Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

Vol. CLIV, Issue 6
Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

Photo by Nathaniel Martin

Place Names: Symbols of the Past and Present

Esme Fife-Adams and Keathley Pinney Brown November 2, 2023

Whitman College is named after a colonialist legend. Marcus Whitman – missionary, doctor, ‘pioneer’ – is best known not for his accomplishments in life, but for the circumstances of his death....

Marcus Whitman in D.C. to be replaced

Maleda Sims, News Reporter February 9, 2023

In 2021, the United States Legislature voted to replace the Marcus Whitman statue that currently presides in D.C.’s National Statuary Hall with a statue of Billy Frank Jr. An advocate for Native American...

Our college’s history is founded on a lie. We should talk about it more often.

Parsa Keshavarz Alamdari, Columnist April 1, 2022

We have all heard about Marcus Whitman, the man our college is named after. The way Marcus Whitman was murdered made him a character that is remembered to this day, and Whitman College had a big role...

Students in Stan Thayne’s Secularization of Whitman College course grapple with the College’s history

Naia Willemsen, News Reporter December 2, 2021

Despite the fact that Whitman’s namesake, Marcus Whitman, was a religious missionary, today Whitman has no institutional religious affiliation. This is a topic students in politics professor Stan Thayne’s...

Unmaking Whitman, Unlearning the Myth: Considering the Whitman’s legacy

Rosa Woolsey, News Editor October 21, 2021

Throughout the week following Indigenous Peoples’ Day, falling on Monday, Oct. 11 this year, Whitman’s history department and the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR) co-sponsored...

Illustration by Anna Stone.

Marcus Whitman statue creates TikTok account, is immediately banned

Lee Thomas, author of critically acclaimed novel series Goosebumps October 21, 2021

With rapper Saweetie's voice saying "Let's go" in the background, the Marcus Whitman statue records his frozen, expressionless face with text reading: "Me omw to Oregon Country spreading the White Man's...

Scrub In, an art performance piece, centered around the Marcus Whitman statue at the intersection of Main Street and Boyer Avenue.

“Scrub In” opens opportunities for discussion

Rohan Press, A&E Reporter November 21, 2019

The “Scrub In” performance art piece, in which participants scrubbed the Marcus Whitman statue on campus with water, was hardly literal.  “In fact,'' said senior co-organizer of the performance,...

Illustration by Elena Kaminskaia

Don’t idolize Narcissa Whitman

Nidhi Jaltare, Columnist November 14, 2019

"I am a stranger here myself," by Debra Gwartney, is a book about a young mother who fled Idaho because of its gender expectations. She makes peace with her roots by finding inspiration from Narcissa...

A Proper Monument a joint faculty and student curated exhibit in Maxey Museum, adds to the discourse surrounding the defacement of the Whitmans monuments. It featured the restored Narcissa Whitman portrait, here hung upside down with an accompanying definition of vandalism.

A Proper Monument? Narcissa Whitman Exhibit

Zoe Brown, Staff Reporter April 19, 2018

Avisual exploration of the discourse surrounding the Whitman family makes its home in Maxey Museum’s newest exhibit, “A Proper Monument?”, which opened on April 11 and will remain up until May 5. The...

Op-Ed: White Unsettlement 101

Lisa Uddin, Assistant Professor of Art History and Visual Culture Studies March 1, 2018

It has been almost five months since the portrait of Narcissa Whitman that once hung in Prentiss Hall was defaced with black spray paint, and Avard Fairbanks’ statue of Marcus Whitman on the corner of...

Photo by Tywen Kelly

Continuing the Conversation: Politics of Material Memory

Kate Grumbles, News Reporter February 1, 2018

On October 9, 2017, recognized nationally as Columbus Day and unofficially as Indigenous People’s day, the portrait of Narcissa Whitman hanging in the Great Hall of Prentiss was defaced and the hands...

Missionary mascots hold tenuous place in colleges culture

Missionary mascots hold tenuous place in college’s culture

Lachlan Johnson October 23, 2014
Though never formally adopted by the college, the Missionaries have been the school’s de-facto mascot for over a hundred years. Attempts to change the logo have been made since the 1920s, but generally failed due to opposition from alumni and an inability to unite the opposition in support of another name.
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