By Jarice Hanson For the Valley Advocate Plays about difficult subjects, like the consequences of personal actions, politics, and social change, require more of the audience in terms of asking them to ...

By Hannah Bevis For the Valley Advocate On most days, Andrew Curran, better known as his drag persona Magnolia Masquerade, is ...

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Easthampton, Northampton, Cambridge and Somerville have passed resolutions deprioritizing plant-based drugs, while State Rep. Lindsay Sabadosa of the 1st Hampshire District has co-sponsored bills that ...

Two women leaders of Valley theaters - Priscilla Kane Hellweg of Enchanted Circle Theater and Lucinda Kidder of Silverthorne Theater Company - have retired from the troupes they’ve nurtured from ...

Kayla Manzi, a bartender at the Majestic Saloon who grew up in western Massachusetts, used to frequent Divas, a staple in Northampton’s queer community that opened in 2001. The closure of the bar in ...

PEXELS/Lisa Fotios No matter how hard I think about it, I can’t dream up a plausible public health or safety rationale for dividing the market between tobacco sellers, alcohol sellers, and weed ...

While she was at the ward, Clark met her future wife Valerie. “We were actually both inpatient,” Valerie Clark explained how they first met and how they spent time together while they were there in ...

Springfield, Massachusetts, was a big abolitionist hub during the days of the Underground Railroad — not that many people know this. When talking about Massachusetts history, Western Mass isn’t well ...

The initial rumored threats of tariffs to be applied to alcohol from the EU were as high as 200%. At writing, those threats seem unlikely to come to fruition. The number the Trump administration ...

In Hadge’s case, she wasn’t in a communicative space, so she spent hours with a staff member quietly putting together a ping pong table. Others I spoke to marveled at being able to do their laundry ...

David Wilson owner of Mystery on Main Street in Brattleboro, however, reasons more pragmatically. “Once we lost Walden and Borders, it was a little bit easier to make a living.” Mystery on Main Street ...