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Feb 26, 2005

"All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up." --Pablo Picasso

A Path with Art

In 1963, Bill Strickland was a 16-year old kid struggling to survive in a decaying Pittsburgh neighborhood until one afternoon he peered into an open classroom door and saw something he'd never saw before, a mound of clay being worked into a vessel by a man absorbed in his work. That teacher mentored Strickland, and put him on a path that lead him not only to college and out of poverty, but also to finding a way to inspire other underprevileged people to do the same. Strickland went on to found and grow the Manchester Craftsman's Guild, a Pittsburgh-based after-school arts program that has sent 75% of its at-risk high school kids on to college.