Merrill’s grandparents did a lot of buying for the Webb family, who put together the collection for the Shelburne (Vt.) Museum, and they became interested in folk art before it was being widely collected. There were always items in those houses that were really, really good.” Mr. “And I couldn’t wait to get inside and read their letters and go through their stuff. Merrill said recently during a conversation in Southampton. “When I was a kid, 4 or 5 years old, every other weekend it would be some huge house in the country that five generations had lived in,” Mr. Now run by his brother, Ethan, the auction house handles estates throughout New England, in upper New York State, and occasionally from Long Island. His father, Duane, started Merrill’s Auction Gallery in Vermont in 1967. Nathan and Margaret Merrill, his grandparents, founded the Vermont Antiques Dealers Association and established the Ethan Allen Antique Shop in South Burlington in the late 1930s. The team will leave China in the next few days but then it’s back to Slovenia and on to the World Juniors in Norway.Todd Merrill was to the manor born, but it wasn’t his family’s manor. “We all pitch in and help any way we can.”īobbie Jo can’t wait to hug her granddaughter but she will have to wait. “The kids are supported by their families,” Bobbie Jo said. And ski jumping doesn’t have a lot of funding. It’s quite amazing, the sounds as they come down the run.”Īlexandria currently lives and trains in Slovenia as Canadian skiers no longer have a training base at home since the Calgary jumps were decommissioned a few years ago. We got to watch her live in Germany two years ago, just before COVID. “Women have only been jumping in the Olympics since 2010. “The Olympics were always something she was interested in,” Bobbie Jo says. Her bio on the Canadian Olympic team site says that she is enthralled by the feeling of weightlessness. She began ski jumping at the age of nine with the Olympic jumps in Calgary right in her back yard.īobbie Jo says Alexandria loved it from the start. Competing in her first individual World Cup events in 2021-21, Loutitt achieved a career-best 14th place finish in the large hill event in Lillehammer in December. Loutitt made her first appearance on the FIS Summer Grand Prix circuit in 2021 and achieved a personal highlight in Klingenthal, Germany as she placed 19th. It’s lovely in ended on such a bright note.”Īlexandria is only 18 years old, but she has had some good results on the international scene. “My birthday is tomorrow, what a present. There has never been a Canadian medal and not one in North America in almost 100 years. “She talked to her mom after and she was pretty teary and excited. “Oh, she’s just over the moon,” Bobbie Jo said. A number of other top teams were disqualified before the team event finals, which led to the improbable medal for the Canadian team. The rules for ski jumping are very tight and most teams try to take it right to the line. “I was just sick at heart when she was disqualified.” “300 grams too light and her skis were too long,” Bobbie Jo said. That stress went to a very high level when Ale was disqualified from the singles event because she weighed less than she should. I’m pretty excited and kind of stressed,” Bobbi Jo said before the event. My daughter in Calgary (Tracy McKay) is having a watch party, but we’re staying home. The grandparents had hoped to watch live, although Bobbie Jo didn’t promise she could stay up that late. The team arrived in Zhangjiakou, China last Monday evening and Ale’s first run was at 2:45 a.m. Grandmother Bobbie Jo said the weekend was “agony and ecstacy”. Their granddaughter, Alexandria Loutitt, who lives in Calgary, competed in women’s ski jumping, and the team event, where she won a bronze medal for Canada. That’s the case for Bobbie Jo and Percy Mackie of Kimberley. But imagine if your grandchild was an Olympian? How about an Olympic medalist? Proud wouldn’t even begin to cover it. Any grandparent knows how proud you can be of your grandchildren.
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