Interview with Jeff Antonelis-Lapp

I recently interviewed Jeff Antonelis-Lapp, a friend of mine for over ten years who’s retired from a 37-year teaching career.

Congratulations on your retirement from The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington and your honor of being designated Emeritus Faculty. That’s quite an accomplishment. What have you been doing since you retired?

"In 2009, I was preparing to teach a class on Mount Rainier, and wanted to have the students read a book about the mountain’s natural history. The only problem—it didn’t exist. Unbelievably, there were no up-to- date books about the park’s geology, plant and animal communities, climate and weather, etc. I was reluctant to undertake such a broad, extensive project, but my colleagues eventually persuaded me to write the book. I spent the next seven summers doing fieldwork on the mountain, much of it accompanying scientists on glaciers, tracking endangered species and at archaeological excavations. I’ve recently completed and revised the manuscript for Tahoma: The Place and Its People, a natural history of Mount Rainier National Park. I’m now in the process of finding a publisher and hope to have it in print by next year.

Wow—that sounds terrific! What was it like working with all those people?

"I had a few contacts at Mount Rainier National Park from my years of leading students there on field trips, so I started there. When the staff found out I was writing a book, they introduced me (often by email, sometimes in person) to people who were conducting research on the mountain. Those experts in turn suggested I contact other people, and my network continued growing. One of the greatest compliments I receive when interviewing an expert is that they’ll say, “You seem to know quite a bit about this—are you a geologist?” An archaeologist or biologist will ask me the same thing. I think one of the secrets is to “learn their language” as quickly as possible and make their discipline’s vocabulary my own. The other trick is to be an enthusiastic listener. Most folks have a story to tell, and sometimes it just a matter of opening the door and then listening intently. I’ll ask questions when given the opportunity, or steer a conversation if needed, but I enjoy giving the other person the reins to see where it takes us. It turned out that networking played a huge role in my research and that in most of these fields, the circle of experts is quite small. It’s rewarding and a real door opener to be able to say, “Yes, I met them. They were very helpful to me.” Even today, after the research is complete, I’m in frequent contact with park scientists and other experts to keep abreast of their work and any fresh developments."

So you’ve finished the manuscript and now you’re looking for a publisher. What are your plans?

"I know I could self-publish to Amazon this spring and I know that there’s no longer a stigma about taking that route, but I want the book to have the distribution capabilities that a publisher provides. This is a regional niche book, so I don’t have any false pretenses about the “Big Five” publishers or national exposure. I’m hoping to work with a regional press that will make the book available at all the outlets where you’d expect to find it- local bookstores and businesses, the visitor centers at the park, and online, of course."

That sounds great, and I wish you the best. Do you have plans for a second book?

"One of my mentors published a similar book on Olympic National Park, and he’s preparing a third revision and groups still ask him to give readings and do book signings. I’m planning to support Tahoma for its entire lifespan, however long that may be, with the same sort of thing. In the meantime, I got an idea from the fieldwork I did with scientists for this book. We did surveys in the middle of the night, in lousy weather, snorkeled alpine lakes, and did all sorts of other crazy things. My beta readers have enjoyed those parts of the manuscript, and I believe that people would like Scientists Do the Wildest Things: Endangered Species and the Work to Save Them, or something like it. Imagine reading a book profiling ten or twenty scientists and the wild work they do inside volcanoes, wrestling endangered species or cloning organisms in a lab."

Before we finish, here’s the question I’m asking everyone that I’ve interviewed for this project. What’s your opinion on entrepreneurs, consultants and people learning how to make a living independently? Do you see more people gravitating to this trend? Any predictions?

"I realize I only have a small sample size, but many of the experts I interviewed for Tahoma were consultants or otherwise working independently. The other thing I noticed was that a university chemistry professor, for example, also served on the board of an organization whose work she admired or volunteered with youth groups engaged in the same kind of work. Just as it’s important for me to reach out and network (even when I’m terrified!), it’s essential to diversify how I spend my time. Besides my fieldwork and writing, for example, I lead interpretive hikes at Mount Rainier and supervise student interns each summer. I volunteer to help on other scientist’s projects. These things bring exposure, of course, but also keep me sharp and consistently meeting new people and learning new things. As for predictions or trends, I’m no expert, but if a person has the time and inclination to branch out on their own, they should go for it, right?"

So that concludes my interview with one of my great friends and mentors. I hope you enjoyed the interview as much as I did. Until next time...

Respectfully,

Dylan Larson