Marshals Museum sets lecture series

FORT SMITH -- The U.S. Marshals Museum will host its fifth spring lecture series beginning in March with the history of the American Indian tribal law enforcement officers and their interactions with United States marshals.

The lectures will be presented from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at the Blue Lion at 101 N. Second St. The first lecture will be held March 5. The second lecture in the series, to be held April 2, will be about the outlaw Cherokee Bill. The third lecture will be held May 7 and will cover the Going Snake tragedy, when eight members of a marshals posse were killed in a gunbattle with members of the Cherokee Nation.

"The overlapping jurisdictions of the U.S. government and independent Indian nations led to dangerous situations, with 64 deputy marshals killed in the line of duty riding out of Fort Smith," said Leslie Higgins, the museum's director of education. "With this lecture series, we are hoping the community will learn more about the difficulty of the job as well as the courage of the marshals."

The Marshals Museum will be the service's national museum on the banks of the Arkansas River. Construction of the 50,000-square-foot museum is expected to begin this spring and is scheduled to open Sept. 24, 2019, the 230th anniversary of the nation's oldest federal law enforcement agency.

State Desk on 02/11/2018

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