Features

I can’t remember a better winter around my place when it comes to seeing birds.

February yards in San Marcos may look bleak and brown after freezing weather, yet many silently support wildlife, especially insect pollinators such as bees and butterflies. Spring Lake Garden Club’s first meeting of the new year featured an overview of how plants and insects depend on each other, especially in winter.

Many people take to the great outdoors to escape the increasingly tech-driven daily grind. Though that’s an understandable perspective, gardeners who aren’t deploying tech in their home gardens could be missing out on a host of benefits that could help their plants, flowers and vegetables thrive.

Local painter gets banner treatment downtown

Today, let us consider five interesting facts about birds.

Q.February is Black History Month. What are some examples of racism in historic educational literature? Also, why do we have Black History Month? A. Black History Month in the United States is a time of remembrance and celebration honoring the contributions and history of African Americans throughout the United States. It is particularly important because so much African American history has been diminished, obscured, ignored and outright dismissed by historians and, unfortunately, the public school system. As a collector of late 19thand early-20th century juvenile history and geography textbooks, I see this firsthand.* Many of the books in my collection often only mention African Americans in terms of their skin color and “characteristics” of their race. School books at this time focused on “levels of civilization.” People were “classified” in a pseudo-scientific way as “red, black, yellow and white.” For example, In the book titled, “The Elementary Geography Book” published as part of the Indiana Educational Series from the Indiana School Book Co., 1889, the levels of “civilization” and “Races of Men” are discussed in detail (p.20). Public schools throughout the country used this book to teach children not only geography, but overt racism. At one point the book blatantly says, “The white race is called the Caucasian. It is the ruling race of the world.” (p.20) The writing exercise in this chapter of the book asked the children to:

The San Marcos Art League kicks off 2023 with a brand-new exhibit in collaboration with the Cenikor Foundation’s Project AIM that will feature works surrounding the topics of substance use, addiction and recovery. The exhibit will be showing at the San Marcos Art Center on The Square from Feb. 2-28. The exhibition’s opening reception will take place on Thursday, Feb. 2 from 5-7 p.m.

As the world’s population has increased, so, too, has the need to accommodate such growth. Areas that were wild as recently as 100 years ago may have long since been overrun by housing and urban development, leaving little space for local wildlife to call home.

The San Marcos Art League recently announced it has been approved by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to receive a Challenge America award of $10,000. This grant will support a city-wide exhibition of the art of Roberto Rios. This grant is one of 262 Challenge America awards totaling $2.62 million that were announced by the NEA as part of its first round of fiscal year 2023 grants.