Alden (Joe) Doolittle and Kate Dudding, producers of Story Circle at Proctors, received the 2015 Brother Blue and Ruth Hill Award from the League for the Advancement of New England Storytelling (LANES) at the 34th Sharing the Fire – Northeast Storytelling Conference. Each year in March at the Sharing the Fire – Northeast Storytelling Conference, the LANES Board of Directors presents the award to one recipient in recognition of his or her extraordinary commitment and efforts to promote a broader understanding of the art of storytelling and the support of storytellers in the development of their art. For a candidate to be considered for this award, they must have demonstrated their dedication in creating and nurturing a strong storytelling community, be it by individual mentoring, guild or event venues or by fostering a greater public awareness of storytelling and its applications in all areas of society. “Alden (Joe) Doolittle and Kate Dudding received this award because they’ve produced since 1999 more than 200 storytelling events for over 11,000 attendees as well as a public access TV show,” stated league officials through a press release. The duo first started producing “Tellabration” (an annual storytelling benefit) together in the late 1990s. They have produced 15 of the 19 local “Tellabrations” with over 2,600 attendees. Over 90 storytelling programs have been underwritten with the proceeds from all Story Circle of the Capital District Tellabrations. The award is named in honor of its two original recipients Brother Blue (a.k.a. Dr. Hugh Morgan Hill) and Ruth Hill. Both have long been recognized and honored as tireless in their promotion of storytelling and storytellers throughout the greater New England region. Doolittle and Dudding are currently producing the 16th season of Story Sundays at the Glen Sanders Mansion, a storytelling dinner series for adults. More than 110 storytelling dinners have interwoven four courses of stories with three courses of food. The remaining dinner this season, on Sunday, April 26, at 5 p.m., is: “Stories for the Moon of Earth Waking” with Joseph and Jesse Bruchac. Doolittle and Dudding are also producing the eighth season of “Word Plays” at Proctors, a storytelling series for adults. The remaining “Word Play” performance this season, on Sunday, April 12, at 2 p.m. in the Fenimore Gallery is “Unexpected Consequences” with Siri Allison, Kate Dudding, Anne Marie McLaughlin, Bonnie Mion, Colette Odell, Eliud Nieves, Merideth Nieves, Joe Peck and Sandy Schuman. They’re now in their sixth season of “Story by Story: Sharing the Human Experience,” a monthly hour-long public access television show where there is a guest storyteller each month to discuss aspects of storytelling and tell stories. Recent new storytelling venues include the Fort Salem Theater, Salem, NY and the Irish American Heritage Museum in Albany. In January, Doolittle and Dudding created Story Circle’s Speakers Bureau. At regularly scheduled professional and community meetings of business and civic leaders, Story Circle’s Speakers Bureau can provide brief educational presentations about storytelling and its values, uses, and forms. A special emphasis of these presentations is how storytelling is used in business, professional and educational settings. Doolittle specializes in stories of home and family, historical events, places and people. He began storytelling when his children were young (a long time ago) and realized it was also good method to motivate and teach staff and graduate students. Doolittle loves to bring history to current life as reminder and reference and has developed many tales about the early settlement of the Hudson and Mohawk Valleys, the Adirondacks, Colonial and Revolutionary Wars, and the Erie Canal. He has applied his humorous and good-natured style to audiences throughout the region. Two of his stories are in the anthology “Stories We Tell,” published in 2014. He has produced six CDs over the years. Dudding, a native of Clifton Park, creates entertaining, heartwarming and memorable stories about real people who made a difference. She has told stories at many venues in the Northeastern USA, including The Clearwater Festival (Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.), First Night Saratoga (Saratoga Springs, N.Y.), and The Norman Rockwell Museum (Stockbridge, Mass.). She has been commissioned to create stories by The New York Historical Society in New York City, The Schuyler Mansion State Historic Site in Albany, The Empire State Aerosciences Museum in Schenectady and Easton Library. Each of her four CDs has received a national award. Two or her stories are in the anthology “Stories We Tell.” In 2010, she won the story slam competition at the National Storytelling Conference in Los Angeles, Calif. for telling a personal story. Dudding worked in the computer industry for 31 years prior to storytellers.
For more information about storytelling productions, visit www.StoryCircleAtProctors.org. — Proctors