This is a press release from Change Our Name Fort Bragg:

Lori Laiwa Thomas

Change Our Name’s Monthly teach-in will be Wednesday, June 26, at 7 p.m. at the Harbor Lite Lodge first floor conference room at 120 N Harbor Dr., Fort Bragg.

Envisioned as a program to educate attendees about the issues involved in the name change and to hear neighbors’ ideas, the teach-in will last about one hour and will feature a speaker and a question and answer/discussion period.

Our Speaker will be Lori Laiwa Thomas, a full time tenure track instructor at Mendocino College where she teaches in the Ethnic Studies department. She was raised in Point among her father’s people, the Boyas of Pdahau (also known as Point Arena) and is an enrolled citizen of her mother’s people the Shanelos of Shoqowa (Hopland).

The title for her talk is Local Indigenous History and Why it Matters Today?

In addition, the winner of this year’s Change Or Name essay contest, FBHS Senior Darwin Marroquin will read his essay responding to the question “Should The Name of Fort Bragg High School be Changed?” Marroquin will accept the winner’s check for $2,000.

Discussing  controversial topics requires civility and respect for the opinions of others. This program is free and open to all.

For further information: [email protected]

A local grass roots non-profit, Change Our Name Fort Bragg is dedicated to an educational process that leads to changing the name of Fort Bragg so that it no longer honors a military Fort that dispossessed Indigenous people or Braxton Bragg, an enslaver and Confederate General. who waged war against our country.