A century ago, Flagstaff residents watched one of the nation’s most prominent archaeologists uncover an ancestral pueblo on the edge of the city. They celebrated each new discovery—until the excavation ended and Dr. Jesse Walter Fewkes packed the artifacts into crates and took them back to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The experience convinced Flagstaff residents that northern Arizona needed a museum of its own.

Join MNA Exhibitions & Publications Manager Kristan Hutchison on the Museum of Northern Arizona’s 98th birthday for the story of the 1926 Elden Pueblo excavation, the controversy that followed, and the series of events that led to the founding of MNA two years later.

Free for MNA members. Free with museum admission.