Schedule

2021 Hoover Dam and the Shaping of the American West Schedule

Please note that this schedule is subject to changes.

SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE

Sunday June 27	Evening	Registration and Meet and Greet, Boulder City, Nevada
Monday June 28	Morning Afternoon	Michael Green – Keynote Lecture Sally Denton – Bechtel
Tuesday June 29	Morning Afternoon	Richard Guy Wilson – Architecture and Design of the dam Site visit to Hoover Dam
Wednesday June 30	Morning Afternoon	Anthony Arrigo: Visual History of Hoover Dam Jeffrey Hinton: Pedagogy Workshop I, Boulder City Hoover Dam Museum & Archives
Thursday July 1	Morning Afternoon	Site Visit to Springs Preserve/Nevada State Museum Andy Kirk: Environmental History
Friday July 2	Morning Afternoon	Donald C. Jackson: Dams of the New Deal Era, Postcard Culture Jeffrey Hinton: Pedagogy Workshop II with Doris Dwyer
Saturday July 3	Morning Afternoon	John Shields: Bureau of Reclamation Off, Optional trips and events suggested
Sunday July 4	All day	Day Off, Optional trips and events suggested
Monday July 5	All day	William Bauer: Native Americans, Hoover Dam, and the Colorado River
Tuesday July 6	All day	Karen Harry and Stephen Rowland: Archeology of Native lands Site Visit to Lake Mead, Lost City Museum, Valley of Fire
Wednesday July 7	Morning Afternoon	Paul Gilmore: California and Hoover Dam Deanna Beachley: Women and the New Deal/Great Depression
Thursday July 8	Morning Afternoon	Michelle Turk: Labor and Occupational Safety of Hoover Dam Jeffrey Hinton: Pedagogy Workshop III
Friday July 9	Morning Afternoon	Claytee White: African Americans, Oral History Workshop Final Presentations and Wrap-up

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EXTENDED SCHEDULE

Sunday, June 27 – Day 1: Introduction and Host Welcome

 Host event:

• Reception and meet and greet at Boulder Dam Hotel. Introduction to topic and overview of the week. Discuss the conceptions of the program. Keynote address.

Schedule:

5:00 pm	Registration/Introduction Registration at the Hoover Dam Hotel, Boulder City, Nevada.
6:00	Welcome Address Dr. Anthony Arrigo will provide an overview of the week, the intellectual rationale for the workshop, and the expectations of the participants.
6:00 – 7:30	Dinner/Meet and Greet Participants will be invited to a meet and greet at the Boulder Dam Brewing Co. across the street from the hotel to introduce themselves, discuss teaching and other interests.

Monday, June 28 – Day 2: Historical Context 

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Michael Green, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
• Sally Denton, Independent Scholar/Author

Required Readings:

• Green, Michael. Nevada: A History of the Silver State. University of Nevada Press, 2015.
• Denton, Sally. The Profiteers: Bechtel and the Men Who Built the World. Simon & Schuster, 2016. 19-44, 304-311.

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Hoover Dam and Las Vegas: An Overview Dr. Michael Green will provide an introduction to the dam’s construction and to the history of the surrounding area.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Lecture/Discussion Sally Denton will discuss the impact of Hoover Dam on Boulder City and on the world through the prism of Bechtel, one of the Six Companies that became a worldwide force.

Tuesday, June 29 – Day 3: Dam Construction, Hoover Dam Tour

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Richard Guy Wilson, University of Virginia
• Bureau of Reclamation personnel

Readings:

• Kaufmann, Gordon B. “The Architecture of Boulder Dam.” Architectural Concrete 2 (1936): 2–5.

• Wilson, Richard Guy. “Machine-Age Iconography in the American West: The Design of Hoover Dam.” The Pacific Historical Review 54 (1985): 463–493.

Schedule:

8:30 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Anthony F. Arrigo
8:45 – 11:15	Lecture/Discussion Dr. Richard Guy Wilson will lead a workshop on the design, engineering, and architectural features of the dam.
11:15 – 12:15	Lunch
12:15 – 12:45 pm	Travel to Hoover Dam
12:45 – 4:00	Hoover Dam guided tours, explore site on your own Guided tour by the Bureau of Reclamation accompanied by Professors Arrigo, Green, and Wilson.
4:00- 4:30	Travel back to Boulder City

Wednesday, June 30 – Day 4: Visual History of Hoover Dam, Pedagogy Workshop I

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Anthony F. Arrigo, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth

Readings:

• Arrigo, Anthony F. Imaging Hoover Dam: The Making of a Cultural Icon. University of Nevada Press, 2014.

 Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Lecture/Discussion Dr. Anthony Arrigo will discuss the role of images in the drive to build the dam and their use in persuading a skeptical public.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Pedagogy Workshop I: Boulder City Archives Mr. Jeff Hinton will run a pedagogy workshop. Participants will visit the local archives of the Boulder City Museum and Historical Association.

Thursday, July 1 – Day 5: Springs Preserve, State Museum, Environmental History

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Andy Kirk, UNLV

Readings:

• Worster, Donald. “Hoover Dam: A Study in Domination.” in Worster, Donald. Under Western Skies: Nature and History in the American West. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. 64-78.

 Schedule:

8:00 am	Travel to Springs Preserve
9:15 – 12:00	Springs Preserve Dr. Andy Kirk will lead a tour of the Spring Preserve, explaining water and the local environment.
12:00 – 1:30	Lunch
1:30 – 2:30	Nevada State Museum Las Vegas Participants also will tour the museum
2:30 – 4:00 pm	Lecture/Discussion Dr. Andy Kirk will discuss how to do environmental history in the classroom.
4:15 – 5:00	Return to Boulder City

Friday, July 2 – Day 6: Dams of the New Deal Era, Pedagogy Workshop II

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Donald C. Jackson, Lafayette College
• Jeffrey Hinton, Teaching Mentor, and Dr. Doris Dwyer, UNLV

Readings:

• Jackson, Donald C. Pastoral and Monumental: Dams, Postcards, and the American Landscape, University of Pittsburgh Press, (2013). Ch. 1. p. 1-37

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Anthony F. Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Lecture/Discussion Dr. Donald C. Jackson will discuss the St. Francis Dam disaster and its influence of dam design, as well as postcard culture and dams
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Pedagogy Workshop II: Doris Dwyer and Chautauqua Mr. Jeff Hinton will run a pedagogy workshop along with Dr. Doris Dwyer and discuss using Chautauqua in the classroom.

Saturday July 3 – Day 7: The Bureau of Reclamation

Scholars/Lecturers:

• John Shields, engineer, Bureau of Reclamation

Readings:

• Shields, John W. “Elwood Mead’s Establishment of the Constitutional Foundations of Wyoming’s Water Law.” Annals of Wyoming 85 (2013), 22-42. 

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:30	Lecture/Discussion Mr. John Shields, an engineer with the Bureau, will present an overview of the role of the Bureau or Reclamation in building Hoover Dam.
11:30	Free the rest of the day. Optional events for participants, include visiting Las Vegas to tour The Mob Museum, the Neon Museum, the Clark County Museum, and/or the Atomic Testing Museum; working in the Boulder City or Nevada State Museum archives; visiting the UNLV library; or exploring Boulder City.

Sunday, July 4 – Day 8: Off

Nothing scheduled for Sunday

Monday, July 5 – Day 9: Native Americans

Scholars/Lecturers:

• William Bauer, University of Nevada, Las Vegas 

Readings:

• Bauer, William. We Were All Like Migrant Workers Here: Work, Community, and Memory on California’s Round Valley Reservation, 1850-1941. University of North Carolina Press (2009). Ch 8. Labor Economy and Community in the Great Depression

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Lecture/Discussion Dr. William Bauer will discuss the history of Native peoples in Nevada, the impact of the dam on Native Americans, Native contributions to building the dam, as well as the Native communities displaced by Lake Mead.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:00	Lecture/Discussion Dr. William Bauer will continue his lecture/discussion.

Tuesday, July 6 – Day 10: Native Culture, Lake Mead, Valley of Fire

 Scholars/Lecturers:

• Karen Harry, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
• Stephen Rowland, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

 Readings:

• “Archeologists Racing to Unearth Indian City That Dam Will Flood.” Los Angeles Times 8 Sept. 1937.

Schedule:

7:00 am	Travel to Lake Mead National Recreation Area and Valley of Fire State Park
8:30 – 3:45	Lake Mead, Valley of Fire Professors Karen Harry and Stephen Rowland will lead participants to Lake Mead (the man-made lake created by Hoover Dam) and Valley of Fire for a discussion of the environmental history of the Colorado River, topography of Black Canyon and surrounding areas, and important anthropological and archeological aspects of the area.
3:45 – 5:15	Travel back to Boulder City

Wednesday, July 7 – Day 11: California, Women in the Great Depression

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Paul Gilmore, Fresno City College
• DeAnna Beachley, College of Southern Nevada

Readings:

• Worster, Donald. “Hydraulic Society in California” in Worster, Donald. Under Western Skies: Nature and History in the American West. New York: Oxford University Press,1992. 53-63.
• Carmody, D.L. “A Visit to the Hoover Dam Site.” New Reclamation Era 22 (1931): 172–174
• Carmody, D.L. “What the Reclamation Women Do in Las Vegas.” New Reclamation Era 22 (1931): 202–203.
• Bethune, Mary McLeod. A Century of Progress of Negro Women. 1932.
• Shallcross, Ruth. Shall Married Women Work?
• Le Sueur, Meridel. The Despair of Unemployed Women. 1932.
• Mitchell, Louise. Slave Markets in New York City. 1940.

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Lecture/Discussion Paul Gilmore will discuss the role of a booming California in getting Hoover Dam built.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Lecture/Discussion Dr. DeAnna Beachley will discuss working women in the Great Depression, women and the New Deal, the role of women in Nevada history and at Hoover Dam.

 Thursday, July 8 – Day 12: Labor, Pedagogy Workshop III

 Scholars/Lecturers:

• Michelle Turk, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
• Jeffrey Hinton, Teaching Mentor

 Readings:

• Turk, Michelle F. “Dead Roses and Blooming Deserts: The Medical History of a New Deal Icon.” The Nevada Historical Society Quarterly3 (2007): 239–264.
• Turk, Michelle F. “Work on the River: Employment at the Hoover Dam.” Journal of the West 2 (2013): 66–76.

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15-11:45	Lecture/Discussion Dr. Michelle Turk will discuss the role of labor in building the dam, and what it was like to work at the dam.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Pedagogy Workshop III Jeffrey Hinton will lead a final pedagogy workshop to help participants finalize their lesson plans and prepare for their presentations on Friday.

Friday, July 9 – Day 13: African Americans, Oral History, Wrap up Presentations

Scholars/Lecturers:

• Claytee White, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Readings:

• Fitzgerald, Roosevelt. “Blacks and the Boulder Dam Project.” Nevada Historical Society Quarterly 24 (1981): 255–261.
• Fitzgerald, Roosevelt. “The Evolution of a Black Community in Las Vegas, 1905-1940.” Nevada Public Affairs Review 2 (1987): 23–28.
• Sears, James M. “Black Americans and the New Deal.” The History Teacher 10 (1976): 89–105.

Schedule:

9:00 am	Introduction of the theme/overview of the day Dr. Anthony Arrigo
9:15 – 11:45	Lecture/Discussion Ms. Claytee White will discuss the history of African Americans in Nevada, and conduct a workshop on doing oral histories.
11:45 – 1:15	Lunch
1:15 – 3:45	Final Presentations Participants will present their lesson plans and reflect on their time at the institute.

 

 

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