Battle Mountain topic of Nevada State Museum lecture

Ken Beaton likes to say, if you think there’s nothing to do in your home town, “check into a Battle Mountain hotel for three weeks one Tuesday evening.”

Beaton, a Carson City resident who was a business teacher at Battle Mountain High School from 1972 to 1975, is a big fan of the Lander County seat, which is located along Interstate 80 between Winnemucca and Elko.

Beaton will be mixing history and humor about Battle Mountain in the monthly Frances Humphrey Lecture Series at the Nevada State Museum in Carson City.

The lecture, titled “Battle Mountain is the Place for Me,” is July 27 from 6:30 to 8 p.m. in the museum’s South Gallery.

The cost is $8 for adults; free for museum members and children 17 and younger.

Battle Mountain has had a rich, colorful and quirky history — mountain men trapping along the Humboldt River, a deadly incident involving the Donner Party, copper mining, gold mining and a few rites of passage carried out by the students at Battle Mountain High School.

“It will be a mix of history and some funny vignettes of things that happened there,” he said.

Beaton was born in Lynn, Mass., and earned his bachelor’s from Salem State University in Massachusetts before earning a Master’s in Education at Utah State.

After his teaching stint at Battle Mountain High, Beaton taught at Carson High School from 1975 until 1994.

An author and essayist, he has written a memoir titled “The Bulldog Brigade: Every Day Red and Gray,” along with pieces for the Nevada Appeal, Nevada in the West magazine and numerous other publications.

The Frances Humphrey Lecture Series is held the fourth Thursday of the month at the Nevada State Museum.