How realistic was the Vermont of Newhart?

I think it was meant to be a lovable parody of Vermont/New England life, certainly as the show evolved. I enjoyed the show, but the writing left a lot to be desired, I think. Newhart's delivery and Duffy/Scolari's comedic timing really made the show.

Vermont has little urban crime but there are pockets of poverty reminiscent of Appalachia. Wear fluorescent orange in the wilderness to avoid being shot by hunters. Most cities and towns are governed by Town Meeting. There are few minorities, but it's not like it was thirty years ago when it was 99% white.

I preferred Suzanne Pleshette as Leona Helmsley. If that wasn't acting . . .

I went to college there. The isolation, esp. in winter without a car, was hard to take. Fortunately Montréal was just a couple of hours away.

About as realistic as the Cabot Cove of Jessica Fletcher which is to say, not much.

Granted it was on the air 30 years ago, but they were (gently) parodying a Vermont that existed in the 1950's perhaps, but not since then and even less so now. Today? Long lonely winters without a lot for rural kids, anyway, to do, way too much drug use, lots of guns (for New England, anyway) and R2 is right - as of April 1, 2019, the racial diversity among the population residing in the state of Vermont is currently at 94.7% Caucasian, 1.9% two or more races, 1.5% Asian, 1.2% African American, .4% other races, and .3% Natives of North America. In other words, whiter than anywhere else on earth except perhaps Iceland...

The writing suffered in the last few seasons when they seemed to have run out of ideas, but seasons 3 and 4 were some of the zaniest, laugh-out-loud funniest TV I've ever seen - and I generally hate sitcoms. The world's smallest horse and Pirate Pete never get old. Newhart, Julia Duffy and Peter Scolari all had an incredible gift for comedy.

Yes, there’s a lot of opioid use there now, as in the rest of rural northern New England.

Vermonter here! it was more accurate in the time period it aired than now but itwas, even then, definitely not entirely accurate.

I worked for FEMA when FEMA was in Vt a few years ago. the people absolutely couldn't figure out how to connect with the Vt people who tgey were trying to help. I told them, 'tell Bob and Martha that June and Chris won't fill out the paperwork if you don't because they don't want to take money that could potentially go to you ". we are very concerned with not taking things away from our neighbors or acting like we're better than them.

So basically a little of the opoid-riddled rust belt plus a little of Appalachia mixed in with a bit of the gun-crazy isolated rural West?

I love R8's story. That's exactly the kind of thing I was hoping to read. Are the family-owned dairy farms still hanging on R8?

The traditional New England of my imagination seems idyllic to me, but I guess it doesn't exist any more (if it ever did.)

I know this sounds sappy, but when I think of New England, I think of Peyton Place (the film and the series). Despite the gossipy nature of the town, it was very evocative of cozy, small-town New England life. Maybe it romanticized a type of life that never truly existed, but that's what I think of when I think of NE.

R10

That was filmed in Camden, Maine. Beautiful town.

thanks r9! no, the farms are all suffering and closing. there's almost none left except for the rich hobbyists. the family farms have almost all gone bankrupt, the ones that haven't are being crushed by the taxes.

I love Vermont and I understand growth and progress but we've lost some of our 'honesty' in the process.

It's very pleasant around the big rich ski areas.

A girl I went to suburban L.I. Catholic high school moved to VT in the 80s and started an organic farm. She was the least likely person I ever thought would do such a thing, as she was never a hippie or a back-to-the-land type.

A friend’s sister moved there and her kids took cross country skiing as a school sport.

Vermont is a myth. The money comes from the out of staters.

The state is JOBLESS, the people are some of the NASTIEST on earth (I had Vermont in my sales territory at work) and the cost of living is quite high for a state with primarily low wage jobs.

Bizarre state with some breath taking scenery. But it's nothing like what it appears on the surface.

and the WORST WEATHER IN New England, and that's saying something.

Full of people crazy enough to vote for Bernie Sanders.

Was the Vermont as depicted in Baby Boom accurate? Where Diane Keaton high-tails it up there, buys a huge farm, fucks the hunky, lonely town doctor, and starts a gourmet baby food empire all within about 3 months. Do NYC yuppies still vacation there?

It seems like the left-wing version of West Virginia. Breathtaking natural beauty, very rural, mostly poor and white.

In one of the early episodes, Joanna gets really mad at the people in the town off-camera and is said to have shouted at them, calling them "Syrup-sucking stump jumpers." (Bob Newhart is really hilarious when he recounts this.) That's become how I always think of Vermonters.

My partner is from the " Nawtheast KIngdom" and quite the interesting folk. I kid that they are Arctic hillbillies! We met online and I offered to move there but he came to KC and I am nearly certain that our life turned out much better here.

Here is a nice VT to visit.

[quote]Yes it's a 30 year old sitcom, but is it basically accurate? Are there slums and no-go areas in Vermont?

Were you dropped on your head? What is the matter with you?

Camden, Maine where Peyton Place was shot looks so idyllic. What a wonderful place to live. This video shows all the beautiful filming locations from the movie.

I think everyone on Datalounge should move there and take over the town. How fabulous would that be. We can turn it into a real Peyton Place. I can't decide if I want to be Lana Turner and open up a clothing store, or be Betty Anderson, the town slut.

R23 , Camden is actually a place I have considered to move to, but again, I need a job and I make 6 figures in sales in Massachusetts- Maine jobs pay as little as Vermont. Its very interesting actually- I could go on the myth of Maine/Vermont for hours. I LOVE Maine. Vermont is truly a bizarre state with bizarre people. ANGRY people- This is from 5 years of experience working there.

And again, unless you are an inheritress or a true professional (doctor/lawyer) I do not know how anyone can live in Vermont. I have read some articles that Vermont is becoming a haven for independent cosmetic companies- One successful one is Ursa Major (Mens line)

Back to Vermont- and that ACCENT!! Holy shit, it is an atrocity. Its a thick mixture of Canada/Minnesota with a minimal touch of Boston

And when Vermont people go psycho- the accent intensifies.

Weird and frightening people- it goes beyond yankee this or New England that.

And I planned on moving to Burlington VT (truly lovely city) early in my career at my company- but as I experienced more and more of Vermont, I was like NO FUCKING WAY.

Well, OP North Carolina is no Mayberry if that’s what you’re basing your idea on.

Do they have maple syrup farms there?

I'd love to see those if they do.

True about the dairy farms. It’s a catastrophe in progress and no national attention.

R27 It is a catastrophe but what can farmers going to do when people don't buy their products? Milk sales are way down because people don't drink milk like they used to.

It's a global issue. People are drinking less milk, supermarkets are keeping prices down, small dairy farmers are closing as large producers are able to keep costs down.

[quote]Are there . . . no-go areas in Vermont?

You mean moose slums? Just wear a hijab over your antlers and you’ll be fine.

There's actually not a Vermont accent, I don't know where you are getting that from. There are small pockets of areas with older people who have a french drawl accent or an almost stereotypical Stephen King Movie Maine accent but that's not very common.

at worst, there can be a tendency to drop our r's but no more so than other areas.

we also don't have tempers like you are saying. But we do hold grudges for generations. it gets too dammed cold to have explosive tempers around people who you may need help from.

And about as realistic as the Indianapolis in One Day At A Time.....

Vermont at it's best!

That would depend on the color of your nipples, r23 (According to the book).

There are towns in VT that look like the show. Try Grafton or Dorset.

Don’t forget the entire show was a dream.

It wasn’t even meant to be a realistic portrayal for the 80s, let alone today

R34 what? Refresh my memory please?

[quote]Vermont has little urban crime

[quote]There are few minorities,

These two facts are definitely correlated.

Genius⬆

R38 It depends on your definition of "urban" and more so when the state's largest city has a population of 42,000 people.

But until 2018, Vermont had almost no gun laws at all and the state can pre-empt any city or town's attempts to enforce stronger prohibitions. You still don't need a permit to carry a concealed weapon. As a consequence (and to be fair, it's not just Vermont - New Hampshire as well) of the ease of access in obtaining weapons there, the Green Mountain State has long been a significant source of guns used to commit crimes in other states. It's not to say it doesn't happen elsewhere, just that in New York and New England, anyway, a lot of the guns used to commit crime can be traced back to other states with looser gun laws of which Vermont has long been one.

In effect, some of the urban crime that's almost non-existent in Vermont is being exported to states which have both big cities and stronger gun control laws.

[quote]ease of access in obtaining weapons there, the Green Mountain State has long been a significant source of guns used to commit crimes in other states

Yeah. Amazingly, all those guns are freely available in Vermont, and yet the almost entirely white population manages to use them responsibly and have almost no violent crimes.

Then take those guns to a more “diverse” environment, where the gun laws are stricter, and the “minorities” can’t seem to stop killing each other with them.

Yeah, the guns are definitely the problem here, it couldn’t possibly be that certain groups of people have a predilection to violent behavior.

Peter Scolari totally killed that show. While it seemed funny at the time, watching it in repeats, it was unbearable. Kind of like watching the post Richie years of Happy Days, Terri on Three's Company or L&S in California. It wasn't funny.

Kirk was much funnier and rounded

As for the portrayal, it was far from accurate. The town would've been far from Burlington (it was an hour from Dartmouth) so it wouldn't have had all the conveniences, much less a TV station, as it was portrayed.

I believe it has fewer deplorables than New Hampshire.

Big expose about human trafficking in one of the largest papers this week, opioids and guns are interconnected and run regularly up the Rt. 7 and R100 corridors from CT and NYC, farmers hide large migrant populations on their back-woods farms, no jobs, the schools are consolidating and families are moving out, trust funders and the retired are moving in to buy what affordable housing is left, and the leaves are pretty in the fall.

You have to be tough to live here and willing to serve the rich.

If you're not from here, they will let you know it. Big disputes between neighbors over the dumbest shit you can imagine (your tree fell on my 100 acres!), mean gossips, everyone drinks far too much and there's big business in fly by night mental health facilities that says a lot about what VT winters can do to a person. Those places are also the dumps for NE and NYC rich kids with mental illness.

I moved here in the 70's and it was lovely and people were friendly. It may have been the end of it, though, because that's all gone now. You could make a hand shake deal and be assured it would be honored....no more.

Your best bets for a idyllic, Vermont experience are in Woodstock, Stowe, and the richer towns like Shelburne. They've preserved the lie for the tourists in those towns.

BTW, snow is still on the ground here. Preserve your sanity and avoid it here. It's only going to get worse because we just had a helluva flooding event and we're continually being punished for not being conservative by the GOP.....Irene was the worst and it took over a year for FEMA money to finally come. We took care of ourselves, like we always do, but we noticed the mean fuckers in Congress who pulled that shit.

Still good people here, however, but you have to stay awhile before they'll feel safe enough to reveal themselves. It took about 10 years back in the 70's.

There aren't many blacks in Vermont, but they're super-violent. This is today's news:

Four to Be Charged With Murder in Burlington Shooting

POSTED BY COURTNEY LAMDIN ON THU, APR 18, 2019

"Four people will be charged with murder in the fatal shooting of Benzel Hampton in Burlington's Old North End on Tuesday, Burlington police announced Thursday.

Lesine Woodson, 32; James Felix, 36; Brandon Sanders, 18; and Johnny Ford, 32, are all in custody, according to Burlington Police Chief Brandon del Pozo.

Cops say Felix, Sanders and Ford attacked Hampton just before 3 p.m. Tuesday at 235 North Willard Street, where Hampton was completing a drug deal. Hampton and his attackers exchanged gunfire, and Hampton was fatally shot in the head, authorities said. The attackers fled in a vehicle driven by Woodson.

Felix sustained numerous gunshot wounds and was being treated at the University of Vermont Medical Center. Woodson was arrested shortly after the shooting, on Colchester Avenue.

Sanders fled to Connecticut with Ford, police said. A Connecticut SWAT team apprehended Ford at a Motel 6 in Enfield, where police recovered $16,000 in cash and more than 100 grams of crack cocaine. Hampton had a "quantity" of crack cocaine when he was killed, police said.

Police learned Ford had gone to the MGM Grand Casino in Springfield, Mass., and played poker after the murder. He has previous arrests in Florida for robbery, aggravated battery, carrying a concealed weapon and various drug charges. Sanders also has a record for robbery and larceny, police said.

Del Pozo said the altercation sprayed bullets around a residential neighborhood just as school was letting out, and that it was fortunate no bystanders were shot.

Hampton, the victim, is also from Florida. In January, he led troopers on a 30-mile pursuit at speeds over 100 mph. He was eventually apprehended by an off-duty sheriff’s deputy in Essex."

Vermont is the whitest state in the country, with the most gun rights, and the lowest crime rates.

But the liberal carpetbagger Jews who run the state are trying their hardest to change all this.

The Jewish cabal pulls stuff like this. They break and bend all kinds of laws to bring in a black superintendent to run the Burlington School District, and then he proceeds to act completely shady, with a clear anti-white agenda, only promoting fellow black people, and covering up for their corruption and sexual harassment and refusal to help white students with their college applications.

Then the school board keeps supporting all the corrupt black school leaders, under threats of being called racist by the Jewish carpetbaggers.

All the Advanced Placement classes get cut, because those are for white people, while all the money is spent on ESL and classes catering to low performing black students.

Burlington is now considered the worst place in Vermont to be a teacher, when 20 years ago it was the best.

Teaching positions in Burlington used to attract 200-400 applicants.

Now it's just a black nationalist race war on white kids, with passionate support from the Jews.

Asking about Vermont reminded me that the made-for-TV movies about the Pennsylvania Amish are all made in Canada. "Witness" more 20 years ago was filmed in Lancaster County.

Where would one vacation n Vermont? Are there any nice town on Lake Champlain beside Burlington? Any small likeside towns?

Look at these Jews, they own the whole state. Here's the oxycontin drug lord family buying up one of the ski resorts. And the Jews running Burlington are now giving free heroin needles and methadone to try to turn Burlington into San Francisco:

The Sackler family, facing a multitude of lawsuits for fueling the nation’s opioid epidemic, has purchased majority ownership in Mount Snow’s parent company, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

The Sacklers obtained 54% voting power in Peak Resorts last November through a public company called CAP 1 LLC, SEC documents show. The Deerfield Valley News first reported the Sacklers taking effective control of Mount Snow.

I lived in Burlington for two years. Miserable frigid weather, I ended up with vitamin D deficiency, but the food was great. The crime R46 mentioned did happen in the one "rough" 4 square block neighborhood. My kid went to kindergarten at one of the designated schools for English language learners. Lots of refugees since it's a resettlement city, so we lived in a more diverse environment than most anywhere else in the state.

r52 Note that Bernie Sanders and Weinberger and the rest of these Jews don't believe in diversity for Israel, THEIR Jewish ethno-state. But they move up to Vermont and declare that it is too white, and they lie and pretend that maximum diversity is a strength. It's only a strength for the hostile elite Jewish ruling class in Vermont and the US.

If the people of Vermont, or the US in general, decided they want to protect their demographics, culture, and heritage, Bernie Sanders and ALL Jews would be united in calling us Nazis, while also calling us Nazis if we point out their passionate support for a Jewish ethno-state with as little diversity as possible.

If David Duke pretended that diversity was a strength for Israel, that would make him the equivalent of Bernie Sanders.

Do you have a small penis, R53?

[quote] trust funders and the retired are moving in to buy what affordable housing is left,

This is an internet trope that’s used everywhere. “It’s the rich people from somewhere else who are causing prices to rise!” No, it’s not. It’s inflation, dummies. Rent is included in the consumer price index, but home prices are not. So house prices are not used when calculating inflation. So, duh. House prices, food and energy (natural gas, oil, electric, propane, gasoline) are not included in the CPI in order to make inflation look artificially low.

Retirees arent buying houses in Vermont, you dolt. They might buy condos to use as possible rental income, but they don’t want or need houses in an area where it’s cold, snowy, icy winter 9 months out of the year.

Bernie Sanders is a nasty piece of shit.

I have a feeling that Vermont is more like the movie "Funny Farm" with Chevy Chase. It looks beautiful and idyllic, but the people are weird and unfriendly.

I've always wanted to move to the Berkshires area of Massachusetts. That area looks like heaven on earth.

And let me echo the flooding issues in VT from above. That state was decimated in parts during 2011 or 2012 due to flooding.

I remember thinking "Vermont has flooding issues!!?"

Fuck that state.

They’ve issued another flood watch for VT today, 4 days after parts of the state were still under water.

The Frugalwoods live in Vermont! Which would be enough of a reason by itself to avoid the place.

R57 If you like mud, mosquitos, and smoking weed all winter, there's nowhere better.

Like anything else? There's not too many places that are worse.

R61. I would say that Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Kansas, parts of Florida, and Louisiana are worse than VT-- parts of Connecticut aren't exactly great either

They have mosquitos in the winter? Fuck that!

VT always votes for Sanders because he is so pro-NRA. That is how he keeps his job. He doesn't do anything in the Senate. He once named a post office. He was also the only person on the left that voted against sanctions for Russia in the last vote.

I lived in Western Massachusetts for a while. Equally as beautiful in the fall. For some reason I would have panic attacks going to Vermont. I have no idea why, past life stuff? I know that is woo, but it was so unreasonable when it happened. I just could not settle down till I got back to Mass. Now Mass has a lot of beautiful small towns - high cost of living, high taxes. But I made some life long friends from that experience of living there. The people are smarter and harder working then any place I've ever resided and I have lived all over the United States. Lot of Irish, Polish, Italian - Catholic pride running through that state still. I also lived in Maine, which was beautiful on the eyeballs and very white - but those people once you get away from the tourist towns never ever really Welcome outsiders, or Flat Landers as they call people "from away" ~ Over all New England is an interesting part of the United States. Yankee Pride and work ethic can still be found. (You might have to look harder these days, but its still around.)

[quote]I preferred Suzanne Pleshette as Leona Helmsley. If that wasn't acting . . .

Hang the phone up! HANG IT UP!

Was that a personal call?

You're FIRED!

Kirk Devane was a horrible character. I’m glad they replaced him with Scolari.

Vermont. Truly. What a bunch of fucking weirdos. You all have to trust me.

Its not all the Vermont Country Store catalog, folks!!!!

What a fucking weird state!!! And when I tell you that New Hampshire is a better alternative, you must know that VT is FUCKED!!!!

Weird, weird, weird flood ridden and bizarre state and people. Run bitches! Run!!

show me on the doll where Champ touched you r68

Newly uploaded clip on-line showing protesters in Burlington claiming that prominent Vermonters once owned and traded slaves.

70 Look at those mentally ill anti-white racists talking about how white people are exhausting.

These people are exhausting. They move up here and they scour the state's history for any leverage they can find to assert their dominance over white people, and to guilt-trip white people into supporting whatever anti-white policies these out-of-state people of color can think up.

And these people of color work hand in glove with the Jews in Vermont. In fact, the Jews probably write the scripts for these people of color. Some Jew found out that some of the very first families in Vermont, 300 years ago, owned slaves. Then the Jews feed the script to these out-of-state people of color who come to Vermont not to fit in and get along and be thankful, but rather to conquer, and badger, and manipulate, and guilt-trip, and even stop traffic in front of emergency rooms.

What these exhausting people make perfectly clear is that Vermont would be much smarter to kick them out of the state.

Just being white means being evil to these insecure racists. It doesn't matter that Vermont was one of the first states to ban slavery. It doesn't matter that slavery was never widely practiced in Vermont.

It doesn't matter that Vermont helped run the Underground Railroad into Canada, as a key transit point on the border.

It doesn't matter that my ancestors fought and died in the Civil War to free the ancestors of these black assholes.

All that matters is that Vermont is "too white", and has the lowest crime rate in the country. These two things are related of course, and these blacks with their ghetto inferiority complex hate that about Vermont, and about white people.

White people (and Vermont) remind these people how utterly inferior black culture is, everywhere in the world. Always high crime, always ultra-racist, always a low trust society, always a low IQ society, always nothing but impulsiveness, crime, and tragedy.

Vermonters are mean and nasty to anyone not from Vermont and if you are they're outright rude to you if your parents and grandparents aren't also from that shithole state. Incest. Heroin. Lots of sad, dilapidated barns.

Northampton or Amherst MA aren't that far away and much more liveable.

I hope terrorists kill R71 and his whole fucking family.

Kirk was hysterical and worked because it took the emphasis off Stephanie.

Michael and Stephanie were OK in small amounts, but after Kirk left, it became the Julia Duffy Show

[quote]This may be partly influenced by the crush I have on Bob Newhart.

Blegh. Imagine dirty talk with Bob Newhart. "Uh, listen, I-I think I'm uh--I'm going to--I uh, I-I'm going to c-cum. Y-yeah. Cum." Then his dick coughs out a little dewdrop of cum and he immediately rolls over and falls asleep.

Actually, never mind, that does kind of turn me on. Carry on, OP.

I wore funky sweaters before Cosby did.

Serious question: was Joanna Loudon the same character of anti-semite Joanna Forbes that Mary Frann played on The MTM Show? I could swear her full name was Joanna Forbes Loudon. Maybe JJoanna gave up hanging out in the garment district to marry Bob and move to Vermont. Did Joanna ever display any bigotry when she moved to Vermont?

OP, do you realize what you just did? Starting a thread about an old celebrity that hasn't been mentioned in awhile increases their risk of death. If he dies soon, it's your fault.

I owned a vacation property near Okemo that I sold just before the last big flood. I was friendly to everyone in the shops and restaurants but wouldn't say anyone was friendly back. Every time I had to get something done at the house, repair or maintenance, more often than not the worker would cancel at the last minute or not show up. I had a really hard time getting things done (which is one of the reasons I sold the place, though it was a goldmine of a money maker). The local mindset was work until you have enough money to get by the rest of the year, and then ski.

R79- HOLY FUCK!!! Vermonters are some of the laziest pieces of shit in existence-

Contractors in Vermont cannot even find help because nobody wants to work- I have been told this many times by unrelated companies in construction-

I was also told that during hunting season, it is even worse- that people in VT make so much money off of hunting (for various reasons- meat/pelts/fur) that it doesn't even make sense for them to work. I was told this in various ways by others in construction.

Very, very, very strange place. And VERY small, everyone talks.

r80 has $40,000 in credit card debt because he's so materialistic. R80 can't fathom how people would care about anything but money.

[quote] This may be partly influenced by the crush I have on Bob Newhart. Yes, he's a million years old, but that dry wit and stammer really butter my brioche.

He was handsome in his younger days.

Paul Ryan eyes are a disqualifier

I think of native Vermonters being like Larry, Darryl and his other brother Darryl. Their family tree is a straight line.

Mary Frann was a gem. Loved her on DOOL, and of course, Newhart.