Pittsfield Municipal

The Berkshires of western Massachusetts are the southern continuation of the Green Mountains — a humpy ridge of weathered hills that delivers some of the densest fall color in New England. North Adams, in the far northwest corner, was a Gilded Age mill town built on the Hoosac River; the abandoned 26-building Sprague Electric factory complex was converted into MASS MoCA in 1999, now one of the largest contemporary art museums in the country. Tanglewood (summer home of the Boston Symphony), the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, and Edith Wharton's house The Mount in Lenox are all within a 30-minute drive.

A 306-foot blue limestone obelisk in Bennington, Vermont — the tallest structure in the state of Vermont, completed in 1891 to commemorate the Battle of Bennington fought August 16, 1777. The battle was actually fought across the New York state line in Walloomsac, NY, but the supply depot the British wanted to capture (and didn't) was in Bennington. Brigadier General John Stark led 2,000 New Hampshire militia against a 1,200-man British/Hessian/Loyalist raiding force; the Americans lost 30 dead and captured 700 prisoners. The British defeat at Bennington — combined with the loss at Saratoga two months later — convinced France to enter the Revolutionary War on the American side, the strategic turning point of the conflict. The monument's observation platform 200 feet up gives a 360-degree view across three states (VT, NY, MA). Robert Frost is buried in the Old Bennington Cemetery at the base of the monument — his epitaph reads "I had a lover's quarrel with the world."

On the north perimeter of Bradley International Airport sits the largest aviation museum in New England. The Connecticut Aeronautical Historical Society started building the collection in 1959 in a smaller hangar at the airport. In October 1979 an F4 tornado tore through Windsor Locks and destroyed most of it — aircraft scattered, fuselages torn open, a B-29 that had been intact for thirty years left in pieces. The volunteers spent years restoring what could be saved and built a new permanent home on Perimeter Road. Today it holds more than eighty aircraft across three display hangars plus an outdoor yard, and is one of the most significant aviation collections in the eastern United States. The collection leans on Connecticut aerospace history — Sikorsky, Pratt & Whitney, Kaman, Chance Vought, all of which had factories in the state. The 58th Bombardment Wing Memorial centers on a fully restored B-29A Superfortress, "Jack's Hack." The oldest aircraft is the 1870 Silas M. Brooks balloon basket, generally considered the oldest surviving American-built flying machine. The Sikorsky VS-44A on display is the sole remaining American-built four-engine commercial flying boat. The Goodyear ZNPK-28 blimp control car is one of only two surviving K-class control cars in the world. Major fighter exhibits include a P-47 Thunderbolt, F-86F Sabre, F-100A Super Sabre, F-89J Scorpion, F-104A Starfighter, and an F-15C credited with a 1991 MiG-25 kill. There's an exhibit specifically on the 57th Fighter Group — the unit Eugene Bradley flew in when he was killed at this field in 1941.

On October 17, 1777, British General John Burgoyne surrendered 6,000 troops to American General Horatio Gates at Saratoga, New York. It was the first major British defeat of the American Revolution. The news reached Paris in December, and on February 6, 1778, France formally entered the war as an American ally. Without French troops, French ships, and French money, the Continental Army would have lost the war. Historians call Saratoga the turning point of the Revolution. The battles actually played out across two engagements — the Battle of Freeman's Farm on September 19 and the Battle of Bemis Heights on October 7 — over a 10-square-mile stretch of farmland and forest along the Hudson River 30 miles north of Albany. Benedict Arnold (still on the American side, before his 1780 betrayal) led the decisive charge at Bemis Heights and was wounded in the leg. A boot monument on the battlefield commemorates Arnold's leg — but not Arnold himself. He is the only named American general who fought at Saratoga not honored with a personal monument. Saratoga National Historical Park preserves 3,400 acres of the battlefield. The 9-mile auto tour road links 10 interpretive stops including the Neilson House, Balcarres Redoubt, Breymann Redoubt, Hessian Camp, and the Saratoga Monument (a 155-foot granite obelisk near Schuylerville commemorating the surrender). Saratoga Springs, 12 miles W of the battlefield, is the spa town. Sixteen mineral springs bubble up from the carbonate-rich aquifer beneath the village. The Iroquois drank the water; rich New Yorkers built bathhouses here in the early 1800s; by the Gilded Age Saratoga was the most fashionable summer resort in the East. The Adelphi Hotel (1877) on Broadway is the last surviving Victorian grand hotel. Saratoga Race Course opened in August 1863, six weeks after Gettysburg — the oldest organized sporting venue in continuous operation in the United States. The Travers Stakes, run annually since 1864, is North America's oldest major stakes race. Six weeks of racing each summer (mid-July through Labor Day) draw 50,000+ to the track on weekends. Yaddo, the literary artists' colony founded 1900, sits across the road from the racetrack; Truman Capote wrote "Other Voices, Other Rooms" there, Sylvia Plath worked on her novel, and Saul Bellow, Carson McCullers, Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, and Philip Roth all spent residencies there.