Fort Smith Museum of History administrators are inviting patrons to join them for their Pardi Gras benefit Feb. 10 at the Shipley Baking Co.
The event is the nonprofit organization's largest fundraiser and will begin with cocktails and live music by Cutthroat Trout followed by dinner, live auction and dancing to live music by the Rockets. Guests are encouraged to wear masks and other festive attire. Tickets are $125, and tables for eight are $1,000. Sponsorships are available.
Pardi Gras
Who: Fort Smith Museum of History
What: Cocktails, live music, dinner, dancing, live auction
When: 6 p.m. Feb. 10
Where: Shipley Baking Co. in Fort Smith
Tickets: $125
Attire: Festive, masks encouraged
Information: (479) 783-7841
The mission of the Fort Smith Museum of History is to collect, preserve and share the history and culture of Fort Smith and the surrounding region.
Caroline Speir, historical interpreter and exhibit designer, said, that as part of Fort Smith's bicentennial celebration, the museum has on loan through March an original watercolor painting of the city's first fort. The painter, Samuel Seymour, accompanied Maj. Stephen H. Long on the 1819-20 Rocky Mountain Expedition to map the Lousiana Purchase. Speir said Seymour drew the image on a stop toward the end of the expedition, and it is the only known image of the original fort.
Museum workers have embarked on a timeline renovation for the first time since 1982. In the next couple of years, the group will update exhibits to show older artifacts in new light and incorporate more layers of history to demonstrate events' causes and effects.
-- CARIN SCHOPPMEYER
cschoppmeyer@nwadg.com
NAN Our Town on 01/18/2018