Community Corner
Prominent Montco Land Trust and Nature Preserve turned 50!
The Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust celebrated its 50th anniversary with a socially distanced interpretive hike on November 13.
Founded on November 12, 1970, the Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust celebrated its 50th anniversary with a socially distanced interpretive hike on November 13
Along the trails at the Pennypack Preserve, there were 48 informative signs to describe the Trust’s work and history of the land. The Trust is a private, non-profit land conservancy in Huntingdon Valley, Pa., 15 miles northeast of central Philadelphia. The mission of the Trust is to steward the Pennypack Preserve natural area as an important component of the region’s natural areas network, and to educate and encourage people to appreciate, enjoy and protect the Preserve’s native ecosystems.
Founding members, board members, staff members, Pennypack volunteers and members of the community all attended the celebration.
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“This year the Trust has found itself to be a respite for those forced to stay close to home,” said Gilbert High Jr., Board President of the Pennypack Trust. “We’ve had a tremendous rise in visitors and in membership, which affirms that the Trust is indeed keeping us grounded and in touch with the natural world here in Huntingdon Valley.”
History of the Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust
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The Pennypack Trust was founded in 1970 as a membership-based environmental group called the Pennypack Watershed Association whose primary mission was to improve water quality in the Pennypack Creek’s rapidly urbanizing watershed. In 1976, the Association began to assemble the Pennypack Preserve natural area through a combination of land donations, purchases, and conservation easements.
Today, as the steward of 852 acres of protected meadows, woodlands and floodplain forest, the Trust manages Montgomery County’s second-largest privately owned natural area that is open to the public. The lands within the Trust’s natural area, the PennypackPreserve, are located in the townships of Abington, Upper Moreland and Lower Moreland and in the Borough of Bryn Athyn. Over 1,300 dues-paying members support the Trust, and the preserve hosts 40,000 visitors annually.
