All of this season's Museum Midday programs are now available on KetchikanMuseums' YouTube channel!

The 2025-2026 Museum Midday season will be announced in September. Have an idea, suggestion, or want to join our program line up? Send proposals to our Program Coordinator: ErikaChristian@ketchikan.gov

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PAST PROGRAMS

April Museum Midday: Cultivating Ketchikan's Food Future 🌱

Ketchikan Museums in Partnership with USDA Forest Service Southeast Alaska Discovery Center invites you to join us at the Southeast Alaska Discovery Center (50 Main Street) for the season finale of our Museum Midday series on Thursday, April 3, 2025 at 12:00 p.m., as we explore food production and growing in Ketchikan! This engaging panel discussion features representatives from Ketchikan Community Gardens and Ketchikan Agricultural Producers Association—key players in connecting our community to locally grown food.

Whether you’re savoring produce grown right here in Ketchikan or actively working to produce it, this is your chance to celebrate and learn from those cultivating our local food system. Discover the challenges and triumphs of growing in Southeast Alaska and the innovative ways these groups are shaping Ketchikan’s food future.

This event is free and open to all. Don’t miss this opportunity to connect with the people growing Ketchikan’s next chapter in food production!

Our panelists 🌱Ketchikan Community Gardens: https://ketchikanwellness.org/community-gardens/ 🌱KAPA: https://www.ketchikanagriculture.org/

Now Available on our YouTube channel

March Museum Midday: History Afloat Oral History Listening Event

Join us at the Tongass Historical Museum for a special Museum Midday. Featuring the work of local photographer Brooke Ratzat, this event offers a unique listening session with recorded interviews that reveal insights into our region’s maritime heritage. Don’t miss this chance to connect with the stories of those who keep our waterfronts alive. Learn more about the project: http://ketchikanmuseums.org/.../vex37_history.../index.htm Connect with photographer Brooke Ratzat and see more of her work: http://www.brookeratzatphotography.com/ https://www.instagram.com/brookeratzatphotography/ https://www.facebook.com/brookeratzatphotography **This oral history project was made possible through funding from the Alaska State Museums' Grant-in-Aid program.

Now Available on our YouTube channel

February Fame and Shame: Beyond Seward's Folly with Seward House Museum

Join staff members from the Seward House Museum in Auburn, New York for a virtual program on the 1867 Alaska Purchase and its long aftermath. Often referred to as "Seward's Folly," this acquisition redefined Secretary of State William Seward's career at the conclusion of nearly half a century in public life. But Alaska was always contested-- from the original negotiations, to the transfer from Russia, and for generations afterwards. Museum staff will bring these stories to life from inside the historic home of the Seward family, including an inside look at the objects and artifacts from Seward's visit to the territory in his retirement years.

Images Courtesy of the Seward House Museum. Learn more: https://sewardhouse.org/

Now Available on our YouTube channel

January: Ketchikan's Dive Center – More Than Just Diving

Join us for a deep dive into the world of Ketchikan’s Wind & Water Dive Shop! Since 1997, Allen and Saunya Alloway have been dedicated to promoting dive safety and education in our community. Over the years, they’ve adapted to the needs of Ketchikan's working waterfront, becoming the go-to spot for scuba training, gear sales, and hydrostatic testing for high-pressure cylinders—serving recreational and harvest divers alike.

From their start in local dive charters to becoming Southern Southeast Alaska’s only hydrostatic testing station, Wind & Water has evolved with Ketchikan’s growing needs. Learn more about this incredible local business, their focus on safety, the services they continue to provide, and the dive community that exists here.

Learn more: www.windandwaterdiveshop.com

Now Available on our YouTube channel

December: Our Submerged Past — Archaeology in Southeast Alaska with Dr. Kelly Monteleone

Dive into history with us and learn how submerged archaeological sites, like those off Prince of Wales Island, help piece together the ancient story of human migration to the Americas.

Join us for an eye-opening journey beneath the waves with Dr. Kelly Monteleone, Underwater Anthropologist with the Sealaska Heritage Institute! Discover the story of Southeast Alaska’s ancient submerged coastline, which witnessed a dramatic sea-level rise at the end of the last Ice Age. As the land transformed, early peoples traveled these waters, leaving traces of their existence below. One incredible find: a 11,000-year-old stone fish trap, evidence of early coastal migration and possibly one of the oldest of its kind! Now Available on our YouTube channel

November: Unlocking the Wisdom of an Ancient Canoe

Join Stormy Hamar and Stephanie Hamar from the Haida Canoe Revitalization Group as they share about their project documenting an ancient canoe in the forest and how that process relates to Haida canoe making today. This project was made possible with funding from the State of Alaska's Historic Preservation Office NPS Maritime Heritage Preservation Grant. Learn more about the Haida Canoe Revitalization Group: www.hcrg.org Now Available on our YouTube channel

October: Ketchikan Indian Community Tlingit Language Team

Presenters Yakdushí, Lisa Milne-DeWitt, and Kiyéis Tláa Natasha Clevenger, discuss what Ketchikan Indian Community's (KIC) Tlingit Language Team is doing in the community, in the schools, and what goals and achievements are being worked on to contribute to Indigenous language revitalization. Traditional place names and the importance of Indigenous history of the land were also discussed. Now Available on our YouTube channel