A town meeting is a form of direct democratic rule, used primarily in portions of the United States – principally in New England – since the 17th century, in which most or all the members of a community come together to legislate policy and budgets for local government. This is a town- or city-level meeting where decisions are made, in contrast with town hall meetings held by state and national politicians to answer questions from their constituents, which have no decision-making power.
Archives: Events
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Theatre Performance
Amateur theatre, also known as amateur dramatics, is theatre performed by amateur actors and singers. Amateur theatre groups may stage plays, revues, musicals, light opera, pantomime or variety shows, and do so for the social activity as well as the artistic side. Productions may take place in venues ranging from the open air, community centres or schools to independent or major professional theatres and can be simple light entertainment or demanding drama.
Amateur theatre is distinct from the professional or community theatre simply in that participants are not paid, although this is not always the case, even though the productions staged may be commercial ventures, either to fund further productions, to benefit the community, or for charity. Amateur actors are not typically members of actors’ unions, as these organisations exist to protect the professional industry and discourage their members from working with companies which are not signatories to union contracts.
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Sunday TownPress Run
The marathon is a long-distance running event with an official distance of 42.195 kilometres (26 miles and 385 yards), usually run as a road race. The event was instituted in commemoration of the fabled run of the Greek soldier Pheidippides, a messenger from the Battle of Marathon to Athens.
The marathon was one of the original modern Olympic events in 1896, though the distance did not become standardized until 1921. More than 500 marathons are held throughout the world each year, with the vast majority of competitors being recreational athletes as larger marathons can have tens of thousands of participants.
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Jazz Night
A jazz club is a venue where the primary entertainment is the performance of live jazz music. Jazz clubs have been in large rooms in the eras of Orchestral jazz and big band jazz and when its popularity as a dance music was common. With the transition to styles like Bebop and later, played by smaller numbers of musicians such as quartets and trios smaller clubs became practical.
Contemporary such venues may be found in the basement of larger residential buildings, or as simple storefront locations. They can be rather small compared to other music venues, reflecting the intimate atmosphere of jazz concerts and long term decline in interest in jazz. Despite being called “clubs”, these venues are usually not exclusive.
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Indie Movies Friday
A movie theater or movie theatre (also called a cinema, movie house, film house, film theater or picture house) is a venue, usually a building, for viewing movies (films), for entertainment.
Most but not all movie theaters are commercial operations catering to the general public, who attend by purchasing a ticket. The movie is projected with a movie projector onto a large projection screen at the front of the auditorium. Most movie theaters are now equipped for digital cinema projection, removing the need to create and transport a physical film print.
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Kids Sports Day
Sports days, sometimes referred to as field days, are events staged by many schools and offices in which people take part in competitive sporting activities, often with the aim of winning trophies or prizes. Though they are often held at the beginning of summer, they are also staged in the autumn or spring seasons, especially in countries where the summer is very harsh. Schools stage many sports days in which children participate in the sporting events. It is usually held in elementary schools, or grades Kindergarten-8th Grade.
In schools which use a house system a feature of the school is the competition between the houses; this is especially brought out during sporting events such as an inter-house sports day. Games that are played on school sports days can be wide and varied. They can include straightforward sprints and longer races for all age groups as well as egg and spoon races. Three legged races are run as well as sack races, wheelbarrow races, and parent and child races. Additional games are traditionally run in Ireland, and the UK, such as horseshoes.
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Summer Rock Festival
Initially, some of the earliest rock festivals were built on the foundation of pre-existing jazz and blues festivals, but quickly evolved to reflect the rapidly changing musical tastes of the time. For example, the United Kingdom’s National Jazz Festival was launched in Richmond from August 26–27, 1961. The first three of these annual outdoor festivals featured only jazz music, but by the fourth “Jazz & Blues Festival” in 1964, a shift had begun that incorporated some blues and pop artists into the lineup. In 1965, for the first time the event included more blues, pop and rock acts than jazz, and by 1966, when the event moved to the town of Windsor, the rock and pop acts clearly dominated the jazz artists.
A similar, though more rapid, evolution occurred with Jazz Bilzen, a solely jazz festival that was inaugurated in 1965 in the Belgian city of Bilzen. The 1966 festival still featured mostly jazz acts. However, by the time of the third festival from August 25–27, 1967, rock and pop acts had edged out most of the jazz bands and become the main attraction.