Community Education

Creativity and the Arts

July 8    Tell your Story with Phone Photography

Tom Alexander

Exposure, focus, cropping and composition. Flash? Email or Text? Learn how to enhance your storytelling with phone photography.

July 15  Reflections on Collaboration in Art and in Life

Billy and Colleen Smith

The presenters will discuss their collaborative process in art making as a reflection of their lives together.  Photographs and short clips of work they have produced will be included. 

July 22   Ekphrasis: Using Art to Inspire Your Writing

Sacha Siskonene

In this writing workshop students will learn the history of Ekphrastic Writing (writing about visual art or material culture). We will discuss how to use photographs or objects from your life to share your family history, pen a personal essay, or inspire your fiction and poetry. Please bring a photograph or small object that is meaningful to you to class. We will do an in-class writing exercise using these artifacts.

July 29  The Art of Oral Traditions and Story Telling

Larry Hendricks

We are all storytellers. Storytelling is the way we humans understand the world and arrive at deeper meanings about ourselves and our lives. Local writer Larry Hendricks shares some of the tricks of the trade he’s learned over the years.

Myths and Facts of Our Night Sky

July 8  How Far: Myths and Distance Determination

Dr. Nat White

How are distances to astronomical objects measured?  How far is it to the moon and other destinations?  What are some of the myths that have been shared through stories and folklore and what are the facts?  Retired Lowell Observatory Astronomer and Coconino Community College District Governing Board member, Dr. Nat White, shares the first of our Myths and Facts of our Night Skies series.

July 15  The Planets

Dr. Gerard van Belle

Astronomer at Lowell Observatory, Dr. Gerard van Belle, shares what we do know (facts), or what we think we know (myths) about planets, including how Pluto came to be a planet, as well the “process” which changed Pluto’s planet status in 2006.  Did you know the Dr. van Belle participated in the actual vote on Pluto’s planet status?

July 22  How Long Ago?

Bryan Bates

Bryan Bates, Professor Emeritus from Coconino Community College, will share his research into the development of science and astronomy amongst the ancestral Puebloan cultures. He will address his research on the astronomical knowledge recovered from the Chacoan , Wupatki, Chimney Rock and Mesa Verde cultures.  The event will provide time for discussion as to the role of science in ancestral and modern cultures.

July 29  The Moon – Myths and Facts

Kevin Schindler

Lowell Observatory Historian, Kevin Schindler, shares his passion surrounding Flagstaff, Lowell Observatory and the Moon.  You put these three items together and you have a rich perspective of Flagstaff’s love of all things Lunar, including the Flagstaff’s own Lunar Legacy which celebrates the 50^th anniversary of the Lunar Landing in July.

Northern Arizona History

July 10  Cracking a Cold, Cold Case:  The 1887 Murder of Little Johnny Elden, Jr

John Westerlund                                  

Elden is by far the most frequently used pioneer name in Flagstaff today. John Elden and his new bride settled at the base of the mountain five miles east of Flagstaff in 1877. Today, Elden Mountain is a prominent sight to all visitors and those passing along Interstate Highway 40.

Program description:

The best-known and perhaps most-visited gravesite in northern Arizona belongs to little Johnny Elden, Jr. His murder in 1887 remains one of the most infamous in Arizona Territorial history. Today, Johnny rests alone in a rock-covered forest grave at the base of the Flagstaff mountain named for his father and family. Johnny was just six years old when he was shot and killed by itinerant mule skinner Bob Roberts in a dispute over water. The murder has haunted Flagstaff for well over a century and is mentioned in books and newspapers. The ghastly crime weighs heavily on gravesite visitors at the base of Elden Mountain where they often leave small toys and plastic flowers next to the gas-pipe cross that rests in concrete on top of the grave of stones. Yet, there are questions. This presentation will look at what attracted the first settlers to the San Francisco Peaks area, the story of Flagstaff pioneer and Civil War veteran John Elden, the violence and prosperity that rolled in with the Atlantic & Pacific Railroad in 1882, the horrible shooting of Elden’s young son Johnny, and the contribution of myth to history.

The article was published in The Journal of Arizona History Autumn 2017 issue and is available for sale from the author. $5

July 17  Arizona's War Town: Flagstaff Navajo Ordnance Depot, and World War II

John Westerlund                 

Just weeks after Pearl Harbor, the War Department announced the construction of a massive ammunition depot ten miles west of Flagstaff, just south of U.S. Highway 66 at Bellemont. Flagstaff’s population exploded from five to twenty thousand. The U. S. Army rushed the $17 million project to completion in a spasm of boomtown upheaval.

Program description:

One thousand Navajo and Hopi construction workers stayed on to run the struggling new depot, the key storage facility for the Port of Los Angeles. Meanwhile, the U. S. Navy halted plummeting enrollment at the teacher’s college (today Northern Arizona University) by shipping in one thousand sailors and marines as part of its "V-12" program designed to produce officers for the largest navy in world history. Then, the Florence prisoner of war camp sent 250 POWs to Flagstaff. These men, happy to be out of the war, were Austrian "signers" and agreed to be model prisoners. The Flagstaff story shows the remarkable co-existence of sometimes contentious ethnic communities, and illustrates the results of military expansion on social, economic, and community development in Arizona. Often humorous and at times almost unbelievable, the experience was also breathtaking, reaching the heart and soul of the community. The town became an "arsenal of democracy," where hard work and discipline were required and expected from all.

 Arizona’s War Town: Flagstaff, Navajo Ordnance Depot, and World War II (University of Arizona Press, 2003) won several awards for preservation of Southwest history and culture. It is available for sale from the author. $25.

July 24 History of Route 66 in Arizona

Sean Evans

Learn about the history of the nation’s famed “mother road” in Arizona, it’s impact on Arizona’s northern cities and towns. The class will cover from the predecessor roads, through establishment, key realignment phases, decommissioning, and up through to today.

July 31 Rails to Both Rims

Al Richmond

Rails to Both Rims will be a journey back in time to the south and north rims of the Grand Canyon through photographs, postcards and advertising by the Santa Fe and Union Pacific railroads.  Also, I’ll add a short update on the Arizona Railroad Heritage Park/Arizona State Railroad Museum project in Williams.

Civics and Our Constitution

Harriet Young

July 10 Reading the Constitution.  What does it actually say? 

July 17  Interpreting the Constitution

What the Constitution says vs. what we say it says.  What are the primary interpretations and who is promoting those interpretations?

July 24  Law and the Constitution

Who decided what the Constitution says?  Who writes laws, who carries out the laws, who judges how law is applied?

July 31 Changes to the Constitution

Who creates changes in the law?  What is the role of elections, interest groups?

Native American Art & Culture

July 11 Tribal Perspectives on the Creation of Native American Art 

Robert Breunig, Former Museum of Northern Arizona Director

Overview of Native American Art and its meaning for the cultures of our region.

July 18  Art Journey of a Hopi Artist

Duane Koyawena, Hopi Artist

A Hopi artists’ journey in finding his identity as a Hopi artist and man in sobriety.

July 25  Pueblo Textile through a Zuni Perspective

Kandis Quam and Eloy Natachu

Kandis and Eloy will present as a team and will bring Zuni textiles as illustrations.

August 1  Native Americans in Literature, Art & Popular Culture

Samantha Burton, Museum of Northern Arizona

Exploration and critical thought about the representation of Native Americans in the Arts.

Petroglyphs, Pictographs, & People

Learn about the Cultures who inhabited Northern Arizona over time, how they created images on rocks, why they may have done this, and compare the local imagery with samples from around the world.

July 11  Introduction to Rock Art

Peter Pilles, Coconino Forest Archaeologist

Students will learn about techniques used to create rock art images with examples from the local region.

July 18 Pictographs and Petroglyphs Along the Rio de Flag

Evelyn Billo, Rupestrian CyberServices

Some of the history and imagery of Veit Spring pictograph site, Picture Canyon Natural and Cultural Preserve petroglyph sites, and the ties they have with the Museum of Northern Arizona.

July 25 Picture Canyon Field Trip, Rio de Flag site

Field trip to Flagstaff Area Rock Art and Archaeology

Robert Mark, Rupestrian CyberServices

One of the Rio de Flag sites discussed in class 2 will be visited.  Class will meet at the Rio de Flag site parking lot and may extend past the 3:00 p.m. end time.

If inclement weather, then the class 4 will be taught at CCC Fourth Street and the field trip rescheduled for the Thursday, August 1.

August 1   A World Sampler of Rock Art

Evelyn Billo & Robert Mark

A World sampler of rock art and some comparisons with the Colorado Plateau.  Should the weather not cooperate this day either, then another presentation about rock art site documentation will be given using Canyon de Chelly National Monument as the example.