NAG’s Last Hurrah: Arts group plans to fold after Shakespeare performances

As evening settles around Good Old Days Park in St. Ignatius this weekend, the few remaining members of Ninepipe Arts Group (fondly known as NAG) will settle in too, ready to savor Montana Shakespeare in the Parks’ performances of “The Three Musketeers” on Saturday and “Measure for Measure” on Sunday.

NAG’s other legacies – including an annual fine arts camp and Missoula Children’s Theatre performances in Charlo – have slipped away and, with these performances, the stalwart arts organization takes its final bow.

According to Caroline Myhre, a founding member and driving force in the organization, NAG’s demise was sped by COVID, an aging membership and a lack of new recruits – a plight that seems to be afflicting many nonprofits these days. According to a recent survey, conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau and AmeriCorps, volunteer participation dropped 7% between 2019 and 2021.

NAG was launched about 20 years ago when a self-described group of “artsy and not-so artsy volunteers” joined forces to support arts and culture in the Mission Valley, with an emphasis on kids.

The organization was instrumental in bringing Missoula Children’s Theatre to Charlo for several years. The Missoula-based theatre company sends two trained actors to communities far and wide to rehearse and stage one-hour musicals with local kids, who might start out as pumpkins (“Cinderella”) or rats (“The Pied Piper) and eventually land a leading role.

Over the years, NAG also sponsored the Charlo-Dixon Fine Arts Camp, scholarships, field trips, and Montana Shakespeare in the Parks performances in Charlo and St. Ignatius. The annual Valentine’s Art Party, held each February at Leon Hall, was a much-anticipated mid-winter soiree as well as a major source of revenue. Artists from as far afield as Missoula donated work, which was sold via live and silent auctions during a lively evening that included desserts and live music.

The fine art camps, which were launched in 2001 with “Show Me the Monet” and continued through 2019 with “Buggy About Art,” brought together performing and visual artists from the Mission Valley and beyond to share their talents for four days each summer. Up to 70 children signed up for a program that – in the face of budget cuts that decimated school art programs – helped provide a valuable foundation in art education. Thanks to NAG, which organized the elaborate and imaginative camps, admission was nominal (and free for those who couldn’t afford it).

“Some of those kids who did so well in art camp didn't do well in other subjects,” Myhre says. “Then they discovered something that they were good at.”

The Valentine’s party and the fine art camps both fizzled in the face of COVID. “It's unfortunate nobody's willing to take that over and do something with it, but it needs some young blood,” Myhre says.

NAG initially brought Montana Shakespeare in the Parks to the shady environs of Palmer Park northeast of Charlo. The pastoral setting on Hwy. 212, draped with weeping willows, was a favorite for audiences and performers alike. Eventually they added Good Old Days Park in St. Ignatius and were thus able to bring both MSIP plays to Mission Valley audiences.

According to Myhre, local sponsors – both individuals and businesses – help foot the bill, which amounts to around $3,000 a year for both productions, which are free to audiences.

This marks the first year since NAG has sponsored the event that both plays will be performed in St. Ignatius, and the last year the traveling troupe will come to the Mission Valley unless another organization picks up NAG’s mantle.

“It would be sad to have it just go away,” says Myhre of Shakespeare in the Parks. She adds that the organization has a list of sponsors and seed money that it would consider bequeathing to another nonprofit willing to shoulder the responsibility. Otherwise, NAG will dissolve its non-profit status in the coming year and donate its remaining funds to Shakespeare in the Parks.

Being part of Ninepipe Arts Group “has been great. I’ve loved it,” she says. “But it takes work – it takes people being willing to pull it off.”

For more information on NAG, or how to ensure that 2023 isn’t the final performance of Montana Shakespeare in the Parks in the Mission Valley, call 406-644-2311 or email carolina@charlo.net.