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Contact: Dave Carney, 520-723-3172 x118
COOLIDGE, AZ – Beginning November 2, 2022 through January 18, 2023, Casa Grande Ruins will host its annual speaker series. The speaker series will kick off on November 2 at 1:00 pm featuring Leland Thomas who will present a lecture titled "O’odham Relation to Casa Grande Ruins". The speaker series will continue every Wednesday at 1:00 pm through January 18.
Leland Thomas, Tohono O’odham/Akimel O’odham, is member of the Tohono O’odham Nation. He is an Assistant Curator/Exhibits Project Manager at the Huhugam Heritage Center on the Gila River Indian Community. Leland has worked in collections management, cultural education, exhibition design and development, and museum interpreter. For many years he has been continuously working in the field of cultural preservation within museum programs. His previous experience includes working at the Casa Grande Museum as a Cultural Exhibit Consultant, Amerind Foundation as a Collections Management Assistant, G.R.I.C. Cultural Resources Management Program as Laboratory Aide and the Casa Grande Ruins National Monument as an Interpretive Ranger.
Leland will be sharing the cultural perspective of the Casa Grande Ruins.
The Speaker Series is funded by the Friends of Casa Grande Ruins National Monument (http://friendsofcasagranderuins.org/) with additional support from Arizona Humanities (https://azhumanities.org/). The program begins at 1:00 pm in the Casa Grande Ruins visitor center theater at 1100 W Ruins Drive, Coolidge AZ, 85128. There is no fee for the program, and entrance is free at Casa Grande Ruins National Monument.
Casa Grande Ruins National Monument protects the multi-story Great House (Casa Grande) and the remnants of other ancient structures built by the Ancestral Sonoran Desert People over 800 years ago. Established as the nation’s first federal cultural and prehistoric reserve in 1892, the ruins sparked the beginning of the archeological preservation movement in America. The monument is open daily from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm except for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Independence Day holidays. Directions and additional information are available on the monument’s website, http://www.nps.gov/cagr. You may call (520) 723-3172, or follow us on Facebook by searching for Casa Grande Ruins National Monument.
Last updated: October 23, 2022