Heritage Conference at the Western Washington State Historical Society

The Washington State Historical Society (or as we on the east side know it, the Western Washington State Historical Society) is hosting an interesting two-day conference February 4th and 5th. The Art of Heritage conference will take place in Olympia. The WWSHS conference page does not include a descriptive overview for some reason, but the excellent Department of Archeology & Historic Preservation blog fills the gap:

The Washington State Historical Society is partnering with the Washington State Arts Commission, the Washington State Arts Alliance and Washington Museum Association for the 2013 Heritage Conference “The Art of Heritage” at the Red Lion Hotel in Olympia on Tuesday, February 5, 2013.  

The Conference also features workshops on Monday, February 4, 2013 on Collections Care and Effective Grant Writing at the State Capital Museum in Olympia. 

At the conference on February 5th, attendees will learn how to work effectively with elected officials, how to implement social media; get an update on lodging tax; learn about initiatives to build new audiences for arts and heritage; see how other arts and heritage groups have used state grants; get some tips on board development; and enjoy a special session on “Museums, Arts and Historic Sites Synergy.”

The spotlight event will be a noon keynote address on February 5^th  by noted author Carol Kammen, American Association of State and Local History columnist who writes “On Doing Local History.”  She will speak on “Clio and Her Sisters:  Integrating Arts and Heritage.”

Sounds like a worthwhile event. I find that such smaller, focused conferences are far more worthwhile professional events, both for information and for networking, than are impersonal national gatherings. I can't make this one, maybe a reader will catch me up with what happened?

Special Event Tomorrow at the MAC

David Nicandri, Director of the Western Washington State Historical Society in Tacoma, will be at the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture tomorrow, Wednesday September 15 at 6:30 p.m. to talk about "Deconstructing the Lore of Lewis and Clark." Announcement below the jump.

Nicandri is an excellent speaker and is as deeply immersed in the expedition as anyone I know. This should be good!

Wednesday Night at the Museum!

This new series of lectures and presentations will offer a wide range of reflective and forward-looking programs based on our exhibits and collections, as well as contemporary culture, history, art and film. Wednesday Night at the Museum partners include Spokane Chapter of the American Institute of Archaeology, Contemporary Arts Alliance (SpIFF), and the Visiting Artist Lecture Series. (There is no charge for the Archeological Society programs or the Visiting Artist Lectures. MAC programs and CAA/SpIFF films are $5.00.)
Museum and partner members receive special email calendar notices of the schedules for Wednesday Night at the Museum programs. Please watch for updates and edits to programming at www.northwestmuseum.org.
Wednesday, September 15  "Deconstructing the Lore of Lewis and Clark"  Author and historian David Nicandri will discuss his book, River of Promise that fills the gaps in our understanding of Lewis and Clark's legendary expedition. The MAC is proud to welcome Nicandri who is the director of the Western WA State Historical Society in Tacoma.  6:30 PM  in the Eric A. Johnston Auditorium  Admission is $5 to all.

"Metaphorically speaking, I came to appreciate the value of simply keeping the oar in the water. I imagine that this is something that Lewis and Clark imputed to the men with great regularity - it's a great life-lesson."    
      --David Nicandri

Online Resources at the Washington State Historical Society

I began working on a post about the new Columbia magazine website, but along the way found a treasure trove of other history resources at the Washington State Historical Society. So I will begin with the magazine and branch out from there.

I see that Columbia: The Magazine of Northwest History, the journal of the Washington State Historical Society, has a new and improved website. Those of you who are familiar with Columbia know that it is a superb journal of popular history, with articles and book reviews that present recent scholarship to a popular audience. The website does not contain everything that has appeared in the journal but many of the articles are available in full text. (This article is excellent.)

There are many other online resources available from the WSHS, including lesson plans, featured collections, women's history resources, and information about visiting the WSHS locations in Tacoma and Olympia. The featured collections is an especially rich resource, and includes digital collections of maps, American Indian Photographs, Columbia River Photographs, a Gustav Sohon Collection, and a Sheet Music Collection. The collections are very much oriented to the west side of the state (a search for "Spokane"  results in zero hits!) and are presented in ContentDM. But within these restrictions there tremendous things to be found at the WSHS site.