The Rotary Nature Center Is Back!

By C.J. Hirschfield

“I spent many happy hours here when I was growing up, trying to find the queen bee at the Rotary Nature Center’s hive,” said Oakland’s own queen bee, Mayor Libby Schaaf. She was referring to the hive that fascinated generations of kids and adults at this treasured institution in Lakeside Park. The center was closed for two years, but it’s back now, along with many new exhibits and programs, as we learned at the grand reopening last Saturday.

Inside the reopened Rotary Nature Center

For the last year, I’ve been honored to be part of a core team working to restore, reimagine and reopen the center. On Saturday we joined civic officials and center supporters to welcome the community back in – with some fanfare – to see some of the  changes that have been made, and to celebrate the 66-year-old institution that has meant so much to so many Oakland kids and adults.

A Kids' Paradise

By C.J. Hirschfield

Lakeside Park is a very special neighborhood that’s designed with our community’s kids in mind. There’s Children’s Fairyland, of course, a treasure for our youngest kids since 1950. There’s the Rotary Nature Center, which since 1953 has served as a citywide interpretive center for science and environmental education. 

Rotary Nature Center in Lakeside Park.

And there’s the delightful Junior Center of Art and Science, which moved to Lakeside Park in 1992 from Mosswood Park, where it had been located since 1954.

The Junior Center of Art and Science in Lakeside Park.