FROM THE FILES OF…The Hurleyville Sentinel
Compiled by Sullivan County Historian John Conway
June 2016
HURLEYVILLE ARTS CENTRE NEARING COMPLETION
Opening will Energize Community
The long awaited Hurleyville Arts Centre, its impressive façade already defining Main Street’s new look for months now, is expected to officially open this summer.
The Arts Centre itself is basically finished, with the official opening awaiting completion of the parking area and other site work and landscaping. The building features a fully modern cinema and screening room that seats 130, rehearsal studios, and performance spaces as well as a magnificent grand ballroom capable of hosting international dance competitions. There are also other educational and training spaces devoted to music, dance, cinema and the performing arts. The first floor retail spaces are already partially filled, as a well-established dance teacher will be occupying at least one of the storefronts with her classes. There is also an outdoor amphitheater planned to complement the indoor facility.
The Arts Centre has been built and furnished through the generous funding of The Gerald and Janet Carrus Foundation. It is fully wheelchair accessible and universally designed to be welcoming to people of all abilities and needs.
GOOGLE BACKS THE CENTER FOR DISCOVERY
IndieGo Development Funded
Hundreds of thousands of wheelchair users may soon be getting around under their own power, thanks to an innovative idea from a frustrated Occupational Therapist and the world’s most famously disruptive company.
Google.org is awarding The Center for Discovery a Google.org grant from the Google.org Impact Challenge: Disabilities for $1.125 million to complete development of the indieGo, a compact power unit that lets manual wheelchairs roll on and off, providing power when it’s needed.
The funds will be used to bring the device to market at a fraction of the cost of a powered wheelchair (about $1,000) and is part of the Google Impact Challenge: Disabilities, which puts $20 million in Google.org grants behind nonprofits using emerging technologies to increase independence for people living with disabilities. There are over 3 million wheelchair users in the country at present, many of whom need a power mobility device, currently denied by Medicare in 4 of 5 cases.
June 2017
“OUR SOCARATES” HONORED
SUNY Sullivan Fetes Professor Tom Lambert
SUNY Sullivan and the Sullivan County Historical Society joined forces on May 9 to pay tribute to one of the college’s longest serving faculty.
Professor Emeritus Thomas Lambert, who retired in 2016 after 43 years teaching sociology at Sullivan, was feted by a succession of speakers offering insights into his unique persona, and with a bench dedicated in his honor.
The bench, with one of his trademark sayings, “My gentle friend, I want to talk to you outside,” sandblasted into its seat, has been permanently installed under Professor Lambert’s favorite tree outside the college’s “G” Building.
Starting with SUNY Sullivan’s interim president, Jay Quaintance, colleagues and acquaintances spoke eloquently of the impact Professor Lambert had on their lives.