Gwich’in Relationship from 2003 Takes Centerstage Today

The sun gave me a magnificent offering of its rays as it rose over the Blue Mountains today.

Happiest day, beloved Joy Train Rider! I love you! Bless you. I affirm we are doing well.

I used to bounce out of bed every Monday and Friday morning particularly excited to share our experiences in the National Parks and publicly-owned lands system for the sheer pleasure of it. But as I’ve matured 55 months and almost 500 Joy Rides later, I find myself wanting to refine what I’m offering you - to become more attuned to your needs, considering the flood of information overflowing all our in-boxes.

To that end I searched Substack’s recommendations for increasing relevance and relatability. Among the things they suggest is to define who my likely audience/Riders are, and make it easier for you to support my efforts because you care. They encourage the Buy Me a Coffee tab that allows you to do that without necessarily adding to your reading list. Approaching my 75th birthday next week Friday, I’m glad my brain still has the neuro-plasticity to seek out new information, adapt and utilize it. So here goes:

Buy Me A Coffee!

This will supplement but not replace paying tickets to ride the Joy Train, though I’m making it free today A three-hour wi-fi outage delayed our tour.

I revised my profile description to state: “I bring more than 30 years of experience in our National Park System—and a passion for connecting the past to the present in ways that inspire curiosity, joy, and a sense of empowerment.”

No sooner had I completed that, the manifestation of what it means leapt out of one issue of our newly re-discovered collection of Pickup & GO! newsletters, published in 2003, with a story uniquely relevant today:

“The human face of drilling in the Arctic Refuge.”

The front-page sidebar headlined “Senator vows retribution,” records that after the Senate voted 52-48 AGAINST drilling in the Refuge, Sen. Ted Stevens, (R-Alaska) said,

“People who vote against this today are voting against me, and I will not forget.”

Senator Stevens retired in 2009 as the longest serving Republican Senator in history at the time. He died in an airplane crash in 2010, God rest his soul.

Now the issue is back front and center in today’s headlines, “Trump Administration Offers Vast Tracts within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to Big Oil Drilling.”

I’m extraordinarily pleased to be able to share this journey by Charlene Stern, a member of the Gwich’in Nation, when she traveled to Atlanta on an educational mission in 2003, at the invitation of my husband Frank who was then Southeast Regional Director of The Wilderness Society. Please allow it to enliven your heart and arouse your empathy on the Joy Train as you picture the experiences she describes:

Now Dr. Charlene Stern, she is Vice Chancellor for Rural, Community and Native Education at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

“In the summer of 2001, I moved back to my native community of Arctic Village, Alaska, after spending much of my young life attending public school in a neighboring city. The prospect of returning home to my respective Gwich’in Athabascan community greatly excited me, as I yearned to again experience the traditional subsistence-based way of life that has been passed down through our ancestors for thousands of generations.

“As our small bush plane landed on the airstrip in Arctic Village, I was thrilled to see the familiar faces of relatives and friends, many of whom I had not encountered in several years. Once we were through the accustomed ‘welcome home’ embraces, I was on my way toward the main village.

“As I settled into my late grandfather’s cabin, I could not help but feel overwhelmed by the many wonderful memories I had of spending my childhood summers in Arctic Village. Images of my grandfather sitting on the porch with his binoculars, carefully scanning the mountains for any sign of migrating caribou danced through my mind, reminding me of the strong roots I have to this place and to its people.

“The Gwich’in Nation comprises approximately 7,000 members residing in 15 isolated villages throughout northeast Alaska and northwest Canada. For thousands of generations, our ancestors relied upon the local resources of the region (namely the porcupine caribou herd) to meet their essential cultural, physical, social and spiritual needs.

The nursery of porcupine caribou herds such as this would be devastated by oil and gas drilling in the Arctic Refuge. CBC photo.

“. . . As the Gwich’in are among the last indigenous groups in the world to still have an intact subsistence cycle, we feel we have an obligation to uphold the integrity of our culture and way of life for the benefit of our future generations.

“Proposed oil and gas development within the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge threatens the future health and productivity of the porcupine caribou herd. The 1002 area, the coastal plain of the Refuge, is the primary birthplace and nursery ground of the porcupine caribou herd, which numbers 120,000.

“Recent efforts by multimillion dollar oil companies to develop in this sensitive area pose tremendous risks, not only to the porcupine caribou, but also to the hundreds of other species of wildlife that depend upon the undisturbed ecosystem of the Arctic Refuge . . .”

According to Google, today the total porcupine caribou herd is estimated at approximately 143,000, and while the entire herd migrates across Alaska, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories, nearly the entire population travels to the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to calve and spend the summer months.

Chad Brown, left. and members of the Arctic Delegation Cohort ally with the Gwich’in Nation to protect the Arctic Refuge. Chad Brown photo.

In what I consider a cosmic (natural) alignment, our brother and colleague Chad Brown, Navy Veteran, Arctic Explorer and Filmmaker among his many other titles, recently announced “the 2026 Arctic Delegation Cohort - a partnership with Hunters of Color and Color in the Outdoors that brought a circle or leaders into the Arctic to learn directly from the Gwich’in Nation.” He posted on Facebook:

“In Vashrail Koo Village (Arctic Village) the village chief and elders welcomed the delegation with generosity and honesty. Around kitchen tables and community spaces, leaders listened to stories of lineage, caribou migration, and the long fight to protect the Arctic Refuge . . . Development threatens migration, food security, cultural continuity, and a relationship between people and land that predates the United States itself . . .”

Beloved Rider I hope these glimpses into the historic personal relationships and the coalitions uniting to uphold the protection of one of our most ecologically sound, culturally significant areas in our country inspire and delight you. All is not lost, and never can be as long as we are determined to show up however we can in the righteous effort to safeguard the hard-won protections they’ve enjoyed until this administration. I encourage you to learn more and support the Gwich’in Nation’s efforts at The Gwich’in Steering Committee.

I leave you here at the station with visions of the porcupine caribou continuing to thunder across the mountains down to the plains, unbounded, wild and free to be greeted by the ecstatic people whose very lives depend on them. Until we ride together again on Friday, all being well, I bid you One Love!