Arizona Water Use from Prehistory to the Present with Jim Turner

Flagstaff City - Coconino County Public Library 300 West Aspen Avenue, Flagstaff, United States

This presentation covers humankind’s water use and food supply interactions with Arizona’s ecology from Clovis culture hunter-gatherers to prehistoric irrigation canals, contemporary Hopi and Tohono O’odham dry farming, and present-day American farmers. We will examine how overhunting and climate change affected the wooly mammoth populations and the agriculture experiments that followed. From early attempts to […]

Hiking into the Past: The Sierra Ancha Cliff Dwellings with John Mack

Caviglia-Arivaca Library 17050 W. Arivaca Rd., Arivaca, AZ, United States

This presentation examines the remarkable living structures built by the people who first lived in the canyons of the Sierra Ancha wilderness during the early Middle Ages. The architectural dwellings reflect the culture and history of these people and help us understand their contributions to life in the Arizona desert. The presentation includes numerous photos […]

The History Matters: Yours Too! with Pamela Stewart

Lecture Hall - R H Johnson Rec Center 19803 N. R.H. Johnson Blvd, Sun City West, AZ, United States

PRESENTATION DESCRIPTION Reasons exist for why people do not look to history to address today’s challenges. Yet actively engaging in historical thinking can reveal tools for solving problems faster and with greater success. Even as personal history can matter and the presentation is useful for those interests, this is not an introduction to genealogy class. […]

FREE

Border Geography: Key Context from the Arizona-Mexico Boundary with Scott Warren

Maricopa County Library District - George T. Lord Library 1900 N Civic Square Drive, Goodyear, United States

The boundary that separates Arizona from Mexico extends 354 miles across land and 24 miles up the Colorado River. Arizona shares this boundary with two Mexican states and two Native American Reservations. Eight ports-of-entry and six sets of border town pairs create important points of contact. Efforts to conserve land, manage urban growth, create resilient […]

Arizona Snake Oil Salesmen, Scams, and Hoaxes with Christine H. Reid

Phippen Museum 4701 N Hwy 89, Prescott, AZ, United States

Entrepreneurs offering assorted “get rich quick” schemes and “cure-alls” have visited Arizona since the early days. Benefitting from tales of abundant resources in the territory, limited law enforcement and communication, a scoundrel could create enticing promises of wealth and health without much external oversight. Newspapers often fanned the hysteria only to later denounce and expose […]

Archaeology’s Deep Time Perspective on Environment and Sustainability with Allen Dart

Flagstaff City - Coconino County Public Library 300 West Aspen Avenue, Flagstaff, United States

The deep time perspective that archaeology, geology, and related disciplines provide about natural hazards, environmental change, and societal development is often ignored when societies today make decisions affecting social sustainability and human safety. Studies of ancient peoples and natural events can help modern society deal with problems of environmental and social change, overpopulation, and sustainability. […]

100 Years Grand – The Story of Arizona Highways Magazine with Win Holden

Maricopa County Library District - White Tank Library 20304 West White Tank Mountain Road, Waddell, United States

April 2025 will mark Arizona Highways magazine’s 100th birthday. How did a brochure produced by the Arizona Highway Department become one of the most revered travel publications in the world? How has Arizona Highways remained relevant for a century while other national magazines have failed? Former Arizona Highways Publisher, Win Holden, will share the inside […]

Beyond the Kitsch: The Pervasive Spirit of our Indigenous Creative Community with Nanibaa Beck

Tohono Chul Park 7366 N. Paseo del Norte, Tucson, AZ, United States

Throughout the Southwest, tourists and locals encounter a range of Indigenous art, from manufactured and imported cultural appropriations to fine art in galleries and museums. The state’s creative Indigenous communities are sometimes lost in what is popularly featured as Native American Art. In this presentation, Diné jeweler Nanibaa Beck will highlight contemporary Native American Art, […]

Border Geography: Key Context from the Arizona-Mexico Boundary with Scott Warren

Goodyear Civic Square - Georgia T. Lord Library Community Room 1900 Civic Square, Goodyear, AZ, United States

The boundary that separates Arizona from Mexico extends 354 miles across land and 24 miles up the Colorado River. Arizona shares this boundary with two Mexican states and two Native American Reservations. Eight ports-of-entry and six sets of border town pairs create important points of contact. Efforts to conserve land, manage urban growth, create resilient […]

Cochise, Geronimo, and the Apache Wars with Gregory McNamee

Phippen Museum 4701 N Hwy 89, Prescott, AZ, United States

Their names resound in Arizona history and pepper the of the state map, but few people know well the tangled history that surrounds the so-called “Apache Wars”, when fully half of the active U.S. Army descended on the territory to combat a relative handful of Indigenous warriors. Ironically, the Apache peoples of the Southwest had […]

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