Flutes!

It's nearly time for the annual flute-making workshop at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center.

This is your opportunity to make a beautiful wooden six-holed Plains-Style Native American flute in a 3-day workshop with master flute-maker Marvin Yazzie, Navajo, and his wife, Jonette.

Also learn the basics of flute-playing from Ernest Siva. Discover the music of the First People of Southern California.

Enrollment is limited to 10 people. The price remains $300. Pre-register at the email siva@dishmail.net. Or call 951.849.4676.

The workshop will be held on three days, May 6, 7, and 8. May 7 is the annual downtown Art Hop in Banning, and we have storytelling, singing, crafts and much more free family fun planned at the Center as part of the overall event.

Hope you can join us, at the corner of San Gorgonio Ave. and Hays Street in Banning, for Art Hop fun! Stay tuned for more exciting news about the Art Hop.

Keeping the Songs Alive

Cahuilla singer Will Madrigal Jr. (far right)

© Carlos Puma Photo for The Center

The songs recall the Creation.

The stories share other Native American cultural history and memories.

Cliff Trafzer, UC Riverside history professor and Costo Chair in Native American History, worked with 10 elders and recorded their stories and songs.

The result was a 40-minute DVD video, called "Keeping the Songs Alive," which Trafzer has shared at Native American and other public gatherings.

In addition, more than 40 hours of videotaped interviews are archived at UCR's California Center for Native Nations and at UCR Libraries Special Collections & Archives.

At our Dragonfly Lecture Monday, Trafzer and

Will Madrigal Jr., a Cahuilla singer and recent UCR anthropology graduate, will share the DVD and more about the project, which was funded by a $10,000 grant from the California Council for the Humanities.

Read more about the project HERE.

DETAILS: 6 p.m. Monday April 11,

The Learning Center, 17 W. Hays, Banning.

Information: 951-849-7736

Ernest Siva © Carlos Puma Photo for The Center

Our Center co-founder and leader, Ernest Siva, is one of the elders featured in "Keeping the Songs Alive."

Below:

Click on the arrow to see the late culture bearer Pauline Murillo of San Manuel Reservation sharing a story and song:

Music, Music, & More Music

Second Saturday Sidewalk Storytelling has been a hit since our debut earlier this year.

It's all about learning and free family fun.

This coming weekend our event features MUSIC:

• Learn about our Southern California music from Ernest Siva, the Center's leader.

Photo © Carlos Puma for The Center

• Discover animals that are in songs.

• Find out why we have dragonflies on our doors at the Learning Center.

Photo © Pat Murkland

Learn the Dragonfly Song! Make your own dragonfly to take home.

• Discover musical instruments of Southern California.

Make your own instrument to take home.

• Learn about flutes, hear flute music,

and play a flute.

Photo © Pat Murkland

DETAILS:

Corner of Hays and San Gorgonio Ave., Banning

1-4 p.m. this Saturday, April 9

INFO: 951.849.7736

Spring is for music

True Cowboy and Indian Tales of the Pass

A few Morongo brands © Pat Murkland Photo

Welcome to the Old West. The real Old West.

San Gorgonio Pass has a rich history of cowboys and Indians.

For starters, the first cowboys WERE Indians.

And when it came to good guys and bad guys, there's a story of how Cahuilla leader Juan Antonio caught a whole gang of bad guys.

He and his men had no guns but the bad guys did.

Want to hear this story? Want to hear more stories?

Did you know Wyatt Earp was in the Pass?

Come to Dorothy Ramon Learning Center’s family sidewalk event this Saturday (March 12) for “True Cowboy and Indian Tales of the Pass.”

The event from 1 to 4 p.m. at the corner of San Gorgonio Avenue and Hays Street is part of the Learning Center’s Second Saturday Sidewalk Storytelling series.

Here you'll find free family fun with hands-on activities for children, along with storytelling.

The first two events drew standing-room-only crowds of all ages to our nonprofit that saves and shares Southern California’s Native American cultures, history, languages, and traditional arts.

“True Cowboy and Indian Tales” will feature stories by Richard Hanks of Riverside.

Hanks has a background in journalism, public history, and archival work. We like to tell people he has an ear for listening to voices not usually found in the history books, and an eye for ferreting out telling details amid a library's vast holdings.

He can tell a good story or two or three, and on Saturday, that's just what he'll be doing. The true stories are much more interesting than the Hollywood clichés.

Hands-on activities will help teach children about real Pass cowboys and Indians — including American Indians who were and still are cowboys.

© Carlos Puma for the Center

For example, try a lasso.

Family fun! And it's free!

All are welcome.

Information: (951) 849-7736.

Discover Photos of the Pass

View of Banning, CA, downtown, 1901

(looking north on San Gorgonio Avenue from railroad tracks)

Courtesy of Banning Public Library District

Photos from the rich past of San Gorgonio Pass tell many stories.

On Monday, Bill Bell will share some.

From cowboys to apricot groves and other community commerce, from a World War I armistice parade to more modern Stagecoach Days events, Banning Public Library's photos comprise a wide range of the Pass past.

SCANNING HUNDREDS OF PHOTOS

Bell has been working on a state library grant project to digitize old photos in the library district archives.

He’ll share some of his discoveries at Monday’s Dragonfly Lecture at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center — and tell how he’s on the lookout for more.

The public is invited to the lecture starting at 6 p.m. at the Center at 17 W. Hays, Banning, CA. Donations at the door help the small nonprofit save and share Southern California’s Native American cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts.

The Center celebrates a theme each year, and this year, it’s Shadowcatchers: Photographs. The Center is spotlighting work in documenting and preserving Native American-related historic photos. These photos are often not in major historic collections.

Thanks!

Our local patch.com news named

Dorothy Ramon Learning Center as one of the region's top nonprofits. Thanks!