Baseball and trains have a shared history in the U.S. From the early days of baseball until the 1950s, baseball teams traveled by train and many teams were named for train lines. A collaborative presentation of the National Ballpark Museum and the Forney Museum of Transportation, “Where Baseball Hits the Tracks” treated about 30 visitors to some entertaining history about America’s pastime.
Hate crimes against Asians are on the rise. Again. But this time, there’s a difference from last year’s wave of hate: The “mainstream” media, from newspapers to television news, has been reporting on the spike.
“2020 was a rough year for a lot of people, with big events that had an impact on everybody,” says James Peterson, assistant curator for artifacts at the History Colorado Center museum.
The Capitol siege, followed by impeachment, and inauguration of a new president have provided social studies teachers and their students with plenty of history-in-the-making moments to observe, question, and assess.
There won’t be any little piggies or cute bunnies or a stick-horse rodeo this year. In fact, there won’t be a National Western Stock Show (NWSS) and Rodeo. For only the second time in the event’s 115-year history it has been cancelled, this time due to the corona virus pandemic.
Roger Kahn’s “How Crested Butte Became a Tourist Town: Drugs, Sex, Sports, Arts and Social Conflict,” Zoe Argento’s “Isolation Island: A Pandemic Story,” and Kathryn Haber’s “Fear Less, Love More.”
The Denver Art Museum’s “Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Mexican Modernism” exhibit, conveys some of the power of Kahlo’s personality. The exhibit is from the private collection of Jacques and Natasha Gelman. Twenty of Kahlo’s works complement 130 others that either center on her or add context and understanding to her life and times.
Harold Fields says of reparations: “We have pipes that are deep underneath these buildings and underneath our streets. The pipes are decaying, they’re old. They’re leaking, and they are only distributing resources to certain places. You’ve got to be able to dig up those pipes and re-do the system. It’s not a matter of changing the washers on faucets or putting in a new shower head, but changing the system.”
Burns, who will celebrate his 100th birthday on August 5th of this year, usually moves down the sidewalk with one of the many neighbors who affectionately refer to him as “Papa Ray.”
As we confront uncertainty, fear, and even death in the coronavirus pandemic, we know Coloradans experienced similar traumas in World Wars I and II. Then, the community came together to face a common enemy—but also fell prey to xenophobia and racism as they looked for someone to blame.
