Dan & Whit’s: “The Heart of the Town” Documentary Premieres on August 26

Filmmaker Carla Kimball

Screenshot from one of Dan Fraser’s weekly Monday Minutes during the pandemic.

UPDATE: THIS SCREENING ON AUGUST 26 HAS BEEN CANCELLED. The filmmaker has released the film on her website.

Remember during the darkest of COVID days when Dan Fraser had the idea to hold a mass outdoor haircut fest in Dan & Whit’s parking lot, proceeds to benefit two Norwich hairdressers whose salons had been required to close? The town of Norwich, Vermont was beautified by 22 newly trimmed heads, and bystanders took a therapeutic, communal deep breath amid some laughter.

Carla Kimball, photographer, dancer, and now filmmaker, has documented the story of Dan & Whit’s during those difficult years in "The Heart of the Town,” a brief film that will premiere on August 26 at—where else—the parking lot of Dan & Whit’s. (Rain date: August 27) Bring a chair. Music and food begin at 6:00 pm, film at 8:00 pm. No charge. (Click here for more info and link to the film’s trailer.)

The store is so familiar to Upper Valley residents that one might think there is not much new to say about it. We can all recite the store motto, for example: “If we don’t have it, you don’t need it.” Kimball’s take, however, focuses on the connections between the store and the community exemplified during pandemic times.

The CBS Evening News’s Steve Hartman found his way to Dan & Whit’s in December, 2021 (click here to find link) to bring the country the story of how community members stepped into the breach when Dan Fraser discovered he had lost virtually all of his employees due to COVID restrictions and fears. Kimball’s film interweaves snippets of the CBS footage with interviews of those local residents who “volunteered” to run the cash registers and tend the deli, stock the shelves, and generally keep the doors open and the lights on. Fraser describes it as a modern day equivalent of a barn raising.

Townsfolk and employees talk about Fraser’s business model, a for-profit enterprise that does the right things. His highly successful “19 Days of Norwich,” in which local businesses contribute a portion of their profits during the winter holiday season, is not just a feel-good gesture. Since its inception nine years ago it has raised approximately two million dollars for the Upper Valley Haven.

Part of the fun of a local documentary is to see whose familiar faces pop up on the screen to tell the story, so I will provide no more details here (other than to mention Whit the Dog in dancing mode.) But I will close with this: part-time cashier Joyce Reynolds reads a note from her boss Dan Fraser that he had attached to her time card. It’s one of the best moments on the big screen.

( The free outdoor summer premiere is in collaboration with Dan Fraser and JAM/CATV. Photo credit and by permission: Carla Kimball)

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And in case you are wondering . . . Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.