The River Corridor Foundation has announced the topics for this year’s “A River Flows Through It … Life in the Fox River Valley” lecture series that kicks off on Wednesday, Jan. 21.
The series, now in its seventh year, is offered by the foundation in partnership with The Conservation Foundation and the St. Charles Park District.
All lectures will be presented at the Baker Community Center at 101 S. Second St. in St. Charles at 7 p.m. on the third Wednesday of each month from January through April.
The topics for the monthly series include “The Majestic Migrators: Sandhill Cranes” on Jan. 21, presented by Amber Ross of the Forest Preserve District of Kane County; “The Roaring ’20s: Organized Crime and Prohibition in the Fox River Valley” on Feb. 18, presented by Chris Linden of Hughes Media; “Quiet Wings of the Watershed: Butterflies and Moths of the Fox River Valley” on March 18, presented by Kane County Naturalist Pam Otto; and “Coyotes Among Us: The Urban Coyote Research Project” on April 15, presented by Shane McKenzie of the Max McGraw Wildlife Foundation.
“The original series years ago had five topics, but we found that attendance in the May series was the lowest of the five months, probably because the weather was getting nicer and people weren’t looking for things to do indoors anymore by the middle of May,” board member and past president of the River Corridor Foundation Laurel Moad of St. Charles said. “Last year, we shortened the series to four lectures.”
Topics, she said, are based on feedback from audience members as well as discussions among the foundation members.
“Each year, we do a couple of things. We ask our attendees what they might be interested in hearing about in the coming year and we have a committee that gets together annually and discusses potential topics,” she said. “Everything that we select is centered around either nature or life in the Fox River Valley, so we truly try to focus on things related to our communities and our lifestyles.”
Moad added that from there, “we seek out topics and then we seek out the speakers.”
Most of the lectures draw a crowd of over 100, Moad said, because the organizers have “built our reputation of having quality speakers and interesting topics.”
Weather, Moad said, helps promote the series.
“It’s the middle of winter and there aren’t a lot of activities to do outdoors,” she said. “It’s something to do on a Wednesday night in the middle of the winter but the draw, mostly, are the topics of the speakers.”
She said as far as themes, “animal and insect topics remain popular because they live among us. We appreciate the nature around us, and I think the river draws a lot of it to the community. We have a unique ecosystem because of the river.”
Those looking to attend the lectures are asked to register in advance at www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0F4BA8A92FAAF5CE9-60892018-ariver
Walk-ins are also welcome to attend the events, organizers said. The programs are free to attend, but donations are appreciated.
For more information about the series, contact Laurel Moad at 630-631-7729 or email laurelmoad@gmail.com.
David Sharos is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.