Portland-based historian Laurence Cotton will speak at the next Pub Night Talk at McMenamins event next week.

The talk, “The Olmsted Landscape Legacy Across America and the Pacific Northwest,” is part of a free monthly lecture series featuring the work of experts from the University of Washington and the local community. The series is co-sponsored by the University of Washington Bothell and McMenamins. Topics have ranged from black holes and butterflies to ecological resistance and storytelling through engineering.

Cotton has served as consulting producer on the 2014 PBS documentary “Frederick Law Olmsted: Designing America.” He will screen the documentary and lecture on Olmsted’s legacy of including green spaces in urban planning in the late 19th Century, including New York’s Central Park. Cotton will also discuss the work of Olmsted’s son, John Charles Olmsted, who designed parks in Seattle (an “emerald necklace” of dozens of miles of scenic boulevards, according to historylink.org), Portland and Spokane in the early 1900s.

The talk will be from 7-8:30 p.m., Jan. 29 at Haynes’ Hall at McMenamins Anderson School, 18607 Bothell Way NE in Bothell. Doors open at 6 p.m. While the event is free and open to all ages, seating will be first come, first served. The talk will be followed by a question-and-answer session.

For more, visit www.uwb.edu/advancement/speakers or www.mcmenamins.com/history.