Date: Wednesday, September 25, starting at 6:00 PM
Location: Virtual, via Zoom
Registration:
Click HERE to register for the in-person presentation at Valley Green Inn
Click HERE to register for the virtual presentation via Zoom

Join Friends of the Wissahickon and Alex Bartlett from the Chestnut Hill Conservancy and dig into the Wissahickon from the archives. We’ll learn a bit more about 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 the FOW and the Great Depression and programs associated with the WPA, the “period of stasis” in the park (1950s-1960s), decline, the FOW’s role in park’s care, and the CH Conservancy/ FOW joint easement program. To name a few!

A resident of Mount Airy for 42 years, Alex spent much of his childhood in the Wissahickon Valley, and the occasional hiker or biker may have caught a glimpse of him snooping around an old ruin or long-disused quarry. From this early interest in history and archaeology, he would pursue his Bachelor of Arts degrees in Anthropology and Earth Sciences from Temple University. He would then work at a cultural resources firm for 12 years as an archaeologist before returning to school to earn his Master of Arts in Museum Studies from the University of the Arts. In 2009, he began volunteering in the Archives of the Chestnut Hill Historical Society (now the Chestnut Hill Conservancy); he was hired in the Archives a short time thereafter and is now the Conservancy’s Curator and Archivist.