Greetings Friends of ArtsAltoona,
We have continued to be very busy this month with engaging new people and organizations, planning events, keeping current on our social media sites and always learning new things along the way!
Hopefully you are already following us on Facebook to learn about the MANY great activities happening in the Altoona, Blair County area and you are looking forward to the arrival of our weekly newsletters every Thursday morning. Have you subscribed to our YouTube channel to view our ArtsAltoona LIVE! series of interviews? I can promise you will learn something new with each one. Please take a look, let us know what you think of those completed to date, and make some suggestions for new interviews. This area has SO MUCH talent, I am constantly amazed!
This week’s newsletter is featuring two local history based organizations, the Blair County Historical Society and the Fort Roberdeau Association. Both are continually finding new opportunities to engage with the community which we are giving you a little taste of here.
The Fort was reconstructed near its original site in Sinking Valley as a Bicentennial Project of the Blair County Commissioners in 1976. Be sure to check their website www.fortroberdeau.org throughout the year to stay aware of their many events open to the public. If you are a veteran, or are caring for a veteran, please register for their special Recognition Luncheon. As a member of the Fort Roberdeau Association board, I am very excited about the Mountain Lion Observatory project! It will be a great new draw to the Fort once it is completed.
The Blair County Historical Society, with Joe DeFrancesco as Executive Director and Jared Frederick as Board President, has been providing the community with a lot of opportunities to “come to the Mansion” and see what’s happening.You will read about some of them, but there are many more on their website www.blairhistory.org. They mounted an exhibit of works by local artists this year, organized by Michael Allison, who we will be interviewing soon for an upcoming ArtsAltoona LIVE! program.
We would like to Congratulate the Blair County Arts Foundation who will be receiving the Historic Preservation award at the Historical Society Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner on November 9. Congratulations also to Margaret “Peggy” Fields as the awardee for County Preservation for her many years of constructing/sewing MANY historic dresses over the years, among much other work preserving and interpreting Blair County’s History.
As always, please let us know how you would like to be more involved with the work of ArtsAltoona.
Until next time,
Donna