Prepping for Senior Games

Prepping for Senior Games
MERCER, Pa. -- The Mercer County Area Agency on Aging Inc. is offering the county's senior citizens a chance to get into shape for the annual Senior Games coming June 1-6.
The games, which include a 5K run, basketball, horseshoes, bowling, golf, racquetball, swimming and shuffleboard competitions, are open to people age 50 and older.
The Agency on Aging is offering some pre-game conditioning facilities at the Shenango Valley Center for Aging & amp; Geriatric Health, 220 N. Buhl Farm Drive, Hermitage. There are exercise bikes, a treadmill, weights, an indoor walking track, exercise balls and a shuffleboard court.
The conditioning program is open from 3-6 p.m. Mondays, 1-6 p.m. Wednesdays and 3-5:30 p.m. Thursdays.
Speaker at Thiel College
GREENVILLE, Pa. -- Frances Moore Lapp & eacute;, an international speaker on world hunger and food development, will give a public lecture as part of Thiel College's Earth Day celebration at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the college's Lutheran Heritage Room of the Howard Miller Student Center.
Lapp & eacute; is the author of the 1971 best seller "Diet for a Small Planet." She will discuss "Healing the Planet: Pushing the Edge of Hope." The event is free and open to the public. Call (724) 589-2160 for more information.
The author of 12 other books, Lapp & eacute; was a visiting scholar at MIT in Cambridge, Mass., and is currently a senior fellow at Second Nature in Boston. She is co-founder of two national organizations addressing hunger, including The Institute for Food Development Policy, also called Food First. She has received 15 honorary doctorates, and in 1987 became the fourth American to receive the Right Livelihood Award.
Earth Day events at SRU
SLIPPERY ROCK, Pa. -- Kite making and flying, art projects, food and several hands-on activities for children in grades four through six are part of "It's a Kids' Earth," part of Saturday's Earth Day Festival at Slippery Rock University's Robert A. Macoskey Center for Sustainable Systems Education and Research.
Features for adults include an ecological art show, an apple-tree grafting workshop and information on environmental issues.
Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The Macoskey Center is on Harmony Road across from the SRU football stadium. Call (724) 738-0606 for more information.
Fund-raiser for library
SHARON, Pa. -- The Shenango Valley Community Library will host a wine and cheese party from 6-8 p.m. Wednesday at the library at the corner of Sharpsville Avenue and East State Street.
Tickets are $10 and are available at the library. The event is a fund-raising activity for the library.
Author plans lecture
SHARON, Pa. -- Dr. Richard Kopley, associate professor of English at Penn State DuBois, will present the first lecture of Penn State Shenango's 2004 Distinguished Lecturer Series.
He will speak at 7:30 p.m. Monday in Forker Lab Forum, 147 Shenango Ave., on his new book, "The Threads of The Scarlet Letter: A Study of Hawthorne's Transformative Art." This year is the 200th anniversary of "The Scarlet Letter."
Kopley's lecture is free and open to the public but reservations are required and should be made by calling (724) 983-2905. His speech will be followed by a book signing and reception.
Festival of Nations groups
YOUNGSTOWN -- The Festival of Nations, part of the Summer Festival of the Arts, is seeking ethnic groups to participate in the July 10-11 festival on the Youngstown State University campus.
A meeting to review which groups will be participating in the festival will be 4 p.m. Tuesday in the church hall of Holy Trinity Romanian Orthodox Church, 626 Wick Avenue, in Youngstown.
The Festival of Nations highlights the Mahoning Valley's diverse ethnic populations through food, displays, presentations and musical or dance performances. To participate, ethnic groups need to be members of a church, synagogue or established club or organization. Almost 20 groups participated in last year's festival.
Contact Lori Factor, SFA coordinator, at (330) 941-2307 for more information and an application packet. For further details, visit www.ysu.edu/sfa/. SFA is sponsored by YSU and the Arts Council of Youngstown and Mahoning County.