Bill Brown's obituary
Robert Utley
Lifetime E&AA member William Edward Brown, 86, died May 1 in Sequim, Washington. “Wild Bill”, as he was known affectionately to his friends, was a writer, historian, park planner, passionate advocate for wild places and inspiration to many throughout and beyond his 30+ year career with the National Park Service.
Bill was born January 19, 1930 in Seattle. He served in the Air Force during the Korean war as a weather observer, and graduated from Whittier College with a major in history in 1954.
He joined the NPS in 1957 as a historian/writer/editor in Washington D.C. and, later, Philadelphia. He transferred to the Santa Fe Regional Office in 1963, becoming Regional Historian for the Southwest Region the following year. Bill’s excellent study of the Santa Fe Trail, completed in 1963, was eventually published in book form in 1988. Bill became a trailbreaker himself as he took the lead in figuring out how to implement the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 to take full advantage of its provisions.
Bill enthusiastically joined the growing environmental movement of the 1960s. His passion for the environment led to a new assignment as Environmental Affairs Specialist for the Southwest Region. In this position he oversaw environmental management, education and planning activities in NPS areas and surrounding communities. Bill served during those years under legendary Director George Hartzog. Though Bill considered Hartzog a great friend and mentor, the two had rancorous debates. Bill famously quit the Park Service in Hartzog’s office in 1970 following a particularly acrimonious policy disagreement.
For the next year and a half Bill devoted himself to environmental causes, especially the Black Mesa Defense Fund, which opposed coal-fired power plants in the Southwest, and to his book Islands of Hope, Parks and Recreation in Environmental Crisis.
He was re-hired in 1971, serving for a year as Interpretive Specialist for the Southern Arizona Group, then back to his old job as Southwest Regional Historian. In 1975 Bill jumped at the chance to go to Alaska as a member of the Alaska Task Force that worked on proposals for new national parklands. His assignments--keyman for the Yukon-Charley National Rivers proposal and task force historian--provided wonderful opportunities for field work in remote Alaska, which Bill enthusiastically undertook. Bill would consider his two years with the Alaska Task Force as probably the most consequential of his career. The hard work of those years was rewarded in 1980 when Congress passed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, perhaps the greatest single land conservation act in history.
Once again chafing under the confinements of bureaucracy, Bill quit the Park Service a second time in 1977. He hired on with the University of Alaska and the North Slope Borough as an ethnohistorian and cultural landscape planner; his projects included preparation of a special planning document aimed at protecting native ways of life in the village of Nuiqsut. He returned once again to the NPS fold as Chief of Cultural Resources for the newly formed Alaska Regional Office in 1980. Protection of subsistence and other traditional lifeways in the new parks was a major focus of his work.
Bill’s book This Last Treasure, about the Alaska national parklands, was published in 1982 (and re-issued in 2005 as part of the commemoration of the 25th anniversary of ANILCA). As Park Historian for Gates of the Arctic and, later, Denali National Parks, he researched and wrote historic resources studies for those parks. Bill finished off his career with a two-year stint back in his beloved Southwest, where he coordinated planning for the commemoration of the Columbus Quincentennial in Santa Fe. He retired in 1991.
Bill and his young second family moved back to Alaska after his retirement, this time to the tiny community of Gustavus adjacent to Glacier Bay National Park. There Bill found a special sense of community that he cherished. In retirement he contributed to several special NPS projects, including film treatments for Little Bighorn Battlefield and Lyndon B. Johnson NHP, and was invited to speak or sit on panels at numerous conferences and symposia. He was a regular contributor to the George Wright Forum, and rarely missed an opportunity to add his eloquent voice to the spirited environmental and political debates of the day. He continued to be very active in Park, environmental and education issues throughout his retirement years.
Bill leaves behind his wife of 36 years Carolyn Elder, three sons--Darwin (wife Marianne), Randy (wife Karen), and Ken (wife Melody)--from his first marriage to Rita Sjunnesen, and two sons--Daniel and Zachary--from his second marriage to Carolyn. He also leaves behind five grandsons--Jedediah, Gabriel, Hunter, Noah and Cody--and one granddaughter, Ava. Friends and family are invited to a celebration of Bill’s life (date?) in Gustavus. Please send any memories you would like to share to Carolyn Elder (carob...@gmail.com).