2024 Speaker Series & Major Events – Overview
THE BEAVER AREA HERITAGE FOUNDATION SPEAKER SERIES
Free programs start at 7 p.m. at Beaver Station. Stay tuned for our announcement of the 2024 presenters.
– Tuesday, February 20, 2024 – The Beaver Art Group: A 75-Year Legacy of Fine Art, from Founders Hugh and Hilda Fischer to the Present
– Tuesday, April 16, 2024 – The Bricks that Built a Town: A History of Beaver’s Brickyards, Bricks and Sidewalks, presented by Chuck Copeland
– Tuesday, September 17, 2024 – Documentary Premiere: Restoration of Beaver’s 1802 Log House
– Tuesday, November 19, 2024 – His Pictures Told Our Stories: A Profile of Award-Winning Beaver County Times Photographer Pete Sabella, presented by his family.
MAJOR EVENTS
Museum Exhibit – Each year, the museum features a free, new exhibit of appropriate historical interest. Displays in recent years have included Early Days on the Farm; Beaver’s Greatest Generation: Honoring Local Heroes of World War II; Humble Origins to Rich Traditions: the Story of Michael Baker Corporation; Holiday Gingerbread; Walk with Harry; Saint or Sinner-Matthew Stanley Quay; and Out of the Unknown.
Past displays have featured a celebration of the life and work of Beaver’s Priit Vesilind, longtime writer and editor with the National Geographic; sports heroes and musicians of Beaver and the Beaver Valley; Beaver’s record-setting Mayor, the late Robert Linn; firefighting in Beaver; and the actual pistols used in a fatal 1770s duel between Gen. Lachlan McIntosh, builder of Fort McIntosh in Beaver, and Button Gwinnett, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Other rotating exhibits have featured Beaver College, early firearms and model riverboats.
Annual Beautification Awards – The Heritage Foundation annually sponsors its prestigious Restoration and Beautification Award, known as the Harry Phillips Award in memory of our founder. The Award, a handsome plaque, is presented at the annual Charter Day Dinner for residential and commercial buildings which have been meticulously restored to their original appearance. Past winners have been the Todd Funeral Home on Third Street which was restored after a disastrous fire (seen here) and the John F. Dravo house on River Road.
Memorial Day – The annual Memorial Day observance in Beaver involves a parade on Third Street followed by a stirring ceremony of remembrance at the Beaver Cemetery. Guest speakers in past years have included Steve Grossman, principal of the Dutch Ridge Elementary School of the Beaver Area School District; Col. Edward Sudol of the Junior ROTC program at the Beaver Area School District; Rev. Carl Neely, Rector of Trinity Episcopal Church; Dr. Bette Landman, President of Arcadia University; and Judge Peter O. Steege of the Beaver County Court of Common Pleas.
Garrison Day – The annual Garrison Day Show and Sale, held in the beautiful green central parks of Beaver, is one of the community’s largest, most exciting and visible events each year, drawing more than 10,000 visitors annually. Garrison Day, named in honor of the military garrison stationed at Fort McIntosh in the late 1700s, involves hundreds of arts and crafts and antiques vendors, a variety of food and refreshments, an art show, music by the Fort McIntosh Fife and Drum Corps, and other lively entertainment. For questions, please contact event coordinator Carrie Ondrusek at 724-987-0103 or garrisonday@beaverheritage.org.
VENDORS: If you would like to be notified when the Vendor Registration will be open for our next event, click here to join our Garrison Day Vendor email list.
Fourth of July Week “Concert in the Park” – In years past, the Heritage Foundation has helped sponsor a free patriotic music concert at the gazebo. Notable Independence Day celebrations over the years have included a popular “walking tour” of the Beaver Cemetery and a tour of notable local buildings of historic interest. The cemetery tours, led by Heritage Foundation historians, have visited the graves of Beaver notables Senator Matthew Stanley Quay, industrialist John Dravo, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Daniel Agnew and other fascinating personalities of the past. The very first cemetery walking tour, conducted to high acclaim, was held in 1978 and repeated in 1985, 2002 and 2005.
Beaver Tales – The widely acclaimed, annual “Beaver Tales” storytelling event, sponsored by the Beaver Area Heritage Foundation, returns to Beaver. We are so excited to be welcoming this diverse group of storytellers to Beaver County to help connect our communities to the world and celebrate different cultures! Also, our storytellers will be entertaining and captivating school children and students throughout the county at Elementary Schools and the Beaver Library. The culmination of the Beaver Tales Storytelling Festival will be a special evening event at the gazebo in Irvine Park.