About Me

I have a very vivid memory around March or April of 1969. I was in an Introduction to Philosophy class at Long Beach City College. I noticed through the small window on the classroom door my mom standing outside. I got up and left the classroom to see my mom with a big smile and holding an envelope from Lone Pine, California. It turned out to be a summer job offer on the Mt. Whitney Ranger District of the US Forest Service. This was literally a turning point for me. For the next forty years I worked as a Ranger and in the field of wilderness and outdoor recreation. My career started that moment.

I ended up working there for four summer seasons. In 1971, I was the first wilderness ranger to patrol the Cottonwood Lakes Basin. The next year, I was the first wilderness ranger to call the newly established Bighorn Sheep Zoological Area my summer home. Both areas were in the John Muir Wilderness Area. From 1973 through 1975, I was a wilderness ranger in the Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness Area out of Aspen, Colorado. And then in 1976 and into 1977,  in northern New Mexico, I was a wilderness ranger in the Wheeler Peak Wilderness.

In 1977, I started full-time with the Bureau of Land Management; the agency I would spend the rest of my career. I headed up the first wilderness inventory field team in BLM when we inventoried over 12.5 million acres of the California Desert for wilderness study area status. I transferred to Montrose, Colorado in October 1978, in my BLM position as wilderness coordinator. My mid-life crisis hit in 1989, I became the first District BLM Law Enforcement Ranger in Montrose and second Ranger in Colorado. Later I was a LE Ranger in Wenatchee, Washington; Taos, New Mexico; Moab, Utah; State Staff Ranger in Boise, Idaho; and then became National Chief Ranger for BLM (stationed in Boise but worked for the Washington, DC Office). My final year and a half I returned to the field as Resident Ranger in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In September 2009, I retired.

I was born in Long Beach, California. I lived a life playing basketball and baseball as a kid with great childhood friends. In the Era of the Vietnam War I attended Long Beach City College. For a long time I had two directions towards a career. Either a forest ranger or an airline pilot. With the draft lottery my number was 341. So the draft no longer was held over my head. I then went to and graduated from California State University at Long Beach (formerly Long Beach State College) with a Bachelor of Arts in Geography. There was a hiring freeze on Federal government jobs so I applied to graduate school at the University of Idaho. In spring 1973 I received a surprise phone call from Dr. Sam Scripter. Not only was I accepted, but I received a full fellowship which paid for my tuition, books, food and housing for two years. In 1975, I graduated with a Masters of Science in Geography (specialization in wilderness management and wildland recreation) which opened up doors to my later full-time career with the Bureau of Land Management.

Today I live in Montrose, Colorado with my wife Pamela and our German shepherd Dakota. We get out and travel a lot which also includes trips to visit our six kids, twelve grandchildren, and three great grandchildren. Hiking, camping, backpacking, river rafting is still a part of our lives.