The Creekside Cultural Center is a gathering place based on the tenets of the Chautauqua movement - our mission is to address a variety of needs by providing educational, cultural, spiritual, and recreational programming for the broader community.
The Creekside Story :
In these economic times people are busier, more pressed for time and resources, more isolated, have less energy to put towards having their lives be FULFILLING, for growing, for supporting others and feeling supported by others in their community. We’ve moved away from the core of our community’s roots – the sense that we were an extended family with our neighbors, and that we knew them, trusted them, could rely on them, and were important to them. Our survival started being completely about us as individuals instead of about us as a community network. We went to work, came home, ate dinner and watched TV – on a lucky week we’d spend 5-10 minutes talking to a neighbor at a restaurant or the post office.
A while back a number of us noticed this trend, and thought about the way the economy seems to be going – and that it would be useful for us to get back to those roots – to learn about the history of our community, to build deep connections and alliances with each other. To increase those enriching activities such as social events that build families and neighborhoods into stronger units, to have art and music and history and culture be a part of our daily lives, to make sure that as a community we were making sure that everyone had their basic needs covered – does everyone have health coverage? Are there people who need rides to the store, or meals cooked for them? Who would benefit from a community garden? Discussion groups? Play groups for parents with young children? Do we really need a separate lawn mower for every house, or could we share? How many people commute to the same places and might carpool?
We found the ideal community in which to build our vision – One where many of our members already lived. A small town with easy access to major population centers, close to a highway, but with plenty of open space, a hard working PA Dutch heritage and core community members who knew and loved the culture and history of the town. A place where a clear need existed, but where there were solid foundations already existing. We found a property where there was already a large barn that could be used for programs, a farmhouse, a field, and a small cottage. One community member decided to purchase the land and donate the use of the space to the organization until such time as it can support itself.
The morning after settlement was made on the property, 20 people showed up to clean out the old barn - within 8 hours, the barn was transformed from a storage area for piles of 150 year old lumber, stone and hardware, to having an operational stage, a library with books categorized by topic, and a working kitchen (minus the plumbing). Over the next month, a parking lot was outlined, plumbing was installed in the building, and the first activities were held. Donations of furniture, appliances, dishes, books, movies, and time poured in from around the area. 20 families joined the center.
We heard about a woman who had left an abusive relationship, and needed a place to stay. In place of holding a membership meeting that month, one community member donated a trailer, and others did a workday to repair it and move her into it.
A teenager mentioned that there was nothing to do in the area for teens on the weekends in the summer – we put together a regular time for them to meet at Creekside and “hang out” – a dozen local young people have attended, they put together an evening for the community of improvisational drama, played educational and social skills games, and had a movie night. One parent said “We’ve lived in this area for 8 years. We have never had something like this – after the first three years we gave up looking and just stayed home and watched TV. This is just what we needed all along.”
One family said that what would get them out of the house and interacting with the community more would be a bible study or worship group. A weekly vespers worship service was established and has been held every week for three months now.
One family expressed a need to have more space for gardening. Other families wished they could do a cooperative buying program to get healthier foods at lower cost than is available in the local grocery stores. Creekside joined a food co-operative purchasing program, and has provided space for a large community garden project set to begin this month with winter plantings.
Total attendance at the concert series begun in May of 2008 reached over 1000 in the first year. Some local families come regularly; weekly concerts usually include people from Reading and/or Allentown and other towns within the Berks, Schuylkill and Lehigh County areas. Occasional visitors have come specifically to participate in these activities from Philadelphia, Harrisburg, New York, Delaware, Chicago and even Phoenix, Arizona. This concert series has been scheduled to continue every Saturday night From March through August of 2009.
A local group of boys built boats as part of a school project. Parents of some girls in the area wanted to provide equal opportunities for their daughters, and a boat building class was developed and run, allowing three families to build their own canoes, and teaching a dozen young people to use power tools, do wood working, and understand the principles behind the construction of boats.
Kutztown University is 15 minutes from Creekside Center. The director made a connection with students who were part of a “Business of Art” class, and has been showing one two dimensional and one three dimensional artist every 6 weeks, giving young artists the opportunity to practice their career skills, and allowing the local community access to art and craft that they might otherwise never see, or would need to drive 45 minutes to an hour to get to a museum for.
All programs are offered at or below the cost of the program. In order to keep costs to participants at levels which are not a burden to them, daily operational costs and building improvements are paid for by support of memberships and donations from the community, philanthropists, grants and sponsorships.
