MIDDLEBURY — A week-long event unfolding in Middlebury this month will celebrate community, kindness and creating connections in honor of a Middlebury College graduate.

“Known and Loved Week” will run from April 25 through May 2 and feature a kick-off event at Notte, the debut of a custom beer on tap at six local eateries and opportunities for residents to support area businesses and build community.

It’s a collaboration between Middlebury restaurants, college alumni and the Jack Langerman Community Foundation, a nonprofit that seeks to “foster a sense of community through initiatives that inspire people to connect with, champion, and mentor others.” The organization was founded in honor of Jack Langerman, a member of the Middlebury College class of 2019.5 who died in 2021.

“One of his superpowers was really connection and bringing people together,” said Scott Langerman, Jack’s father and an ’87 Middlebury graduate. “You could be old, you could be young, you could be a cool kid, not a cool kid, didn’t matter. You were just people, and he loved bringing people together.”

Scott said the foundation was established as a way to carry on that legacy. The nonprofit offers grants to various community-building efforts and organizes events to bring people together around its mission.

“Community is really what (Jack) was all about,” Scott explained. “That took a number of different forms, whether it was a community he was already a part of — a team, a school, a neighborhood … He was always kind of the ‘glue guy,’ the one who would bring people together, but at the same time, he would always make sure that if there were people on the periphery of those communities, that they had an opportunity to come in and join that community and be supported by that community.”

The foundation looks to create communities around the “passions and principles that defined” Jack, as well as give back to the ones he was a part of. Scott noted that list includes the areas of baseball, youth sports, education and mentorship and parts of the country like Boston, Jack’s home state of Maryland and Vermont.

“We’re intentionally a little bit all over the place, but the connective tissue is that it’s all about supporting community, building community, providing community and ensuring that nobody’s left out,” Scott said.

BUILDING COMMUNITY

The nonprofit has worked on various initiatives, including creating an endowed internship fund at the college and supporting the launch of the Charlie Burchard, a wooden longboat built by area high school students at the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum. Burchard was a Middlebury College graduate who died at the age of 23 from a rare heart ailment.

The foundation has also worked with the Middlebury College baseball team, which Jack was a part of. In recent years, the organization has hosted a “Friends of Middlebury Baseball Weekend” event at Mister Up’s. Phil Bernstein, a board member for the foundation and a good friend of Jack’s, said the event took off in 2023.

“I started messaging local businesses for a raffle to raise money for the (then) recently-started Jack Langerman Community Foundation, and we just got a lot of good community responses,” he recalled.

This year, the foundation is hoping to build on that annual gathering with Known and Loved Week. Known and Loved is the name of a series of beers the foundation has developed with breweries located in places meaningful to Jack. Jack’s parents have owned a brewery restaurant, and their passion for craft beer was one Jack adopted as an adult.

Known and Loved raises funds for the foundation and pays tribute to Jack in part through the label artwork featured on cans of the beer. The first edition of Known and Loved was brewed in Maryland, with several versions developed since then.

“(Known and Loved) was sort of a phrase that we always felt was so appropriate for Jack because that was how he made other people feel,” Scott said. “If you were talking to Jack, you always felt like you were the most important person in the room.”

A few versions of Known and Loved were brewed with Greg Engert, a 2002 graduate of Middlebury College and a partner at Bluejacket brewery in Washington, D.C. The brewery has hosted Jack’s Good People Gathering, an annual event attracting hundreds of people.

Engert explained that Known and Loved is always a spin on the same beer.

“Since the beginning, we’ve been brewing a hazy pale ale,” he said. “Each year the only change we make is the hops that we use in the beer itself.”

Bluejacket is behind the edition of Known and Loved that’ll be available at several local eateries next weekend. Engert noted this year’s edition features Nectaron, Nelson Sauvin, and Riwaka hops — all from New Zealand, with bright, fruity flavors.

Engert has enjoyed collaborating with the foundation, which brought him closer to the Langermans.

“Every time we make this beer, Scott and Vicki (Jack’s mother) come to the brewery and brew the beer with us,” he said. “It’s great because every year they bring in a new cast of friends and family that are in town or available and can be here. It’s a really fun day … It gives us some time in the middle of the day on a weekday to catch up and have a good time and tell stories about Middlebury and Jack and things like that.”

IN MIDDLEBURY

This year’s edition of Known and Loved will be available beginning April 25 at American Flatbread, Two Brothers Tavern, Fire & Ice, Mad Taco, Shiretown Marketplace and Mister Up’s.

Throughout the week, those restaurants will also offer food or drink specials — such as $4 pints of the custom beer at Mister Up’s — for anyone who orders a Known and Loved beer or says the words “Known and Loved.” The first 25 people to do so at each restaurant will be entered into a raffle for prizes including a Burlington staycation and Boston Red Sox tickets.

Community members are invited to a kick-off gathering at Notte on Saturday, April 25, from 9-11:30 p.m., and all are encouraged to perform a random act of kindness throughout the week.

Scott said a portion of proceeds raised through the effort will go to the foundation, which it plans to grow its work in Vermont.

“One of our immediate objectives is figuring out additional needs in not just the town of Middlebury; all of Vermont is important to us, so we’re trying to expand,” he said.

Scott noted one of the hopes for Known and Loved Week is that it encourages community members to support local businesses. The event is also intended to bring people together, a goal of gatherings hosted by the foundation.

Bernstein said he’s enjoyed how such events convene members of the college community scattered across the country.

“As a Middlebury baseball player myself, I was very close with Jack during school, very close with my teammates, but as happens in college, people live in different places,” he said. “I don’t get to see all of these guys that often, and the longer I’ve been away from Middlebury, the more I think about the impact that the baseball program had on me, but (also) just the larger community.”

Bernstein is happy to have been a part of the foundation’s work over the years.

“Jack meant a lot to me, the Langerman family has meant a lot to me,” Bernstein said. “It’s been a joy to interact with some current Middlebury students who are doing outreach, and it’s exciting to work with the local businesses and be able to interact with them. It’s just fulfilling.”

To learn more about Jack and the foundation’s work, visit www.jacklangermanfoundation.org