Sometimes a program at the Dietrich Theater is so informative, we feel we must tell all of you about it. Last Saturday, Mike Lovegreen presented “Agriculture – The Roots of the Endless Mountains,” a program sponsored by the Endless Mountains Heritage Region (EMHR) with funding from the PA DCNR.
I don’t know about you, but from my perspective, farming seems to be on the wane in our area. When we were children, my father would walk with us down the road in the evening to watch the neighboring farmer milk his cows by hand. A vivid memory is when he would squirt some to the cat waiting for a treat. Now that farm does not have any livestock, just a couple of crops and a tree farm. Farming seems be dying around me.
Not so, according to Lovegreen, former Bradford County Conservation District Manager and current EMHR member. Even with changes due to the gas industry, farming is alive and well in the Endless Mountains.
Some farmers try new farming ventures, perhaps moving from raising livestock to niche farming, like producing organic produce. Just to show that agriculture in king in Wyoming County, the total sales in agriculture in 2012 amounted to $14,616,000, a significant contributor to our local economy.
Another program hosted by the Dietrich last week was Leadership Wyoming. With this program, sponsored by the Wyoming County Chamber of Commerce, 14 people representing 14 Wyoming County companies and organizations spent the day learning about Arts and Culture in the area, at a program called Heritage Culture and Tourism Day.
Dietrich Theater Director Erica Rogler and I began by telling the story we love to tell: the story of the theater. The grassroots effort to bring back our town movie theater, our mission to reinvent the theater to be a movie theater and a cultural center, the joys and the many challenges – all are part of the story. And we love to include the statistics from the last fiscal year: we provided 87,000 children and adults with 350 classes, events and movies.
The arts promote tourism and help the economy, but most important of all, “The arts promote true prosperity. They enable and inspire us, they foster creativity, goodness, and beauty, they help us build bridges between cultures, and they bring us together, regardless of ethnicity, religion or age,” according to Americans for the Arts. That is the way we ended our presentation at the Dietrich.
The day’s events continued with a presentation by Jean Ruhf, of the Endless Mountains Visitors Bureau, a presentation about the Howland Preserve, a visit to the Wyoming County Historical Society and a walking tour of Historic Downtown Tunkhannock.
What a wonderful day for Leadership Wyoming.
And now it is time for Halloween. There is something for children and adults alike at the Dietrich. What is better than a good spooky story? And we have the perfect storyteller: Hal Pratt. Pratt will tell Tales of Terror for the older crowd (ages 10 to adult) at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 26. Then he will begin the day on Saturday, Oct. 28 by telling “not too spooky” tales for the younger set from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., followed by fun and games for the family. This free Halloween Carnival is all about good old-fashioned Halloween fun, sponsored by Toni Hockman and coordinated by the Dietrich Theater Fundraising Committee.
For those of you who use our handicapped accessible parking place in from of the theater, you will notice that we now have a new ramp, thanks to PennDOT and Representative Karen Boback. Jim Hudock, our maintenance manager saw an opportunity to get it done; Rep. Boback agreed and made it happen.
Thank you to all who keep the Dietrich Theater improving its service. And thank all of you for continuing to support the Dietrich by coming to our movies, events, and classes.
We hope to see you soon and often.
