Dear Friends,<\/p>\n
(Uh oh! Sounds like he is going to ask for money\u2014yes, but nicely.)<\/p>\n
First, I want to tell you what a privilege it is to work at the Josephy Center. Exhibits are fun\u2014and fun to be a part of. Seeing classes and students, from pre-schoolers to adults, trying paint or clay for the first time can make my day.<\/p>\n
And the opportunity to work with the books, papers, and people that are all part of the Josephy Library is just too good. It is humbling to listen to Nez Perce elders who remember their War and exile generationally, as if it were yesterday. It is exciting to hear an elder tell us that some of the kokanee in Wallowa Lake\u2014\u201cThe ones trying to get out at the base of the dam\u201d\u2014will find their way to the ocean if given a chance, that a sockeye salmon run, gone for 130 years, is possible again with fish passage at a rebuilt Wallowa Lake Dam. And it is thrilling to see sisters from California and Wisconsin meeting here to celebrate their grandmother\u2019s 1918 climb of Eagle Cap with the Portland based Mazamas.<\/p>\n
Research, I\u2019ve come to know, is not just the book writer or movie documentarian\u2019s province, but what we all do when we explore the past and the world around us. It\u2019s elementary kids reading books out of our \u201cNez Perce Teaching Box,\u201d and the people coming in now with faded photos to give us for the January-February \u201cWallowa Country, pre-World War II\u201d exhibit. It\u2019s Allen Pinkham figuring out how to build a Nez Perce dugout canoe.<\/p>\n
And sculptor Doug Hyde finding the right Nez Perce word for \u201cThe Return,\u201d the name he wants for the stone and bronze piece that will go in our front yard this spring. We actually got an answer to his question from Haruo Aoki, the 90 year-old linguist who has spent decades saving and cataloging the Nez Perce language. I can\u2019t make the marks on my computer to show you the Nez Perce word\u2014but I\u2019ll figure it out by the time the sculpture is installed this summer. (We have it in the Nez Perce Dictionary on our shelves.)<\/p>\n
That will be a great event, with drums and song and salmon to celebrate\u2014and you will be invited.<\/p>\n
The Library and I have been with the Josephy Center for Arts and Culture for seven years\u2014from the beginning. The board is concerned about the future: \u201cWhat are the Library succession plans?\u201d \u201cHow will it be funded?\u201d Current board chair Jeff Costello says the Library is \u201cin our DNA.\u201d But how does that carry into the future?<\/p>\n
Good questions. I just turned 76, and although I have no plans to quit this wonderful gig anytime soon, I have to admit that I won\u2019t go on forever. But I know more than ever that the Library and the Josephy Center will go on\u2014we\u2019ve become an important part of this Wallowa Community, and, in my mind, an important window between Indian and non-Indian, urban and rural, present and past. It will be a great job for the lucky man or woman\u2014maybe one of you out there with a passion for the past and its importance today\u2014who steps into it. For now, I want a few more good licks myself on the way to retirement. <\/p>\n
Help me do that! Your donation now will support the Library and help keep this wonderful organization and fine building lit and alive with art and learning, words, music, sculpture, pots, glazes, a printing press and blog posts about Coho salmon, seven drums, dugout canoes, and the work of my old mentor and our namesake, Alvin M. Josephy, Jr. <\/p>\n
Rich Wandschneider, still learning to be a librarian–and loving it!<\/p>\n
Dear Friends, (Uh oh! Sounds like he is going to ask for money\u2014yes, but nicely.) First, I want to tell you what a privilege it is to work at the Josephy Center. Exhibits are fun\u2014and fun to be a part of. Seeing classes and students, from pre-schoolers to adults, trying paint or clay for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247,203,281,201,204,359],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34125"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34125\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.josephy.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}