Pickleball Tournament to Benifit Berkshire Bounty

11:57AM / Thursday, August 29, 2024Print Story | Email Story

GREAT BARRINGTON, There will be a fundraising pickleball yournament to benefit Berkshire Bounty, a 501(c)(3) food recovery organization that provides food to those in need throughout the county.

"We're excited to support Berkshire Bounty. We hope that people will come and support this important Berkshire County resource and have fun!" said Joan Ury and Susan Ferlauto, event committee co-chairs.

The size of Berkshire County's food-insecure population continues to grow. According to Feeding America's Map the Meal Gap, the food insecurity rates in Berkshire County grew by almost 2.5 percent between 2021 and 2022—from 8.9 percent to 11.2 percent. Since then, food price inflation has pushed the percentage of people in Berkshire County suffering from food insecurity even higher, according to a press release.

The pickleball tournament will be held at Bard College, Simon's Rock Kilpatrick Athletic Center Courts, in Great Barrington, on Saturday, Sept. 21, 2024 (Rain date: Saturday, Sept. 28). All tournament proceeds will go directly to Berkshire Bounty. The tournament is open to advanced beginner, intermediate, and advanced players. Each player must sign up with a partner. Teams will self-rank when registering.

"These benefits are gratifying to our organization and show how our community pulls together. We're so thankful," stated Mark Lefenfeld and Jay Weintraub, Berkshire Bounty co-founders and Board members.

Registration began on Aug. 1, 2024, and will close on Sept. 1, 2024. There will be a registration fee—a tax-deductible donation—with proceeds going to support the work of Berkshire Bounty's emergency food distribution programs countywide. The event will be limited to 32 teams of two players each, and prizes will be awarded to the two top winners in each division.

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South County Celebrates 250th Anniversary of the Knox Trail

By Tammy Daniels iBerkshires Staff
06:18PM / Sunday, January 11, 2026

State Sen. Paul Mark carries the ceremonial linstock, a device used to light artillery. With him are New York state Sen. Michelle Hinchey and state Sen. Nick Collins of Suffolk County.

GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. —The 250th celebration of American independence began in the tiny town of Alford on Saturday morning.

Later that afternoon, a small contingent of re-enactors, community members and officials marched from the Great Barrington Historical Society to the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center to recognize the Berkshire towns that were part of that significant event in the nation's history.

State Sen. Paul Mark, as the highest ranking Massachusetts governmental official at the Alford crossing, was presented a ceremonial linstock flying the ribbons representing every New York State county that Henry Knox and his team passed through on their 300-mile journey from Fort Ticonderoga to Boston in the winter of 1775-76.

"The New York contingent came to the border. We had a speaking program, and they officially handed over the linstock, transferring control of the train to Massachusetts," said Mark, co-chair of Massachusetts' special commission for the semiquincentennial. "It was a great melding of both states, a kind of coming together."

State Rep. Leigh Davis called Knox "an unlikely hero, he was someone that rose up to the occasion. ... this is really honoring someone that stepped into a role because he was called to serve, and that is something that resonates."

Gen. George Washington charged 25-year-old bookseller Knox with bringing artillery from the recently captured fort on Lake Champlain to the beleaugured and occupied by Boston. It took 80 teams of horses and oxen to carry the nearly 60 tons of cannon through snow and over mountains.

Knox wrote to Washington that "the difficulties were inconceivable yet surmountable" and left the fort in December. He crossed the Hudson River in early January near Albany, crossing into Massachusetts on what is now Route 71 on Jan. 10, 1776. By late January, he was in Framingham and in the weeks to follow the artillery was positioned on Dorchester Heights.

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