Fall Valley Talks Are Just Over the Horizon
Photo courtesy of Charles Uniatowski
School is back in session and so are our Fall Valley Talks!
To close out our 100th anniversary Valley Talk series, we’re welcoming two fabulous speakers to the Valley Green Inn to share their expertise. The talks will be available both in-person at the Inn and online on Zoom.
Can’t make the talk? We’ll post it to our YouTube channel here. You can find our past talks there too, including Discovering the Wissahickon’s WPA Structures, A Bird’s Eye View of Watching Wildlife in Pennsylvania, and Climate Change in our Watersheds.
First, we’ll welcome Alex Bartlett, the curator and archivist at Chestnut Hill Conservancy on Wednesday, September 25 at 6 PM. CHC takes care of FOW’s archives, so it’s fitting we close our 2024 Valley Talk season with Alex’s “Soup to Nuts History of the Wissahickon Valley”, an overview of park history.
Alex will dive into the Lenni Lenape in our area, the milling industry in the Wissahickon Valley, hotels and inns, the Centennial Exposition of 1876 and its effects on the Park, the arrival of the car and the origins of the name “Forbidden Drive,” the arrival of FOW, the Great Depression and programs associated with the WPA, the “period of stasis” in the Park (1950s-1960s), decline, FOW’s role in the Park’s care, and the Chestnut Hill Conservancy/FOW joint easement program… to name a few (phew!).
Next, we’ll welcome David Harrod, president of the Philadelphia Beekeeper’s Guild to get down to bee basics on Wednesday, October 9 at 6 PM. David is a dedicated beekeeper who leads workshops, advocates for bee-friendly policies, and supports other local beekeepers.
David will talk to us about native bees, honeybees, beekeeping in Philadelphia, and how you can support your favorite pollinators in urban and suburban environments!
Thanks for celebrating our 100th anniversary with us! We’re grateful for a friend like you.