Park Remark Anniversary

Today marks the one year anniversary of Park Remark. A year ago I wrote a little paragraph about the 'Death & Dying Report Missing'. At the time I had thought I would be using the NPS Morning Report for a lot of story ideas. As it turned out, over the course of the year, it was pretty rare that I pulled stories from the Morning Report. Instead I found a lot of inspiration from newspaper articles, other blogs, emails from readers, and some of my own observations. The 238 stories generated on this website over the year represent a lot of work, more work than I imagined when I started Park Remark on a bit of a whim. The reason I have continued to write has been because it is fun. The purpose of today's post is to thank some people who have made the ongoing creation of this site worthwhile for me. To the "thank yous"

Nancy Bandley: First and foremost, I'd like to thank Nancy. I can't tell you how much I have appreciated the excellent series of articles she has written for this website. She is a very busy person, but she has found the time to volunteer these stories. I have enjoyed each and every one of her posts and can't thank her enough for her ongoing contribution. Thanks Nancy.

Kurt Repanshek: Many of my regular readers are probably already familiar with Kurt. He is the author of the National Parks Traveler blog. From the very early days of my website, I have enjoyed sharing occasional emails with Kurt, behind the scenes of our blogs. Some of these email were to talk about park related issues, but most of the time it was nice to have someone else out there to share the experiences of writing a daily weblog about parks. I have appreciated the quality of Kurt's writing and his willingness to tackle some tough issues involving park management and legislation on his website. Thanks Kurt.

Art Allen: Art occasionally writes a blog over at the PEER website, but what most of you may not know is that he is the moderator for a private, and very active email discussion group which focuses quite closely on management issues surrounding the parks. Art searches high and low across the web every day looking for stories that may be of importance to the ongoing park story. But more than that, Art adds his own insight to each story which draws deeper meaning to the issue. I would say that most of the stories written on my website over the last 8 months have had their start as a web article discovered and commented on by Art. Thank you Art.

Scott Silver: No one else has opened my eyes to the constant political push-and-pull happening behind closed doors in the Park Service more than Scott has. Scott has some very strong views. His point-of-view can come across as so strong that in the past, I had wanted to discredit his arguments as being too extreme. But, having shared many email conversations with Scott over the course of the last 6 months or so, I have completely changed my mind. Instead of seeing his arguments as extreme, I now see them as being quite sound, well thought out, and very conservative. As executive director of Wild Wilderness, I can't imagine how busy Scott must be day-to-day. That is why I appreciate even more the time he has taken to share his ideas with me in email. Thank you Scott.

Those Who Have Commented: This website would not work if it were not for the people who have taken the time to comment on the articles here at Park Remark. More than anything, I had wanted Park Remark to be a place where intelligent discussions about park issues could be explored. This web experience for me is satisfying when I see that readers have posted thoughtful responses to stories I've written. Thank you for taking the time to generate a discussion about park issues.

There are a lot of others who deserve some thanks. I have had a chance to share email, and even some phone calls with many folks over the course of the year, all related to this website in one way or another. And while I may not have mentioned your name in this post, I am thankful for your help in making this website very fulfilling for me over the last year. Thanks everyone.