Armed with Our Language, We Went to War: The Navajo Code Talkers

Sedona Winds Retirement Center 405 Jacks Canyon Rd., Sedona, AZ, United States

During WWII a select group of young Navajo men enlisted in the Marines with a unique weapon.  Using the Navajo language, they devised a secret code that the enemy never deciphered.  For over 40 years a cloak of secrecy hung over the Code Talker’s service until the code was declassified and they were finally honored […]

Free

Armed with Our Language, We Went to War: The Navajo Code Talkers

Village of Oak Creek Association 690 Bell Rock, Sedona, AZ, United States

During WWII a select group of young Navajo men enlisted in the Marines with a unique weapon. Using the Navajo language, they devised a secret code that the enemy never deciphered. For over 40 years a cloak of secrecy hung over the Code Talker’s service until the code was declassified and they were finally honored […]

Free

Geronimo and the Apache Surrender: The C.S. Fly Photographs with Jay Van Orden

Smoki Museum Pueblo 147 N. Arizona Avenue, Prescott, AZ, United States

In March of 1886, Geronimo and Tribal Members met with General George Crook in Sonora, Mexico, to discuss the terms of surrender.  C. S. Fly, of Tombstone fame, was on hand to document this historic event with photographs.  These are the only known photographs ever taken of American Indians “At War” and as “Enemy-in-the-Field.”  Audiences […]

Free

Desert Trader: Goldie Tracy Richmond, Trader, Trapper, and Quiltmaker

Smoki Museum Pueblo 147 N. Arizona Avenue, Prescott, AZ, United States

Goldie Tracy Richmond came to southwestern Arizona in 1927 where she lived in a canvas lean-to. To survive, Goldie mined, ran traplines, and operated Tracy’s Trading Post, living among the Tohono O’odham people for four decades. She was a large woman, and the stories told by the O’odham people of Goldie’s life are legendary. Goldie […]

Free

Southwestern Rock Calendars and Ancient Time Pieces

Smoki Museum Pueblo 147 N. Arizona Avenue, Prescott, AZ, United States

Ancient Native American cultures of the Southwest, including the Mesa Verde culture of southern Colorado and Utah, the Chaco culture centered in northwestern New Mexico, and the Hohokam culture of southern Arizona, developed sophisticated skills in astronomy and predicting the seasons centuries before Old World peoples first entered the region. In this presentation Dart examines […]

Working in the Salt Mine: Native American Salt Procurement and Ritual in the Southwest

Red Rock State Park - AZ State Parks 4050 Red Rock Loop Road, Sedona, AZ, United States

Salt has been a valuable trade item throughout human history. Native American salt procurement in the Southwest involved dangerous journeys across sacred landscapes associated with the deity Salt Woman. This presentation focuses on the prehistory of a famous salt mine in what is now known as Camp Verde. In the 1920s, miners discovered prehistoric salt-mining […]

Selling the Southwest: Fred Harvey and the Promotion of Native American Cultures

In partnership with the Santa Fe Railway, the Fred Harvey company vigorously promoted travel to the Southwest and was an early innovator of “cultural heritage tourism.” Travelers experienced an idealized version of the Southwest’s Native American cultures through the company’s grand hotels along the Santa Fe line, their Indian Department’s museum rooms and curio shops, […]

Free

The Instruments & Music of Arizona’s Pioneers: A Time Capsule Opened

Butterfly Lodge Museum SE Corner of St. Rt. #373 & Co. Rd. #1126, Greer, AZ, United States

The story of our state is not complete without music. This interactive program will focus on the various genres of music that reflect the milieu and personalities of Arizona’s diverse immigrants.  Using musical instruments and stories, audience members will be presented an artistic tableau of our past: heroes, villains, and the immigrants who passed through […]

Free

Native Roads: A Virtual Guide to the Hopi and Navajo Nations

Smoki Museum Pueblo 147 N. Arizona Avenue, Prescott, AZ, United States

As editor of the third edition of Fran Kosik’s classic travel book, A Complete Motoring Guide to the Navajo and Hopi Nations, Turner retraced her routes in January 2013, updating information on dozens of intriguing Native American trading posts, prehistoric ruins, museums, and natural wonders. Using the pictures taken on that trip, this presentation creates […]

Free

Sedona Through Time

Red Rock State Park - AZ State Parks 4050 Red Rock Loop Road, Sedona, AZ, United States

Sedona is known for its colorful rocks, but how did this striking landscape come to be? Join Ranney on a thrilling trip back in time when the red rocks were part of a coastal plain, a Sahara-like desert, and warm, tropical seas. Learn how the area became sculpted into a maze of breathtaking buttes, spires, […]

Free

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