about eight to ten other vehicles were parked, I heard Vicki say out loud, “I thought for sure we would be the only ones here.” Tom shot back, “Are you kidding me? This is a very historic farm – I’m surprised people aren’t lined up down the road to see this place.”
My photographer quickly put the camera case, with me in it, around his neck and began the hundred-yard hike to the area in front of the historic farmhouse. His wife, on the other hand, had no interest in the house and she parked her butt on a boulder just outside of the large, wooden barn where the art exhibit was supposedly on display.
The original grand house was built in 1803 from stone from the adjacent quarry and it was home to four generations of the Fisk family, including New York Lieutenant Governor Nelson Fisk. On September 6, 1901, Fisk had invited Vice President Theodore Roosevelt to his home as the featured speaker at a Fish and Game League dinner. TR had come to Isle La Motte that day on Dr. William Seward Webb’s steam-powered yacht known as the Elfrida.
While at the Fisk estate, Roosevelt received word that President William McKinley had been shot in Buffalo that afternoon and his presence in the Western New York city was crucial. The Vice President boarded the Elfrida and the powerful vessel sped across Lake Champlain, arriving in Burlington in just about an hour. From there, a special train took Roosevelt toward Buffalo. By the time TR made it to Buffalo, it appeared McKinley would survive the assassination attempt and Roosevelt returned to his family camping trip in the Adirondacks.
In 1924, a huge fire broke out on the Fisk Farm property, and tragically the main house where Theodore Roosevelt had visited was almost completely destroyed – only a single stone wall still stood between a couple of outbuildings.
During our visit nearly 125 years after Vice President Roosevelt visited the Fisk Farm, I knew the house had been reconstructed on the site of the original, but I also knew TR walked the same grounds where Tom and I stood. When Roosevelt had received word McKinley had been shot, it happened right behind me. From my position on the porch, I looked out towards Lake Champlain, and it was as though I could envision the Vice President as he boarded the Elfrida where he began the long journey towards Buffalo. Eight days later, after the President seemed to rally, McKinley died from his infected gunshot wounds and Theodore Roosevelt became President of the United States on September 14, 1901.
Tom and I had spent roughly fifteen minutes on the grounds in front of the farmhouse and outbuildings, which were now owned by Linda Fitch who purchased the estate in 1970. For most of that time, the two of us didn’t see any other humans on the grounds, with the exception of Vicki, even though there was a handful of cars parked in the adjacent field. Then suddenly, just as my photographer was snapping his final images near the side of the house, the voice of a man talking to someone broke the silence of the moment. Was he talking to us? Tom stood frozen for a second as he waited for the man to make an appearance, but that never happened. Instead, my camera guy put me back in the camera case and he made the short stroll over to the barn where Vicki was still waiting.
Before the three of us headed for the Jeep, Tom slid the heavy wooden barn door open with the hopes of finding other visitors or to see if it was indeed where the art exhibition was being held. Although my photographer found a couple of random framed paintings attached to the interior wall; paintings which looked like they had been there for a long time; the barn was unoccupied. In fact, that barn didn’t seem to be hosting any type of art exhibit as was advertised near the road.
Even though it wasn’t quite three o’clock in the afternoon, Tom said the Fisk Farm was the final site of the day – which meant it was time to find a place to stay for the night. But due to the fact there weren’t many options for hotels in that section of Northern Vermont, all of the places Vicki found on her app had a price tag of over $150 for the night. When the decision was made by my companions, they chose the Holiday Inn Express, which was located in St. Albans City. At a price of roughly $180 for the night, they paid a bit more, but Tom justified the expense when he said to his wife, “I’d rather pay a bit more to stay at a Holiday Inn than to save twenty-five bucks and sleep with the cockroaches at a proverbial ‘Suck & F**k!'”
After we made the 32-mile drive from Isle La Motte to St. Albans City, a route which took us within three miles of the Quebec border, we arrived at the Holiday Inn Express at 3:30pm. But once we had arrived, there was a problem – something strange had happened after Vicki made the reservation from her phone.
While the three of us waited to get a room, the desk clerk notified my photographer’s wife that her reservation was set for Monday August 17th instead of the current August 10th. I listened as an embarrassed Vicki said she didn’t know how that error could have happened or how that day’s date could’ve changed on its own – it didn’t make any sense. In my mind, I knew exactly what the cause was – it was the ‘Curse of the Titanic’, and it was alive and thriving and had followed us to Northern Vermont.
Once we had finally made it to our room after the reservation error had been rectified, my companions rested for a half hour before the three of us headed for dinner – a dinner that I figured would feature the local fare of Vermont such as a New England boiled dinner, pot roast, or maple baked beans. Instead, my two travel mates agreed to have their meal at the Lucky Buffet, or as Tom called it, “The Rucky Buffet”, which was a restaurant that served a smorgasbord of Chinese food.
Following dinner, which Tom said didn’t compare with the Chinese food served at the Dragon Wok in our hometown of St. Clair, we returned to the hotel where my photographer placed me on the table near the television set. For the next hour and a half, the three of us relaxed in our third-floor room while we enjoyed several episodes of The Andy Griffith Show. Everything seemed well and another successful day was in the books.
Suddenly, at precisely 7:30pm, the three of us were startled with what seemed to be a loud clap of thunder – and a few minutes later, the electricity in our room went out. Tom leaped out of bed and opened the curtains to our room’s window – and that was the moment I heard him say to his wife, “Holy shit – there’s a severe storm and it looks like it’s coming our way. As a matter of fact, those low-hanging clouds appear to be rotating a bit – I wonder if we’re under a tornado warning? This could get really bad in a hurry.”
My concerned photographer captured a short video of the storm and texted it to his son, who is an amateur tornado chaser back in Michigan. Without hesitation, Tommy sent back a screen shot of his Doppler radar and wrote, “There’s a tornado warning for St. Albans City, Vermont right now. If you’re in that area, you might want to take cover immediately – especially since it looks like you’re on an upper floor of that hotel.”
Instead of taking shelter in the first-floor lobby, however, my photographer was determined to capture a photo of the impending tornado. After all, seeing a tornado in person has been on Tom’s bucket list for the past fifty years and he was going to take full advantage of his front row seat.
My photographer, with camera in hand, was glued to the window as the storm seemed to swallow the entire skyline around our hotel. The three of us watched the lightning bolts as they danced in the now darkened sky. Suddenly, but not surprisingly, the storm hit us with a fury I haven’t experienced since our visit to Fremont, Ohio on July 10, 2013 when a small tornado struck that town.
Sheets of rain pelted the window, which made it difficult for us to see the nearby trees as they whipped around in the strong, hurricane-force wind. For what seemed to be an eternity, Tom watched helplessly as our Jeep, which he could see through the rain-streaked windows, was parked directly in the line of fire of several large trees.
I was nervous and wondered if our trip was about to come to an abrupt end. To me, this was ‘The Wizard of Oz’ and ‘Twister’ all rolled into one. As I looked out of the window, I wondered whether or not I’d see a wicked witch as she rowed past the hotel in a Titanic lifeboat – closely followed by a bellowing cow.
Roughly ten minutes after the storm’s rage had engulfed the entire area around the Holiday Inn Express in St. Albans City, the wind and rain suddenly stopped, and everything became eerily quiet. Once the power was restored in our room, my companions watched the local news for updates centered on the storm.
Although there were dozens of reports of downed wires and trees in the area, there was no definite confirmation of a tornado. The meteorologist on TV said the tornado warning was in response to the rotating wall cloud observed over St. Albans City, but that wall cloud never spawned any funnels. The weatherman said the damage was likely caused by straight-line winds instead of tornadic activity.
Tornado; straight-line winds; or severe thunderstorm – whatever it was, the darn thing was intense. Unfortunately for my unlucky photographer, whose belly was still fully of Lucky Chinese food, he was forced to erase the checkmark on his bucket list for spotting a tornado.
Once again, we had managed to survive the ‘Curse of the Titanic’. Had the early evening temperature been a couple of degrees warmer, however, the outcome might have been a lot different.
When Tom extinguished the lights in our room just after nine o’clock, I stood alone in the darkness with only my thoughts to keep me company. For most of the night, I couldn’t help but wonder how many more times we will be able to dodge the bullet before something catastrophic happens to us on this trip. In fact, I began to wonder if I was traveling to Walley World with Clark and Ellen Griswold instead of Halifax, Nova Scotia with Tom and Vicki Watson.
Then out of nowhere, I heard a voice inside my head say to me, “Despite all the little problems, it really is fun, isn’t it?” I shook my head and thought, “No. But with every new day there’s fresh hope.”
