Thursday Tour 1: 

Pendleton Tour (Thursday 1)

Departing the Marcus Whitman, this tour travels Route 11 south to Oregon, passing Athena on the right and the historic brick-making town of Weston on the left. After crossing the state line, and passing a functional drive-in movie theatre, the bus passes through the historic town of Milton Freewater.

Tracing the intentionally-meandering path of entry to Tamástlikt Cultural Institute, one enters the museum experience—local history from an entirely native perspective—before even arriving. Notice as well the casino—the tallest structure for miles—a powerful statement of the tribe’s economic presence in the region. The bus will follow Mission Road to Court Street, driving past the famous Pendleton Woolen Mills, before arriving at the Round-Up Visitor Center. Here we lunch in the Grandstands before a visit to Happy Canyon Arena. If time allows, there is a small museum of the Round-Up to visit at Court and 12^th Street.

From the repurposed Carnegie Library two tours spring, one self-guided along Byers Street and the New City Hall neighborhood exploring common and polite houses, and another guided along Main Street, including the once red-light Cozy Rooms.

The day concludes back in Walla Walla at the renovated substation, the Gesa Power House Theatre, where we will be welcomed by the conference co-organizers and hear a keynote delivered by the Director of the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute. Explore the Walla Walla dining scene with dinner on your own.

Thursday Tour 2:

Walla Walla Tour (Thursday 2)

Arriving by Heritage Road, the day starts with the Whitman Mission Historic Site, where the traditional narrative has been flipped by NPS in collaboration with the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Reservation. This is followed by a trip by way of Old Hwy 12 to Frenchtown to hear the lesser-known stories of the Métis and view one of Washington’s oldest cabin structures. Following the winding Lower Dry Creek Road through the soil-rich Palouse agricultural region, we arrive for lunch at the Mikkleson Barn which has recently benefitted from a state heritage barn grant.

While some may wish to return to the hotel for a rest or begin their downtown stroll early, the other bus will drive to the Walla Walla Foundry for a unique glimpse into the rarified world of large-scale bronze-casting. The tour concludes with a self-guided downtown walking tour of historic Main Street Walla Walla. Attendees may either walk to the Gesa Power House Theatre for the conference keynote address or ride a bus from the hotel. Dinner is on your own in the ample dining scene of downtown Walla Walla.

Friday Tour: Atomic Tour

Continental Breakfast served in the Conference Lobby prior to Tour departures.

Lunch and snacks at the last stop of the day are included on the Friday Tour. The entire conference will spend the day together.

Today we enter the strange and hidden world of 20^th-century plutonium manufacturing. Busses arrive at the Manhattan Project Visitor Center after driving past Lake Wallula where you can look back to the left and see the Wallula Gap where ice-age glacial floods ripped through the landscape, leaving the magnificent ravines and striations we see today.

The Pre-Manhattan Tour passes the shuttered facilities that once fueled World War II; this site requires exclusive badged access, and we are thrilled to have secured this for VAF attendees. From here we drive past the atomic era Uptown Shopping Center on our way to the Richland Community Center. The locally famous Spudnut Shop is one of many atomic-themed features in Richland, a town built for the employees of Hanford.

Boxed lunches are enjoyed at the Richland Community Center located in Howard Amon Park. From here folks can peruse The Parkway shops or join the guided (or self-guided) tour of the Alphabet Houses, each of which has a plan in the shape of a letter and comprised the majority of the housing for those families brought to live and work for the government in the super-secret production of petroleum. The haunting history of this town still hangs in the air, the local high school still sporting the controversial mascot of “The Bombers.”

As we drive over the Lewis Street Overpass we enter into the story of East Pasco, the multi-racial partner-town to the neighboring sundown law town of Kennewick. Buses arrive Kurtzman Park to meet local residents and hear the story of how this park and environs were built on sweet-equity and determination. We conclude the day at the nearby Sacajawea Historical State Park at the confluence of the Snake and Columbia Rivers. This was a site of cultural confluence as well as the meeting of those two significant rivers, bringing to a climax the various themes of our conference, Atomic Space, Native Soil, Geologic Time.

Saturday Paper Sessions and Banquet

Continental Breakfast served in the Conference Lobby prior. 

Paper and Poster Sessions will be held on Saturday at the Marcus Whitman Hotel.

Closing Banquet and Annual Meeting will be held at the The Motor Co.

Saturday paper and poster sessions will be in the stately Marcus Whitman Hotel, an easy walk from our concluding awards ceremony and banquet venue at The Motor Co, a funky reuse of a mid-century automobile dealership.