Cynthia Helen Beecher Steps Down As Host of Center Literary Cafe

Cynthia Helen Beecher announced the end of her tenure as the host of the Center Literary Café in early December.  

The Literary Café, sponsored by the Healdsburg Senior Center, offered an evening literary venue for poets and other writers for the last five years. In addition to inviting noted writers to read at the events, each monthly event included an open mic portion for writers to share their works.

“I would like to thank the Healdsburg Senior Center for sponsoring the Literary Café all these years by printing our flyers, providing the venue, and reimbursing the refreshments,” wrote Beecher in a press release.

“…it has been my deep pleasure and honor to serve our literary community of writers and listeners,” Beecher continued in the release.

Healdsburg Realtor and Literary Laureate Emerita (2004-2005) Penelope La Montagne, was a regular reader at the Café, as well as one of Beecher’s friends and supporters.

“Cynthia Helen Beecher has been an extraordinary ambassador for a community of writers, and has made authors from places as diverse as New York City to the Andes aware that Healdsburg is a place where the written, spoken, and printed word is celebrated,” wrote La Montagne in an email.

“The ripples in the global pond that Cynthia Helen created with her dedication to and preservation of the Center Literary Cafe, will keep moving out into the world, in ways we cannot even imagine, though sadly, this venue is no more,” La Montagne ended.

Beecher will continue to support Healdsburg writers through her organization Quill Ink Productions and its workshops.

According to Healdsburg Senior Center manager Lea Black, any organization with the desire to pick up the event will not benefit from continued Senior Center support.  Interested parties may apply to rent the facility but would have to pay rent and provide liability insurance, as well.

Beecher can be reached at quill.ink.productions@gmail.com