Crested Butte Museum
Book of the Month Club
Join us for a monthly book club where we will explore and discuss both non-fiction and fiction works that explore the history of our valley and the lifestyles of those who lived lives similar to those who established the town of Crested Butte.
At the beginning of each month we will announce our book of the month in our e-mail newsletter.
To join the fun just purchase the book of the month in the Museum Gift Shop and BYO (bring your own) snacks and drinks for the discussion on the Fourth Friday of every month. If you already have the book we’re reading that month, no purchase necessary! Just bring yourself and whatever you would like to enjoy (or something to share)!
December Book of the Month
Childrens Book Club: The Adventures of Squeak!
Monday, December 29th- 11am
Bring your little ones to learn about the adventures of Squeak! with the local illustrator herself, Mallory Logan. The Museum book club is free for all and copies of Squeak’s adventures are available for purchase in the museum gift shop. Come early to enjoy Museum Mondays, a museum hour for children and caretakers from 10-11!
Free Community Event 
January Book of the Month
“Captain Jack”
by Ellen E. Jack
Friday, January 23rd 6pm
Free
“Of all the women who came to Colorado to start a new life in the 1860s and 1870s, Ellen E. Jack (also known as Captain Jack) could well have been the most unusual. As a young woman, she was touched by tragedy with the deaths of her husband and two of her three children. Leaving the sadness, she said goodbye to her civilized life and moved to Colorado. She lived briefly in Pueblo and Denver and then moved to the new gold discoveries in the Gunnison Country. There, she ran several businesses, including a series of boarding houses that she ruled with an iron fist; and she became a partner in the successful Black Queen Mine, located between Crested Butte and Aspen. According to her writings, she took part in gun fights, fought off amorous Native Americans, and traveled through avalanche-prone mountains that kept everyone else off the trails. In her later years she moved to Colorado Springs and filed several mining claims nearby, but she mainly catered to tourists – taking them on mine tours, hiring out her burros for rides, telling tall tales, and selling her self-published autobiography, The Fate of a Fairy. It is doubtful that you will ever read a wilder tale of the life of a woman in early Colorado. What is fact and what is fiction is for you to decide.”-Powell Books
January Book of the Month
“From the Age of Exploration to the Age of Discovery”
by Ian Billick
Friday, February 27th -6pm
Free
Join our Crested Butte Mayor, Ian Billick, for Feburary book club.
“From the Age of Exploration to the Age of Discovery”embeds field research at RMBL in the larger context of exploration and discovery, from the fall of Constantinople in 1453 that sparked exploration, through the emergence of the scientific societies in the 17th century, and the geological survey of the Gunnison Basin in the 19th century. It peaks into the future, talking about the transition from carbon-based systems, such as life and fossil fuels, to silicon-based systems, including computers, AI, and renewable energy. Participants will have a chance to look at some of the early books in my collection from the 18th and 19th century documenting the period of exploration and discovery.
Free community event
Billick’s book is for sale in the Museum gift shop.
Friday, February 27th-6pm
