Interior Secretary Ken Salazar will address the role of public lands in American life at the University of Colorado Boulder on Sept. 13 as part of a conference commemorating the 200th anniversary of the General Land Office.

Salazar’s talk is part of a conference titled “The Nation Possessed: The Conflicting Claims on America’s Public Lands” being held at CU-Boulder Sept. 11-14. The conference is sponsored by the Center of the American West and the Public Lands Foundation.

“It is a great privilege to host the Secretary of the Interior, along with many other distinguished public servants and influential Western figures,” said Professor Patty Limerick, faculty director of the Center of the American West. “This is truly a ‘be there or be square’ kind of event; for instance, the session at 4:15 p.m. on Wednesday — ‘Burning Man Meets Managing Man,’ on the relationship between the Burning Man Festival and the Bureau of Land Management — cannot be missed.”

Salazar’s talk is open only to conference attendees, and people may register for the conference on site at the University Memorial Center’s Glenn Miller Ballroom on Sept. 12 starting at 10 a.m. But several other events are free and open to the public, including two evening events:

— On Sept. 12, from 7:30 to 9 p.m. in the UMC’s Glenn Miller Ballroom, a former director of the Bureau of Land Management, Bob Abbey, will be interviewed by Timothy Egan, an author and writer for The New York Times.

— On Sept. 13, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. in the UMC’s Glenn Miller Ballroom, actors Clay Jenkinson and Bryce Townsend will present “The Public Domain and the Public Lands: 1812, 1912, 2112 Re-enactment/Pre-enactment Event with Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and a Visitor from the Future.”

A complete schedule of conference events is available at http://centerwest.org/events/the-nation-possessed/. For information on the CU-Boulder Center of the American West call 303-492-4879 or visit http://www.centerwest.org.