Speaker 1 screened a 15-minute documentary, "Thornton's Wild Ride," and led a public Q&A on Thornton Edwards and the 1928 Saint Francis Dam disaster. The presenter said Edwards (born George Stern Edwards in 1894) moved from a silent-film career into police work, joining the Santa Paula Police Department in 1922 and later serving as a state motor officer, a precursor to the California Highway Patrol.

The presentation emphasized Edwards’s actions during the dam collapse. "By the time the sun came up on March 13, Thornton... was being hailed as the Paul Revere of the Saint Francis" for warning residents, the narrator said. The speaker and attendees described how Edwards reportedly prioritized his family, then went door to door, and deputized local community leaders to help warn residents along the river valley.

Why the dam failed was a recurring topic. The presenter cited research and a blind test of dam materials, saying the dam’s concrete had been judged poor quality and that the structure had been sited on unstable land. The speaker noted that William Mulholland had raised the dam’s height twice without reinforcing its base and quoted a researcher who concluded the project failed in part because of those construction and siting decisions. The talk placed the collapse just before midnight on March 12, 1928, when an estimated 12 billion gallons of water were released down the Santa Clara River.

Audience members pressed for details the records do not clearly provide. When asked about Edwards’s 1939 firing as Santa Paula police chief, the presenter said council records are sparse and that the precise reason remains unclear: "the notes themselves... are very, very scant." The talk also recounted accusations that surfaced decades later during a 1990s debate over a memorial statue; Speaker 1 said allegations of racism and drunkenness were reported then but that she had not found conclusive historical documentation in earlier sources.

On casualties, the presenter gave the official toll as "under 430-ish" and noted other estimates closer to 600, adding that exact totals remain uncertain because many victims were never identified. The speaker cited academic work (Anne Stansell's thesis) and local memorials, and noted 28 unidentified burials at the Santa Paula cemetery.

The program included local-museum discussion and artifacts. Speaker 1 displayed Thornton’s gold bravery medal, which Terry Foley later purchased at auction and has loaned for safekeeping. When an audience member asked whether the documentary would be posted online, Speaker 1 said it was not previously available because of copyright but that it would be posted that night: "Now Deb's gonna put it online... It'll be online tonight."

The presentation closed with the circulation of a small chunk of dam concrete gifted to the organizers as a tactile example of the structure's material quality. The speaker thanked attendees and encouraged further research and preservation of local memory around the Saint Francis disaster.