October 13, 2026

“Walter C. Veazie Goes to Red Mountain City and Other Tales of Mining in the Old West”

Speakers: Anne Sonner

This genealogy search started with a packet of old envelopes that were in a family scrapbook. Anne’s great-grandfather, after serving in the Civil War when a teenager, worked at a gold mine in Montana Territory. Take a trip down a historical rabbit hole to the wild days of the Old West mining towns.

Anne has been doing family history research on and off for 14 years. A graduate of Pitzer College, she has been secretary of the University Club for a while.

Sycamore Room, Doubletree Inn, 555 W Foothill Blvd, Claremont
11:30 am: social • 12:00 pm: lunch • 1:00 pm: speaker
Lunch $25 (subsidized by the Club)

October 27, 2026

“Bringing the Past to Life at the Alf Museum, from Dinosaurs to Dire Wolves”

Speaker: Dr. Andrew Farke, Director of the Raymond M. Alf Museum Paleontology

Paleontology, the study of Earth's prehistoric life, offers windows into our past, present, and future. Virtually anyone, with a little luck, can make a major discovery—which makes paleontology a perfect showcase for the scientific process and its societal impacts. The Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology at The Webb Schools is not only fossil exhibits, but a research and education center that engages high school students in real science. This talk, by museum director Dr. Andy Farke, will tell the unique origins and unique mission of the country's only paleontology museum on a high school campus.

Andy Farke earned a B.Sc. in Geology from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology and a Ph.D. in Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University. He joined the staff at the Alf Museum in 2008, as curator of paleontology. His research interests focus on the evolution and functional morphology of the ceratopsians, or horned dinosaurs.

Sycamore Room, Doubletree Inn, 555 W Foothill Blvd, Claremont
11:30 am: social • 12:00 pm: lunch • 1:00 pm: speaker
Lunch $25 (subsidized by the Club)