We’ve gotten some questions lately about LauraPalooza aka the National Conference of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Legacy and Research Association and I wanted to clarify. So far we’ve held the conference twice, once in 2010 and once in 2012. Our original intention was to hold the conference every two years. However, we since realized that most of the Laura anniversary dates fall on odd years rather than even and we felt that would help publicity to be able to tie in, especially with Laura’s 150th Birthday celebration coming up in 2017. To move from even years to odd years we had to either had to hold an extra conference or skip an extra year. We decided to skip an extra year, so we are looking forward to holding the next conference in July 2015. We appreciate the support of Mankato and the Minnesota State University-Mankato through our first two conferences. Now we are ready for LauraPalooza to become a traveling conference. We don’t have a location confirmed yet for 2015. We’ll let you know more details when it gets closer.
As we’re coming up on the anniversary of last year’s LauraPalooza, so starting tomorrow check back each day to see what was going on a year ago as we were all in Mankato, Minnesota.
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In a related question, I’m sure my membership renewal is coming up soon (if it hasn’t already passed). How can I check this?
On another note, it is amazing how many questions and comments I get whenever I wear one of my Laurapalooza t-shirts.
Memberships expire each year on July 1st. So if you didn’t renew for a multiple years, your membership has indeed expired as listed on your membership card. We haven’t sent out any notice yet because we’ve been wanting to finalize the timing of a board decision and we’re still working on getting our summer board meeting put together. We apologize for any inconvenience.
You can renew at any time without waiting for us at any time under the LIWLRA tab on this site.
http://beyondlittlehouse.com/liwlra/how-to-join-the-liwlra/
Will I see pictures from karaoke? Those involved know who we are.
Hey y’all! Is it possible to host the conference at a site that is more rare than a site that is more frequietly visited, like W.G. or De Smet, although it could be held at a site or site’s town. In other words, could we do it like in Harlingen, Texas, or Crowley, LA, or even Vinton, Iowa? Just would like to through that up in the air, perhaps we can all pitch it to find just the right and exciting place to visit and host a great conference in 2015!
We already have a place in mind for 2015 and some initial plans made, although no formal approval from the institution yet which is why we haven’t announced it. As a traveling conference we hope that we can rotate between all the sites in turn (to support them and to make it more convenient for different members in turn), but institutions have to agree to host us (or ideally eventually offer to). It’s been my experience with similar conferences that (although it’s definitely NOT my cup of tea) many people appreciate a lower cost dorm option which if it holds true for this group (which our previous dorm registration rates seem to indicate it does) we need a place big enough to have a college with a dorm system. That doesn’t necessarily mean we couldn’t go without sometime, but I think having that option would be our goal unless we hear otherwise from the membership. So if anybody has any ins at institutions near Laura homesites we’d be glad to hear from you.
Yes, John all the places you mentioned were on our potential list for future sites along with many others. Vinton is I think especially going to be a good potential conference site once current repairs are finally finished. However, it depends on who’ll agree to have us. The Hoover Presidential Library in West Branch has almost completely abandoned its once powerful conference program and I have strong doubts about any cooperation there currently. But things change and who knows what may happen in future.
p.s. other conferences have been held even at Herbert Hoover in West Branch…what abt. LAURAPALOOZA in West Branch? Any thoughts of that??
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