Born and raised in rural Woodstock, Illinois, Steve became a teacher and later with a Master’s Degree in Public Administration became an executive director of a municipal association of thirty-five...mehr sehenBorn and raised in rural Woodstock, Illinois, Steve became a teacher and later with a Master’s Degree in Public Administration became an executive director of a municipal association of thirty-five communities. He now works on multiple writing projects in screenplays and novels and enjoys being a professional storyteller.
Humble beginnings meant family vacations consisted of piling into a station wagon for a twenty-hour drive to Sioux Lookout, Ontario, Canada to visit members of his mother’s family. Steve grew to love the town in the bush, its local characters, and wildlife. He became enamored with his Uncle Johnny whose life and adventures as a bush pilot were the inspiration for this book.
Those vacations and a father who took Steve into the woods and fields to hunt and fish also created an appreciation, respect, and knowledge of our precious eco-systems and a diet that was more wild game than domestic meat. Steve knew, as Aldo Leopold proclaimed, food did not come from the grocery store. Many nights of camping in tents and cabins made him aware that heat did not come from a thermostat. His involvement in environmental areas led to being selected a Conservation Teacher of the Year in Illinois and a Midwest Region Environmental Quality Award recipient.
Fulfilling a dream of owning a farm enables Steve to grow foods such as hazelnuts and chestnuts, beautify lives with lavender and sunflowers, contribute to the ag-economy with corn, soybeans, and wheat, warm homes with firewood, and provide many acres of wildflowers/pollinators for both honey and a source of wildlife feed. Soon solar fields will be providing clean renewable sources of electricity for hundreds of homes, decreasing global warming by taking tons of carbons from the atmosphere returning them into the ground, and improving the groundwater with the purifying vegetation.weniger sehen