Helen Sipala became the recipient of the Chadds Ford Township Residents Association Chadds Ford Citizen of the Year for 2024. CFTRA presented the award during a brief ceremony at the township building on the evening of Dec. 10.
“Chadds Ford is truly an extraordinary place that forms an intersection of so many themes,” said CFTRA Treasurer Jody Allen, referring to the Battle of Brandywine and as the home base for artist Andrew Wyeth. “We are here tonight to honor a person who has stood at the center of those themes for more than 50 years, Helen Murray Sipala.”
Allen went on to talk about Sipala’s more than 50-year involvement with the Chadds Ford Area Women’s Club. “For 24 years Helen has been solely responsible for planning the programs for these meetings which she’s accomplished with great flair and creativity,” Allen said.
But it’s Sipala’s home, Painter’s Folley, the house she and her husband George bought in 1974, that helps form the intersection Allen referred to in an earlier comment.
The home is adjacent to the Brandywine Battlefield Park and was also Howard Pyle’s art school before moving to Turners’ Mill. One of his students was N.C. Wyeth, Andrew Wyeth’s father. And it was at the home when the Sipalas first met and became friends with Andrew Wyeth.
Wyeth painted many pieces at Painter’s Folly some of which included the Sipalas. Wyeth encouraged her to keep a diary of his visits and the conversations she and George had with him, and that led to Sipala writing two books about the relationship to help “preserve the legacy of Andrew Wyeth, Painter’s Folly and the Brandywine School of Painting,” Allen said.
[For more stories about the Sipalas and Wyeth, read the Chadds Ford Live story Living an unexpected dream.]
Sipala, a 1952 graduate of Unionville High School, was modest in her acceptance of the award.
“I can’t believe you chose me; I’ve always been a private person. I’m just in awe of this,” she said and thanked the association for, what she referred to as its “kindness” in honoring her.
Kindness has always been a part of her life. She said in high school she was offered a job working for the school principal and how, later, a family in Delaware helped her financially so she could attend Goldey-Beacom College while she worked as their nanny.
She also offers kindness. One person attending the ceremony who didn’t identify himself said he would often volunteer at the Battlefield Park and if were setting up near Painter’s Folly, Helen Sipala would come out to offer him food or water.
Katharine King, a member of the CFTRA board, read an email from the Brandywine Conservancy congratulating Sipala for the award. The email read:
“On behalf of the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Study Center and the entire Brandywine Conservancy, we congratulate Helen on her well-deserved Citizen of the Year Award. We’re also excited to share that Glass House Study, a watercolor portrait of Helen that has never been seen by the public, will be on view in the next Andrew Wyeth gallery exhibition, Human Nature, opening March 1, 2025.” It was signed by Karen Baumgartner, collection manager of The Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Collection of the Wyeth Foundation for American Art.
About Rich Schwartzman
Rich Schwartzman has been reporting on events in the greater Chadds Ford area since September 2001 when he became the founding editor of The Chadds Ford Post. In April 2009 he became managing editor of ChaddsFordLive. He is also an award-winning photographer.
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