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Details

Date

May 23, 2024

Time

6:00PM - 7:30PM

Ages

All Ages (Under 18 must be accompanied by a parent)

Location

114 E 3rd Ave, Ellensburg, WA 98926

Lecture: “PUSHED: Miners, a Merchant, and (Maybe) a Massacre”

May 23, 2024

Ana Maria Spagna, author and professor, will discuss her book “PUSHED: Miners, a Merchant, and (Maybe) a Massacre” on Thursday, May 23rd at 6pm. The event is free, open to the public, but seating will be limited.

 

About this Program:

Amid the current alarming rise in xenophobia, Ana Maria Spagna stumbled upon a story: one day in 1875, according to lore, on a high bluff over the Columbia River, a group of local Indigenous people murdered a large number of Chinese miners—perhaps as many as three hundred—and pushed their bodies over a cliff into the river. The little-known incident was dubbed the Chelan Falls Massacre. Despite having lived in the area for more than thirty years, Spagna had never before heard of this event. She set out to discover exactly what happened and why.

Consulting historians, archaeologists, Indigenous elders, and even a grave dowser, Spagna uncovers three possible versions of the event: Native people as perpetrators. White people as perpetrators. It didn’t happen at all. Pushed: Miners, a Merchant, and (Maybe) a Massacre replaces convenient narratives of the American West with nuance and complexity, revealing the danger in forgetting or remembering atrocities when history is murky and asking what allegiance to a place requires.

 

About the Speaker:
Ana Maria Spagna is the author of several award-winning nonfiction books, including, most recently, Pushed: Miners, a Merchant, and (Maybe) a Massacre, along with Reclaimers, stories of indigenous women reclaiming sacred land and waterthe memoir/history Test Ride on the Sunnyland Bus: A Daughter’s Civil Rights Journey, winner of the River Teeth literary nonfiction prize, and three essay collections, Potluck, Now Go Home, and Uplake. She has also written a novel for young people, The Luckiest Scar on Earth, about a 14-year-old snowboarder and her activist father, and her first chapbook of poetry, At Mile Marker Six, appeared in 2021. Ana Maria’s work has been recognized by the Society for Environmental Journalists, the Nautilus Book Awards, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Awards, and as a four-time finalist for the Washington State Book Award. Her essays have recently appeared in Fourth Genre, Ecotone, Creative Nonfiction, Brevity, The Normal School, and Hotel Amerika. After working fifteen years on backcountry trail crews for the National Park Service, she turned to teaching and, in addition to Antioch University, has taught at Whitman College, St. Lawrence University, Western Colorado University, and the University of Montana.
 
 
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The Event, At a Glance:
What: “PUSHED: Miners, a Merchant, and (Maybe) a Massacre”
Who: Author, Ana Maria Spagna
When: Thursday, May 23, 2024 at 6pm
Where: Kittitas County Historical Museum, 114 E 3rd Ave, Ellensburg, WA 98926
Cost: Free

More to Explore at the Museum

Lecture: “Topic To Be Announced”

November 14, 2024

Dr. Patrick McCutcheon and Nik Simurdak will present on Thursday, November 14 at 6pm at the Kittitas County Historical Museum. Their topic and more information will be announced soon.

 

Lecture: “Impactful Women and Their Contributions in Ellensburg History”

October 15, 2024

Julia Stringfellow, Professor and University Archivist at Central Washington University, will speak on “Impactful Women and Their Contributions in Ellensburg History” on Tuesday, October 15th at 6pm.

Ellensburg Blue Agate

Permanent Exhibit

Over 50 samples of Ellensburg Blue Agate are featured in the ongoing Rock and Mineral display, which is the largest collection held by a museum.