Recently in Announcements Category

1960 cover The Hellbox Tucson Press Club

Thanks again to the Internet and the Web, we received ten of the Tucson Press Club's (TPC) annual The Hellbox. Hopefully, we'll be able to determine if there are any rights and permissions to pursue before creating a new website about the TPC and, in particular, these annuals.

The Hellbox issues were sent by Tyler St.Mark in California who wrote that his "parents, Marklan & Beverly Manning, were active members of the TPC during the 50's and early 60's and even appeared in some of the annual Gridiron Shows. My siblings and I grew up knowing many of the club's prominent members including "Uncle Jess" (Riggles)."

TPC ended in 1991, as far as I can tell. The Hellbox and its annual Gridiron show are unique to Tucson's 20th century history. We hope to bring it to the Web for students and community members to appreciate.

The third of Pima Community College's Discovering Southern Arizona community events is Friday, March 28th, 6:00 p.m. at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center. The topic is "Journeys Through Barrio Anita" and will feature the history and stories of Tucson's historic Barrio Anita. The event, of course, is free. For more information call 206-4500.

Tucson Chinese Cultural Center, 1288 West River Road. map.

The 82nd annual La Fiesta de los Vaqueros, February 16-24. Get in the spirit by viewing some of our rodeo and cowboy resources.

Pima Community College Community Education Lecture Series Discovering Southern Arizona

"Form over Function: A Tohono O'odham Artist's Story," featuring Terrol Dew Johnson, nationally-acclaimed basket weaver, artist and community leader. Friday, February 22, 2008 10:00 a.m. Community Performing Arts and Learning Center, 1250 West Continental Road, Green Valley [map]

"Journeys through Barrio Anita." Hear the history and stories of Tucson's historic Barrio Anita. Friday, March 28, 2008 6:00 p.m. Tucson Chinese Cultural Center, 1288 West River Road, Tucson. [map]

Pima Community College has just announced its Community Education Lecture Series. The first lecture is "The Legacy of Gold Mountain: Chinese Immigrant Families in Southern Arizona" and will be held on Friday, January 25, 2008, 6:00 p.m. at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center is a beautiful new facilityTucson Chinese Cultural Center, 1288 West River Road. map.

For more information contact Community Education at 206-6579. [download the announcement PDF]

Read Bonnie Henry's article from the July 22nd Daily Star, "Here's your chance to tell it like it was." Coni Weatherford, Pima County Public librarian, is starting "a new online library collection devoted to Tucson's memories." Coni is a graduate of the UA's School of Information Resources and Library Science. Tucson, Tell Us Your Story is starting off as part of Tucson's 232nd Birthday Celebration.

Perhaps the biggest challenge of in maintaining any of the Through Our Parents' Eyes websites is keeping them current with changes in technology. Since the late 1990s, the Learning Technologies Center has been using a system to capture and convert video into the Real format. We're always trying to move from products that lock us into proprietary formats to more open formats. This summer we are attempting to convert Through Our Parents' Eyes audio and video to MPEG4.

One place you will find this is on Encounters: Our Columbus Legacy, a 1992 KUAT production featuring Big Jim Griffith. We have hosted short video clips from Encounters since the late 1990s. They were captured and converted to Real at a time when most people lacked high bandwidth Internet access, such as cable modem and DSL. Veronica Rodriguez, a senior Media Technician in the LTC, worked from our original VHS tape to re-digitize Encounters and convert the video to the MPEG4 format. Veronica is now working on our Arizona Illustrated clips featuring Big Jim Griffith.

The additional benefit to converting or re-doing these video clips is that once they are in MPEG4, they can be podcast as well. BTW, have you subscribed to our podcasts? If not, all you need to do is click on the iTunes 1-Click button located in the upper right area of the blog's homepage and it will automatically start your podcast subscription and download the most recent episode. All you need is a copy of Apple's free iTunes. Check it out and let us know how you like it.

Tom Marshall's Tucson is now published and available for all to read on its website. It contains a wonderful collection of Tucson from 1899 until Tom Marshall's death in 1931. In addition, we added a chapter containing Tom's photos from his Nome, Alaska album. He left the UA during the semester in 1900, sail on the SS Portland to Nome. His album includes photos of a trip to Dutch Harbor in the Aleutian Islands.

The April 2007 issue of Latino Perspectives Magazine includes "Window to the Past: UA's 'Through Our Parents' Eyes' Continues to Gather Recollections," by Georgann Yara. The article is the April Heritage section contribution. Ms. Yara had called one day on the phone and chatted about the site's origins, purpose and contributions.

Through Our Parents' Eyes includes a rich collection of audio and video. We are now podcasting selections from that audio and video. Just click on the iTunes 1-click button and the podcast subscription will automatically be added to your personal copy of iTunes. That way, whenever you want to watch or listen to a selection you will find there. It's free and it's easy.

Don't have iTunes? It's free -- download a copy. New to podcasting? Watch an 8 minute Flash movie guiding you through subscribing to podcasts using Apple's iTunes

Our first two podcasts are audio performances of the cowboy classic, Sierry Petes (or Tying Knots in the Devil's Tail). We have two performances from past Tucson Meet Yourself Festivals that you will enjoy. One is Dudley Whitlock's October 1981 rendition and the other is Marvin Bennett and Slim Kite's October 1985 performance.

In his chapter "The Mormon Cowboy An Arizona Cowboy Song and its Community," from the book A Shared Space: Folklife in the Arizona-Sonora Borderlands, Dr. James S. Griffith wrote that "this song was "

Composed as verse by Arizonan Gail I. Gardner in 1917 and set to music by Gardner's fellow Prescott cowboy, Bill Simon, in the late 1920s, "Tying Knots in the Devil's Tail" was disseminated by radio, record, and dude ranch performances at about the same time "The Mormon Cowboy" was recorded. Gardner's song rapidly gained considerable currency in tradition."