This is an interactive workshop that explores influential and little known African American contributions and the road they paved to make it possible for African American leaders we have today such as Oprah Winfry, Michael Jordan, and Maya Angelou. Dr. Tamika Sanders is an entrepreneur who decided to become an educator to help address the […]

This session features the principle that Hip Hop performs an important social function, and consequently the messaging within it. We will examine why and how something so controversial and marginal could become so mainstream and central, becoming a billion-dollar business today! Using history as a backdrop, we explore particular genres, artists, styles, sounds, images, and […]

John Wayne was born in Iowa and lived for most of his adult life in California. Yet, he spent many years exploring, living, and investing in Arizona, where he produced his own films, raised cattle, operated a game ranch, and was seemingly everywhere at once. Wayne remains an iconic presence in American popular culture. In […]

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 […]

Ghost towns dot Arizona's landscape and provide unique insights into a diverse history. Some ghost towns tell a boom-to-bust story with few remaining traces of the people who once lived there, while others, like Jerome, have become thriving tourist destinations. Many are old mining locations that once bustled with life, while others tell more modern […]

Before WWII, the resident art community of Arizona was comprised mostly of women, and this talk explores these independent spirits. Kate Cory, one of the first to arrive in 1905, chronicled the Hopi mesas. Marjorie Thomas was Scottsdale’s the first resident artist. Lillian Wilhelm Smith came to the state to illustrate the works of Zane […]

The Hohokam Native American culture flourished in southern Arizona from the sixth through fifteenth centuries. Hohokam artifacts, architecture, and other material culture provide archaeologists with clues for identifying where the Hohokam lived, interpreting how they adapted to the Sonoran Desert for centuries, and explaining why their culture mysteriously disappeared. In this presentation Dart illustrates the […]

The American Southwest is world-renown for its colorful and spectacular landscapes like Grand Canyon, Sedona, Monument Valley, the Superstition Mountains, and the Sonoran Desert. But how did these wonders come to exist and what can ordinary rocks tell us about their ancient origins? You’ll be amazed to learn that the Southwest was once the site […]