An old man died and left two children, a boy and a girl. No one wanted them. Their father settled them on the town and the town sent them to the poor farm.

Atherton and Almon (Alice Meaker, Part 2)

Vermont is known for the beauty of its woods and mountains, but the cost of that beauty is often forgotten. For much of our history, Vermonters endured unimaginable hardship and poverty that limited opportunities for growth and preserved, as if unchanged, the landscape of today. Their suffering is always with us, written on the land, inscribed in cellar-holes and graveyards and orchards gone to wild. Welcome to These Dark Mountains.&nbsp;