BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Events - ECPv6.18.2//NONSGML v1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://live-events-ucsc.pantheonsite.io
X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Events
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H
X-Robots-Tag:noindex
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:America/Los_Angeles
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20250309T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20251102T090000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20260308T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20261101T090000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20270314T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20271107T090000
END:STANDARD
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20261109T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20261109T190000
DTSTAMP:20260930T214308Z
CREATED:20260930T181715Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260930T214308Z
UID:10017632-1794250800-1794250800@live-events-ucsc.pantheonsite.io
SUMMARY:Matt O’Hara – The Flying Death
DESCRIPTION:Bookshop Santa Cruz and The Humanities Institute present author Matt O’Hara for a reading and signing of The Flying Death—A dramatic tale of explorers of the 1930s racing to find and harvest a poisonous Amazon vine\, and how their work plundered local tribes and spurred the invention of new medicines. \n \nYour RSVP helps us plan for your arrival and keep in touch with any changes. Thank you for registering! \nIn the fall of 1938\, a young\, frail American explorer set off down a river in the western Amazon in search of curare\, a poison he thought might save his life. Richard Gill had learned that local tribes used curare-laced blow darts to kill animals\, but it was also potentially a cure for many ailments\, including his own. He also thought he could make a fortune by connecting the knowledge of two worlds. Obsessed with curare\, he raced to make deals with Indigenous poison masters in the Amazon and pharmaceutical companies back home\, even as his Russian-born rival Boris Krukoff sought to do the same. \nIn The Flying Death\, the historian Matt O’Hara asks who and what we are willing to sacrifice in the name of discovery and profit. O’Hara brings to life Gill’s epic quest\, a stranger-than-fiction true story that moves from unexplored territory in the Amazon to rogue medical trials and cutthroat corporate boardrooms in the United States. Navigating treacherous terrain and politics\, Gill and Krukoff successfully created a veritable curare-industrial complex\, as the plant became a key element in shock therapy\, transformed surgery in the United States and across the globe\, and eventually led to a Nobel Prize. The Flying Death offers a thrilling ride across Indigenous knowledge\, scientific exploration\, and exploitation\, unearthing a story of discovery that poses searching questions about the price of progress\, who pays it\, and who gets credit. \nMatt O’Hara is a professor of history at the University of California\, Santa Cruz. He is the award-winning author of many journal articles and two books\, The History of the Future in Colonial Mexico and A Flock Divided: Race\, Religion\, and Politics in Mexico\, 1749-1857.
URL:https://live-events-ucsc.pantheonsite.io/event/matt-ohara-the-flying-death/
LOCATION:Bookshop Santa Cruz
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://live-events-ucsc.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/The-Flying-Death-ucsc-events-banner.png
GEO:36.975497;-122.0287369
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR