The Traprock Center for Peace and Justice, founded in 1978 as the Traprock Peace Center, has a long history of working for peace, nonviolence, and economic and social justice in the Hampshire/Franklin County area. Traprock works in community with both local and national efforts to end violence against Earth, her people, and all living beings. For nearly five decades, Traprock has remained committed to this mission.
And 2025 was a big year! Traprock thanked past board member Emily Greene for her dynamic work for peace and justice, and welcomed several new board members, as well as a new Traprock director. See Greenfield Recorder article on this generational change here.
Liam O’Shea, Traprock’s new executive director, is a filmmaker and communications professional with a passion for activism. Since 2016, Liam has been active politically, canvassing for Bernie Sanders and attending acts of civil resistance, both locally and beyond. He also works on social media and website management for Traprock, and has filmed a number of programs about peace and social justice for Traprock and Greenfield Community Television.
New board member Kim Wolcott is a Greenfield resident focused on racial justice advocacy and committed to promoting equity in our local communities. Active with Racial Justice Rising, with a background in fiscal grants management, her work is centered on education, outreach, and empowering communities to understand and resist systemic systems of racism.
New board member Heather Hutchinson is a coordinator of AFWMA (Apartheid-Free Western MA) a coalition of community groups, businesses, faith organizations and individuals in Western MA working to end Israel’s apartheid regime. She is passionate about engaging the public through educational events and outreach that centers the voices of the oppressed to uproot the systems of inequality, war, and racism. Currently, she is also working to support building resilient communities by first growing skills at home- medicinal plant use and cultivation, seed saving, sustainable flock maintenance, small scale agriculture, and sustainable home power generation.
Rich Karsten brings over 30 years of business management and experience in building affordable net-zero residential homes to the Traprock team, transitioning from a successful career as a business owner to advocate for community building and social justice. After retiring his for-profit construction work in 2022, to focus on building community resilience and social justice, he is cultivating the shift from sustainable home systems to sustainable community coalition building, with the same attention to system development and long-term payback. From the self-sufficient homesteading to the cooperative community network, Rich is now a key coordinator of Apartheid-Free Western Massachusetts and serving social and environmental justice work with Traprock as acting treasurer.
We started the year with Our Visions for 2025 a collaborative organizational response to the incoming administration. Offering a forum to share our hopes, fears, and visions for a better world, the event at the Second Congregational church in Greenfield involved many local activist groups as well as c. 250 people attending.
For a quarter century, Traprock and the Interfaith Council of Franklin County have organized the Peacemaker Awards, a public program honoring youth in Franklin County for their contributions to peace and justice. The 2026 event will be held on May 13th at the Greenfield Middle School auditorium, and all are invited to learn about and support student action for change at this critical time.
Another longstanding youth program for peace is the Traprock supported Journey Camp, a mentorship program led by Board member Sarah Pirtle that has empowered girls, non-binary youth, and teen leaders-in-training for over 30 years.
As the leading area peace group, Traprock organizes, participates in and supports in various ways many programs and events throughout the year. These include the Saturday morning Greenfield Common peace vigil, weekly from 11 am to noon, now in its 23rd year; annual anti-nuclear weapons commemorations of the 1945 U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Traprock’s support for a ceasefire and just peace in Palestine was strengthened in 2025 by our support for the Apartheid-Free Communities movement in Western Mass. A 2025 grant to Traprock from the Markham-Nathan Fund for Social Justice included financial support to the extensive outreach of Apartheid-Free Western Mass.
Much of Traprock’s work is in sharing information and encouraging action for peace and justice. Our e-newsletters share the regular columns of former Director Pat Hynes, links to the monthly webinar based on President John F. Kennedy’s June 1963 “Peace Speech,” upcoming actions and programs.