Join us on Wednesday, July 10 at 2:00 p.m. in the Edgewater Room for a presentation and talk by Laurie Reemsnyder about the history of Southeast Asian Refugees transiting through Marin County. Roughly 180,000 refugees came through Hamilton Airbase in Novato in the early 1980s. Little is known about this part of Marin history. Laurie Reemsnyder will discuss her work with the International Organization for Migration, where she oversaw the airport operation over the span of two decades. Over 1 million Southeast Asian refugees settled in the United States after the Vietnam War, making it the largest resettlement of refugees in American history. The majority of these refugees came from Vietnam (66%), Laos (21%), and Cambodia (13%) between 1975 and 1994. 

Reemsnyder’s photography background inspired her to document her experiences at Hamilton, and various refugee camps, wishing to highlight the resiliency, hope, and enduring power of the human spirit.

Laurie Reemsnyder's bio: Reemsnyder graduated with an Art Ed degree from Rhode Island School of Design, and has been teaching Photography since 1999 in Vallejo and at Marin Catholic. She spent seven years coordinating programs for the International House of Rhode Island, leading cross cultural workshops and programs to help acclimate refugees, immigrants, and international students to the US. She then worked for two decades with the International Organization for Migration, supervising and photographing the movement. Recognizing that art is transformative and connects us all as humans, she designed a photo project documenting her service trips to Cambodia, Costa Rica, Fiji, Thailand, Bosnia/Croatia and Peru. Reemsnyder has lived in Mill Valley for 39 years. When she’s not teaching photography, she’s teaching line dancing or baking.