Good morning, Lancaster County.
Eighty-seven and partly sunny today, with storms possible after 2 p.m. — worth knowing, because the biggest thing happening this weekend is outdoors.
Today's story is about a Lancaster County ministry that spent twenty years moving food that was about to be thrown away.
In today's Lancaster Local:
Twenty years ago it was one sedan. Now it's a fleet.
The Long's Park Art Festival is here — and the weather improves every day of it
A 175-year-old Lancaster County story gets a book, and two descendants in the room
Five local entrepreneurs pitch for real money at a movie theater
COMMUNITY NEWS
One sedan. Seven banana boxes. Twenty years.
Blessings of Hope put out a letter on Wednesday marking twenty years, and the part worth reading is the inventory of what they did not have at the start.
No fleet of trucks.
No large warehouse.
No Ministry Selection Centers.
No nationwide network of partners.
What they had, in their words, was "a vision, a willingness to serve, and a single sedan."
The ministry rescues food — the perfectly good kind that gets thrown out anyway — and moves it to churches, food banks and partner ministries.
Their own line for how far that has come is the one that sticks: "Seven banana boxes have become millions of pounds of food rescued and redistributed each year."
A handful of volunteers became thousands.
One small warehouse grew into what they call "a much larger operation with multiple Ministry Selection Centers."
Close to home that means their Ministry Selection Center on North Franklin Street in Lancaster, plus sites in East Petersburg and Leola.
And what started as local outreach now ships food across the country and overseas.
Twenty years is not a round-number milestone anyone owes them a parade for.
But there is something clarifying about an organization that can still name the car it started with.
EVENTS
The holiday weekend is genuinely quiet on paper — and then one very large exception.
🎨 48th Annual Long's Park Art Festival — Long's Park, 1441 Harrisburg Pike, Lancaster.
Friday, September 4 and Saturday, September 5, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.; Sunday, September 6, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.
Over 200 juried exhibitors from across the country, in the park, for three days.
Here's the useful part: today carries a 40% chance of afternoon storms, and Saturday and Sunday do not.
If you have a choice, go on day two or three.
Service animals are welcome; leave the rest of the pets home.
The show closes Sunday.
🕯️ September First Friday at the Stevens & Smith Center — 13–15 E. Vine Street, Lancaster.
Tonight, Friday, September 4, 5–9 p.m.
Pay what you wish, cash or card, for an after-hours look at the Thaddeus Stevens & Lydia Hamilton Smith Center for History and Democracy.
A reasonable first stop before dinner.
🩸 Community Blood Drive — Ephrata Public Library, 550 South Reading Road, Ephrata.
Today, Friday, September 4, 10 a.m.–3 p.m. Ages 18 and up.
Appointments through the Red Cross: call 1-800-RED CROSS, or go to RedCrossBlood.org and enter "Ephrata Library."
🧶 Yarn Circle — Strasburg-Heisler Library, 143 Precision Avenue, Strasburg.
Tuesday, September 8, 6–7 p.m.
Bring whatever you're knitting or crocheting and sit with people doing the same.
All ages, all skill levels, no registration — just drop in.
📓 Lunch Time Junk Journaling — Mountville Branch Library, 120 College Avenue, Mountville.
Wednesday, September 9, 11:30 a.m.–1 p.m.
Pack a lunch and build a journal out of recycled and found materials.
Supplies are provided, but space is limited and they're blunt about registration being strongly encouraged.
Sign-ups close at 11:15.
📖 Book Launch: "The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker" — The Stevens & Smith Center, 13–15 East Vine Street, Lancaster.
Thursday, September 10, 7 p.m. Free, registration required.
On September 11, 1851, William Parker and a community of freedom seekers and their allies resisted an attempt to capture four men under the Fugitive Slave Law at Parker's home near Christiana.
This launch lands one day before that story turns 175.
Author Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz will be in conversation with Darlene Colon, president of the Christiana Historical Society and a direct descendant of one of the men who was there.
Frank Parker IV — great-great-grandson of William and Eliza Parker — is traveling in from the Buxton Settlement in Ontario, where the family settled after they fled the country.
Two descendants, in the room, for a thing that happened down the road.
💡 2026 Great Social Enterprise Pitch — Zoetropolis Cinema Stillhouse, 112 North Water Street, Lancaster.
Thursday, September 10, 5:30–8 p.m.
Five local entrepreneurs pitch a room of judges and supporters, after twelve weeks of work and a cut from sixteen down to five.
The finalists: Julia Morrell of Custom Clean Commercial Cleaning Services, Malia Burris of The Live Well Experience, Michael Bradley of Aftercare Compass, Sharon Allen-Spann of Coach Sharon, and Susanna Wurtz of Mountain Laurel Sewing Company.
Cleaning, wellness, addiction aftercare, leadership coaching, and sewing.
🏃 Bird-in-Hand Half Marathon & 5k — Bird-in-Hand Events Field, 2727 Old Philadelphia Pike, Bird-in-Hand.
Friday, September 11 and Saturday, September 12.
Friday runs the expo and packet pickup from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., a pizza and pasta party from 4 to 8, the kids fun run at 6:10, the 5K at 6:30, and a bonfire with s'mores from 7:30 to 9.
Saturday is the half marathon at 7:30 a.m., followed by a community picnic from 10 to noon.
Farmland, in September, on foot.
📚 Research Center Annual Book Sale — LancasterHistory, 230 N. President Avenue, Lancaster.
Saturday, September 12, 10 a.m.–3 p.m. No entry fee to browse.
The books come from the personal shelves of LancasterHistory's own staff and volunteers, which is a more interesting pile than a normal sale.
All genres, all ages, indoors.
Card preferred, and all sales are final.
🌳 Tree ID 101 — Kellys Run Nature Preserve, Holtwood.
Saturday, September 12, 1–3 p.m.
A mile-and-a-half walk with the Lancaster Conservancy, stopping to identify trees by leaf, bark and branch as you go.
Uneven ground and some elevation, so wear real shoes.
Rain or shine, ages 12 and up.
Partly sunny and 87 today, with a slight chance of showers around midday and a better chance of showers and thunderstorms after 2 p.m. — 40% overall, and a northwest wind of 3 to 8 mph.
Tonight drops to about 65.
Then the weekend turns lovely: mostly sunny and 82 on Saturday, sunny and 79 on Sunday.
If you're going to Long's Park, that's your answer.
Have a good Friday, and a good long weekend.
— The Lancaster Local