Heritage center starts campaign

The American West Heritage Center has announced its Dream Catcher campaign, a $150 million expansion program that will take place in three phases over the next 10 to 15 years.

At breakfasts held this week in Logan and Salt Lake City, center representatives unveiled architectural plans and talked about their long-term dream of turning the center, located in Cache Valley, in into a premiere educational resource for the state and the nation.

"We see this as an incredible, unique opportunity to develop our heritage," said Jim Bailey, AWHC director of development.

"Location, history, heritage and diversity come together here in ways that you don't find anywhere else. We have a phenomenal opportunity to tell the story of the West that must not be ignored."

To date, $4.7 million has been pledged.

The center, which interprets history from 1820 to 1920, grew out of the Festival of the American West, started in the early 1970s at Utah State University. In 1995, it was spun off as a nonprofit foundation, now housed on 160 acres at the base of the Wellsville Mountains.

In addition to the festival each summer, a Welcome Center is open year-round, and seasonal activities center around the Jensen Historical Farm, the Frontier Village and Pioneer Settlement. Eventually, said Ronda Thompson, executive director of the center, they hope to have permanent venues that will also tell the story of mountain men, the military and the rancher.

As part of the expansion, they will add an educational center that will become a resource not only for students but also for teachers of history. Also, a gathering center that can be used by families, businesses and other groups for reunions and conferences will be built.

A key part of the expansion plans is to have a place where the experiences of the American Indians will be told by American Indians. AWHC will partner with the Northern Shoshone Band to create an cultural and interpretive center that will house tribal artifacts and tell tribal history — from their early wanderings in the Cache Valley area, to their near-annihilation in the Bear River Massacre, to their assimilation into local culture and religion. The interpretative center will not only be an educational center for all those interested in Western history, "it will be a place where our children can come to relearn our culture," said Bruce Parry, executive director of the Northern Shoshone Band.