Farm to Table Day shows local history
Fundraising dinner set for Friday
The first time Cara Sutherland tried her hand at canning on her own, she was in junior high.
Now the executive director of the Everhart Museum, Ms. Sutherland spent her Sunday afternoon demonstrating the basics of canning with her spicy chili sauce recipe. Her tutorial was part of the Farm to Table Community Day hosted at the Scranton museum, where live demonstrations, crafts and displays promoted shopping local.
"I'll be on a canning kick now for the next two weeks," she said as she chopped an onion for her audience.
Shopping local and celebrating the area's history were all part of the inspiration, Ms. Sutherland said. "We think about coal all the time. Most people, even if they were factory workers probably had a garden."
The community day is a family-oriented prequel of a fundraiser dinner the museum will hold Friday. For information on the dinner, visit everhart-museum.org. It will be the second year for the dinner, but it was the first year for the community day.
"The dinner is a fundraiser, typically for an older audience," Stefanie Colarusso, 29, director of interpretive programs at the museum, said. "We wanted to provide an event for families, teens and children of all ages."
Noting that supporting local vendors and farmers markets benefits the entire community, she added, "It helps support our local economy."
State funding for museums has not been available in the past three years, which is why fundraisers and local support are so important, according to Ms. Sutherland.
"It's been here over 100 years," she said of the museum. "We definitely want people to be able to celebrate the bicentennial in 2108. We're just the current generation of caretakers."
Contact the writer: rbrown@timesshamrock.com, @rbrownTT on Twitter