Biz Briefs: Jacob's Pillow Archive Site Builds on Successful Season

Door to the past: Following the record-breaking success of Festival 2016 and the increased demand for its resources, Jacob's Pillow Dance announces year-round online access to its impressive archives through a new website. Beginning this year, digitized content and a large amount of information is available to the public, offering an unprecedented resource to the global dance community.

Festival 2016 was one of the most successful seasons on record for Jacob’s Pillow, a National Historic Landmark, National Medal of Arts recipient, and home to America’s longest-running dance festival. The Pillow hosted a record-breaking 108,000 visitor experiences throughout the summer, including ticketed performances, free performances, free talks, tours, dance classes, film screenings, exhibits, and various other community events. In addition to landmark attendance at these events, the Pillow exceeded the highest budget goal total to date totaling more than $2.3 million in ticket revenue.

In wake of the record-breaking surge in visits to the archives and its programs during Festival 2016, Jacob’s Pillow announces dramatically-expanded online access to one of the most eminent collections of archival material within the dance field. After 20 years of public access solely during the Festival (and by appointment throughout the year), the archives are now available through a new user-friendly site, offering an ever-growing portion of this important collection to the public at archives.jacobspillow.org.

Among the features of the new site is a complete set of digitized programs from throughout the Pillow’s 84-season history. These documents include everything from the first performance in the Ted Shawn Theatre (a 1942 premiere by Agnes deMille) to this past season’s programs including commissioned essays from Pillow Scholars-in-Residence.  

The new site utilizes the same open-source CollectiveAccess software widely used by prominent arts organizations including the Brooklyn Academy of Music, The New Museum and National Public Radio. The project has been made possible through a two-year Archives Advancement Initiative funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and also incorporates digitization work supported by Save America’s Treasures and the Leir Charitable Foundations in memory of Henry J. Leir and the Leir Charitable Trusts, in memory of Henry J. and Erna D. Leir.


Back to basics: Co+op Basics was developed with the help of the National Cooperative Grocers and features the Field Day brand, that focuses on organic and natural products with a commitment to non-GMO. Co-ops around the country, including Wild Oats, have adopted Field Day as their store brand and it is the mainstay of the Co+op Basics program. Wild Oats has chosen to expanded its offerings to include meat, cheese, fruits and vegetables in order to make it easier for families to access a wide variety of healthy foods.

Social Service Organizations Highlight Challenges, Successes at Poverty Talk

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff
08:04AM / Sunday, April 05, 2026

Dr. Jennifer Michaels of the Brien Center demonstrates how to use Narcan. Easy access to the drug has cut overdose deaths in the county by nearly half. 

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Recent actions at the federal level are making it harder for people to climb out of poverty.

Brad Gordon, executive director of Upside413, said he felt like he was doing a disservice by not recognizing national challenges and how they draw a direct line from choices being made by the Trump administration and the challenges the United States is facing. 

"They more generally impact people's ability to work their way out of poverty, and that's really, that's really the overarching dynamic," he said. 

"Poverty is incredibly corrosive, and it impacts all the topics that we'll talk about today." 

His comments came during a conversation on poverty hosted by Berkshire Community Action Council. Eight local service agency leaders detailed how they are supporting people during the current housing and affordability crisis, and the Berkshire state delegation spoke to their own efforts.

The event held on March 27 at the Berkshire Athenaeum included a working lunch and encouraged public feedback. 

"All of this information that we're going to gather today from both you and the panelists is going to drive our next three-year strategic plan," explained Deborah Leonczyk, BCAC's executive director. 

The conversation ranged from health care and housing production to financial literacy and child care.  Participating agencies included Upside 413, The Brien Center, The Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, MassHire Berkshire Career Center, Berkshire Regional Transit Authority, Greylock Federal Credit Union, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, and Child Care of the Berkshires. 

The federal choices Gordon spoke about included allocating $140 billion for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, investing $38 billion to convert warehouses into detention centers, cutting $1 trillion from Medicaid over 10 years, a proposed 50 percent increase in the defense budget, and cutting federal funding for supportive housing programs. 

Gordon pointed to past comments about how the region can't build its way out of the housing crisis because of money. He withdrew that statement, explaining, "You know what? That's bullshit, actually."

"I'm going to be honest with you, that is absolute bullshit. I have just observed over the last year or so how we're spending our money and the amount of money that we're spending on the federal side, and I'm no longer saying in good conscience that we can't build our way out of this," he said. 

Upside 413 provided a "Housing Demand in Western Massachusetts" report that was done in collaboration with the University of Massachusetts at Amherst's Donahue Institute of Economic and Public Policy Research. It states that around 23,400 units are needed to meet current housing demand in Western Mass; 1,900 in Berkshire County in 2025.