Kim Heacox Explained

Kim Heacox
Birth Date:26 June 1951
Occupation:Writer
Genre:Memoir, biography, fiction
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Notablework:-->
Spouse:Melanie Heacox

Kim Heacox is an American author, photographer, musician, and environmental activist living in Gustavus, Alaska, at the entrance to Glacier Bay National Park.[1] [2] He was born in Lewiston, Idaho and grew up in Spokane, Washington.[1] Heacox is best known for two of his books, The Only Kayak, a memoir (2005,[3] [4] 2020[5]), and Jimmy Bluefeather, a novel (2015), both winners of the National Outdoor Book Award, and for his opinion pieces in The Guardian[6] that focus primarily on the climate crisis, global biodiversity loss, and threats to U.S. public lands. His most recent book, On Heaven’s Hill, is a literary novel author Kimi Eisele praised as “the kind of story the planet needs right now.”

Heacox first arrived in Alaska in 1979 as a park ranger in Glacier Bay National Monument (today Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve).[7] His memoir, The Only Kayak (a PEN USA Western Book Award finalist),[8] describes that first summer in Alaska. Heacox has authored 17 books, including five published by National Geographic.[9] [10] His novel, Jimmy Bluefeather (2015), was the first work of fiction in over 20 years to win the National Outdoor Book Award.[11] [12] He has written opinion-editorials for The Guardian,[13] the Washington Post,[14] the Los Angeles Times,[15] the Anchorage Daily News,[16] and the Juneau Empire.[17] [18] He appears in the 2009 Ken Burns film The National Parks[19] and has been featured on NPR's Living on Earth (discussing his biography, John Muir and the Ice That Started a Fire).[20]

In 1985 he began writing for National Geographic Traveler, a new magazine, where his 1987 article on Mount St. Helens won the Lowell Thomas Award for excellence in travel journalism. (He won the same award a second time, in 1990, for a feature article on Alaska’s ABC Islands – Admiralty, Baranof & Chichagof – in Islands magazine). His first full-length National Geographic book, Visions of a Wild America (1996), explores the writings of John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Robert Marshall, Rachel Carson, Edward Abbey, Wallace Stegner and Marjorie Stoneman Douglas, and the landscapes that inspired them.

Heacox was a professional nature photographer from 1984-2013. His images were sold around the world by the photo stock agencies Getty, DRK Photo, Peter Arnold and Accent Alaska. In 2000 he won the Daniel Housberg Wilderness Image Award for Excellence in Still Photography from the Alaska Conservation Foundation. In 2001 he served as the official photographer on the Harriman Alaska Expedition Retraced, organized by Smith College. Heacox’s photography, and his essay, “The Politics of Beauty,” appear in a book about that expedition, published by Rutgers University Press (2005). His photographs have been published in Audubon, Orion, Outside and Sierra magazines, in National Geographic and Smithsonian books, and in The Guardian and the Wall Street Journal, among other publications.

A 2021 newspaper article argued that political systems must become long‑sighted if humanity is to face any kind of reasonable future.[21]

Awards

Bibliography

[9]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: At Home kimheacox.com. kimheacox.com. en-US. 2018-03-27.
  2. Web site: PBS - Harriman: Kim Heacox. www.pbs.org. 2018-03-27.
  3. Web site: Review of The Only Kayak by Kim Heacox. 2005. Kirkus Reviews .
  4. Web site: Review of The Only Kayak by Kim Heacox. 2005. Publishers Weekly.
  5. Web site: 2020. Miles, John. National Parks Traveler. Review of The Only Kayak: A Journey into the Heart of Alaska by Kim Heacox .
  6. Web site: Kim Heacox. The Guardian. en-US. 2023-04-20.
  7. Web site: Bard of Denali: Author Kim Heacox revisits the national park that shaped his destiny. Anchorage Daily News. en-US. 2018-03-27.
  8. Web site: The Only Kayak. www.goodreads.com. 2018-03-27.
  9. Web site: Author kimheacox.com. kimheacox.com. en-US. 2018-03-27.
  10. Web site: Kim Heacox: Alaskan Writers Directory. . www.alaskawritersdirectory.com. 2018-03-27.
  11. News: Alaska's Tlingit Canoe Culture Featured In Kim Heacox Novel. Newman. Chérie. 2018-03-27. en.
  12. Web site: Local Authors and Artists: Heacox, Kim. Hearthside Books.
  13. Web site: Kim Heacox. The Guardian. en. 2018-03-27.
  14. News: Opinion Walk with us, Ryan Zinke, and see the folly in what you've done - The Washington Post. The Washington Post. en. 2023-02-24.
  15. Web site: Amazon.com: Kim Heacox: Books, Biography, Blog, Audiobooks, Kindle. www.amazon.com. 2018-03-27.
  16. Web site: Kim Heacox. Anchorage Daily News. en-US. 2018-03-27.
  17. Web site: Juneau Empire: Where's our Churchill?. www.juneauempire.com. March 16, 2018 . 2023-04-20.
  18. Web site: Juneau Empire: ANWR: Let it be. www.juneauempire.com. February 27, 2017 . 2023-04-20.
  19. Web site: The National Parks: America's Best Idea: Film and Website Credits PBS. www.pbs.org. 2018-03-27.
  20. News: John Muir and the Ice that Started a Fire. Public Radio International. 2018-03-27. en-US.
  21. News: Heacox . Kim . Why we need a department of the future . 27 August 2021 . . London, United Kingdom . 0261-3077 . 2021-08-28.
  22. Web site: 2020 Winners. National Outdoor Book Awards .
  23. Web site: 2015 Winners. National Outdoor Book Awards .
  24. News: April 14, 2016–Kim Heacox–Award-Winning Author of Fiction and Non-Fiction. 2016-03-16. Alaska Professional Communicators. 2018-03-27. en-US.
  25. Web site: Banff Mountain Book Competition Announces 2016 Long List. September 14, 2016. BANFF Center for Arts and Creativity .

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