“Empires of the Wind: Exploration of the United States Pacific West Coast,” a five day teacher workshop supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities Landmarks of American History and a ”We the People” initiative takes place aboard the historic ship collections of the Maritime Museum of San Diego. Summer workshop dates are scheduled for July 11-16 and August 1-6, 2010.

The workshop is designed to take advantage of a location, institution, and the cultural assets that relate directly to West Coast exploration in compelling ways. San Diego is justifiably known as “the place where California began.” Its prominent Point Loma was the first location currently within the boundaries of the United States West Coast to be described, provided geographical coordinates, and placed on a map. San Diego was the first city on the U.S. West Coast to be established as a European settlement in Spanish response to exploration of the Pacific by rival European powers during the eighteenth century. It was one of the first strategic ports seized by the United States in its war with Mexico, and today is home to the greatest concentration of conventional naval power that the world as ever known.
 
The selection of workshop topics, sites, and activities collectively explains historical developments in the Pacific as setting the stage for the arrival of the Americans. Thematically, the lecture discussions are intended to provoke new ways of thinking about the Pacific and its role in the American story.

Day 1: “The Pacific as two worlds imagined”
Day 2: “The Pacific deciphered”
Day 3: “The Pacific rationalized”
Day 4: “The Pacific contested”
Day 5: “The Pacific remembered.”

Each day, leading academics will conduct lecture discussions aboard our fleet of historic landmark ships: Berkeley, Star of India and Surprise. The workshop will also utilize two off-site landmarks: the Cabrillo National Monument, and California’s first settlement, Old Town State Historic Park. In addition, the culminating activity will take participants out to sea aboard California’s Official’s Tallship the Californian.

Following each lecture discussion, participants will have the opportunity to encounter artifacts and rare primary sources through guided gallery discussions or touring historic sites. Afternoons will be focused on group activities that will help make the morning lecture presentations applicable to classroom instruction, led by curriculum resource specialists.

Prior to the workshop a reader will be sent to each participant for review and discussion at the workshop. Participants will be expected to read the packet prior to their arrival at the workshop. After the workshop, participants can expect to take home a CD of resources and images for future use in the classroom.