Sandoz Society announces Kopp as Pilster Lecturer

Kopp is an associate professor of history and co-director of the Public History and Museum Studies Program at the University of Colorado Denver.

His presentation will explore the National Park Service’s dual mission of preserving resources while making them available for public use. The mission dates to the agency’s creation in 1916, when Congress directed the National Park Service to preserve resources “unimpaired” for future generations while providing for public enjoyment.

Kopp will examine how that dual responsibility has created a lasting tension at the center of the agency’s work. Beyond the NPS’s well-known natural parks, he will discuss how infrastructure, historic preservation and interpretation shape what visitors see and how they understand nature and the American past.

More than a century after its founding, the NPS remains an important part of American public life. The agency manages places where millions of people encounter the nation’s natural and cultural landscapes and learn about its history.

Kopp previously spoke at CSC in April 2025 about his manuscript, “Chile Pepper King: Fabián Garcia and the Botany of the Borderlands,” which he expects to be published in 2027. His research explores Garcia’s role in the development of New Mexico’s chile pepper industry and connects the region’s agricultural history to national and global markets.

Kopp’s first book, “Hoptopia: A World of Agriculture and Beer in Oregon’s Willamette Valley,” won the American Historical Association’s Pacific Coast Branch 2017 Book Award for first-time authors.

The Pilster Lecture is funded in part by an endowment from the late Esther Pilster, a retired Omaha schoolteacher and administrator who grew up on a ranch in northwest Nebraska. Funding is provided in honor of her late husband, Raleigh, and his parents.