Whitaker Center celebrating 15 years

(Harrisburg) — The Whitaker Center in Harrisburg is nearing its 15th birthday, and it’s leader is hoping to add more educational and cultural programs in the future.

The Whitaker Center is perhaps best known as home to a science center, a performing arts space, and an Imax theater.

But it also has free art galleries that have featured works from more than 100 artists in the past 15 years.

The Center, on Market Street in Harrisburg, was built thanks to a public private partnership in the mid-1990s.

President and C-E-O Michael Hanes says there’s still much to do for central Pennsylvania.

“Well my hope is that the next 15 years will give us an opportunity to continue to grow. To expand our programming and bring in new ideas. Just in the last 15 years, we’ve added a number of programs that have provided great opportunities.”

Hanes says about 4 million people have visited Whitaker in the past 15 years, and spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the Harrisburg area.

“Whitaker Center has become the place to discover it all. It’s the place to come and enjoy live performing arts. It’s the place to be enlightened, to learn something, to be inspired. But most importantly, it’s the place to discover things.”

He says on its birthday week, he hopes to introduce Whitaker Center to a whole new group of visitors who might never expect such a facility in the capital city.