The Springfield History Museum is holding a community conversation Wednesday, Sept. 16, as part of its “Farm Labor in the Valley” exhibit. 

Three people, Marta Lu Clifford, Karen Meats and Nancy Bray, will share their experiences of working in seasonal farm labor as youth and invite others to share their stories. 

Doors for the event, titled “Picking Beans and Berries: Youth Harvest Memories,” open at the museum, 590 Main Street, at 5 p.m. The talk starts at 5:30 p.m. 

“I actually got my start down this path because of picking beans when I was in junior high,” Bray, a labor activist who helped create the exhibit, told Lookout Eugene-Springfield. “Well, there are a lot of people my age who did this because this is how kids earned money for school clothes in the summer. What we’re hoping is that people who’ve had this experience or people who would like to hear about this experience will join us for the community conversation.”

Curator Maddi McGraw said the event will take place in the museum’s newly renovated gallery space and is the first topic in the museum’s new Community Conversations program. 

“I like to think of us as like Springfield’s living room,” McGraw told Lookout. “We’re there to have these conversations and for it to not just be kind of how people traditionally view museums, where it’s a one-sided conversation where we’re telling you things, but we want it to be two-sided,” she told Lookout.  

Admission is free. 

The talk is part of a series of events the museum is hosting as part of its farm labor exhibit, which is on display until Dec. 26.