About
Who We Are
The Addison Independent was founded in 1946 in Middlebury and quickly became a beloved local newspaper with strong community and advertiser support. The Addy Indy has always been a family-owned independent newspaper, starting with William J. Slator and his wife, Celine. Current publisher/editor Angelo Lynn bought the paper in 1984, and now two of his daughters Christy Lynn and Elsie Lynn Parini are stewarding the paper into the next chapter as co-publishers.
More than 15,000 of us read The Addy Indy each week. We trust the reporting, we share our stories, and we read about what matters to us.
We would be delighted to meet one-on-one with you if you’re interested in learning more about The Addison Independent Trust. And would love to hear any ideas you may have about how to keep our Addy Indy strong for decades to come!
With gratitude,
Angelo, Christy & Elsie
Contact
Board Members
Catharine Findiesen Hays
Catharine joined the Bixby Memorial Free Library team on May 1, 2020 where she served as Library Director until the end of September 2025. Born and raised in Vermont, she returned home to her family’s place in Panton, after working outside Vermont.
Catharine most recently served 10 years as founding Executive Director of the Wharton Future of Marketing/Advertising Program, where she co-authored Beyond Advertising: Creating Value Through All Customer Touchpoints (Wiley, 2016). She previously held leadership positions in marketing, corporate sales, and executive programs at AT&T and was the National Director of Corporate Relations for the Eastern Division of the American Cancer Society.
Catharine received an AA degree from Franklin University Switzerland, a BS from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, an MBA from the Wharton School, and an MA in International Studies from the University of Pennsylvania as a Lauder Fellow. In her free time, she enjoys gardening, reading, renovating a 200-year-old farmhouse, and spending time with her two daughters.
Bruce Hiland
Bruce has been a resident of the Cornwall/Middlebury area since 1988. A graduate of Brown University, he became a Navy officer, then graduated from Wharton with a MBA, worked at McKinsey, served as CAO at Time Inc., and spent 20 years of CEO-level consulting, including being part of four startups. He’s done “considerable community service,” including service as President of the Middlebury Business Association during the same time Angelo was also on the board and formed a close friendship. Bruce has been focused on the “challenges and opportunities people experienced in their work life.” He and his wife Ginny live in Florida in the winter months and here for the other 7-8 months.
Serena Kim
Serena is co-owner of Middlebury’s Swift House Inn along with her husband, Matthew Robinson. They moved to Vermont from LA in 2020. A graduate from U.C. Santa Cruz, Serena has a background as a writer and editor in arts journalism. She has also helped create the editorial social media voice for Apple and crafted experiential marketing copy for Samsung Mobile in South Korea. Now that she lives in Vermont, she’s enjoying teaching the craft and culture of the DJ at Middlebury College, while handling digital marketing for the Inn. She serves on the board of the Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival as acting chair.
Lloyd Komesar
Lloyd is best known to Addison County residents for his efforts in co-founding and building the successful Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival, a community-based event dedicated to showcasing the work of first and second-time filmmakers from around the world. After a decade long run, he recently stepped down from his role as Festival Producer but remains on the MNFF Board. His career in media began in 1984 and spanned three decades, with 25 of those years spent in film and television distribution as an executive at the Walt Disney Company. He is a proud graduate of Wesleyan University [1974] and additionally received a graduate degree from Brooklyn College [1983]. Lloyd and his wife, Maureen Carn, live on Lake Dunmore for the six months of Vermont’s late spring, summer and fall and in Pasadena, California the rest of the year.
Angelo Lynn
Angelo has been editor/publisher of the Addy Indy since 1984. A graduate of Kansas University with a BA in journalism, he is a fourth-generation journalist and was raised in Iola, Kansas, where his great-grandfather founded the Iola Register in 1882. After ski bumming for four years after college, at 26, Angelo bought a small weekly newspaper in Kansas in 1978, flipped it after 5 years and bought the Addison Independent when he was 30. At one point, Angelo operated seven Vermont newspapers with his brother, Emerson, while he also published two magazines (Vermont Sports and Vermont Ski + Ride) and ran a phone book business in central and southern Vermont. Angelo served as president of the Vermont Press Association from 1987-89, while also being drafted onto the New England Press Association board of directors, of which he first served as president in 1992-93. He has represented Vermont on that board ever since, serving as president of an expanded press association in 2020.
Elsie Lynn Parini
Elsie began working in the newspaper business at age 23 (in 2010). Born and raised in Middlebury, she graduated from Colorado College, then spent the better part of a year teaching English in Taiwan, then traveling in China before returning to Vermont with her partner, Oliver Parini. They settled in the Burlington area, where Oliver launched his photography business, and Elsie started at the bottom at the Essex Reporter and Colchester Sun, working the front office, then as a reporter and designer, then editor of those two papers. They married, and Elsie began working at the Addison Independent a decade ago (commuting from Burlington) and has been editor/graphic designer of the Arts+Leisure section of the Addy Indy, and now is co-publisher with her sister, Christy Lynn. She and Oliver, who moved to Weybridge 18 months ago, have two children, Ida, 6, and Massimo, 4.
Annina Seiler
Annina grew up on a small dairy farm in Cornwall and currently lives in Goshen where she is the co-owner and CFO of Republic of Vermont, a maple syrup and honey farm that she runs with her husband, Ethan West. The couple ships thousands of packages a year from their mountainside sugarhouse/fulfillment center while also raising their two young children, Linus and Lelia. Annina holds a master’s degree in anthropology from the George Washington University and previously worked for the State of Vermont managing grants to municipalities for the Department of Housing and Community Development. She currently serves on the board of the Addison County Solid Waste Management District and on the Goshen Planning Commission. She looks forward to serving her community in this exciting new way.