Community Calendar

This month's Garvey Room art exhibit at the Prairie Museum features Colby High School's photography show. Come see this community art display, with select pieces from CHS students!

CSAW’s Nall Lecture at WT to Feature Life of Overlooked Dust Bowl-Era Author
CANYON, Texas — The author whose work inspired both John Steinbeck and Kristin Hannah will be explored at an upcoming event from West Texas A&M University’s Center for the Study of the American West.
Dr. Iris Jamahl Dunkle will present “Shifting Focus: Sanora Babb and Reimagining the Dust Bowl” at 7 p.m. April 9 in Legacy Hall in the Jack B. Kelley Student Center in a presentation for CSAW’s Garry L. Nall endowed lecture series.
Admission is free.
During her eventful life, Sanora Babb took invaluable field notes and oral histories of migrant farmworkers during the Dust Bowl. That work was shared with Steinbeck, who made prodigious use of it for his 1939 masterwork “The Grapes of Wrath”; its runaway success forestalled Babb’s work on her own Dust Bowl novel, “Whose Names Are Unknown,” which eventually was published in 2004.
“She left New York with her book contract canceled,” Dunkle told Colorado Public Radio in 2025. “She couldn't write. She was devastated. She had spent a decade working on this book, and it was just thrown away.”
Her Dust Bowl scholarship—which eventually was featured in Ken Burns’ documentary and helped inspire Hannah’s “The Four Winds”—was only part of a long, fascinating life, as recounted in Dunkle’s “Riding Like the Wind: The Life of Sanora Babb,” published in 2024.
“Dunkle’s work reminds us of a truth that CSAW is dedicated to: there is always more to the story, and we are richer and better off knowing more,” said Dr. Alex Hunt, CSAW director, Regents Professor of English and Vincent-Haley Professor of Western Studies in the Department of English, Philosophy and Modern Languages in WT’s Sybil B. Harrington College of Fine Arts and Humanities. “Dunkle’s work on Sanora Babb will teach us a great deal about the Dust Bowl and the experience of common people who were ruined in those years. But even more, it will teach us about how the main story of the Dust Bowl, notably that so powerfully established in John Steinbeck’s ‘The Grapes of Wrath,’ hides a lot of truth. Sanora Babb is a name we should know, and Dunkle is the champion for this important Dust Bowl author.”
Dunkle, a poet as well as a nonfiction author, also wrote the biography “Charmain Kittredge London: Trailblazer, Author, Adventurer” in 2020 and has several collections of poetry in print. An award-winning author, she specializes in delving into the often-overlooked lives of women in the American West.

This month's Garvey Room art exhibit at the Prairie Museum features Colby High School's photography show. Come see this community art display, with select pieces from CHS students!

This month's Garvey Room art exhibit at the Prairie Museum features Colby High School's photography show. Come see this community art display, with select pieces from CHS students!

The Decatur County Democratic Party, in conjunction with the Food and Farm Caucus, Thomas County Democratic Party , Norton County Democratic Party, and the Smith County Democratic Party, is hosting every Democratic candidate seeking an office in 2026.
Please join us and meet all of the 2026 statewide and district candidates for the Democratic Party in Kansas. This will be your best opportunity to meet and talk with the next leaders of the great state of Kansas.
This is a unique opportunity in western Kansas. The goal of these candidates is to find COMMON GROUND among all Kansans regardless of political affiliation. It will also be possible to register to vote at this event. Democrats, Republicans and Unaffiliated voters are all welcome to attend!
Catered lunch is available for purchase.

The Perryton Stone Age Fair provides artifact collectors with an opportunity to showcase their prehistoric and historic Indian artifact collections. Equally important, the event also provides a setting where collectors can meet with other collectors and exchange information. Persons with collections related to the pre-settlement era, specifically military or buffalo hunting, are also invited to attend. Individuals who are not interested in displaying artifacts they have found, but would like to learn more about them, are also encouraged to bring them as archaeologists will be on hand to help with artifact identification. Buying, selling, or trading of artifacts is not permitted at this event. Artifact reproductions may be displayed for educational purposes as long as they are labeled as such. Admission is free and food and drinks will be available for purchase. To reserve free table space or for additional information, please contact Courson Archaeological Research at (806)435-0619.

PAGLIACCI: Globe News Center . April 11, 2026 . 5:00 PM ~ Pagliacci is a gripping Italian opera by Ruggero Leoncavallo that tells the tragic story of a traveling clown, Canio, whose heartbreak and jealousy erupt during a performance when he discovers his wife’s betrayal. Blurring the line between theater and reality, the opera climaxes in a shocking finale where art and life // The Amarillo Opera will present Ruggero Leoncavallo's Pagliacci on Saturday, April 11, 2026, at 5:00 PM at the Globe-News Center for the Performing Arts. This dramatic opera, featuring Eric Barry as Canio and Katia Kim as Nedda, explores themes of jealousy and betrayal, with an optional post-show gala dinner available. ~ Tickets are now available for Leoncavallo’s 80-minute opera featuring Amarillo’s own, Eric Barry. For “Under the Big Top” Gala reservations, please contact the Amarillo Opera office.

This month's Garvey Room art exhibit at the Prairie Museum features Colby High School's photography show. Come see this community art display, with select pieces from CHS students!

Drop Everything And Read with storytimes throughout the day at DHDC! Visitors are invited to wear their PJs and cozy up with a book. Programs included with admission.

This month's Garvey Room art exhibit at the Prairie Museum features Colby High School's photography show. Come see this community art display, with select pieces from CHS students!