Donner Party
In the cold winter of 1846, the infamous Donner Party faced no other choice but to resort to cannibalism to survive their entrapment in the Sierra Nevada mountains. How did these pioneers find themselves in such a dire situation? Where did they find hope in these dark moments? And why did some survive while others perished? In this talk we will journey westward with the Donner Party, explore their inevitable descent into cannibalism, and contemplate the aftermath of this infamous ordeal of the American west.
Maya Rook has visited the site of the Donner Party camps in northern California three times and was the keynote speaker at the annual Donner Party Hike’s luncheon in 2015. She also co-created a play about the Donner Party entitled The Tower with the Anti-Matter Collective in Brooklyn in 2014.