Niswonger PAC celebrates 10th in style

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

It was a night of glamour and glitz, a night of fantastic entertainment, but — most of all — it was a night to remember, as the Niswonger Performing Arts Center of Northwest Ohio celebrated its 10th anniversary with a gala event that won’t long be forgotten.

The idea of a performing arts center out in the cornfields on the south edge of Van Wert began 16 years ago, in 2001, when then-Van Wert City Schools superintendent Cathy Hoffman floated the idea of having an auditorium as part of the proposed Van Wert High School-Middle School complex.

“Everyone kept saying ‘We need an auditorium’.” Hoffman said, but noted the Ohio School Facilities Commission, the state entity that decides what the state will fund in school facilities, would only sanction building an “auditeria” or “cafetorium” — a blended cafeteria/auditorium.

That meant that, while voters approved a bond issue to build the school, any efforts to construct an auditorium would have to use funds from private donors. While Hoffman was thinking about the problem, a friend, Julie Rupert, noted that a good friend and former classmate of hers might be interested in helping make an auditorium happen.

That friend was Scott Niswonger, multimillionaire founder of two air freight companies, Land Air and Forward Air, and a philanthropist who had already helped fund a performing arts center at the high school in his adopted community of Greeneville, Tennessee,

“I wrote Scott a letter and the rest is history,” Hoffman said. “Scott’s vision turned an auditorium into a performing arts center and it’s absolutely fabulous!”

The former superintendent acknowledged that the project wasn’t a slam dunk, or that everyone supported it, at least in the beginning.

“It wasn’t always easy, and it wasn’t even always popular, but we got it done with the help of a lot of people donating money to make this possible,” Hoffman noted of the project some in the community had called “Niswonger’s Folly”, but added: “The people of Van Wert are truly more blessed and more fortunate than any of you can ever imagine.”

While the Niswongers, Scott and Nikki, eventually provided $3 million to help fund the facility, literally hundreds of local businesses, organizations such as The Van Wert County Foundation, and individual donors provided money for the nearly $10 million performing arts center.

Seth Baker, executive secretary of The Van Wert County Foundation, which donated $1.5 million to the project, including $750,000 over 10 years to help pay staff and other expenses, said the NPAC was “a shining example of what happens when passion, vision, and energy collide. The spark that has ignited this vision has been burning in our hearts far longer than 10 years, however. For over 90 years, The Van Wert County Foundation has had the task of continuing the vision and passions of those who call Van Wert home.”

Niswonger himself talked about some of those who went before him, and who provided money from their estates to fund a vision of what Van Wert could be.

“It wasn’t any of us that started this project,” the Van Wert native said. “Think back: George Marsh, Saltzgaber, I’m sure they’re going to be with us tonight in that performance center.”

Niswonger noted that funds deposited with the county foundation by the Saltzgabers has provided scholarships for hundreds of local music students, as well as money used by the foundation for the Niswonger Performing Arts Center. Other foundation projects, such as the newly-created Wassenberg Art Center facility in the old armory building, have also contributed to the community’s cultural legacy.

“When Nikki and I got away from Van Wert many, many years ago we recognized just what a wonderful place Van Wert was … to have this great underpinning of philanthropy and giving back, where it’s volunteer work or funding — whatever,” the philanthropist added. “It exists in Van Wert like it exists in no other place.”

Van Wert Mayor Jerry Mazur talked about the economic development impact of the NPAC, noting that thousands of people have likely visited the city for the first time to attend an event at the performing arts center. Many of those people also spend money to eat in local restaurants, stay in local hotels, and visit local shops and businesses.

Paul Hoverman, who was hired by the foundation to be the first — and only, so far — executive director of the NPAC, talked about how the gala came about, noting that planning began 14 months ago on the project.

Maestro Keith Lockhart, conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra, also made an appearance, as did Bernadette Peters, to speak briefly to the nearly 200 people who attended a gala dinner at Willow Bend Country Club prior to the gala concert.

“What a gorgeous facility!” Lockhart said of the NPAC. “What a really exceptional place! It speaks to this community, to the generosity of some of the natives of this community.”

Hoverman then thanked him for his contribution to the festivities by presenting him with a bottle of Robert Mondavi Maestro wine.

Others intimately involved in making the NPAC — and gala — happen, including Chuck Koch, president of the Van Wert Area Performing Arts Foundation, which operates the Niswonger, and Central Insurance President/CEO Bill Purmort, provided their insights into the importance of the performing arts center to the community.

Following the dinner, Lockhart, Peters, and the Boston Pops put on an outstanding concert of Gershwin favorites and Broadway’s best, while revelers continued the celebration after the concert during an Afterglow party held at Wassenberg Art Center.