Later this week, we’ll be arriving in Walla Walla, a city in the eastern part of the state of Washington, where we both graduated from Whitman College a lifetime ago.

The city is quite different today than it was back then, at least in one respect.

At that time, the crops grown on the surrounding rich agricultural lands were dominated by wheat and peas.

Today it is a land known for its wine grapes and wine producers. The area brags of hosting more than 100 wineries.

I don’t know if that would have made a difference to us back in our day as students, although I imagine it might have shifted some of my early alcohol consumption from beer to wine.

In any case, I’m preparing with a bit of reading: “Unsettled Ground: The Whitman Massacre and Its Shifting Legacy in the American West,” by Cassandra Tate. Downloaded as an ebook from Amazon prior to our departure.

The author dissects the changing historical narrative surrounding Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, who established and early mission, and became historical figures by being killed an attack by local indians.

History changes as it is constantly reshaped by ensuing events and beliefs. What was then commonly referred to as “the Whitman massacre” is now reinterpreted as the “tragedy at Waiilatpu.”

Early in her book, Tate reminds us that “history” in constantly being recreated and rewritten.

“…memory and story and history and fact have a fluid relationship. Heroes rise and fall to the rhythms of what scholars call “the politics of memory.” New facts are revealed, old ones dissected, and stories reshaped (and sometimes forgotten altogether) as political and social conditions change.”

This seems important to keep in mind as we try to assess the past, and the future, of Lahaina and, by extension, the rest of our island state.