2025 Special Emphasis Series
Throughout the summer, we invite specialists to share their expertise with our guests and staff, both in the field and through evening presentations. Consider timing your visit to coincide with one of our Special Emphasis Series speakers.
David Sibley, son of ornithologist Fred Sibley, began seriously watching and drawing birds in 1969, at age seven. Since 1980, David has traveled throughout North America in search of birds, both on his own and as a leader of birdwatching tours. This intensive travel and bird study culminated in the publication of his comprehensive guide to bird identification, The Sibley Guide to Birds, in 2000 and the completely updated second edition in 2014. Other books include a companion volume The Sibley Guide to Bird Life and Behavior in 2001; Sibley's Birding Basics – an introduction to bird identification – in 2002; and the Sibley Field Guides to Eastern and Western birds second edition in 2016. In 2009 he completed a fully illustrated guide to the identification of North American Trees – The Sibley Guide to Trees. His newest book - What It's Like to be a Bird - was published in 2020.
He is the recipient of the Roger Tory Peterson Award for lifetime achievement from the American Birding Association and the Linnaean Society of New York’s Eisenmann Medal. David lives in Deerfield, Massachusetts, where he continues to study and draw birds and trees.
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Birding, like any nature study, is all about observation, and real observation involves more than just watching. It means asking questions, making comparisons, finding connections. Art, sketching, writing, photography, and more are all great ways to slow down and make discoveries. David is looking forward to exploring the birds and the environment of Denali, and hopes that all participants, birders and non-birders, will come away with heightened curiosity, and a deeper understanding of the natural world.
In one evening program David will talk about his own development as a naturalist and artist, especially the importance of field sketching as a method of study. David’s second talk is about the psychology of perception and how it can lead, and mislead, our efforts to identify birds.
Dr. Patrick Druckenmiller is Professor of Geology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Director of the University of Alaska Museum of the North. His research focuses on dinosaurs and Mesozoic marine reptiles, particularly those from high latitudes. He leads numerous field-based paleontology projects across Alaska, from Southeast to the North Slope. Pat has conducted research on Denali dinosaurs since 2015. In 2018 he became museum director. In that role he oversees the state’s largest teaching and research museum that houses 2.5 million objects focusing on the cultural and natural history of the North and welcomes up to 90,000 visitors annually.
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Dr. Druckenmiller’s first presentation will introduce the unexpectedly rich and varied record of Alaskan dinosaurs and other animals from the Mesozoic Era, or Age of Dinosaurs. From this huge geographic region - extending from Southeast Alaska to the North Slope - he will put Alaskan dinosaurs into a broader context by providing an overview of the questions concerning the fossils found in the state, recent discoveries that help answer those questions, how we study these remains, and what its like doing fieldwork in remote corners of Alaska.
In his second presentation, Druckenmiller will focus more specifically on dinosaurs and ancient landscapes in Denali National Park and Preserve, based on his own field-based research. He will discuss some of the park’s amazing geological history, long before Denali itself was born. He will also describe the ancient vegetation found here 70 million years ago, the amazing variety of fossilized tracks from the park and the methods we use to collect these data. Collectively, he will discuss how we combine these types of information to reconstruct an ancient Denali ecosystem - an Alaska you’ve never before seen.
Nathaniel Herz is an independent journalist based in Anchorage, Alaska, where he publishes the Northern Journal news website, newsletter and podcast.
Nat graduated from Bowdoin College and spent two years covering Olympic level cross-country skiing and biathlon before receiving his graduate degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. After moving to Alaska in 2013, he spent nearly six years reporting on government and politics for the Anchorage Daily News and four years covering climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic for Anchorage’s NPR affiliate station before founding Northern Journal in 2022.
Nat now focuses his work on Alaska’s natural resources — namely its fisheries and its oil, gas, renewable energy and mining industries. His work has taken him from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands to Southeast Alaska fishing towns. He spends a few weeks every summer harvesting salmon at a small commercial setnet site in Cook Inlet, near Anchorage, which supplies Camp Denali with some of its fish.
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Nat’s presentations will cover his experiences reporting on Alaska’s fisheries and the diverse communities they sustain — from small Indigenous villages along rivers to big commercial fishing hub towns on the coast. He will also present on Alaska’s oil and gas industry and the state’s energy identity crisis.
Klara Maisch lives and works in Alaska, where she travels to remote areas to paint on location throughout the seasons. Her landscape-based work often features glaciers, geologic forms, and boreal and Arctic environments. Maisch has painted alongside scientific teams in the remote Arctic, packed paint into bear-proof containers, and painted at Denali Base Camp. Her methods, materials, and conceptual focus seeks to redefine Western traditions of plein air and expeditionary art through ethics of care, questioning, and collaboration.
She has worked on numerous interdisciplinary projects including with the Bonanza Creek Long-Term Ecological Research program, "In A Time of Change.” Her work has been supported by Rasmuson Foundation, the Connie Boochever Fellowship, The Puffin Foundation, and the Alaska Wilderness League. Maisch works seasonally as a guide for Arctic Wild and has previously instructed for Inspiring Girls Expeditions.
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Klara will share about her outdoor painting process, including how she accesses remote areas, sets up to paint, and the unique challenges of painting outside in all weather conditions in both summer and winter. Klara will also discuss conceptual approaches, art and science collaborations, and ethics of care in a time of climate chaos. She will also share her creative process by painting outside during her stay at Camp Denali.
Ben wrote two books about the human consequences of environmental catastrophe in Africa: Radio Congo about the people living in the wreck-age of Eastern Congo’s resource wars and City of Thorns – about people fleeing famine and climate-driven war in the Horn of Africa. After moving to Wales and beginning to research the coming impacts of climate change closer to home, his attention turned to the Arctic Circle and the boreal forest. What he discovered led to his third book: The Treeline and to a dawning realization that we needed to prepare – and soon – for major changes to our ways of life. And to do that, we need new institutions that promote new ways of thinking and learning, new ways of seeing ourselves and new ways of interacting with the non-human world. Black Mountains College is committed to that task.
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Ben Rawlence's first two books focused on the human consequences of environmental catastrophe in Africa. With his most recent book, The Treeline, Ben has turned his attention to the impacts of climate change in the boreal forest - the circumpolar ecosystem which surrounds Camp Denali. Ben will explore how the treeline can be a lens to see change in the Alaskan landscape and the prehistoric Arctic.
Ned Rozell has twice — 20 years apart — walked across Alaska on a gravel road that parallels the trans-Alaska pipeline. In between those 800-mile walks, he has written a few thousand stories on Alaska science and natural history in his job for the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute.
Born in upstate New York where he lived for the first 18 years of his life, Rozell migrated north as a radio repairman for the U.S. Air Force in the 1980s. Now, he has lived in Alaska for more than half his life. He has seen a good spread of the state, a lot of it with scientists who have allowed him to tag along and write about their research.
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In his presentations, Rozell will talk about what makes this oversized peninsula different from other places and the changes that are occurring here.
An award-winning documentary-adventure photographer, filmmaker, and conservationist, Navy Veteran Chad Brown is the founder/president of non-profits Soul River, Inc. and Love is King. In addition, Chad’s latest efforts include outdoor adventure travel, threatened wild spaces, and BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) communities. Through his projects, he connects the public to endangered lands, capturing the true essence of their peoples in moments of passion and the indomitable human spirit. Utilizing striking documentary portraits, photographic exhibitions and film, Chad also advocates for social and environmental justice.
Chad’s pathway began as a conventional one, but took on a number of unexpected twists and turns. He studied communication and photography at American Intercontinental University, then moved onto the Pratt Institute in NYC earning his Master’s Degree in Communication Design. He went on to manage interdisciplinary teams in multiple agencies, serving in various roles including creative/art director and photographer, as well as a freelance artist and editorial photographer for the New York Times. His efforts crossed into the world of hip-hop fashion and culture, where he worked with hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons of PhatFarm and Rasheed Young of Run Athletics, photographing and developing creative campaigns for national hip-hop culture magazines.
In 2007, Chad moved from New York to Portland, Oregon, once more expanding his life and career path beyond the conventional. Today, his adventure photography leads him around the globe - Japan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, and Bangladesh, and into the Alaskan Arctic several times a year. Mother Nature played a significant healing role from the war trauma he experienced during his Navy service. After a failed suicide attempt, he launched his first non-profit, Soul River Inc. in 2013. The organization specializes in cultural expeditions called “deployments” which bring at-risk youth and Veteran mentors together in threatened wild spaces for mission-driven experiences where advocacy and outdoor education meld seamlessly together. Soul River, Inc. also led Chad to Capitol Hill, where he advocates for public lands, wild places, and indigenous peoples and provides youth leaders of tomorrow the opportunity to interact with Congressional members.
In 2021, Chad founded Love is King, a second non-profit organization focusing on access, safety, and healing in the outdoors as well as conservation leadership training opportunities for BIPOC communities and other underserved voices.
Chad also serves on the board of the Alaska Wilderness League, Lower Columbia Estuary Partnership, and Northern Alaskan Environmental Center. He has been featured on the BBC and CBS, including Good Morning America and NatGeo/Disney’s Called to the Wild, as well as national publications like Outside Magazine and The Drake and regional publications in the Pacific Northwest. Chad was the first recipient of the Breaking Barriers Award presented by Orvis, and the Bending Toward Justice Award from Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley.
Most recently Chad is the 2024 recipient of three prestigious IndieFest Film Awards – including the African American Theme Award of Recognition, the African American Filmmaker Award of Merit, and the African American Theme Award of Merit.
To learn more about Chad’s non-profits and how to help, please visit Soul River Inc. and Love is King.
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During Chad's stay, we will screen a selection of his recent films: Blackwaters: Brotherhood in the Wild; Inward: Michi Meko; Resilience Rising: Echoes of Owyhee Canyonlands; and Boundless: The story of a peaceful warrior followed by time for questions with the filmmaker.
Pam Sousanes has lived and worked in Alaska for more than 30 years. She's part of a team of scientists that gather and analyze information on natural resources in the Alaska national parks. Pam's focus is on weather and climate trends. She maintains ~ 50 remote automated weather stations in the eight northernmost national parks in the country, including Denali.
Pam was born and raised in New Jersey and spent her undergraduate years in Boulder Colorado and graduate time in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She has always been drawn to the mountains and in 1992 she traveled to Alaska to work in Denali for the ‘summer’ and found home. Her love for science and the national parks has fueled her career for the past several decades. She lived in Denali for 20 years, but now calls Fairbanks home where she lives with her husband Ken and their golden retriever Luna. They enjoy all Alaska has to offer and love spending time floating remote rivers, camping, paddleboarding, kayaking and hiking.
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Pam will be discussing the science of climate change in Alaska—and beyond. She will walk through the state of climate science in relation to global, regional, and local trends and highlight why a temperature increase of just a few degrees matters in a place dominated by snow and ice. She’ll also share stories from the field, including encounters with muskox, bears, and porcupines. She’ll highlight some interesting Alaska weather facts, share a few personal stories about collecting data in a time of rapid change, and take you on a photo journey to a remote Arctic mountain pass with unbelievably cold wind chill temperatures.
Ronn & Marketa Murray are a husband and wife team, both in life and in business. They share a passion for many things, including photography, Northern Lights, nature, travel, and their dogs.
Ronn fell in love with photography in 2007 while working over the summer in California to pay his way through college. Later that year, he moved to Anchorage, Alaska, to follow his dream of becoming a professional photographer. It was then that he captured his first image of the Northern Lights and became entranced by their magic spell.
Marketa was born and raised in the Czech Republic. In 2002, she moved to Iceland and went on to manage TGI Fridays for several years. During that time she fell in love with the night sky, the Aurora, the beautiful Icelandic landscapes and photography. In 2011, she ventured to Alaska, where the two met and fell in love chasing the Aurora together. They were married a year later, beneath the majestic Aurora Borealis and have been “chasing the lights” together, ever since.
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Ronn and Marketa will be discussing the science behind the Aurora Borealis - why and how they occur, and when and where are the best time to see them. Additionally, they'll spend an evening discussing the best way to capture the northern lights in pictures and lead a nighttime excursion to look for and photograph the aurora.
Ralph Clevenger holds degrees in both zoology and photography and was a senior faculty member at the prestigious Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, CA for 33 years. He follows his passion for the natural world by specializing in photography and video projects of ecotravel, wildlife and the undersea world. Ralph has photographed assignments and led workshops around the world, and this will be his ninth trip to Camp Denali. He is the author of the book “Photographing Nature”, a sponsored ambassador for Light & Motion, and is represented by Tandem Stills & Motion.
Ralph’s publication credits include Audubon, Islands, Oceans, Outside, Orion Nature Quarterly, National Geographic, National Geographic Traveler, Nature’s Best, National Geographic Books, Smithsonian Books, Sierra Club Books, and many other national and international publications.
*additional fee applies to photography workshop participants
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Fieldwork will explore ways to capture Denali’s grandeur, learning to see beyond preconceptions and translating visual impressions into images you’ll be proud to share. Ralph will emphasize the importance of pushing your boundaries to create unique ways of seeing. And he realizes that understanding those complex cameras and processing software is critical to creating great images so bring your questions.
