How do you condense a life worthy of a best-selling biography into one newspaper article? That is the challenge when writing about Judy Wicks, who lives on a 2-acre Chestnut Hill property that is a community gathering place, an event venue for progressive nonprofits' fundraising events and an environmental model for living in harmony with nature.

Almost any "foodie" in the region would know Judy Wicks as the founder of the White Dog Cafe, a pioneer in the local farm-to-table movement, at 3420 Sansom St. in 1983. After helping to save her block of Victorian brownstones from demolition to make way for a proposed mall of chain stores, she grew what she began as a tiny muffin shop into a 200-seat restaurant featuring fresh local food.

Over the years White Dog grew a national reputation for community engagement, environmental stewardship and responsible business practices. In 2010, Wicks sold the company through a unique exit strategy that preserves White Dog's sustainable practices and maintains local, independent ownership. Today there are other White Dog Cafes in Glen Mills, Haverford, Wayne, Exton and Chester Springs.

"I am 77 years old," Wicks told the Local last week, "so I just can't do what I used to do, but I am still involved in projects that reduce carbon, educate as many people as possible on how to live in harmony with nature and reduce dependence on fossil fuels and global supply chains.

"I am planting fruit trees and vegetables and creating a meadow,” she continued. “I want to build what I call the Norwood Homestead here – run by solar power and all about sustainable living. We have to grow our own food and produce our own energy and become self-reliant because things are not going to get any better. Every summer will get hotter."

Wicks previously lived in Center City, but moved to Chestnut Hill last year to help care for a very ill family member. "I just love Chestnut Hill," she said. "There is a real sense of community here that you don't have in Center City. People really care for each other. And then, of course, I fell in love with the Wissahickon Park. I am so glad that I moved here."

Growing up on the outskirts of Ingomar, a small town in western Pennsylvania near Pittsburgh, Wicks developed a deep love of nature and witnessed the role of small businesses in community life. After graduating from college in 1969 with a bachelor's degree in English, she lived for nearly a year in the remote Alaskan Eskimo village of Chefornak as a VISTA volunteer. There she had the transformational experience of living in a culture based on sharing and cooperation.

Then, during the 1990s, she worked with the Zapatista revolutionaries in Chiapas, Mexico, setting up a fair trade coffee venture. The experience of working with small farmers in Chiapas, as well as at home in Pennsylvania, lies at the heart of her current vision of a global economy comprised of a network of self-reliant, sustainable local economies connected by fair trade relationships.

And she’s been an indefatigable entrepreneur for social good ever since. In 2001, Wicks founded the Sustainable Business Network of Greater Philadelphia and co-founded the international Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, which now includes more than 30,000 local independent businesses in the U.S. and Canada. 

In 2015, she founded (and still runs) the Circle of Aunts & Uncles, a micro-loan fund for local entrepreneurs without access to family and friends' capital. And in 2019, she went on to found All Together Now PA, an organization (now called PA Fibershed) that seeks to unite urban and rural communities to build resilient, self-reliant regional economies–  both to mitigate and prepare for climate change and to increase community wealth. 

On top of all that, in 2013 she published "Good Morning, Beautiful Business," a book that won a national gold medal for business leadership and has been translated into Chinese and Korean.

Wicks' work has earned numerous local and national awards, including the James Beard Foundation Humanitarian of the Year Award, the International Association of Culinary Professionals Humanitarian Award and the Women Chefs and Restaurateurs Lifetime Achievement Award. Wicks was inducted into the University Science Center's Innovators Walk of Fame in 2016.

For more information, visit judywicks.com. Len Lear can be reached at lenlear@chestnuthilllocal.com.