CONTACT:
Shelly Angers, Northern Forest Center, 603-229-0679 ext 109; email:

On May 17-20, a new celebration of the Northern Forest will take place in Old Forge.

Northern Forest Days are a multi-day, multi-event program being held in communities across the Northern Forest region of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and New York. Each local event is coordinated jointly by the Northern Forest Center and community partners to ensure that the celebration reflects local needs, interests and opportunities.

In Old Forge, partners include the Central Adirondack Partnership for the 21st Century (CAP-21), Arts Center/Old Forge, Old Forge Library and the Town of Webb Historical Association. Local sponsors are Central Adirondack Association (CAA), Community Bank, N.A. and the Northeastern Loggers’ Association.

Old Forge’s Northern Forest Days celebration was specifically scheduled to coincide with the annual Adirondack Paddlefest, which this year takes place May 18-20.

“We’re so pleased that Old Forge was chosen to be part of the first Northern Forest Days celebration held in the Adirondack Park,” said Lani Ulrich, founding director of CAP-21 and currently an in-park commissioner on the Adirondack Park Agency. “Working on this project has shown, once again, that exciting things happen when residents, businesses, schools and other organizations in the Central Adirondacks come together.”

Each day during the celebration has opportunities to explore the Northern Forest’s past and discover its future. There are activities for people of all ages who care about the region.

On schooldays, local students will take field trips to Ways of the Woods, the Center’s mobile museum about the changing relationships between people and the land. This “museum on wheels” elicits powerful, emotional responses from attendees as they explore both the history of the region and their personal connections to it. Funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Ways of the Woods combines interactive displays, artifacts that illustrate the region’s history in action, and interviews with people who live, work and play in the Northern Forest.

Ways of the Woods will be open to the general public on Thursday from 2:30-6:30 p.m., Friday from 2:30-5 p.m., Saturday from 9 a.m.-5 p.m. and on Sunday from 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

“Last year’s Ways of the Woods tour confirmed that people have deep connections to the Northern Forest,” said Mike Wilson, senior program director at the Northern Forest Center. “Northern Forest Days creates new opportunities to bring people together to share their hopes for the region’s future.”

Thursday there will be an evening event at Maloy’s Main Street Grill, sponsored by CAP-21 and CAA. A chicken barbecue dinner takes place from 5-6:30 p.m. ($8.00, RSVP requested; call 315-369-3353 or email info@cap-21.org to reserve your place). Immediately after the meal, Wilson will give the 30-minute presentation “A Hopeful Future for the Northern Forest,” which highlights dynamic and innovative business and community initiatives from across the four Northern Forest states, illustrating that the region does indeed have a bright future—economically, culturally and environmentally. It also details the work of the Northern Forest Center and local partner organizations, and outlines opportunities for people to help ensure that the region’s future is indeed a bright one. The evening continues with Bill Smith, Adirondack Storyteller, until 8:30 p.m.

From 9-11:30 a.m. Friday morning, a meeting about the economic future of the region takes place at Maloy’s. The public is invited to attend, and state and local officials representing Herkimer, Oneida and Hamilton counties are scheduled to be on hand. Light refreshments sponsored by CAA will follow.

Information collected at this meeting will be integrated into the Northern Forest Center’s Sustainable Economy Initiative (SEI), a program operated in partnership with the North Country Council (NH) and funded by the federal Economic Development Administration and private contributions. Ways of the Woods will be open for viewing from 8:30 a.m. until the meeting begins, and again from 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.

SEI is developing a strategic blueprint for sustainable economic development in the four-state Northern Forest region that is based on balanced investment in business, community and environment.

“We’re very excited to work with communities across the Northern Forest to hear their perspectives on the challenges they face and the opportunities they see for the future,” said Joe Short, SEI program director. “This input—which will come from people across the Northern Forest representing a variety of perspectives on community and economic issues—will impact SEI’s work to create a long-term strategy for the region’s economic future.”

From 2-3 p.m. on Sunday, Ulrich will give the presentation “The Adirondack Park—Preserving Lands and Communities” at the Arts Center/Old Forge. The Arts Center is open from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday-Saturday and noon-4 p.m. on Sunday; Northern Forest Days takes place during two exhibits at the Center: “Leave Only Footprints: The Adirondack Wilderness and the Impact of Man” and “The Blue Line Goes Green: Renewable Energy Projects in the Adirondack Park.”

Several other exhibits will also be open to the public during the Northern Forest Days celebration, including “Adirondack Waterways: Tributaries to the World” at the Old Forge Library (open Tuesday-Friday, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. and Saturday, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.), exhibits on early life in the Adirondacks at the Town of Webb Historical Association’s Goodsell Museum (open Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-3 p.m.) and other exhibits at the Northeastern Loggers’ Association’s Forest Industries Exhibit Hall (open Thursday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-5p.m.).

Northern Forest Days celebrations have already taken place in Gorham/Berlin and Colebrook, NH as well as in Morrisville, VT. Others are currently scheduled for:

May 24-26: Watertown, NY
May 31-June 2: Farmington, ME
June 7-9: Greenville, ME
June 13-16: Ft. Kent, ME

Specific details about Northern Forest Days events will be available from partner organizations and in the calendar sections of local newspapers. Northern Forest Days schedule updates, and the complete 2007 Ways of the Woods tour schedule, are available at www.northernforest.org.     

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NOTE TO MEDIA: Photos of the Northern Forest Center’s Ways of the Woods exhibit are available for publication. Please contact Shelly Angers, Marketing/PR Coordinator, at 603-229-0679, ext. 109,