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Oscar-Winning Actor, Writer, Director

SEAN PENN
reads from and discusses his new novel
BOB HONEY

Bob Honey Sings Jimmy Crack Corn, the madcap follow-up to his debut novel, which was hailed by authors as diverse as Salman Rushdie, Jane Smiley, and Paul Theroux ―explores the deepest recesses of American politics and culture. Bob Honey, the disillusioned divorcee with a penchant for murder by mallet, weaves his way toward Washington DC for the ultimate showdown with a certain nefarious “landlord,” but nothing is as it seems, and Bob will have more than just the government working against him. Part comedy and part thriller, Bob Honey Sings Jimmy Crack Corn establishes Sean Penn as a fixture of the literary landscape for years to come.

Author

Matthew Shindell
will read from and discuss
his new book
The LIFE and SCIENCE of
HAROLD C. UREY
  Saturday, November 23^rd, 7PM

Harold C. Urey (1893–1981) was one of the most famous American scientists of the twentieth century. Awarded the Nobel Prize in 1934 for his discovery of deuterium and heavy water, Urey later participated in the Manhattan Project and NASA’s lunar exploration program. In this, the first ever biography of the chemist, Matthew Shindell shines new light on Urey’s achievements and efforts to shape his public and private lives.

Shindell follows Urey through his orthodox religious upbringing, the scientific work that won him the Nobel, and his subsequent efforts to use his fame to intervene in political, social, and scientific matters. At times, Urey succeeded, including when he helped create the fields of isotope geochemistry and cosmochemistry. But other endeavors, such as his promotion of world governance of atomic weapons, failed. By exploring those efforts, as well as Urey’s evolution from farm boy to scientific celebrity, we can discern broader changes in the social and intellectual landscape of twentieth-century America. More than a life story, this book immerses readers in the struggles and triumphs of not only an extraordinary man, but also his extraordinary times.

Matthew Shindell is curator of planetary science and exploration at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. Shindell is a historian of science with a Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego's History Department and Science Studies Program. His work focuses on the intersection of science and religion in the American Cold War, the postwar development of nuclear geochemistry, the history of earth, environmental, and planetary science, and the growing importance of "scientific consensus" in contemporary policy making. Shindell has held postdoctoral fellowships at University of California, San Diego, the University of Southern California, and Harvard University.

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Senator
BYRON L. DORGAN
will discuss his new book
The Girl in
the Photograph:
The True Story of
a Native American Child,
 Lost and Found in America,
Saturday, January 18 at 2 PM, 2020

Through the story of Tamara, an abused Native American child, North Dakota Senator Byron Dorgan describes the plight of many children living on reservations—and offers hope for the future. On a winter morning in 1990, U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota picked up the Bismarck Tribune. On the front page, a small Native American girl gazed into the distance, shedding a tear. The headline: "Foster home children beaten—and nobody's helping." Dorgan, who had been working with American Indian tribes to secure resources, was upset. He flew to the Standing Rock Indian Reservation to meet with five-year-old Tamara who had suffered a horrible beating at a foster home. He visited with Tamara and her grandfather and they became friends; but then Tamara disappeared. He would search for her for decades until they finally found each other again. This book is her story, from childhood to the present, but it's also the story of a people and a nation. More than one in three American Indian/Alaskan Native children live in poverty. AI/AN children are disproportionately in foster care and awaiting adoption. Suicide among AI/AN youth ages 15 to 24 is 2.5 times the national rate.  As distressing a situation as it is, this is also a story of hope and resilience. Dorgan, who founded the Center for Native American Youth (CNAY) at the Aspen Institute, has worked tirelessly to bring Native youth voices to the forefront of policy discussions, engage Native youth in leadership and advocacy, and secure and share resources for Native youth.

BYRON L. DORGAN served as a U.S. congressman and senator for North Dakota for thirty years before retiring in January 2011. He was chairman of Senate Committees and Subcommittees on the issues of Energy, Aviation, Appropriations, Water Policy, and Indian Affairs. Senator Dorgan is the author of the New York Times bestseller Take This Job and Ship It. When he retired from the U.S. Senate, he created the Center for Native American Youth (CNAY) to work on teen suicide prevention, education opportunity and more for children living on Indian reservations.

"As he tells the harrowing, yet inspiring story of one young Native American girl, Senator Dorgan describes the nearly two centuries of shameful treatment of American Indians, much of which continues today."
—Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Council of Chiefs, Northern Cheyenne Indian Tribe

“The Girl in the Photograph is one of the most important civil rights books written in this century. It examines, in full detail, through the life of one young woman, the horrific conditions in which many Native American children live in a country that once belonged to their ancestors. Once you recover from your shock, the author gives you an opportunity to participate in the change that will restore opportunity and justice to the precious children of our first Americans.” —Senator Heidi Heitkamp