Midwest Open-Air Museums Coordinating Council and

Mountain-Plains ALHFAM

  “Are We There Yet?  Traveling the trails of yesterday and today”

Olathe, Kansas      Spring 2010 -  March 4, 5, 6

Another “in your face, material culture guzzling, cool stuff aplenty conference” from

the makers of “Galena 2002”.

CALL

FOR

SESSIONS:

Interpretation, Marketing, Technology, Collections, Finance – we follow many paths in our work. The people we interpret had their own trails to travel. Join us on the Santa Fe, California, and Oregon Trails as we discover the material culture and processes of travel and transportation in the past, and explore some of the new trails we must travel today.

Areas of Interest

Topics of interest for the conference could include:

•  Oxen, Horses, and those Beasts of Burden
• Private Foundation grant writing
• New approaches and latest technology of electronic media
• Wagons and Wagon Making for the western trails
• Steamboats and river travel
• Steam train technology and travel by rail
• The material culture of travel
• Historic firearms of farm and trail
• Santa Fe Trail – two-way highway of cultural exchange
• Overview of the days of Bleeding Kansas and its role in national history
• Interpreting Travel – panel of sites with inns, hotels, stagecoach stops
• Facing Finances – panel of speakers on current challenges and creative funding and marketing ideas
• New Angles on Old Stories – research for interpretation
• Food for the Road:  Living History – it’s not just for breakfast anymore

Host Site: Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop and Farm Historic Site is owned by the City of Olathe, Kansas and administered through its Parks and Recreation Department.  The farm was established in 1858 on the Westport Route of the Santa Fe Trail.  The stone farmhouse built in 1865 is the only intact stagecoach stop left on the Santa Fe Trail preserved as a public museum/historic site.  Mahaffie Historic Site is a certified component of today’s Santa Fe National Historic Trail by the National Park Service.

Papers/Session Proposals should be submitted to Charles Pautler at  charles.pautler@mnhs.org  no later than November 1, 2009.