Past Events

The dramatic and uplifting story of legendary outdoorsman and conservationist JohnMuir’s quest to protect one of America’s most magnificent landscapes, Yosemite.

“Everybody needs beauty, as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” —John Muir

In this portrait of a place, a time, and a movement, the bestselling author Dean King takes us behind the scenes, to the beginning of America’s love affair with Yosemite Valley. In June of 1889 in San Francisco, John Muir—iconic environmentalist, writer, and philosopher—met face-to-face with his longtime editor Robert Underwood Johnson, an elegant and influential figure at The Century magazine. Before long, the pair ventured to Yosemite Valley, the magnificent site Muir had visited twenty years earlier. There, they confronted a shocking vision, as predatory mining, tourism, and logging industries had plundered and defaced “the grandest of all the special temples of Nature.” The rest is history: that watershed moment led to the creation of Yosemite National Park, and launched an environmental battle that at once captivated the nation and ushered in the beginning of the American environmental movement. Join us for King’s illustrated presentation of his riveting new book, Guardians of the Valley, “a rich, enjoyable excursion into a seminal period in environmental history.” (The Wall Street Journal)

Watch episodes of Arthur and learn about the importance of accessibility from a few of his friends! GBH is on the frontline on creating content for disabled kids and their family. Learn about GBH’s mission of inclusivity and accessibility.

Registration is appreciated but not required for this free event.

Photo credit: GBH

A Detroit native, Nina Ott grew up surrounded by music. She loved singing in choirs and playing the piano, a passion which has never left her. Nina trained classically as a pianist before dedicating herself to jazz and improvisation. Her love for music took her across the country. Nina attended live shows in Boston and NYC before eventually moving to Chicago and later Providence, where she had the opportunity to learn more about Latin Jazz and Salsa.

Come join us for an evening of jazz, wine, and food.

This in-person event will begin at 6pm ET.

Photo Credit: Chris Lopes

Join American Ancestors for a shimmering discussion about artists and their summer communities, the “utopias” they created for their friends, families, and students during the first half of the twentieth century on Cape Ann and Cape Cod.

Their names are iconic: Edward Hopper, Charles Hawthorne, Hans Hoffman, Willem de Kooning, Josef and Anni Albers, and Walter Gropius. The artist residents of summertime seashore communities hold a special place in America’s history. To this day, in private collections, museums, and galleries, they portray our country in transition in the last century, its welcoming light and obscuring shadows, burgeoning with industrial and political power.

Join John Taylor “Ike” Williams and Elliot Bostwick Davis for a discussion of their new books looking at the vision and ascendancy of several celebrated artists associated with summer colonies and communities. Our presenters will spotlight individual paintings and measure the cultural impact and their creators who, imbued with summertime spirit and sensitivity, became our country’s cultural luminaries. Don’t miss these authors’ insights on Cape Ann and Cape Cod as it was experienced and represented by its artists, and the lasting impact of their work.

Join us for a shimmering discussion about artists and their summer communities, the “utopias” they created for their friends, families, and students during the first half of the twentieth century on Cape Ann and Cape Cod.

Presented by the American Inspiration series from American Ancestors/NEHGS in partnership with the Cape Ann Museum and Provincetown Arts Association and Museum.

Dr. Ousmane Pame is founder of REDES Ecovillages based in Senegal. He talka about ecovillage communities in the Sahel region of Africa. and their global and regional contexts. The Sahel region includes Senegal, Mali, Mauritania, Burkina Faso, Niger and the Gambia. REDES is the leading, nonprofit, community-led regenerative organization in the fight against desertification and its negative socioeconomic impacts in the Senegal River Valley. REDES is catalyzing efforts and initiatives on both sides of River Senegal, which is the border between Senegal and Mauritania, to regenerate the ecosystems and improve community life in the region. There are now 100 ecovillages in the area. Dr Pame ia joined by Dr. Marie Nazon, Academic Programs Coordinator for REDES International Service Learning Program and Katrina Jeffries, International relations coordinator. Dr. Dave Damm Luhr moderates the conversation.

Dr. Livio explains how developments in astronomy have altered our sense of human uniqueness. He describes the “Copernican Principle” that suggests that we humans are not especially unique. And scientific discoveries, including evolution, other planets and galaxies, have led to the expectation of other intelligent life in the universe –and indeed, even the notion of multiple universes. But scientists have also discovered that the conditions necessary for complex life may be rare. Here, we learn what we might expect.

A clear explanation of how conventional agriculture damages soil and reduces the nutritional value of crops. David Montgomery and Anne Biklé discuss how regenerative agriculture restores the soil, improves food nutrition, and ultimately health. What Your Food Ate is an essential resource for all those who care about the well-being of humans and environment.

Likely the last in her family line to qualify for tribal citizenship with the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, Leah Myers elegantly blends Native folklore, personal history, and the search for identity in this highly anticipated memoir, Thinning Blood.

Because of her tribe’s strict blood quantum laws, Leah Myers may be the last of her family to be formally recognized as a member of her tribe. For her, this realization carries with it a responsibility to preserve her heritage and her ancestors’ memory. Thinning Blood is Myers’s attempt to capture a record of her family’s history, presenting the stories of four generations of women. Beginning with her great-grandmother, the last full-blooded Native member in their lineage, she connects each woman with her totem to construct her family’s totem pole: protective Bear, defiant Salmon, compassionate Hummingbird, and perched on top, Raven. Myers weaves together tribal folktales, the history of the Native genocide, and Native mythology. With fresh perspectives and profound insight, she offers crisp and powerful vignettes of her own life between White and Native worlds. Thinning Blood is at once a bold reclamation of her female identity and a searingly honest meditation on heritage, family, and what it means to belong.

Leah Myers is in conversation with Kaitlin Curtice, also author, poet-storyteller and member of the Potawatomi nation.

This talk explores a key chapter in trans-Atlantic, U.S., and African American history. The title is from a quote from Malachi Postlethwayt, a British mercantilist theorist in 1745. The book on which this talk is based chronicles contributions made by millions of African peoples and their descendants to the vast “wealth of nations” that financed the economic and social progress of modern Western civilization called the “industrial revolution.” The same global process has been identified as one cause of the “underdevelopment” in Africa and other parts of the world. The phenomenal contribution resulted from the uncompensated labor of enslaved Black peoples across several centuries and on several continents. Prof. Bailey has coined the term “slave(ry) trade”™ to encompass an array of activities generally considered as separate developments. This includes the trade in Africans as commodities; commerce in slave-produced goods, especially sugar and cotton; trade among slave-based economies; production of manufactured goods from slave-produced raw materials; and related financial and commercial activities. The story is narrated in three “acts” focused the slave(ry) trade’s pivotal role in three key periods of global history. Act I is a chronicle of Europe’s journey—especially Portugal and Spain—out of its “Dark” Middle Ages beginning in the 9th century and into a new global system centered around the Atlantic Ocean. With a focus on Great Britain, Act II begins in a world of expanding commerce—the “Age of Reconnaissance” or “Age of Discovery” in the 1500s—the period of mercantilism and the “Triangular Trade” when the colonization of the Americas and other parts of the globe was completed. Great Britain emerges as the first global industrial power in the 18th century. Act III explores the American Revolution and focuses on the role of the slave(ry) trade and the global cotton kingdom in transforming colonial America into a world power as the independent United States, a process that continues with the Civil War in the 1860s.

The long practice of ignoring Indigenous history is changing, with a new generation of scholars insisting that any full American history address the struggle, survival, and resurgence of American Indian nations. Ned Blackhawk interweaves five centuries of Native and non‑Native histories, from Spanish colonial exploration to the rise of Native American self-determination in the late 20th-century. He argues that European colonization in the 1600s was never a predetermined success; Native nations helped shape England’s crisis of empire; the first shots of the American Revolution were prompted by Indian affairs in the interior; California’s Indians targeted by federally funded militias were among the first casualties of the Civil War; the Union victory forever recalibrated Native communities across the West; and 20th-century reservation activists refashioned American law and policy. Blackhawk’s retelling of US history acknowledges the enduring power, agency, and survival of Indigenous peoples, yielding a truer account of the United States and revealing anew the varied meanings of America.