April 6, 2023 — Dr. Timothy Smith — Communication Among Musicians and the Value of Live Events

Dr. Timothy Smith, Professor of Piano at the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA), will speak at Alaska Professional Communicators meeting April 6, 2023. Join us in-person with lunch or by Zoom.

Dr. Smith described by the Philadelphia Inquirer as “A pianist who interlaces grace with bursts of power and color” will speak about the special forms of communication that occurs among musicians and how that is transmitted to an audience in live concerts and the value of live events. Since the world has experienced the trauma of COVID and resulting isolation, can the genuineness, immediacy, and excitement of live classical music be replaced?

Dr. Smith has won major prizes in international competitions. He has given master classes in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, and North and South America. He has performed in over 50 concerts in Asia and Japan. In the U.S., his students have received honors and recognition in local, state, regional, and national competitions. Timothy Smith is a Steinway Concert Artist and is Associate Dean of Programs and Compliance at the College of Arts and Sciences at UAA.

During the months of COVID, Smith and his wife Rumi produced videos for their YouTube channel. These can be found via a Google search or accessible via this link.

Dr. Timothy Smith

In-Person Luncheon (Doors open at 11:30) or Zoom (your choice)
Program begins at noon

Inlet Tower Hotel and Suites, Fireside Room
1020 W 12th Ave. (12th & L and 13th & L)
Free Parking

Make lunch reservations by noon, Tuesday, April 4,2023.

RSVP via any of these three ways:

1. Click here to Register and Pay

2. Email, akprocom@gmail.com

3. Call 907-274-4723 and leave a message, including a phone number where you can be reached. When calling or sending an email, please include how many people are coming and their names.

Members:
$28 for in-person lunch
$5 for Zoom link
Click here to Register and Pay

Guests:
$32 for in-person lunch
$8 for Zoom link
Click here to Register and Pay

March 2, 2023 — Bonnye Matthews — Author Serendipities

After decades of work as a public and homeschool teacher, and working in business and federal government sectors, Alaskan author, Bonnye Matthews, experienced a life-changing event in 1988. No longer able to work; instead, she was expected to die. Knowing she had work to do, Matthews decided to write with an aim to prevent or reduce the hazards that changed her life. Her books on chemical poisoning let her hear from nine readers, each of whom told her the book prevented their plans to commit suicide.

In 2005, she moved to Alaska. She took an Alaska History class. Her fascination with who were the first Americans grew. Matthews continued to research while she wrote the Winds of Change five-volume novel series followed by a three-volume novella series and a tiny non-fiction booklet with a focus on her paradigm. All of her prehistoric novels and novellas were published between 2012 and 2018. Each of those is an award-winner at state or national levels. Needing a change of pace, Matthews shifted to write Arctic Dinosaurs which has already received an award and is entered in other contests. The first draft of Sanctuary: In His Pocket is just finished and has moved to the beta reader phase. She says, “It’s the hardest job I ever had.”

Bonnye Matthews
Bonnye Matthews

Feb. 2, 2023 — Rolfe Buzzell — Editor of two memoirs from the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush of the late 1890s.

Rolfe Buzzell has been a resident of Alaska for 45 years. He earned a Master of Arts degree and a Ph.D., both in History, from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was employed for two years as a historian for the National Park Service in Alaska and 29 years as a historian for the State of Alaska, Department of Natural Resources. He worked as a field historian documenting historic and prehistoric sites on public construction projects and he participated in the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill cleanup monitoring the protection of cultural sites. Dr. Buzzell authored 60 interpretive signs posted along Alaska’s highways celebrating the Gold Rush Centennial, wrote approximately 100 professional reports including a history of bridges in Alaska, and worked as an expert witness for the State on litigation regarding the use of navigable waters and rights-of-ways for historic trails and roads across public lands. He mapped and documented the ruins of the gold rush town of Sunrise and is an expert on the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush of 1896-1898. He edited two books by people who lived in Sunrise and nearby mining camps in the 1890s. His article, “Women of the Sunrise Mining Camps, 1895-1901,” was recently published in Alaska History journal. He is currently writing a history of the town of Chitina in Alaska’s Copper River Valley.

Summary of Presentation: Historian Rolfe Buzzell will discuss two books he edited on the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush of 1895-1901. The first is the memoirs of Albert “Jack” Morgan, entitled Memories of Old Sunrise, Gold Mining on Alaska’s Turnagain Arm (1994 and 2013),in which Morgan writes about his experiences as a miner in the Sunrise area. The second book is Gold Rush Wife, The Adventures of Nellie Frost on Turnagain Arm, 1895-1901 (2016, 2020) which provides rare insights into the role of women in one of southcentral Alaska’s earliest mining camps. Dr. Buzzell will talk about the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush, which began 20 years before the founding of Anchorage, and how he came to edit the two manuscripts. He will also provide highlights of these two books, which provide markedly different perspectives on life in a remote mining camp. The books are available from Alaska’s “Ember Press.”   

Photo of Rolfe Buzzell
Rolfe Buzzell


Jan. 5, 2023 — Tom Kizzia — Ghost Town Dreams

Kizzia traveled widely in rural Alaska during a 25-year career as a reporter for the Anchorage Daily News. Kizzia was named 2022 Historian of the Year by the Alaska Historical Society for Cold Mountain Path, his latest bookHe also penned the bestseller Pilgrim’s Wilderness, chosen by the New York Times as the best true crime book set in Alaska. And, The Wake of the Unseen Object, was re-issued in an Alaska classics series by the University of Alaska Press. Learn more from Kizzia as he speaks to us from his home in Homer, Alaska.

Tom Kizzia

Dec. 1, 2022 — Dr. Beth Baker — The Joy of Playing Music During Winter Holidays

Make reservations for this luncheon

Dr. Beth Baker will play a variety of instruments and share stories of her outdoor adventures, including climbing Denali, running dogs in the Iditarod, ocean kayaking, and her interest in recent science about music and the human brain.

Dr. Baker, a retired physician, was drawn to Alaska in 1982 because of all the outdoor opportunities. Her lifelong interest in music, especially holiday music, will help sound in the holidays.

Beth Baker

Beth Baker

Nov. 3, 2022 — Corinna Cook — Leavetaking

Corinna Cook asks how can a geologically-enlarged sense of time benefit writing that is motivated by immediate concerns and/or lived experience?

Corinna is a former Fulbright Fellow, an Alaska Literary Award recipient, and a Rasmuson Foundation awardee. She offers writing workshops, teaches at Alaska Pacific University, and is working on an oral history account of the early years of the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission. Her current creative focus is a book project centered on Yukon-Alaska art, ecology and history. More at www.corinnacook.com.

Corinna Cook

Oct. 6, 2022 — Bill Jack — Persevering on the Appalachian Trail

Author Bill Jack will discuss his memoir about hiking the Appalachian Trail, Perseverance. The presentation will include a video with photos.

During his adult years, Bill ran 5Ks, 10Ks, and some half marathons. Upon turning 70 years of age, he gave up running and decided to hike the Appalachian Trail. He didn’t realize that he had picked one of the most difficult long-distance hikes in the world. Learn what hiking the trail is all about and how Bill persevered. Attendees might be motivated to attempt their own new and exciting adventures.

Bill grew up active and loving the outdoors in the Finger Lakes Region of New York. After high school, he attended Greenville University in Greenville, Illinois. After graduation, he was offered a teaching position in Point Hope. After teaching and coaching basketball in several remote Alaska communities, Bill retired in 1998 and moved his family to Anchorage. His wife Penny and he now enjoy 11 grandchildren.

Perseverance is Bill’s second memoir. His first, Majestic Journey, described his Iditarod Trail Race experiences.

Participants can join the Zoom meeting at 11:30 a.m. for conversation and to troubleshoot connections. Please sign on by 11:50 a.m. to be prepared for start of the program at noon. Get details by sending a message to sherrie@arctic.net.

Bill Jack

Bill Jack on the Appalachian Trail

Sept. 1, 2022 — Mr. Whitekeys — “Adventure, Danger, Scurvy, Romance” by Mr. Whitekeys

Adventure, Danger, Scurvy, Romance by Mr. Whitekeys

The true story of the largest expedition ever organized during the 1898 Alaska Gold Rush. Eighty greenhorns from Chicago sailed to Alaska, built a 110-foot sternwheel riverboat, sailed up the Yukon and Koyukuk Rivers, and endured one of the most brutal winters on record. One of the prospectors lugged a 40-pound camera for 2 1/2 years and documented his time in the gold fields with over 100 images. His photos have been stored unseen for 120 years. This meeting will be the FIRST presentation about this book.

Mr. Whitekeys’ Bio

For all of his fifty years in Alaska, Mr. Whitekeys’ job description has proudly been “mouthing off and making snotty comments.”

In the early 1970s, while performing with The Oosik Music Company at Chilkoot Charlie’s, he gave the bar its world famous slogan, “We Cheat The Other Guy and Pass The Savings On To You.”

In 1980, he opened Mr. Whitekeys’ Fly By Night Club—Anchorage’s center for “Spam, Booze, Rhythm and Blues.” The Whale Fat Follies musical comedy satiric revue was a legendary production involving music, singing, dancing, costumes, and a photographic multi-media show. It was truly The Alaskan Show The Department of Tourism Does NOT Want You To See.

In his spare time, Whitekeys has written a book version of The Whale  Fat Follies (Alaska Bizarre,)  a monthly column for Alaska Magazine, and a weekly satirical segment for KTUU-TV in Anchorage. He also produced a cinematic lampoon of the state’s history, Alaska—The First 10,000 Years—and a DVD version of The Whale Fat Follies Live in Concert.

Since performing The Whale Fat Follies  “Farewell Tour” in 2019, Mr. Whitekeys has proudly continued to embarrass the entire Alaskan environmental community as the Commander in Chief of the Anchorage Audubon Society.

Mr. Whitekeys

June 2, 2022 — Evan Swensen — While you’re out there having fun in Alaska outdoors, I’m doing the same thing, but I’m working.

Evan Swensen, book publisher, editor, author, and Author Masterminds charter member, and his wife, Lois, publish books by authors worldwide. In addition, he has been the publisher and editor of Alaska Outdoors magazine and producer of Alaska Outdoors television show and outdoor videos, and host of Alaska Outdoor Radio Magazine. He has been an Alaska resident since 1957.

As a pilot, he has logged more than 4,000 hours of flight time in Alaska in both wheel and floatplanes. In addition, he is a serious recreation hunter and fisherman, equally comfortable casting a flyrod or using bait or lures. Evan has been published in many national magazines and is the author of five books and publisher of more than 1,000 books by other authors.

Evan claims to have the best job in the world; he gets up in the morning, puts on his fishing vest, picks up his fly rod, kisses his wife goodbye, and tells her he’s going to work—and she believes him!

See more about Evan Swensen and Publication Consultants at publicationconsultants.com.

Evan Swensen

May 5, 2022 — Jen Jolliff — Promoting Navigational Literacy and Decision-Making Through Her Book Fogrunner

Jen Jolliff, a competitor in orienteering races, will introduce her first novel, Fogrunner. The book is set in a world where map reading, good decision making, and efficiency are the keys to success. It is her way of encouraging navigational literacy in a generation for whom computer algorithms have seemingly taken over the need for individuals to process visual information.

Jolliff grew up in Waco, Texas, and graduated from Middlebury College in 1992 with a BA in English/Creative Writing, a life-partner from Alaska, and a love for navigation-based adventure. Two years later, she moved back to Anchorage. Jolliff ran the couple’s whimsical fleece hat company (Gimme Dat Hat Co.), worked as an activities therapist, and began competing in navigation races put on by the Arctic Orienteering Club.

Around 2000, she began to work as a custom visual artist, painting murals in homes around the city and creating wood carvings as commissions and gallery work. Jolliff has designed and facilitated two dozen large-scale permanent art pieces in schools and libraries through the Teaching Artist and 1% for Art programs. In recent years, Jolliff has shifted much of her energy to literary arts. More information is available at jenjolliff.com.

Participants can join the Zoom meeting at 11:30 a.m. for conversation and to troubleshoot connections. Please sign on by 11:50 a.m. to be prepared for start of the program at noon. Get details by sending a message to sherrie@arctic.net.

Jen Jolliff

Jen Jolliff