The river is what binds us all together and the stories of the river told by the Hanford Reach Interpretive Center will be our legacy to future generations. It will be a reflection of who we are and all of the elements that have been woven together to make the Hanford Reach National Monument unique in the world.
As storyteller, our goal is to bring our history, culture and heritage alive for learners of all ages. We will reflect on where we have been, who we are now and where we are going. Our story begins with the land itself and the early formation of the Hanford Reach National Monument via the Basalt Flows and the Ice-Age Floods. We will explore the peopling of this land from the Native Americans to Lewis and Clark and the early White Bluffs settlers who planted the seeds of an agricultural community. We will commemorate the Northern Pacific Railroad, the construction of Grand Coulee Dam, and the Columbia Basin Project that brought water to the Columbia Basin, transforming the land to an oasis in the desert.