Author Gary Ferguson has appeared on more than 200 television and radio programs across the country. His keynote addresses have been popular with a wide variety of conservation groups, including the Audubon Society, Sierra Club, The Wilderness Society, Save the Redwoods League, and the Land Trust Alliance. As a writer, Gary has worked for dozens of national publications – including Vanity Fair, the Los Angeles Times, and Outside Magazine – and is also the author of twenty-two books on nature and science.
Hawks Rest: A Season in the Remote Heart of Yellowstone (National Geographic Press), was the first nonfiction work in history to win both the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award and the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Award for Nonfiction. Decade of the Wolf (Globe-Pequot), as well as The Great Divide (W.W. Norton), were Audubon Magazine Editor’s Choice selections. His latest book, a wilderness-based memoir titled The Carry Home, was published in November, 2014 by Counterpoint Press. The Carry Home won the Sigurd Olson Nature Writing of the Year award 2014.
Ferguson was the 2002 Seigle Scholar at Washington University, St. Louis, the 2007 William Kittredge Distinguished Writer at the University of Montana, and a visiting writer in the graduate writing program at the University of Idaho. He currently serves on the faculty of the Rainier Writing Workshop Masters of Fine Arts program at Pacific Lutheran University. Gary lives with his wife, Mary, in Montana’s Beartooth Mountains as well as in Portland, Oregon.
"Gary Ferguson is one of the most engaging speakers we've ever presented."
-- Greg McGruder, National Geographic Lecture Series
"A true professional, and a most compelling talk … his enthusiasm, knowledge and passion for the written and spoken word is phenomenal. We highly recommend Gary Ferguson for all audiences."
-- Cheryl Schwartz, Association for Experiential Education
"Gary was fabulous. His talk set the stage for the entire event. He is eloquent, inspiring, and so down to earth. His sincerity, candor, and passion opened our hearts and minds and prepared us to share in a much more authentic way for the remainder of the weekend. I am so glad that he came."
-- Rob Meltzer, Naropa University Wilderness Conference
"It was an absolute joy to have Gary and Mary on campus for some of our freshman seminar students and instructors who use Shouting at the Sky in the classroom. Gary's genuine presence in the masterclass and instructor meetings, coupled with Mary's pedagogical insight for instructors made for an excellent visit that students are already proclaiming as the best part of the course. We were incredibly lucky to secure their time, knowledge, and kindness to our students and instructors!"
-- Kayte Kaminski, Course and Program Manager, Montana State University
"Shouting at the Sky, Gary Ferguson's beautifully written story of loss, hope, and the healing power of nature, resonates deeply with College students finding their way in a challenging and sometimes discomforting stage of their lives. In the stories of young people restored by companionship and beauty, Ferguson reminds us of the triumphant power of the human spirit."
-- David Cherry, Director, College of Letters and Science first year seminar, Knowledge and Community Montana State U
Here is alchemy; equal parts intellect, courage and honesty. In The Carry Home Gary Ferguson has accomplished what only the best of us can hope to achieve in a lifetime; he has spun grief into a golden exultation of the natural world and its ability to heal our wounds.
-- Mark Spragg, author of Where Rivers Change Direction and An Unfinished Life
Praise Gary Ferguson, for taking us on the most intimate journey from utter loss and devastation through rebirth and all the way to wonder, for letting the wilderness that had always saved him, save him again. Praise him for this big hearted, lyrical and loving reminder of why we went to the wilderness in the first place, of how it saved us and made us--and how it might still. If we are courageous enough to love it in all its diminishments, if we are brave enough to fight for what remains.
-- Pam Houston, author of Contents May have Shifted
A memoir that doubles as a an intensely personal, sweet, and melancholy love song to his lost beloved and to the wild places of America. As in the best nature writing, the human experience becomes infinitesimally small and yet paramount, the 'mythical shining through the mundane.'
-- Publishers Weekly,
Videos featuring Gary Ferguson
Wilderness is Patriotic
Importance of America's Relationship to Wilderness
