Baker City interpretive center launches culture keeper residencies this spring

Visitors to the National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center will soon hear living traditions in the center’s theater, not just see Oregon Trail exhibits. The new culture keeper residencies will give Baker City a chance to host artists and tradition-bearers at 11 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. on residency dates, starting with Sara Barton of Hines on April 23-25.

The Oregon Culture Keeper Residency is a seven-month partnership with the Oregon Folklife Network, supported by the James and Marion Miller Foundation. Crossroads Carnegie Art Center and the Friends Organization for NHOTIC helped bring the program to Eastern Oregon as part of the Oregon 250 Celebration, a statewide effort tied to the U.S. semiquincentennial. The Oregon 250 Commission was created through Senate Bill 1531, signed by Gov. Tina Kotek on March 27, 2024, to coordinate Oregon’s observance and consult with the state’s nine federally recognized tribes.

Barton brings more than 40 years of weaving and teaching to Baker City. Raised in Yosemite National Park and surrounding areas, she comes from a long line of basketmakers and identifies as having Mono Lake Paiute and Yosemite Miwuk ancestry. Her roster bio says she moved to Burns and built a relationship with master basketmaker Minerva Soucie of the Burns Paiute Tribe, learning to work with willow, tule and cattails. Barton also has helped Burns Paiute weavers keep basket and cradleboard traditions alive and has taught net making so the practice would not disappear.

That matters at NHOTIC because the center is already one of Baker County’s most visible trail sites. The National Park Service says the 500-acre Bureau of Land Management site sits above Oregon Trail ruts on Flagstaff Hill and Virtue Flat, with about 13 miles of ruts still visible across the area and about one mile on the interpretive center’s grounds. A residency built around living culture gives travelers a reason to stop in Baker City for more than a quick look at the trail landscape.

The schedule stretches well beyond Barton’s first visit. Oregon 250 lists Kathy Moss of Prairie City, a cowboy poet, buckaroo, horse trainer and rancher; H’Klumaiyat-Roberta Kirk of Warm Springs, a regalia maker and food gatherer; and Cheryl Newhouse of Richland, a spinner and weaver. Later presenters include Mildred Quaempts, Clair Kehrberg, Katie Harris Murphy and Mary Harris, with additional residency dates set for May 7-9, June 18-20, July 9-11, August 13-15, September 24-26 and October 15-17.

For Baker City, the draw is clear: these residencies turn the interpretive center into a place where visitors can meet working culture keepers, hear how traditions survive and connect the Oregon Trail story to Native and regional knowledge still being practiced today.