By Jess Deluccia
Photo: Elk painting by Al I. Sterner donated to Sinnemahoning State Park by Brady Schrecongost of Dayton, PA.
Visitors to the Sinnemahoning Park Office and Wildlife Center now have the opportunity to view three new art displays featuring the local heritage and history of the First Fork Valley.
The “Wood on Glass” exhibit, on display in the classroom of the Wildlife Center, is a collection of lumber industry photographs taken by William T. Clark between 1890 and 1917 in Potter, McKean and Clinton Counties. Clarke’s images graphically illustrate the epic transformation of the Commonwealth’s forests and ways of life in north central Pennsylvania during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. On loan from the Lumber Heritage Region, seven prints of this “Wood on Glass” collection will be on display through February 2017.
The “60 Year Anniversary” photo display in the front lobby of the Wildlife Center takes visitors on a photographic journey of the construction of the First Fork Dam, which was completed in 1956. Now called the George B. Stevenson Dam, this dam was designated to regulate stream flow of the First Fork Sinnemahoning Creek and control flood water discharge into the Susquehanna Valley. The “60 Year Anniversary” photographs will be on display through December 2016.
A painting by Al I. Sterner, depicting a large bull elk in the George B. Stevenson reservoir is on display above the fireplace in the Wildlife Center. This impressive work of art, donated to Sinnemahoning State Park by Brady Schrecongost of Dayton, PA, at the First Fork Festival on October 8, 2016, was originally given to the Sinnemahoning Sportsman’s Association by the artist.
The elk painting is based in Sinnemahoning State Park with the George B. Stevenson Dam in the background during a hot July day in 2006. In the painting visitors can take note of the lowered water levels that had been dropped two feet to dilute the waters of the Sinnemahoning Creek which experienced a devastating chemical spill several days earlier. The elk painting by Al I. Sterner will be on permanent display at Sinnemahoning State Park.
For more information on park programs and events please contact Sinnemahoning State Park at (814) 647-8401 or SinnemahoningSP@pa.gov
