The Origins of Sin City Saddled with gleaming skyscrapers and picturesque fountains, the streets of Las Vegas suddenly emerge amongst red-rimmed mesas in the Mojave Desert. Sin City offers a shimmering respite from the desert that surrounds it, a consumerist paradise set along sandstone and tumbleweeds, but it wouldn’t exist if Hoover Dam was never […]
The American West Program Returns in 2021 On October 14th, the Public Lands History Center brought the American West Program back from a year-long hiatus. Featuring Northern Arapaho speaker Yufna Soldier Wolf, the hybrid event hosted attendees in person and online. Soldier Wolf’s daughter, Blue Soldier Wolf, opened the event by reading the CSU land […]
COVID-19 inspires PLHC’s ‘Public Landemic’ Project What is a Public Landemic? Efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19 have radically changed recreation and leisure landscape in Colorado. The pandemic caused ski resorts to close at the height of height of spring ski season. Climbing gyms and fitness centers closed their doors. Closures of businesses including […]
Colorado State University History faculty member, Dr. Douglas Sheflin, was selected to receive the 2019 Choice Outstanding Academic Title designation for his book, Legacies of Dust: Land Use and Labor in the Colorado Plains. The award recognizes the top academic titles of the year, as reviewed by Choice. Dr. Sheflin has also participated on an American […]
Last Week, PLHC Faculty Director Dr. Jared Orsi published an article in The Conversation discussing Quitobaquito, an oasis in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. As Dr. Orsi points out, the oasis’s past is rich with connection. Over the course of its long human history, the oasis attracted a variety of different land users, each of […]
The Office of the Vice President for Research recently launched a podcast, State of Research. The podcast showcases research initiatives at Colorado State University from a variety of disciplines. In the inaugural episode, host, Ty Betts, highlighted the Public Lands History Center’s ongoing research partnership with Colorado Parks and Wildlife. Now in its second year, […]
The following is written by Hailey Doucette, an intern at the PLHC during the fall ’19 semester. Learn more about our internship program. A day in the life of a cultural resources manager On October 2, 2019 I had the opportunity to shadow Rocky Mountain National Park’s Cultural Resource Program Manager, Kelly Dick, and a […]
We are very excited to share that the Henry Luce Foundation has awarded the PLHC a $225,000 grant for our “Telling Untold Stories” project. Through this project, the PLHC plans to identify two under-served communities that have a public lands story to tell, assist the communities in sharing their story, and give them a platform […]
Former program manager for the PLHC, Maren Bzdek, recently discussed the Apollo Mission Control Restoration with Colorado State’s SOURCE magazine. Maren Bzdek also discussed the project with the Colorado Springs Gazette in July. She is currently the senior historic preservation planner for the city of Fort Collins. Below is a time-lapse of the restoration.
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) has awarded a $350,000 grant to the Colorado Encyclopedia! We can’t wait to continue our partnership with the encyclopedia. This partnership provides Coloradoans with new stories about our beloved Centennial State. Read more about this initiative on CSU’s SOURCE. The NEH grant represents the next phase is a […]
