Good Neighbor Podcast: Delco
Bringing Together Local Businesses and Neighbors of Delaware County, PA (Delco"") and the surrounding Philadelphia Metro Region.
Good Neighbor Podcast: Delco
America's 250th Celebration Is Getting Underway With Andrea Silva
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America's 250th Celebration Is Getting Underway With Andrea Silva
The story of America’s 250th isn’t just written in Philadelphia’s halls; it’s alive in the mills, meeting houses, campuses and parade routes of Delaware County, PA (fondly known as "Delco"). You'll hear how in this episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast, as our Host Bob Blaisse sits down with America 250 PA Delco Director Andrea Silva to map out a year of celebrations that will be turning local landmarks into living history lessons and civic pride. From the We the People Party Kickoff on January 9th at Valley Forge Military College, to a spring wave of historic house openings and a summer packed with parades and fireworks, the plan brings neighbors together around the places and stories that shaped the nation.
Listen as Andrea Silva walks us through five heritage themes guiding the celebration calendar: Agricultural Bounty and Great Gardens, Revolutionary and Colonial Sites tied to the Philadelphia campaign, the Pathway To Freedom from the Underground Railroad to Martin Luther King Jr.’s studies in Chester, Innovation and Industry, from early mills to today’s colleges and Energy Hubs, and a Spirit of Patriotism that shows up in streets lined with flags and families volunteering side by side. Along the way, Andrea shares how nearly a hundred partners are collaborating to deliver accessible, 250th Birthday Celebration family-friendly events across 49 municipalities, making it easy to discover new sites or fall in love again with the Delaware County ones.
If you’re a business owner, there’s a seat at the table through sponsorships, co-branded storytelling and “Designed in Delco” products that keep dollars local. You'll learn how, if you’re ready to serve, the new Delco Volunteers initiative can match individuals, families and teams with roles from reenactments and parade prep to artifact care and park cleanups, with educators and students getting classroom-ready resources and scholarship opportunities.
With America's 250th Birthday Celebration upon us now, the goal reaches beyond a single year to create lasting memories, invest in historic and civic spaces and renew the habits of service that make communities strong. And this episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast helps kick it all off.
America 250 PA Delco
America250PADelco.org
facebook.com/america250padelco
instagram.com/america250padelco/
--- About The Show--- Good Neighbor Podcast is a spotlight on local businesses in and around Delaware County, PA (“Delco” ) and Beyond... The executive producer and host, Bob Blaisse, is a community sponsorship advocate, business branding specialist, and publisher of several hometown magazines, including: Newtown Square Friends & Neighbors, Marple Friends & Neighbors and Newtown Edgmont Friends & Neighbors, mailed monthly to more than 12,000 homes in Western Delaware County, PA, and also available for reading online.
Welcome And Why Delco Matters
SPEAKER_00Hello, Delco. This is Michael Barkin. Welcoming you to the Good Neighbor Podcast, where fans of local businesses and their neighbors come together. It's my pleasure once again to introduce my friend and neighbor, our host, Bob Lacey.
SPEAKER_01Well, thank you, Michael Barkin, for that introduction. And everyone, welcome again to our episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. We're going to do something different today because while it's called the Good Neighbor Podcast, and typically we talk about good neighbor businesses coming to you from Delaware County, Pennsylvania, the southeast corner of Pennsylvania we lovingly refer to as Delco, uh just above the state of Delaware and just west of the state of New Jersey and just south of the city of Philadelphia. The smaller county in Pennsylvania, Delaware County, is um what we're going to be celebrating here today in this episode, and we're going to do it in a big way because we're going to be putting an eye towards the history of not just Delaware County, but uh the history of the United States. You know that the anniversary of the United States uh Declaration of Independence is coming up in 2026, right? The 250th anniversary. It's technically called the semi-quincentennial 250 years. And Delaware County is going to have a big part in it because, and why not? So much of our history from the uh you know the founding of our country happened all around Delaware County. And uh, we're gonna learn a little more here about our celebration. Uh let me bring to the stage um the director of the um uh commission that is gonna be uh overseeing Delaware County's participation in this, the the director, uh Andrea Silva. Andrea, welcome to uh our Good Neighbor podcast and thank you for being a guest here today.
Meet The America 250 PA Delco Director
SPEAKER_02Hi, Bob. Thanks so much for having me as a guest today. It's such a pleasure to tell you a little bit about it.
SPEAKER_01It's gonna be a lot of fun, Andrea, because normally we have businesses and we're talking about what those businesses do and all that. But in this case, we're talking about really us, Delaware County. We're talking about the pride that we have in Delaware County and why that pride is going to be reflective of the pride we have in our in our country, the 250th anniversary of our country, which we'll all be celebrating in many ways, but your role is to help us know where and how and when to celebrate from a from a Delaware County perspective. So, you know, let us know a little bit about how this came to be. Are you a longtime, you know, Delaware County politician? Have you been uh taken from the ranks of business to come in and show us how to celebrate? What's your really your role and what's the name of your organization?
SPEAKER_02Sure. Um, well, um I am uh not Delco born. I married a Delco guy, and we know that gives you a lot of credibility in this neighborhood. Um, but I've been here uh for about 16 years, and this new role that I have as the director of the America 250 Commission for Delaware County, or America 250 PA Delco, as we kind of call ourselves, is really to help Americans know all the history that's here in Delaware County because we're just steps from Philadelphia, which we know is the birthplace of American democracy. Um, but we're a community just as old as Philadelphia. And we have so many points of history, historical assets to visit, community celebrations, um, some really big, big name regional events coming right to our backyard. And so I get to really make sure everyone who lives and works in Delaware County, anyone who's gonna come visit, you know, is gonna find a meaningful way that they can be a part of the celebration, feel like they, you know, have an appreciation for them their selves as an American, their own personal history, and that we can take that and leverage it into uh civic engagement that really enlives us and enriches us for the next 250 years.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, sure. And and with those events and projects that you're working on, uh there's needed volunteers and involvement and really a lot of goodwill. So maybe we name a couple of them. Like what would be what's actually, since we're only weeks away from 2026, the year of the semi-quincentennial, tell us what's gonna be the kickoff? What's one of the first ones that we'll be hearing about from your office?
SPEAKER_02Well, our big We the People Party kickoff is on January 9th at Valley Forge Military College, which is one of our most historic um educational and um uh sites in the county, and it's really gonna be an opportunity where people can get a sneak peek of just the hundreds of programs that are gonna come out next year.
SPEAKER_01So that that event that events on January 9th. Well, you're starting right away, and and it's appropriately being held at Valley Forge Military Academy. Wonderful, but it's it's a sneak preview. In other words, you're having an event about the events. Is that what I'm hearing?
SPEAKER_02It is because the way we kind of operate is we're I'm an umbrella organization and we have about a hundred community program partners. Some of them are our businesses like Penswood Winery, other ones are nonprofit sites like the Brandywine Battlefield or Colonial Farmstead. Um, I represent hundreds of organizations that have been working for many years, some of them, to develop these special programs. And so you'll see a couple of them beginning to start in the winter, and then come spring, when all of our historic houses open up, you're gonna start seeing a flush of events. And then as we get closer to the 4th of July, Delaware County has 24th of July parades and six fireworks events. So the community is gonna come out in the streets. Yes. After that event, we have a whole year-long program of things we're expecting to do and ways that we're connecting the community to these sites and these historic spaces through a volunteer program.
Partner Network And Event Preview
SPEAKER_01Well, we're gonna be talking about a few of those some more in this episode, but I think we want to get it out a few times that for uh our listeners that want to hear more about this, especially if you're Delaware County born and bred or you're you once were here and you want to learn a little bit about the centennial that's coming, the the semi quincentennial, the really America's 250th birthday, uh, you can look at a great website that um Andrea Silas team has put together for the the commission. Um and it's the website is simply America 250 P A Delco, D-E-L-C-O. America250PA Delco.org is your website. And uh the listeners can go and learn some more. And I'm sure you'll be updating this as the months go forward with all the many events. And and you did touch on a little bit about why it's appropriate starting at Valley Forge Military Academy, but yes, you know it. Well, Delaware County has been really a part of American history with uh the the Battle of Brandywine and other battles that uh happened through here. But you know, being, as you say, the doorsteps of the Declaration of Independence, if we're gonna be celebrating American freedom and the history of the American uh revolution or really the signing of the Declaration, Delaware County has a place here. So I'm interested in hearing a little bit more about your thoughts about how that comes out from a history perspective throughout your program of the year, and then how it's gonna come out in really the vision uh for community involvement and and volunteer engagement uh during these celebrations.
SPEAKER_02Well, thank you. Um we do have uh this area has over 250 years of history because we were founded when William Penn first landed in the state of Pennsylvania. Um we actually have the first city in the state of Pennsylvania, Chester. Um, and from there on out, um our region was connected to the American Revolution, it was connected to um really the pathway to freedom through the Underground Railroad, it was connected to uh industry and the development of mills, to some of our largest uh industry, including uh World War II. And today uh we are still the center of over 12 million people come through the Philadelphia Airport. So we're a major transportation and energy center. So we have, I want to say, all of American history happened right here in Delaware County, and so our local history is America's history, and we get to celebrate all 250 years of that throughout next year. Um, if people join us at the We the People Party, they'll see that we've kind of laid things out in five different heritage themes. We've got agricultural bounty from farms to the great gardens, so people can see some of those uh cultural assets here because we started really as farmland many, many years ago, but then we were a pivotal place in the American Revolution, and we have an enormous amount of colonial history here and revolutionary history for the Philadelphia campaign. Um, we're gonna touch on all the different ways our county was a part of the American pathway to freedom for all different kinds of people through the Underground Railroad, to Martin Luther King, who studied in Chester. And then we're gonna talk about the innovations and how, as a people who come from this area, we have 13 colleges and universities today, but that spirit of innovation started here. Um, and we have so many stories of inventions and interesting businesses that we hope to tell over the next year to celebrate who we are. And of course, I think Delaware County is one of the most patriotic little corners of America.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And a lot of blue just everywhere.
Delco’s Place In American History
SPEAKER_01You have really got some oversight here in some grand history, but uh a grand celebration for that history. And you know, as as uh as I'm always associating with business owners, and oftentimes business owners are called on because here they are serving the community, the people of the community, people depend on those businesses, but you know, they they're oftentimes the ones that you know get the knock on the door um to say, hey, can you help the people that are really the patrons of your business? Can you help us celebrate? Can you be a part of something bigger than your business and take a take a little piece of this responsibility and lead with these organizations? It can be a billboard in the outfield or it can be, you know, taking an ad in the high school program book. But really, I think this is something that businesses would be really interested in because they're one of us. They love celebration, they love people, and that's a great way to brand a business, I think, with the celebration, not for advertising commercial really uh reasons, but more so to be at the party, to be part of the party, really to help make the party great. Well, if if a business is out there and they're interested in getting involved, and we'll talk later about volunteers, but what what role would business have in these events?
SPEAKER_02Well, we are looking for businesses to come on as sponsors, uh, but we're really looking at as a partnership. And so when people make a financial contribution, we also look at other ways that they can support it. Um, we decide on different stories that we can tell across social media. So if there's some businesses that want to help us tell certain history stories, you know, we want to engage them as a sponsor for that story. Um if if they're a business that creates uh commemorative memorabilia or provides special event services, we're going to build an e-commerce page to be able to promote buy local here in Delaware County. So I'm looking for businesses that want to co-brand or or are making products that we want them. You know, if you're decorating your house in red, white, and blue, you know, we're working with some local businesses now to purchase our American flags because we kind of we don't want it just American-made, we want it, you know, designed in Delco.
SPEAKER_01Delco made, yes.
SPEAKER_02Also it's a way for us really to bring it downtown and bring it home and make it a hometown celebration.
Five Heritage Themes Explained
SPEAKER_01Amen. Now, I gathered that you know, once we're talking about the businesses and it's all about trying to um educate the people, this is like a living history museum that's going to come to life here in Delaware County across many different events and many different places. And you're at the you're at the vortex of it, you're bringing it to us, but you're gonna need help, I think. Um, I'm imagining this is a lot bigger than your little uh staff that you might have to help get this organized. Uh, it turns into a massive staff of volunteers. If if someone is interested in, and I'll say this, you know, this is going on in Delaware County already, as you may know, we're gonna host the uh 2026 um PJA Gulf uh open, you know, uh in in May in Delaware County and and actually out in Newtown Square. Well, they're gonna be bringing on hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, really thousands, of volunteers. You might not have that grand number, but if someone wanted to get involved and say, I I'll travel a little bit, I'll stand there and take tickets, I'll I'll count things, I'll I'll organize things. If somebody wanted to become a volunteer, are you shopping for that? Are you bringing them in the fold? Are you are you kind of finding jobs for people who want to get involved? And if they are wanting to get involved, how so?
SPEAKER_02Well, we're launching a whole new initiative called Delco Volunteers, which is a way that Americans can celebrate their patriotism through service to their community. And what we're doing is working with all of these community pro community program partners to advertise their volunteer opportunities. So there will be chances to serve in the parades, to prepare for the parades, to serve at some of our reenactment events, to do things like artifact preservation or uh community cleanups and community beautifications at historic sites and in our civic spaces. We have 49 municipalities here. We have parkland that is preserving our natural history. So when we're talking about service, we're really saying there are opportunities for you to help make Delaware County a better civic space. And now's the time to get out. We have opportunities for small teams of businesses. I had a real estate company of just four folks who said we want to find a place to help. Um, and then some of our largest uh local businesses, like Power Home Remodeling or bringing larger groups, um, but we're looking for ways individuals can help, families, good for teens. So if you're a history lover and you want to be a hero next year, I say put your cape on. It's gonna be time. It is time for our history lovers to come out. Uh, this celebration is gonna offer you a lot of ways to really get engaged in what you love, but also invest in our historic sites.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's it's nice that there's an opportunity to get involved because there are people that love history and will get involved. Um, older folks have longer history themselves and they remember the bicentennial in 1976. Um, but youth not so much. This is this is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of uh event happening for a lot of people born, you know, in this century. So so will there also be an opportunity for youth and schools to get involved in some of the events that are going to be taking place throughout the calendar year?
How Local Businesses Can Partner
SPEAKER_02Most of our events are going to be free and open to the community. And what we'll see is in addition to community events, my organization is aggregating all the educational resources that are coming down from our state and national and other organizations all over the region so that our children can learn about American history and American civics, and we're putting that out to the classrooms. Um, there's also some really cool scholarship opportunities that are out and available that we'll be sharing with students. And then, of course, our civic initiative, Delco Volunteers, we're encouraging our sites to highlight and think about what are those events that families can come to.
SPEAKER_01Well, Andrea, uh, and we're talking to Andrea Silva, who is the director of this celebration that's coming and coming to our country, really coming to the city of Philadelphia for sure, but definitely coming to Delaware County, Pennsylvania, where our podcast is coming from, Delco, as we lovingly referred to it. Andrea is the director of the America 250 PA celebration, the coordinator for all that's kind of related in our own historical county. And and Andrea, I guess I want to first say thank you because this is gonna be one heck of a year for you to be able to be putting in a lot of long hours, and uh, but it's a big time celebration. We're only at the front end of it, and it's gonna be a full year. But you know, the year's gonna pass and then it will be over, but there will be legacy remembrance of everything that this work that you're investing in. So we're so grateful. But I have to ask, maybe it's a good way to kind of close this episode, but what what would you imagine, Andrea, is really your goals for the long-term impact of this America 250 celebration? And you know, what what are we gonna leave behind once this celebration is over? Is it gonna be just memories or changed hearts, minds? What's your goals for the uh whole overall success of the program?
SPEAKER_02Well, yes, we're going to change hearts and minds. I think this is our chance to give children them their once in a lifetime memory of what it means to be American. And we're gonna give them memories that will last their whole life. I think for adults, um, we're trying to give them an opportunity to learn more history, to consider with intentionality who we are and how they want to act in civic life going forward to really bring us together and move our United America, our United States of America into a good direction. Um, and but locally, you know, we're looking to support the economic development of our local businesses, to really revitalize and reinvest in some of our historic and civic spaces, uh, so that we are proud of the history we have and connected to um the values we hold as Americans as we want to move forward.
Volunteers And Service Opportunities
SPEAKER_01It's great. I'm so happy that we've got a chance to meet. And I'm gonna ask if you don't mind, I don't want this to be the only podcast that we do together because it would be a great place here on the Good Neighbor podcast to be able to get word out again and again. And if someone uh on your staff or yourself could come back and give us an update as the year continues, I'd love that. And I think our listeners would love that as well. And and on behalf of the listeners and really Delaware County citizens, thank you, Andrea, for your effort and your investment and all this time and labor and creativity, and and thank you for going out and asking for others to get involved. So please, if you're a business out there, a good neighbor business, and you'd like to support this uh Delaware County um celebration of America's 250th um birthday, please reach out to Andrea's organization and you can find that online at America250pa delco.org. And of course, you can look them up on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and and uh you'll get a chance to at some point talk to someone on on uh Andrea's staff and and get involved, everybody. But Andrea, thank you for getting involved and really being the the focus and the attention that we're giving this, the leadership that you're giving. Very much, very grateful on behalf of all the good neighbor businesses of our community and citizens of Delfco. Thank you. And thank you for being a guest here today on the Good Neighbor Podcast.
SPEAKER_02Thank you for having me, Bob, and so excited to share even more events as they come out in 2026.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast, hosted by Bob Lacey. This is Michael Barkan, inviting everyone to get on the Good Neighbor team, nominate your favorite local business to be featured on an upcoming episode by going to GMTelco.com or by Bowen Baumboard 574 374.