Main Library

“The Idaho Traveler” with Alan Minskoff

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In 1976, Alan Minskoff embarked on a tour of Idaho to explore the future of the state’s small towns and record what was special about them in the voices of residents and unique characters and in his own intuitive perceptions about rooting one’s identity to place. Forty-plus years later, he returns to those towns to record in flashbacks and new impressions his love for the towns, the old buildings, the people, the food, and especially the best sources for pie. As a poet, journalist and teacher, he offers in The Idaho Traveler a colorful historical and culinary tour, revisiting the miles of contemplative two-lane blacktop that tie one town to the next. From Paris to Oakley to Idaho City to Wallace, this book is a traveling companion to our own impressions.

**Special program time is 4:00**

Books will be available for sale and signing courtesy of Iconoclast Books.

Alan Minskoff has spent his life in pursuit of journalism, historic preservation, the arts, urban issues, wine and wine making. He has taught Journalism at the College of Idaho since 2001, and in early 2019, he and his wife created the Alan and Royanne Minskoff Scholarship for Journalism students. He was the founding chair of The Cabin in Boise in 1996, and as a longtime board member of the Idaho Heritage Trust he co-chaired the Capital Campaign  to create the Idaho Shakespeare Festival amphitheater on the Boise River. His latest book is The Idaho Traveler. Other publications include: Idaho Wine Country, 2010 (Caxton), Point Blank, 2006 (Limberlost), Blue Ink Runs Out on a Partly Cloudy Day: Poems, 1994 (Limberlost), and A Future for the Small Town in Idaho, Anti-Anthology, 1976 (University of Idaho Press). His work has appeared in Edible Idaho, The Intermoutain Observer, Travel and Leisure, Boise Magazine and other publications.

Celebrating Apollo 11: Lessons from Space with Margrit von Braun

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NASA’s Apollo Mission and Earth’s Climate Crisis

On July 16, 1969, astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a journey to the Moon and into history. Four days later, while Collins orbited the Moon in the command module, Armstrong and Aldrin landed Apollo 11’s lunar module, Eagle, on the Moon’s Sea of Tranquility, becoming the first humans to set foot on the lunar surface.

Wernher von Braun, a German and later American aerospace engineer and space architect, joined NASA in 1960 and served as director of the newly formed Marshall Space Flight Center and as the chief architect of the Saturn V super heavy-lift launch vehicle that propelled the Apollo spacecraft to the Moon. Wernher’s daughter, Margrit von Braun, has spoken to audiences across the country this year in honor of the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, which her father was an instrumental figure in.

Join us for an evening with Margrit as she shares lessons from Apollo–why and how we got to the moon; lessons from Earth–how pollution and environmental health problems are connected to climate; and how we apply lessons learned from space and the Apollo mission to our current climate crisis.

Margrit von Braun is an environmental engineer, working in the areas of hazardous waste management and risk assessment. She holds degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Idaho, and Washington State University. After working for USEPA in Atlanta, Margrit moved to Idaho in 1977 to work for the Idaho DEQ. She joined the faculty at UI in 1980; she directed the Environmental Science and Environmental Engineering programs for 10 years and served as Dean of the College of Graduate Studies. Recently, Margrit and her husband Ian founded TerraGraphics International Foundation (TIFO), a non-governmental organization assisting communities in reducing their environmental exposures. Margrit was born in Huntsville, Alabama, and has fond memories of growing up in the town that took us to the Moon.

“Alta California” a Conversation with Nick Neely

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In his new book, Alta California: From San Diego to San Francisco, a Journey on Foot to Rediscover the Golden State, Nick Neely chronicles his 650-mile trek on foot from San Diego to San Francisco, following the route of the first overland Spanish expedition into what was soon called Alta California. Led by Gaspar de Portolá in 1769, the expedition sketched a route that would become, in part, the famous El Camino Real. It laid the foundation for the Golden State we know today, a place that remains as mythical and captivating as any in the world.

Neely grew up in California but realized how little he knew about its history. So he set off to learn it bodily, with just a backpack, trekking through stretches of California both lonely and urban. For twelve weeks, following the journal of expedition missionary Father Juan Crespí, Neely kept pace with the ghosts of the Portolá expedition―nearly 250 years later.

Weaving natural and human history, Alta California relives his adventure, tells the story of Native cultures and the Spanish missions that soon devastated them, and explores the evolution of California and its landscape. The result is a collage of past and present, of lyricism and pedestrian serendipity, and of the biggest issues facing California today―water, agriculture, oil and gas, immigration, and development―all of it one step at a time.

Join us for a conversation with Nick Neely and Scott Burton, a literary interviewer based in San Diego.

Books will be available for sale and signing, courtesy of Iconoclast Books.

This program was recorded, and can be viewed on our LIVESTREAM ARCHIVE.

 

Nick Neely holds an MA in literature and the environment from the University of Nevada, Reno, and MFAs in nonfiction and poetry from Hunter College and Columbia University. He is a recipient of PEN Northwest’s Boyden Wilderness Writing Residency, a UC Berkeley–11th Hour Food and Farming Journalism Fellowship, and an AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award. His first book, Coast Range, was a finalist for the John Burroughs Medal for natural history writing. Originally from San Francisco Bay Area, he now lives in Hailey, Idaho.

National Energy Transitions: What Have We Learned about Champions, Time & Industry?

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Energy transitions are now a common aim in policy and planning. Yet in the 1970s, the concept was barely in use. As today’s energy decision-makers weigh choices about strategic and unanticipated change, insights can be gained from early leaders in low carbon energy shifts. Building on new research and her book Low Carbon Energy Transitions: Turning Points in National Policy in Innovation, Dr. Kathleen Araújo outlines critical junctures that have shaped energy development in Denmark, Iceland, Brazil, and France over nearly five decades.     

Dr. Kathleen Araújo is Associate Professor of Energy Systems and Policy at Boise State University, and Director of the Energy Policy Institute, the policy arm for Center for Advanced Energy Studies, a consortium of public universities plus Idaho National Laboratory. 

Dr. Araújo’s work focuses on critical decision-making relating to safety, sustainability and security amidst regional development. This includes national cyber and drone policies in relation to nuclear plants, wildfire-grid risk, electric vehicles, and energy jobs. Her book Low Carbon Energy Transitions: Turning Points in National Policy and Innovation (Oxford University Press) provides an in-depth look at four country-level shifts that occurred since the global oil crisis of 1973. Dr. Araújo’s approach considers early vs. late adopters, science and technology policy, and industrial cluster or innovation system development. Dr. Araújo is also Book Series Editor for Routledge’s Studies in Energy Transitions. She earned her Ph.D. at MIT, and completed post-doctoral research at the Harvard Kennedy School in science-technology policy and international nuclear safety.  

**Note special start time of 5:00 pm**

Wolves, Sheep and Local Coexistence Solutions

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The Wood River Wolf Project: 12 years protecting both sheep and wolves in the Wood River Valley

Join us for an evening learning about a local project that has gained international interest through its pioneering nonlethal measures protecting domestic livestock and wild predators like wolves. Project leaders Larry Schoen, former Blaine County Commissioner, and Suzanne Stone, project co-founder, will explain why sheep losses to wolves in the local area are among the lowest in the state and how this benefits both local agriculture and our resident wolf packs.

The Wood River Wolf Project has just quietly completed its 12 year in the valley while serving as a model for livestock and wildlife conflict management across the west and around the world. Find out how you can become involved in this effort and why it matters to our ranching, ecological and tourism efforts.

“Legacy of War” with Ed Marohn

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In the novel Legacy of War ​a new patient triggers Psychologist John Moore’s traumatic memories of his last days of the Vietnam War. Moore is forced to return to modern-day Vietnam, a journey confronting his past war demons: the dying on the killing fields, a rogue CIA agent, corrupt South Vietnamese Army officers, the father he never knew, and the war’s perverted killing machine—the Phoenix Program. In the decaying jungles he fights his anguish compounded by his wife’s death and his growing attraction to a national police agent.

Come meet the author, Ed Marohn, for a reading and discussion around the novel, military veteran PTSD, and his experience facilitating a PTSD group for the United States Department of Veterans Affairs.

Books will be available for sale and signing courtesy of Chapter One Bookstore.

Ed Marohn served in the Vietnam War with the 25th Infantry Division and the 101st Airborne Division. He was later an Assistant Professor of Military History at the University of Nevada. Legacy of War is his first book.

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