Chattermarks

John Miles will read from his book Koma Kulshan at Village Books on Sat, May 1, at 7 pm. Photo by Brett Baunton.

Mount Baker was officially named by George Vancouver for Lieutenant Joseph Baker of the good ship Discovery who directed his captain’s attention to the dominant white peak on the eastern horizon in 1792. Discovery had dropped anchor in Dungeness Bay on the northeast shore of the Olympic Peninsula. Vancouver was impressed, and since he was naming everything encountered on his historic voyage, honored his lieutenant by attaching his name to this great peak. Thus did this mountain come to bear the name of an otherwise obscure British naval officer.

Native people had various names for the peak, but to early white man’s ears the name spoken by the Nooksack people seemed to be “Koma Kulshan” which, they thought, must be the Indian name for the great peak – but it was not. The phrase kwomae klelsaen can be translated “go up high or way back in the mountains shooting.” So, the phrase which sounded like “koma Kulshan” to the white ear referred to the region of the mountain, not the mountain itself. My book, Koma Kulshan: The Story of Mount Baker, takes the Indian meaning and tells tales of the mountain and the region around it.

I am delighted to have a new edition of Koma Kulshan hot off the press after more than two decades. The original research and writing of this book, which was my first, occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with publication by The Mountaineers in 1984. It sold well, but went out of print around 1990. For many years I hoped to revise and reissue it, but the publisher had moved on to other priorities, so it languished. Then, in the summer of 2009, Chuck Robinson of Village Books, the great independent bookstore in Bellingham, approached me with an idea.

Chuck is an extraordinary entrepreneur and is always trying (with success) to keep his independent bookstore flourishing in this age of on-line and big-box bookstores. He was thinking of going into the publishing-on-demand business by installing an Espresso publishing machine in the store. Would I be interested in publishing my two North Cascades books (the other is my edited Impressions of the North Cascades) this way? I would and we have done it. Impressions became available in late fall, and Koma Kulshan in March.

» Continue reading Koma Kulshan

We’re getting ready for Barry Lopez’s visit to Seattle and couldn’t be more excited. We’re meeting him tonight at a private reception near Seward Park, and then co-hosting his presentation “Speak, Landscape” at Benaroya Hall in downtown Seattle tomorrow night, April 7. Inbetween, Barry will be doing an interview on KUOW 90.3 FM with Steve Scheer at 9 am and visiting a creative writing class at Roosevelt High School with the Writers in the Schools program.

If you don’t already have your ticket, Seattle Arts & Lectures is offering a special deal on them to all “Fans” on North Cascades Institute’s Facebook page. Tickets are available online, by phone at (206) 621-2230 or at the Benaroya Hall box office beginning at 6pm. The Institute will be tabling our exhibit in the lobby, handing our information on 2010 Learning Center programs and selling the beautiful Barry Lopez poster we designed using Rebecca Allan’s fascinating tondo paintings — come by and say hello!

We’ll leave you with this introspective biographical essay Barry has posted to his website:

For most of my writing life I’ve been driven, like other writers and artists, to explore. The shape this took from the start was geographical, bibliographical, and conversational–I traveled widely, read voraciously, and sought out stimulating conversation. Central to the ideas I developed about what it means to be a writer was the need to remain conscious of the voices I encountered while traveling, reading, and conversing. The voices from two communities, in particular, held my attention: the circle of artists and writers with whom I felt the greatest creative camaraderie, and the group of people–family, friends, mentors, professional colleagues–to whom I felt most beholden. This latter group eventually came to include readers interested in the sorts of things I was trying to illuminate, people with whom I imagine I share a common fate.

A dangerous bit of American folklore is that our social, environmental, and political problems, which grow more ominous by the day, call for the healing touch of a genius. They do, but if we’re intent on waiting for some such remarkable individual to show up we can count on disappointment. The solution to what threatens us, however, is already here, in another form. It’s in our diverse communities. Most often we recognize the quality of genius in an individual man or woman; but the source of that genius lies with the complicated network of carefully tended relationships that sets a vibrant human community apart from a solely political community.

» Continue reading Barry Lopez in Seattle tomorrow, KUOW interview at 9 am

May 30 was a great day for a paddle in Seattle, with full sun and a light breeze to take the edge off. With a myriad of wild lakes, rivers and open sound waters to choose from, the Duwamish Waterway hardly seems like a choice location for an excursion. An EPA Superfund site, the Duwamish River flows through the backsides of various industries – shipyards, cement factories, and scrap plants to name a few. It is a heavily traveled waterway, where industry supercedes habitat. But don’t tell that to the osprey, purple martins, killdeer, bald eagles, great blue herons and other birds we saw out on the water that day.

Cruising past a cement plant

» Continue reading Surfing a Superfund site

Guest post by Molly Hashimoto

Abby Williams Hill visited Horseshoe Basin in the North Cascades in 1903 after an arduous journey by steamer on Lake Chelan, on horseback and on foot.  Her commission from the Great Northern Railway was to create 22 oil canvases en plein air in 18 weeks, and much of that time was spent on trains, handcars, stages, steamboats and horses.  She endured the jeers of railroad workers and the discomfort of heat and cold, walking across snowfields, organizing baggage and caring for her children whom she often brought with her on her expeditions.

Learn more about this remarkable woman from Andrea Moody, consulting curator at the University of Puget Sound, at the next Sourdough Speaker Series event on April 25 at the North Cascades Environmental Learning Center on Diablo Lake. In addition to Andrea’s engaging presentation, you’ll enjoy comfortable overnight accommodations, healthful gourmet food, naturalist-led outdoor activities and the incomparable scenery of the North Cascades — all for only $95 per person. I’ll be assisting Andrea, showing slides of some of my favorite 19th century American landscape painters who traveled to wilderness areas and set the stage for the accomplishments of Abby Hill. It’s going to be a great night talking about the connections between art and conservation in the mountains!

» Continue reading A Woman Lured West: Abby Hill’s Legacy of Art & Conservation