HARTWICK — The Community Center in Hartwick has been spruced up just in time for the Alumni Banquet and Bicentennial Celebration.

With "great help from the town," New Lisbon folk artist Susie Conklin said she's been working for three months to change the appearance of the Community Center. The gym floor was refinished along with the one in the kitchen. A new ceiling and coat of blue paint changed the appearance of the stage, and on Tuesday morning, Conklin was sewing a twenty-three foot velvet valance to be hung across the stage.

"This is a very exciting project and the town has just said go for it," Conklin said. "This is a great way to find some artistic expression and make the place more usable."

Hartwick town supervisor Carol Niedzalkowski said that Conklin deserves the spotlight for her work.

"I think it's wonderful the way she's energized the town board towards the community center. We consider the community center a treasure. Not all communities have a place like it and we're lucky. Susie and her volunteers have put in a lot of time and materials."

The building was moved to its present location in the 1930's, Conklin said, and has been used for community events like dances and silent films since then. Incarnations of the building's former lives are still visible, like an old-fashioned scoreboard on the gym wall that has outlived its usefulness and will soon be removed.

"What I hope to see happen is to have the town the building more often for stage productions," Conklin said.

Part of the Bicentennial Celebration will take place in the Community Center, like the Artisan Show in September and a Mystery Theatre presentation in November, to be performed by local people thanks to a grant garnered by Joanne Telfer, Conklin said. A community ball will round out the festivities in December.

Conklin graduated from Hartwick High School in 1956, a year before the district merged with Cooperstown and "Hartwick lost the heart of the community," she said.

"We lost the hub," she said, "but of course taxpayers had to vote for it. State ed probably stepped in and said, 'this is what you have to do."'

Since that time, the community has been going through a phase, but is now experiencing a surge of enthusiasm and energy, Conklin said.

"I'm just so excited that we're going to have linen on the tables for the banquet," she said.

Conklin's hard work is stamped all over the place, but she has yet to begin her grand finale-a painting on a eight by twelve canvas, still rolled up on the stage floor near Conklin's sewing station.

"It is a mystery not revealed yet," said Conklin, who is a folk artist. "It will be something permanent for the building."