Maureen Flanagan Battistella, presents the 2018 Windows in Time Lecture: “Stories of Southern Oregon: Landscape Changed”. 

Landscape Lost, Landscape Gained, Landscape Changed. It's the story of Southern Oregon, how family farms and ranches have changed over time. How people work the mills, mines, forests and fields of Southern Oregon. Cadastral boundaries, ownership, technologies, crops - all have changed since the first donation land claims here in the 1850s. These are the stories of Southern Oregon. Through a large NEH grant, Maureen has listened to and recorded many personal stories of those who work the land – their toil, the changes they’ve seen, their heritage and their legacy.

“This project is important because it helps Southern Oregon’s largely rural communities trace, preserve and share their heritage,” Battistella says. “It will document how and why population growth, economic development and new agricultural opportunities have affected Southern Oregon’s heritage industries.” Come listen to the stories she heard. They will fill you up. 

Maureen Flanagan Battistella is on the Sociology/Anthropology faculty at Southern Oregon University and is an architect of the Stories of Southern Oregon collection in the Southern Oregon Digital Archives, SODA.sou.edu. Her research interests are the Southern Oregon wine industry, heritage agriculture, and the “culture of kitchens.”  She has a Rutgers University master’s in library and information science, which prepared her for a career in technology services, medical education and a lifetime of learning, thinking, and writing. 

The monthly “Windows in Time” lunchtime lectures are offered free to the public from 12 noon – 1:00 p.m. on the first Wednesday of each month at the Medford Library and the second Wednesday of each month at the Ashland Library.  These lectures feature well-known writers and historians, and bring alive the people, values, and events that shaped our Southern Oregon heritage. Lectures are jointly sponsored by the Southern Oregon Historical Society and Jackson County Library Services.