BBHC offers field trip for Fern-filled Fauna of the Bighorn Basin

Fossilized vegetation of the Bighorn Basin

From the Buffalo Bill Historical Center:

Dr. Scott Wing describes his job like this, “As a research scientist and curator at the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History the three major parts of my job are research, collections, and outreach.”

All three come together on July 9, 2011, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. with a plant fossil field trip to the Big Cedar Ridge in the southeastern Bighorn Basin. The Buffalo Bill Historical Center co-sponsors the outing—dubbed Fern-filled Fauna of the Bighorn Basin—with the Wyoming Native Plant Society, Washakie Museum, and the University of Wyoming Berry Biodiversity Conservation Center. There is no charge for the trip; however, pre-registration is required by contacting Emily Buckles at emilyb@bbhc.org or 307.578.4110.

Washakie Museum in Worland receives $10,000 grant from National Endowment for the Arts

Washakie Museum and Cultural Center. Photo by David Huber

The Washakie Museum and Cultural Center in Worland is the recipient of a $10,000 Access to Artistic Excellence grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.

According to a May 17 NEA press release, the grant will “support a series of visual and performing arts presentations. Project activities will include traveling exhibitions of Norman Rockwell's Saturday Evening Post covers; American Legacy: Our National Parks, On Location with the Plein-Air Painters of America; Montana Repertory Theatre's performance of Doubt; and a music performance by mezzo-soprano Lindsay Craft with the Museum Singers Choir.”

FMI: www.washakiemuseum.org

BBHC begins spring schedule March 1

From the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody:

As spring approaches, the Buffalo Bill Historical Center expands its public hours to 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week beginning March 1. The schedule remains in effect through the end of April, with May 1 bringing further expanded hours of 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. for the summer.

As the Historical Center moves toward the busier spring and summer seasons, its calendar expands with special events, programs, and additional special exhibitions openings. Upcoming highlights include the following:

Buffalo Bill’s Birthday Celebration, Friday, February 25, 5 – 8 p.m.
Family Fun Friday, March 11: Family Ties.
Historic Homes of Cody Tour, March 26, advance registration required.
Special exhibition opening: Yellowstone to Yukon: Freedom to Roam, April 15.
Spring Fling Sage Grouse Field Expedition, April 16, advance registration required.
Special exhibition opening: Arapaho Journeys: Photographs and Stories from the Wind River Reservation, April 29.

For more information on events, programs, and exhibitions, explore the Historical Center’s Web site at www.bbhc.org.

Committed to connecting people with the Spirit of the American West, the Buffalo Bill Historical Center weaves the varied threads of the western experience—history and myth, art and Native culture, firearms technology and Yellowstone natural history—into the rich panorama that is the American West. The Center, an Affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution, is now operating its winter schedule, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. Thursday through Sunday, daily beginning March 1.

Caleco Foundry celebrates solstice with bronze pour

Employees at the Caleco Foundry in Cody prepare for a public winter solstice bronze pour on Dec. 21. Read the Billings Gazette article by Martin Kidston at http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/wyoming/article_caa7ecd4-8720-5864-b6fc-4c26e0dfcf4c.html. Photo by Martin Kidston.

Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale a big success

The 29th annual Buffalo Bill Art Show and Sale was held over the weekend.

Cody sculptor Peter Fillerup won the Quick Draw People's Choice Award for his sculpture of Buffalo Bill as a Pony Express rider.

Read today's Cody Enterprise story about the event at http://www.codyenterprise.com/news/local/article_2c89e122-ca81-11df-a9cc-001cc4c002e0.html

NEH Chairman Jim Leach speaks about "Civility in a Fractured Society" at BBHC on Sept. 18

Press release from the Wyoming Humanities Council:

On September 18, the public is invited to participate in events honoring Jim Leach, chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, who will visit Wyoming as part of his fifty-state civility tour. Wyoming welcomes Leach to Heart Mountain Relocation Center at 10:30 a.m. for a public ceremony and tour, followed by a 1:00 p.m. conversation with students and faculty at Northwest College, Powell. Culminating the visit will be a 7:30 p.m. public address by Leach on "Civility in a Fractured Society" at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody.

Leach introduced his fifty-state tour in November 2009 to call attention to the need for civility in public discourse. "Civilization requires civility," says Leach. "Words matter. Polarizing attitudes can jeopardize social cohesion."

Leach began his four-year term as NEH chairman in August 2009 after serving 30 years in the U.S. House of Representatives. As a congressman representing southeastern Iowa, he chaired the Banking and Financial Services Committee, the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs and the Congressional-Executive Commission on China. He founded and co-chaired the Congressional Humanities Caucus. Cosponsors for the events are the Buffalo Bill Historical Center; the Heart Mountain, Wyoming Foundation; and the Wyoming Humanities Council.

Leach's visit will also launch the Wyoming Humanities Council's year-long civility initiative, which will include an innovative lecture and discussion series, a visiting scholar, and grants for civility-themed projects.

Call for entries: "Public Lands, Personal Visions"

Call for entries from Northwest College in Powell:

Northwest College, in collaboration with the Greater Yellowstone Coalition and the Wyoming Outdoor Council, seeks artwork that communicates personal perspectives of, interactions with, and experiences within the public lands of the Bighorn Basin.

The intent of "Public Lands, Personal Visions" is to create a dialogue about public lands in the Bighorn Basin and communicate how these lands are used and their significance to the lives of those who live, work, play in, and otherwise value this area. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is currently revising its 20-year management plan for all public lands in the Bighorn Basin and it is our hope that a visual dialogue will inspire more public input into this planning process.

"Public Lands, Personal Visions" is a professional-level juried art show that will be exhibited at the Northwest Gallery October 13-November 19, 2010. The Northwest Gallery is located in the Cabre Building at Northwest College in Powell.

Calendar:
Entry Deadline: Sept. 7, 2010, 6:00 pm MST
Notification of Acceptance: Sept. 13, 2010, by email
Accepted Works Delivered: by Oct. 7, 2010, 4:00 pm MST
Opening Reception: Oct. 13, 2010, 7:30 pm
Exhibition Duration: Oct. 13-Nov. 19, 2010

FMI: Elaine DeBuhr, NWC Art Dept., 307.754.6128, elaine.debuhr@northwestcollege.edu

Grand opening set for Washakie Museum

WASHAKIE MUSEUM AND CULTURAL CENTER GRAND OPENING

2200 Big Horn Avenue, Worland, Wyoming

Opening Gala will be held on Friday, May 14, 7 p.m.-midnight. Tickets are now on sale.

Grand Opening Event will be held on Saturday, May 15, 1-5 p.m. OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. No Admission Cost.

The Friday evening Opening Gala will be a celebration of the newest addition to the Big Horn Basin. Plan to attend this elegant event and celebrate the culmination of Newell B. Sargent’s dream. Events will include the dedication of bronze plaques for Legacy and Pioneer Society members, a performance of American Masterpieces by the Museum Singers, David Shaul--harpist, and dancing to the String Jumpers. Champagne and hors d' oeuvres and no-host bar. Semi-formal attire. $50 per person.

The Grand Opening Event on Saturday will be an open house for all to view the Permanent Exhibit Galleries and Tempory Exhibit. There will be a ribbon cutting ceremony, performance of American Masterpieces by the Museum Singers, and harpist David Shaul will perform.

Paul Taylor performs in Basin Jan. 8

The Basin City Arts Center, 121 S. Fourth St. in Basin, presents Paul “Walkingstick” Taylor in concert featuring “Matilda and the Dream Time” at 7 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 8.

Paul is a Wyoming Arts Council roster artist. He is an Australian storyteller, didjeridoo player and educator who shares the culture of his homeland.

Tickets available at the door are $10 for adults, $7 for seniors 60 and over, $5 for kids 12 and under, and $35 for an immediate family.

For more information, call Wendy at 307-568-2915.

Bio for Aaron A. Abeyta, judge for Blanchan/Doubleday writing awards

The 2010 Blanchan/Doubleday Judge is Aaron A. Abeyta. Here's some bio info:

Aaron A. Abeyta is a Colorado native and professor of English at Adams State College. His first poetry collection, Colcha, received both an American Book Award and the Colorado Book Award. His second poetry collection was As Orion Falls, published by Ghost Road Press. It received a number of favorable reviews, including one from Juan Felipe Herrera, author of Cinnamon Girl: Letters Found Inside a Cereal Box:

“There is no other voice that conjures the sky and keeps count of stars as human migrations, moving, fading, and bursting anew as Aaron Abeyta’s. Here he is standing naked and alone on the abandoned snow drifts and tierras, holding them as fallen angels and stellar evidence of our birthright -- the luminous lands we claimed we would honor thirty-five years ago. Abeyta speaks with the voices of Nazim Hikmet, Jim Sagel, Allison Hedge-Coke and Albert Hunter, all lovers of the small earth and its colossal heart."

In 2007, Aaron published his first novel, Rise, Do Not Be Afraid, also published by Ghost Road Press in Denver. Annie Dawid wrote a review in of High Country News:

“Entering Colorado poet Aaron Abeyta’s first novel, Rise, Do Not Be Afraid, is like visiting a world that no longer exists -- if it ever did. Santa Rita, the mythical Western town that forms the subject of this short, dense novel, is a place reminiscent of Eden, both before and after the Fall. One is reminded of Gabriel García Márquez’s fictional Colombian town, Macondo, as Abeyta creates a culture in a specific place and witnesses its dissolution -- from greed, abandonment, the withering of love. Like García Márquez in One Hundred Years of Solitude, Abeyta begins with an annotated cast of characters, for it’s easy to confuse the people in this novel. Abeyta moves through time and generations as if through memory: ‘That was 1926,’ when the fences were built, we are told in the same paragraph in which we have traveled even further back to the arrival of the treacherous Matthews family in 1878. ‘Santa Rita sat in a long and deep canyon cut by an ancient river of ice, now melted to a river that flowed east toward the Rio Grande. There was no TV reception in Santa Rita. Most news traveled like it always had, by word of mouth.’ ”

Aaron is the recipient of a Colorado Council on the Arts fellowship for poetry. He earned an M.F.A. in creative writing from Colorado State University. He lives in southern Colorado where, as he says in his bio, he can remain close to his family and culture, both of which greatly influence his work. Abeyta was born in 1971.

Wyoming Big Horn Basin Nature & Discovery Center

Sue Blakey from the Dancing Bear Folk Art Center in Wyoming sent this update on the Wyoming Big Horn Basin Nature and Discovery Center:

House Bill 239 asked for $15 million to help build the first phase of the facility in Hot Springs State Park. The bill is sponsored by Rep. Lorraine Quarberg (Thermopolis), Rep. Debbie Hammons (Worland); Senators Hank Coe, Gerald Geis & Ray Peterson.

On Jan. 30, Thermopolis and Worland residents appeared before the House Committee on Minerals, Business & Economic Development. Speaking in behalf of the bill was Milward Simpson, director, Wyoming State Parks & Cultural Resources; Diane Shober, director, Wyoming Travel & Tourism; Sara Needles, director, cultural resources, Wyoming State Parks & Cultural Resources. Also speaking were Frank Manning, Hot Springs County Commissioner; Toni Casciato, Thermopolis Town Council; and Sue Blakey, Hot Springs Greater Learning Foundation.

The Committee passed the bill 8 to 1 in favor and left the funding intact. On Tuesday, Feb. 3, the bill was read in the House Appropriations Committee. It passed 7 to 1 but the funding was cut to $100,000. Unfortunately in re-wording it, the bill ended up stating that $1 million must be raised before the state provides $100,000. This did not seem to be the intent of the committee, however; and Rep. Quarberg has assured us that she will ask for amendment.

From here, the bill goes to the House floor, and if approved, moves on to the Senate, where it goes through the same process.

Our thanks to all those who have made the drive to Cheyenne to attend. From Thermopolis: Kevin Skates, Hot Springs State Park superintendent; Dr. Guy & Beth Drake; Jacque Michel, CPA; Kyle Gillette, Schutz-Foss Architects (Gillette); Jackie Manning; Bev & Dave Koerwitz. From Worland: Eric Decker, Big Horn Basin Resource Conservation & Development Council; Mark and April Whitlock, also representing the Council.

You can follow the bill’s progress on http://legisweb.state.wy.us/