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SEEK was a program that ran for a few years to bring urban kids out into the wilderness to work in the parks. This site is dedicated to the first year of that program.
A couple years ago, after seeing an article in the NY Times about Nick Fahey living alone on Cyprus island, my curiosity was peeked. I tried to learn more about SEEK and refresh my memories of that summer spent as a counselor by going onto the web. I could find nothing, which I thought was too bad.
For some of us, it was a pretty intense experience. The actual work done to clear trails or whatever was minimal. The park service was not actually eager to have the work done, and we were a motley crew that really was never successfully mobilized to work. So we spent six weeks moving among six sites, mostly in the Olympic National Park trying to live with each other. It was a racially mixed crowd. Many participants had no experience of living in the wilderness. Conflicts were many. I remember the staff almost coming to blows at the final meeting which was intended to evaluate the program at its conclusion.
The sites were beautiful.
The kids were between 12 and 15. They were often "out of control" as Governor Evans was promptly informed about the group that settled the first week at Sucia Island.
None of us are kids now. This is an early attempt at a website dedicated to that summer.
I would like to hear from any and all of you who were involved as kids or staff. What did the experience mean to you? What are your memories?
Write me. I would like to hear from you. Perhaps we can build this site up to reflect where people have gone. Hey, kids! How did things play out?
rlivingston@me.com
Email me with any thoughts| Campsite | Age | Site Director | Counselors | Students |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lake Ozette | 13 | James W. Sollars | Tim White | Micheal Hester |
| Leroy McCullough | Micheal Jackson | |||
| John E. Johnson | Robert Young | |||
| Wes McConnell | David L. Jackson | |||
| Daryl Washington | ||||
| Quilla Joel Lofton | ||||
| Troy Cottom | ||||
| McClyde Clifton | ||||
| Micheal Wood | ||||
| Roscoe Brown | ||||
| Allen D. Raine | ||||
| Bruce Daniels | ||||
| James Wilson | ||||
| Humes Ranch | 13 | Brian Shera | William Burton | Edgar Batiste |
| Richard Mesmer | Limmie Dillard | |||
| Corbet Clark | Delo Hayes | |||
| Gregory Alex | Luther Jenkins | |||
| Gregory Little | ||||
| Melvin Marshall | ||||
| Charles Price | ||||
| Travis Macklin | ||||
| Chris Green | ||||
| David Lewis | ||||
| Malcom McKinney | ||||
| Patrick Esslinger | ||||
| Delbert Williams | ||||
| Third Beach | 12-13 | William Hopf | Matt Witt | Jefferson Banks |
| Doug Pullen | Robert Turner | |||
| Dennis Brown | Anthony Owens | |||
| Frank Longstreth | William Thrasher | |||
| Roi-Martin Brown | ||||
| James Earl Bryant | ||||
| Benard Franklin | ||||
| John Common | ||||
| Eddie Hampton | ||||
| George Williams | ||||
| Ezra Davis | ||||
| Arthur Altheimer | ||||
| William Zei | ||||
| Ray Jenkins | ||||
| David Anderson | ||||
| Micheal Marshall | ||||
| Deer Lake | 14-15 | Doug Leen | Jay Sasnett | Carlos Carter |
| Michael Stone | Martel Calhoun | |||
| Ronald Ray Woods | Dennis Myers | |||
| Kimball Hoelting | Stephen Raible | |||
| Kenneth Hopkins | ||||
| Eddie Moore | ||||
| Willie Sly | ||||
| Walter Kimble | ||||
| Joseph Thurman | ||||
| Allen Sussman | ||||
| Charles Daniels | ||||
| Robert Chaney | ||||
| Randy Dixon | ||||
| Micheal Harris | ||||
| Jose Gantt | ||||
| Big Flat | 12-13 | Charles B. Jones | Jeffery Jackson | Tom Davis |
| Theodore Sheimo | Charles Dillard | |||
| Hulet Gates | Curtis Brown | |||
| Jim Barr | Micheal Thurman | |||
| Victor Moleson | ||||
| Gary Herrman | ||||
| Tony LeClair | ||||
| William Rivers | ||||
| Sucia Island | 13-14 | Doug Thiel | Donald Thomas | Micheal Adams |
| Robert Livingston | Allen Bell | |||
| Herbert Frey | Marlon Johnson | |||
| Harvey Lowery | ||||
| Micheal R. Smith | ||||
| David Steinbrueck | ||||
| Leroy Ward | ||||
| George Lover | ||||
| Stephen Metcalf | ||||
| Vernie Reeder | ||||
| Richard Weisgerber |
Billy Burton died recently, remembered for his work with youth in South Seattle. The Seattle Times reflected on his life.
Bill Burton, who did so much for South Seattle youth, dies at 75 (Seattle Times)
Doug Thiel, Site Manager at Sucia Island, died in 2022.
Douglas Aaron Thiel obituary (Elemental Northwest)
Frank Longstreth died young in 2012. A glimpse of his life appears in a reflective essay in The New Yorker.
A Recipe for Forgiveness (The New Yorker)
Frank Longstreth, Lecturer in Sociology, who died following an irreversible stroke, was a pioneer in the comparative and historical sociology of national economies, a thoughtful and nurturing teacher, and a long-serving governor of local schools around Bath.
Born in Akron, Ohio in 1950, he studied at Harvard University (1972) and the London School of Economics (1973), where he later completed doctoral work on the influence of the City of London on British economic policymaking. His early publications from this research were widely cited.
After a brief appointment at the University of Birmingham, he joined the University of Bath in 1979. As part of a group of economic sociologists, he contributed to the analysis of Thatcherism and the transformation of British trade union structures, and later helped shape the field of historical institutionalism in political economy, including the influential volume Structuring Politics: Historical Institutionalism in Comparative Analysis (1992).
Although mental health challenges limited his later work, he continued to contribute to international discussions, including a prescient 2007 lecture on the role of financial capital in European integration.
Where Home Is Really About Getting Away From It All (New York Times)
Herb Frey is remembered fondly by many of us. He liked the counsellor job and the kids.
Herb Frey retired at the beginning of 2014 after 26 years of working through/for/with a program targeting homeless singles and families in Minneapolis. It was a community organization at the start but gradually morphed into an affordable housing outfit for singles and families. We also organized folks to protest the Minneapolis and Minnesota governments to beef up their programs for poor people. We even went after the cops, protesting the crap they pulled with homeless people, particularly Indians.
Herb says he enjoyed working with this crowd. They were always pulling some crazy shit but were all the more interesting in spite of themselves.
Before this, Herb finished his Ph.D at the UW in German history, getting a degree in ministry from San Francisco Theological Seminary in Marin County (lived in Berkeley fortunately). Worked for four years as a minister at the church I grew up in in Pennsylvania. In 1982 I finally got married at 41 and moved with my new wife and her 2 year old son to Northfield, MN where Olivia had a teaching job at St. Olaf College.
Herb remembers the crowd doing great job running that little SEEK outfit 50 years ago. "What I did with poor people in Minneapolis grew out of that experience."
Nick Fahey was living in a cabin in the San Juans in 2010, in a life that echoed the spirit of that summer.
Where Home Is Really About Getting Away From It All (New York Times)
Doug Leen never quite got Olympic National Park out of his system.
Seattle adventurer uncovers hidden history of national park posters (Seattle Times)