Seniors celebrate Veterans Day with a visit to museum

Al group of seniors from The Chateau at Gardnerville came to the Carson Valley Museum & Cultural Center to help celebrate Veterans Day.

Docent Mary Kamman – dressed in period attire – took the guests through the many presentations from Snowshoe Thompson the “mailman of the Sierra” to the Basque exhibits and the Women in History room. She discussed each in colorful terms from a historical perspective.

Many of the visitors said they remembered growing up and seeing many of the displayed items in the homes of their grandparents and great-grandparents – a clothes washer with squeezing rollers, a foot operated sewing machine, a heavy iron, an ice box , and antique phonographs to name a few. These brought back many fond memories.

One visitor particularly enjoyed the high school exhibit. She commented about her a friend at The Chateau who attended Douglas County High School in the early 1900s . The old school building houses the Gardnerville museum.

Touring with the group was 102-year-old World War II veteran Ed Martinez. He stood in the museum’s Washo Room marveling at the winter house called a Gal-is-dungal, the Washo baskets, grinding stones, projectile points and spear heads and the other items. 

Martinez was moved by the framed pictures of Washo veterans in uniform and the honors bestowed on them recognizing their contributions in keeping the United States safe.