{"id":119398,"date":"2026-02-20T21:52:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T21:52:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/119398\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T21:52:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T21:52:10","slug":"the-bethlehem-centers-impact-on-dr-gerald-ware-local-news-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/119398\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bethlehem Center’s Impact on Dr. Gerald Ware | Local News"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was here, within these walls of The Bethlehem Center<\/a>, and through the generosity of a volunteer where Dr. Gerald Ware learned some of the skills that would eventually shape the trajectory of his life.<\/p>\n

“He sat down with me at a table and literally taught me things about how to draw and how to conceptualize things to get something that’s in your head on a piece of paper,’ he said.<\/p>\n

Ware would later join the Navy, attend architecture school and earn a PhD. Now, he said, his life has come full circle.<\/p>\n

Where he once walked through these doors as a student, he now walks through them as the executive director.<\/p>\n

“If I hadn’t had a location that was close to where I lived, that could provide a safe space for me, to just come in and just be a kid, and not have to worry about what was going on in the streets or what was going on at home or what was going on in society, I don’t know. Maybe my life would have been a lot different,” he said.<\/p>\n

The Bethlehem Center gives kids a safe place to go after school and during the summer and supports families through community outreach. Staff and volunteers mentor kids with homework, reading and teaching new skills, like maintaining a community farm.<\/p>\n

“We also use it as a laboratory for the kids who come here after school, they get to go out there and put their hands in the dirt and see where food actually comes from,” Ware said.<\/p>\n

The produce from this farm goes to local restaurants Calliope and Little Coyote to be used in their award-winning dishes.<\/p>\n

Uplifting children today to create stronger communities tomorrow. A ripple effect, Ware said, he knows is real because he’s lived it.<\/p>\n

To learn more about The Bethlehem Center or to support their mission, visit their website.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It was here, within these walls of The Bethlehem Center, and through the generosity of a volunteer where…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119381,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,182,56591],"class_list":{"0":"post-119398","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news","11":"tag-local-news","12":"tag-making-a-difference"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}