Exploring Arctic Alaska's National Petroleum Reserve with Debbie Miller

Debbie Miller is on a mission. 

Having spent considerable time in the far reaches of Arctic Alaska, she’s found a wilderness wonderland that most of us have never heard of. It is a landscape of superlative natural riches — the largest herd of caribou in America, the highest concentration of grizzly bears in the Arctic, millions of nesting migratory birds, beluga whales, polar bears, walruses, salmon, spotted seals, the list goes on and on. It is, like most untouched places, under threat of resource extraction and industrialization, and that is where Miller’s mission comes in to focus: spreading the gospel about this unspoiled terrain that belongs to each and every American.

So, why haven’t most of us heard about this special place? Call it bad branding.

“The National Petroleum Reserve” is not a name that inspires wonder and awe. It sounds like the place you’d stop to fill up the gas tank on your way to the much more famous Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which lies to the east.

And yet, this reserve — larger than the state of Maine, ten times as big as Yellowstone National Park — is the largest unit of public lands in the US. Its 23 million acres are home to the largest river (Colville) and lake (Teshekpuk) in Arctic Alaska, the aforementioned riches of wildlife and migratory bird habitat, the most prolific site of dinosaur fossils of any polar region on earth and more than 10,000 years of native inhabitation and history.

It also, not surprisingly, holds oil and natural gas resources, and neighbors the 1000-square-mile industrial oil-field development of Prudhoe Bay and other North Slope complexes.

While there are designated “special areas” within the Reserve  — denoting exceptional wildlife, recreational, subsistence, historical and scenic values — not a single acre has permanent protection.

Miller’s new book On Arctic Ground: Tracking Time Through Alaska’s National PetroleumReserve aims to change that. She is traveling around the country giving multimedia presentations that combine photography, soundscapes, scientific findings and storytelling, bringing her journeys through the Reserve to life.

She hopes to win over the hearts and minds of Americans, introduce them to this hidden gem and inspire actions towards protecting the best, most profound places within the Reserve.

And it seems like Miller has the wind at her back. Her mission was boosted by late summer political developments, including Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announcing the first comprehensive management plan for the Reserve that put approximately half of it off-limits to oil and gas drilling.

Still of concern is the future possibility of a new pipeline crossing the Reserve, moving oil and gas from the remote Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, where Royal Dutch Shell is attempting the first offshore drilling in the American Arctic in 15 years.

“If we listen closely, if we observe the fullness of life in this vast, wild Reserve, if we exercise restraint as consumers” Miller writes hopefully, “this great northern landscape may have a chance. When we begin to understand this big blank spot on the map, and love it, perhaps we’ll gain the wisdom to protect it.”

John Scurlock's "Snow & Spire: Flights to Winter in the North Cascade Range"

John Scurlock makes his living working as a paramedic for the Bellingham Fire Department, but finds his calling soaring high above the North Cascades in a small yellow aircraft that he built with his own hands. Flying in all varieties of unpredictable weather above the raggedy peaks and yawning glaciers of our “American Alps,” he circles his snowy subjects, does his best to focus his Canon 5DmkII 21 MP digital camera through the plexiglass canopy and captures vistas most of us will never see with our own eyes.

The results reveal a vast landscape buried in snow and encrusted in ice, a wintery terra incognito of terrifying beauty and austere grace: the frost-bound North Face of Mt. Triumph, impossible cornices on Cloudcap Peak, fire lookouts encased in rime, the Pickett Range hidden in mist, Mount Baker’s shining snowfields, Ripsaw Ridge and Skagit Queen Creek and Park Creek Pass in snowy, silent repose. This is the terrain that holds the world’s record for most snowfall ever recorded in a single winter, and Scurlock’s photography unveils the artistic potential of this seldom-seen northern range: “something primitive, forbidden and inaccessible, yet also profoundly and exquisitely beautiful,” according to Scurlock.

Scurlock's first book, Snow & Spire: Flights to Winter in the North Cascade Range, is a coffee-table-sized collection of his aerial photography published by Wolverine Publishing in Colorado. It represents a culmination of several years of determined labor and features stunning reproductions of his body of work, plus essays by geologist David Tucker and mountaineering historian Lowell Skoog. A display copy in the window of Winthrop's bookstore has attracted more walk-in traffic than they can remember for any other book, and the initial print run of a few thousand seems destined to sell-out as word spreads through Scurlock's networks of climbers, nature photographers, NPS and USFS staff, pilots, naturalists, scientists and other friends.

Christian Martin: When did you first start photographing the North Cascades from the air?

John Scurlock: My first aerial photographs of the North Cascades were in the 1990s when I flew up there in a Cessna with a friend, looking at routes in the southern Picket range for a possible traverse. But my first digital aerial images were in early 2002, when I began photographing Mount Baker and got connected with Dr. Kevin Scott at the USGS/Cascades Volcano Observatory. That led to my meeting with his associate and friend, Dave Tucker from Bellingham. We've collaborated extensively since then, with me supporting their research into the geologic and volcanic history of Baker. I started photographing the rest of the range in winter after I observed the winter mountains while flying above and around Baker. Because of my familiarity with the North Cascades through climbing, I knew I was seeing the mountains in a condition that was really unknown, and I knew photographs of the range in winter either were very limited or didn't exist. That led me eventually to my great obsession…

CM: What were the outlines of your obsession?

JS: Well, I was familiar with the range from climbing and hiking in the summer, but I realized at the outset that seeing the mountains in winter was an incredibly altered condition from what I was used to. I marveled at their stunning beauty after this snowy transformation. I knew I was seeing things that no one else had ever seen or photographed, and that led to my determination to somehow photograph the entire range from the air during the winter. I didn't dive right in however, but rather gradually expanded my boundaries as I gained experience. At this point, I am fairly satisfied that's I've flown into every nook and cranny of these mountains during winter.

CM: When did you begin flying?

JS: I had always wanted to fly, since childhood. I had thought that nearsightedness disqualified me, until I found out in my 30s that I could still be a pilot, though not professionally. After getting my pilot's license, I wanted to own a plane, like all pilots dream of. It was suggested that I could build a better plane than I could buy, and so after some investigation, I started in on my plane, a kit called an RV6 from Van's Aircraft. It took nine years to build, as I traveled, hiked, and skied extensively during that time. It's a small, 26-foot, two-seat tail-wheel plane of conventional construction. It's very versatile, with a fast cruising speed, good handling at slow speeds, generally docile, and a service ceiling of more than 20,000 feet. The design has stood the test of time, and it has proven to be a really great airplane.

CM: What is your goal in photographing the North Cascades and sharing these photographs?

JS: My goal with all my photography, and this book in particular, is to share the amazing beauty of the North Cascades in winter, from every aspect and angle. I've been enormously privileged to see things that are nearly incomprehensible in their wildness and wonderful aesthetics. I've been so fortunate to be in the position to photograph what I've seen and share those images with everyone else. Photography is the means to accomplish this; digital photography, a great airplane, and obsession are the driving forces, and not a day goes by that I don't remember how fortunate I've been in this endeavor.

Northwest Natural Bookshelf: Notable regional titles in 2011

Reviewed by Christian Martin

Beneath Cold Seas: The Underwater Wilderness of the PacificNorthwest

David Hall (University of Washington Press)

Skilled diver David Hall is obsessed with the weird cold-water ecosystems found off the northern Pacific Coast, with their iridescent squid, ghostly salmon, glow-in-the-dark jellyfish, psychedelic nudibranchs, curious seals and neon anemones. It is a great gift to all of us landlubbers that Hall is also a photographer who, through state-of-the-art equipment, innovative techniques and plenty of fearless gumption, captures this hidden world in glorious images rich in color, detail and ecological context. It is bewildering to learn what unseen life dwells just off of our local shores, and how little we know about this mysterious and beautiful world.

Potluck: Community on the Edge of Wilderness

Ana Maria Spagna (OSU Press)

Stehekin resident Ana Maria Spagna writes perceptively and generously about the ties that bind communities: people to people, people to place, self to story. Also serving as a memoir of her travels near and far, Potluck celebrates the ordinary rituals that define our lives.

The Way of Natural History

Edited by Thomas Lowe Fleischner (Trinity)

An environmental studies professor at Prescott College in Arizona, Tom Fleischner’s local roots stretch back to summers spent working in North Cascades National Park and the founding of North Cascades Institute. Defining natural history as “a practice of intentional, focused attentiveness and receptivity to the more-than-human world,” his vision of a zen-like study of the natural world is fleshed out in this volume with essay and poetry contributions from Jane Hirshfield, Robert Michael Pyle, Kathleen Dean Moore, Robert Aiken, Scott Russell Sanders and others.

New Land, North of the Columbia: Historic Documents thatTell the Story of Washington State from Territory to Today

Lorraine McConaghy (Sasquatch)

A unique and entertaining way to explore our state’s history, Lorraine McConaghy – historian at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle – assembles a wide-ranging selection of documents from public archives to tell the century and a half story of Washington State. Presented in colorful, sharp images, these documents range from the first telegraph to the new Washington Territory from Abraham Lincoln, the Point Elliott Treaty and a program from the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition through to FBI files on D.B. Cooper, blueprints for the Kingdome, radio transcriptions during the eruption of Mt. St. Helens, a handbill from the WTO “Battle in Seattle” and poster for SubPop’s Lamefest featuring an unknown band named Nirvana. Even ordinary artifacts like letters, wills, cartoons, menus, snapshots and advertisements provide insight in to the extraordinary trajectory of the Evergreen State.

The Legacy: An Elder’s Vision for our Sustainable Future

David Suzuki (Greystone)

In 2009, Vancouver-based broadcaster, author and elder environmentalist David Suzuki gave a last lecture that synthesized his perspectives and insights on the fate of the world: where we’ve come from and where we’re going. This book expands on that talk, with a focus on exponential population growth, the technological revolution and the ecological footprint of a global economy. Luckily for us, Suzuki also presents his vision of a sustainable future that is within our reach. A harrowing yet ultimately inspirational presentation from a vital voice of sanity.

The Historical Atlas of Washington & Oregon

Derek Hayes (UC Press)

It is difficult to describe all of the riches that Derek Hayes’ latest atlas project offers to the armchair historian. Its 200+ pages brim with more than 500 maps, photos, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, illustrations, advertisements and other historical ephemera, all succinctly explained and consolidated in Hayes’ descriptive yet succinct text. The journey begins with the earliest known maps of Washington and Oregon drawn up by explorers like Quadra, Barkley, Quimper, Gray and Vancouver – scrawled yet often elegant relics reflecting the limits of knowledge of the first Europeans venturing in to this rugged landscape – and gains sophistication as missionaries, railroad workers, miners, loggers and other settlers begin to push in to the territory. Later pages are devoted to the development of the interstate road system, national parks and forests, irrigation and hydropower, floating bridges and atomic and aerospace industries. Open to any page of Hayes’ bursting compendium and you’re likely to be engrossed by the diversity of materials and depth of research.

Snow & Spire: Flights to Winter in the North CascadeRange

John Scurlock (Wolverine)

Flying a small, yellow, home-built airplane out of Concrete, John Scurlock explores the North Cascades in wind, weather and light that inspires most people to be safe and cozied up at home. The results of his extraordinary forays in to the inaccessible corners of this range are photographs of a landscape seldom seen before, a wintery terra incognito of terrifying beauty and austere grace. *Snow & Spire*, a collection of Scurlock’s aerial photography and his first publication, is a culmination of several years of determined labor and features stunning views of Baker, Shuksan, Forbidden, Terror, the Picketts and beyond, plus essays by WWU geologist David Tucker and mountaineering historian Lowell Skoog.

Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle

Thor Hanson (Basic Books)

Winner of the 2011 Northwest Booksellers Association book of the year award and a Library Journal Top 10 Science Book, *Feathers* tells the natural and cultural history of the feather – one of the most highly evolved objects in nature. Hanson is a conservation biologist with experience in the field studying everything from trees and songbirds in Costa Rica, bears in Alasks and gorillas in Uganda, and he possesses the rare gift of translating scientific concepts in to prose both captivating and poetic. Writing from his home on San Juan Island, Hanson takes the reader back to the Chauvet Cave in southern France, through Greek and Hindu mythology, up to recent discoveries using DNA fingerprinting, all the while exploring the development and uses of this evolutionary marvel.

Empire of the Beetle: How Human Folly and a Tiny Bug areKilling North America’s Great Forests

Andrew Nikiforuk (Greystone)

Celebrated in Canada as one of their most engrossing nonfiction books of the year, journalist Andrew Nikiforuk focuses his honed investigative skills towards the tale of an insect “the size of a rice kernel” that has killed more than 30 billion pine and spruce trees from Alaska and northern British Columbia, down the Rocky Mountains range into Colorado and New Mexico. There are many villains in this man-made tragedy -- climate change, unsustainable logging practices, misguided science, a century of fire suppression – and the author makes his best attempt to draw lessons and look ahead into the unknown future of one of the world’s greatest natural heritage.

Faith of Cranes: Finding Hope and Family in Alaska

Hank Lentfer (Mountaineeers Books)

A finely-wrought memoir of a life lived in a remote town in southeast Alaska, Hank Lentfer weaves together threads of conservation, natural history, parenthood and family. Sandhill cranes, passing over the author’s home every fall on their journey between California and Alaska, serve as the inspiration for his quest to find hope in a world seemingly intent on crushing all things beautiful and natural.

Darius Kinsey, Photographer

Ansel Adams of the Pacific Northwest

You have to wonder what drove Darius Kinsey to sojourn away from the comforts of his stately 12-room Seattle home to enter the dripping, dark primeval forests of the Pacific Northwest so incessantly. Over the course of two decades, he was frequently finding excuses to jump a train or motor coach north out of the city to return to the logging camps, shantytowns, deep groves and snowy summits of the Cascadian back-of-beyond. Of course, he always packed along his large-format camera and crates of negatives with him. The tools of his art lent purpose to his wanderings.

Traveling through the untamed Northwest undergrowth, with its thickets of devil's club, vine maples and salal and ankle-twisting maze of downed and decomposing old-growth trees, was seldom an easy affair, and Kinsey didn't travel light. His 11x14 Eastman View camera weighed around 15 pounds and the large 20x24 inch glass negative plates were both fragile and unwieldy. The Skagit Courier reports in 1902 that Kinsey traveled with over 250 pounds of photographic gear to shoot one remarkable Doug Fir.

Even though his Eastman View was advertised as "an excellent camera of strong and substantial construction," it is doubtful that many Kodak customers pushed their equipment to the extremes that Kinsey did: shooting in all vagrancies of weather, crawling up and down fern-choked gorges, teetering across the goat trails of hard rock miners.

"For Kinsey," explains the Whatcom Museum of History and Art website, "finding the perfect shot sometimes meant dodging avalanches, crossing crevasses and jumping over rattlesnakes."

If he wasn't lugging around his camera, which occasionally was an even-heavier 20x24 model, he could be found next to waterfalls or a cedar shake cabin experimenting in the improvised arts of taking stereo-camera shots, making glass lantern slide images and capturing panoramic perspectives with his "Cirkut" camera, a self-revolving 50-pound behemoth that spooled out negatives 10 inches wide and 20 feet long.

The breadth of Kinsey's work gives off a sense of restlessness matched by an insatiable curiosity. I imagine a man who, so in awe of the raw landscape around him, couldn't sit still. The Whatcom Museum notes that even on family trips to the wood, Kinsey "was known to jump out of the car on a moment’s notice, set up his equipment on the shoulder of the road or disappear up a trail."



Kinsey is most well known for the record he created of the Pacific Northwest logging culture. His photos immortalize tableaus of mustachioed men in tin pants and suspenders, buckers crosscutting fallen cedars, horses slipping down skid roads, shake-splitters retiring to their smoldering stump huts and steam engines traversing massive trestles.

"Through a fifty-year career in photography," museum archivist Jeff Jewell recently explained to me, "Kinsey captured the monumental interaction between men, machinery and mammoth trees that defined early logging in northwest Washington."

Though he created a visual history of our corner of the continent majestic in scope, Kinsey's work isn’t simply about quantity or the dry assemblage of a historical record. There is a majestic, bold and original artistic quality to the prints he produced that calls to mind the similarly stunning work of Ansel Adams. Both share the same palette of rich inky blackness and the thousand subtle shades of grey, the shockingly sharp detail and eye for dramatic composition. Much like Adams and his beloved Yosemite Valley, Kinsey’s work presents the Northwest woods as a cathedral. There is a sense of architecture, space and depth, and a somber, serious light in many of his prints of the forest.

The Whatcom Museum, which holds and tends the world's largest Kinsey archive, has recently put on display 38 Kinsey prints, 21 of which have never been displayed in public before. Many of the “new” images are donations from locals who have found Kinsey pieces among their family possessions – large format negatives, photographs and an extremely rare custom album of 11x14 original prints.

“The real star of the exhibit is a four piece panoramic of a lumber mill with workers and their families, circa 1910,” says Jewell. “It's from four original photographs that revealed how Kinsey shot a series of 11" x 14" negatives that, once printed, (his wife) Tabitha could match and glue together as a panoramic image. It was an aspect of the Kinseys' work that was unknown until the donation of these photographs to the Whatcom Museum in 2003.”



“Some photographers take reality... and impose the domination of their own thought and spirit,” Adams once remarked. “Others come before reality more tenderly and a photograph to them is an instrument of love and revelation.” Kinsey, as revealed in his sensitive body of work, falls in the later camp. Those of us fascinated by the history of the Pacific Northwest – and in love with the forest -- are all the more fortunate for it.

photos copyright Whatcom Museum of History and Art.