Ellen Braun’s hospitality story started with a detour. “I graduated from Penn State in 1984 with a degree in English and quickly realized that I was so shy and introverted that I wasn’t emotionally prepared for any of the career paths I’d dreamed of,” she said. So, to overcome it, she got what she calls “assertiveness training” — a job at The All American Rathskeller. The job turned out to be a crash course, not only in confidence, but also in her career path.

When Tanya Campbell was a little girl, her grandmother walked her dogs on Charcoal Flats, a trail in Shingletown. Tanya, her mother, and her daughter also enjoyed hiking along this same trail. The trail, just past Pine Grove Mills near the small town of Shingletown, is known for its series of four charcoal flats — large, circular flat areas where logs would be piled and allowed to smolder to create and one that was used to make iron ore. Or, in the words of little girl Tanya, it’s a place that is “rocky and awesome.”

Zach Lorber lived the transient chef life before coming to State College. “My wife, Megan, grew up in State College and is a Penn State alum of the hospitality program. We met while both working at Bedford Springs Resort, fell in love, and knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. I moved here in the winter of 2009 and Happy Valley has been home since. In just a few more years, this will be the longest I've lived anywhere and that makes me happy.”