At Lenny Kohm’s Memorial

Abstract

The prologue begins at the memorial service for Lenny Kohm and introduces his unlikely career as an activist. It explains how the author became increasingly fascinated with Kohm’s story and describes the research journey that led to this book. In 1987, Kohm’s life became entangled with the political battle over the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. For the next two decades, he presented The Last Great Wilderness slide show across the United States. Kohm was not a traditional wilderness advocate but instead learned from leaders of the Gwich’in Nation to view the Arctic Refuge debate as a fight for Indigenous rights and environmental justice. Like other refuge defenders, he applied the “trickle-up theory of politics”: encouraging grassroots audiences to take action so that their concerns would trickle-up to the national media and elected officials. The prologue introduces some of the other characters in the book—including Gwich’in leaders, scientists, photographers, and grassroots activists—and places the small, seemingly quiet story of the Last Great Wilderness show in broader contexts. This history complicates familiar critiques of wilderness, indicates the impact of grassroots activism, offers insight in environmental-Indigenous alliances, and demonstrates why visual culture scholars should study non-iconic images.