Centrum Information Center

Centrum and Port Townsend Film Festival Create Winter Film Series

The Port Townsend Film Festival and Centrum have partnered to create 3 by 3: The Fort Worden Winter Film Series. Curated by Tom Skerritt, Reel Grrls, and Kathleen Murphy, the series will screen nine films, one every Tuesday evening from January 6 to March 3. Each film will be introduced by one of the guest curators, and a question-and-answer period with the guest curator will follow each film.

Films will be shown in the historic Joseph F. Wheeler Theater, built in the 1940's to serve as the Fort Worden’s original movie house.

Tickets are $12; $8 with current student ID, and are available online at www.fortwordenwinterfilms.com, or by calling Centrum at 360-385.3102, x117. Series passes are $95. Tickets are also available at the Wheeler Theater box office one hour before the film begins.

Reel Grrls is a unique after-school media & technology training program that empowers girls to critique media images and to gain media technology skills in a safe, open environment, mentored by a network of multi-cultural women media professionals. Each of the three films selected by Reel Grrls will be preceded by a five-minute short film. Reel Grrls chose films that were female-directed and women-focused, taking care to match each of the feature films with Reel Grrls’ participant-created shorts  similar in subject matter or theme.

The films of Tom Skerritt, an Emmy Award-winning American actor who has appeared in over forty feature films and more than two hundred television episodes, include M*A*S*H, Alien, Top Gun, Steel Magnolias, A River Runs Through it and Smoke Signals, among many others. His television series include Gunsmoke, Picket Fences, and Cheers. The three films in this series offer a retrospective of his choices as an actor and testify to his range.

Kathleen Murphy has served on the faculties of the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Washington where she founded a Cinema Studies program and headed the UW Arts and Humanities Department in Continuing Education. She has served on the selection committees of the Seattle International Film Festival and the New York Film Festival. Murphy’s selection was based on films that artfully express the complicated connections between art and life, creativity and experience.

Lifelong Learning a Reality at Fort Worden; Changes for Centrum

On September 25, the Washington State Parks Commission voted unanimously to begin the process of finding and selecting a nonprofit organization to pursue management and operations of the planned life-long learning center at Fort Worden.

Today, Centrum announced its intention to submit a Letter of Interest to Washington State Parks to begin negotiations about options for nonprofit management.

Thatcher Bailey will resign as Centrum's Executive Director, effective November 15, to assemble a task force—including Centrum Board members Cindy Hill Finnie and John Begley—which will develop this application. Bailey will work as a consultant to Centrum through this process.

"This is a moment of extraordinary opportunity for Fort Worden, the local community, and the region," says Centrum Board President, Libby Reid. "We are deeply excited by the new vision for Fort Worden and want to play a role in building a partnership economy that serves and benefits all resident partners and users of the Park along with the local community."

The Centrum Board has begun a search to replace Bailey as Executive Director. In the meantime, Kisha Palmer will take charge of staff and day-to-day operations as Managing Director. "We remain 100% committed to strengthening and diversifying Centrum's core programs," explains Reid. "We are extremely fortunate that Kisha is in place as we move through this next phase of Centrum's evolution."

Map & Directions

Centrum is located at historic Fort Worden State Park in the Victorian seaport of Port Townsend, WA.

Perched at the northeast tip of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, Port Townsend is a magical combination of land and sea, with panoramic views of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, as well as the Olympic and Cascade mountain ranges.

Located a short ferry ride from Seattle, Centrum is ideally located for easy access, while being a world away, set in the timeless beauty of Fort Worden State Park.

Here is a Google map of Fort Worden and Port Townsend.

DIRECTIONS

Getting to Port Townsend and Fort Worden

Taking the ferry From Seattle or Edmonds to Hood Canal Bridge

Take the ferry from the Colman Ferry Dock (at the foot of Madison Street in downtown Seattle) and drive across Bainbridge Island, through Poulsbo, turning right on Highway 104 and follow signs to the Hood Canal Bridge...

... or take the ferry from Edmonds to Kingston and proceed, following the signs to the Hood Canal Bridge....

Allow 30 minutes crossing time, and an hour to an hour and a half drive time. We urge you to get to the ferry early.

Five miles past the Hood Canal Bridge, turn right off Highway 104 onto Highway 19.

Or, from Sea-Tac Airport to the Hood Canal Bridge.

Take the “exit to freeways” from the airport. Get on I-5 south. Take Rt 16 west to Tacoma and the Narrows Bridge & Bremerton. Go across the Bridge. Now you are on Rt 3 north. Signs will say “Bremerton-Hood Canal Bridge’, and then ‘Silverdale-Hood Canal Bridge”. Stay on Rt 3 until you get to the Hood Canal Bridge.

Go across the Bridge. Now you are on 104 west. Stay on 104 west for about 5 miles, until you see signs for Rt 19 north-Port Townsend. Turn right onto 19 north.

Then... 

Stay on 19 north until it curves to the right (about 20 miles) and becomes 20 east at the stop light (you’ll see the Courtesy Ford Dealership). Stay on 20 east and it goes right into Port Townsend.

Hwy 20 will go thru the first part of Port Townsend (and will be called Sims Way now) and then you will see the water and head down a hill. You will go through a stop light right by the Safeway. You will see a sign for Fort Worden right before the next light. Turn left onto Kearney St. at the light. At the next stop sign (at a T intersection) turn right onto Blaine. At the next stop sign (another T) turn left onto Walker. Walker curves around to the right and becomes Cherry St. Follow Cherry St thru the next stop sign. You will come to a ‘Y’ intersection. Follow Cherry to the right and up the hill. At the bottom of the other side you will be at the Fort gate. (You can also go left at the ‘Y’ and you will be on Redwood. Turn right at the next stop, go one block and turn left into the Fort. Campers and motorhomes need to go this way.) To get to the Centrum office, come thru the gate and to the 4-way stop. Turn right and go down past the flag pole. Turn left onto Battery Way. The office is the 2nd building on the left.

Getting to Sea-Tac Airport from Fort Worden/Port Townsend

Go straight out the Fort Gate and up and over the hill on Cherry St. Stay on Cherry thru the 4-way stop and past the golf course (on your right). Take a right onto Blaine St. Take the next left at Kearney St. At the stop light turn right onto Sims Way. Sims Way turns into Hwy 20 west. Follow 20 to the intersection and stop light at the Courtesy Ford Dealership. 20 turns right, but you want to go straight and you are now on Rt 19 south.
Follow 19 south (it is also Beaver Valley Rd after you go thru the 4-way stop in Chimacum) until it ends at 104. Turn left onto 104 east and follow it across the Hood Canal Bridge. On the other side of the bridge turn right onto Rt 3 south. Stay on Rt 3 south down thru Silverdale and Bremerton, and to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. Cross the bridge and you are on Rt 16 east. Stay on 16 until you hit I-5 north. Take I-5 north up to exit 154A, 518 west, to Sea-Tac Airport. Follow signs into airport parking or pick up area.