50 Year Anniversary for Alaska, and for a Great Alaskan.
~~Lanie Fleischer and Helen Nienhueser - Powerhouses for Parks!~~
I wanted to share an occasion of great celebration I attended on Friday night. Helen Nienhueser had a gathering of family and friends to celebrate her 50 years in Alaska, as Alaska itself celebrates its 50th Anniversary.
~~Yummy spread!~~
Helen is an absolutely remarkable woman who I am pleased to call a friend. She is one of those people about whom you keep discovering new things. You’ll never hear it from her, but every time I talk to someone else about Helen, I find myself saying, “Are you kidding? I didn’t know she did that!” After a while it became almost comical. I’ll try to share some of her amazing accomplishments with you, with the caveat that I’m sure I’m missing a lot.
Helen Nienhueser grew up in Pennsylvania’s Pocono “Mountains.” She came to Alaska in 1957 for a summer job as waterfront director at the Girl Scout Camp outside of Fairbanks. After falling in love with Alaska, she moved back in 1959 and was hired by the Susitna Girl Scout council as the assistant director. She homesteaded in the Eagle River Valley, where she raised two sons. She became active in Alaska’s fledgeling conservation movement in the late 60’s and began work on what is widely considered the Alaskan hikers’ Bible – 55 Ways to the Wilderness in Southcentral Alaska, which is now in its fifth edition. That was the first book I bought when I moved to Alaska in 1991, and I enjoyed many beautiful hikes thanks to Helen. When I actually got to go hiking with her, I was a bit starstruck even though we’d known each other for a while. It felt like bombing around Florida with Ponce de Leon.
In 1970, Helen spearheaded a successful statewide movement to reform Alaska’s abortion law. Because of her incredible talent for grassroots organization, and her tenacity, Alaska became the third state in the nation to pass a law that allowed a woman, in consultation with her doctor, to choose whether to carry a pregnancy to term—three years before Roe v. Wade.
In 1971 she helped found the Alaska Center for the Environment, where she served on the board for nine years. Her volunteer experience in natural resource issues led to an 18 year career as a planner with Alaska Department of Natural Resources. During this time she returned East to earn a Masters of Public Administration from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.
~~Helen's beautiful collection of Alaska Native grass baskets and carvings~~
Her job at the DNR transferred her work from downtown Anchorage to Midtown, and she wasn’t happy. Midtown needed a lot, part of which was a park—which, assisted by the knowledge she gained from 6 years on the Park & Rec Commission led her to 20 plus years of twisting the city’s arm to get a park established and keep a road out of the middle of it. Our mutual friend Ruth Moulton’s leadership in the establishment of Town Square Park was her model. Today the Cuddy Family Midtown Park stands as testament to Helen’s leadership and initiative.
One thing Alaska is not short of is amazing, determined, women who do not shy away from leadership or activism. I have met so many, it’s hard to name them all, but Helen is right at the top of that illustrious list.
So congratulations on your golden anniversary in the Last Frontier, Helen. You have made this place better than it was when you found it.
~~A homemade card from one of Helen's many admirers~~
@Karin in CT
Well, I left when I was 18. So perhaps is a generational thing in reverse 😉
that’s because you are an Earth Angel too SMR….it is what YOU do…b
Isn’t it amazing, wonderful people dedicated to making Alaska a better place? Anchorage is such a dreary town in so many ways (the architecture — or lack thereof — the icky roads falling apart, the dirt everywhere… it is so unfriendly to pedestrians, bicyclists and family-time. Yet here & there are little pockets of loveliness, parks that we have thanks to dedicated people like this!
Sad, though, that so many who live here can’t be bothered to summon up the same enthusiasm for working to make our state & city a better place. So much time spent on one’s own home & garden, so few willing to extend that outward so that many benefit.
Reading something like this is a bit bittersweet for me. My family love to be outdoors and do plenty of walking, hiking, biking, etc., and yet I can’t get them to write letters to legislators, or even pick up trash on the city-wide clean up days… My mother has been here over 50 years. Some of my aunts were born here. And yet… I write letter after letter, volunteer all over the city, do all of the clean-up days, but can’t get them to get onboard. Sigh.
Thank you Helen. My husband has made it his routine to take his breaks from his job at the Cuddy Family Midtown Park. I am probably as greatful for this as he is. To be able to step away and have a place to reconnect/refresh outdoors is such a valuable gift. Thank you.
@bubbles Says:
i name women and men like mrs. fleischer and mrs. nienheuser Earth Angels. they live among us quietly. they make quality of life good for the rest of us. they just go along doing their earthly jobs and along the way ,the people, whose lives somehow intersect with theirs are changed in some way for the better. just as AKM changed mine….. may many blessings and long life be theirs……much love b
I couldn’t have said it better myself. Kudos to the quiet ones who do not need the limelight and unquestioned adulation of their “followers” to know who and what they are; who simply go about changing the world in positive ways. What a wonderful role model for young women!
I don’t know Helen, but someone should tell her she is entitled to a free ride on the Alaska Railroad in honor of Alaska’s and Her 50th.
http://www.alaskarailroad.com/arrc1038.html
i name women and men like mrs. fleischer and mrs. nienheuser Earth Angels. they live among us quietly. they make quality of life good for the rest of us. they just go along doing their earthly jobs and along the way ,the people, whose lives somehow intersect with theirs are changed in some way for the better. just as AKM changed mine….. may many blessings and long life be theirs……much love b
What refreshing information! The real deal: Alaska and people like Helen. These people should receive recognition for their dedication to Alaska. Unfortunately, GINO is too self centered to initiate any recognition…so this blog could be a start. Thank you Helen.
Oh, to spend an an afternoon with Helen Nienheuser, listen to her reminisce, and photograph that beautiful face. Happy Anniversary.
What a refreshing bit of information! This is the real deal: Alaska and the wonderful people like Helen. It’s time they are recognized for their contributions. Theirs is a heartfelt mission for Alaska, not for personal gain/show as GINO.
There’s a reason for that, womanwith… Palin is neither intelligent nor effective.
Sarah doesn’t ever recognize strong, intelligent, effective women.
Thanks AKM, for showing us some REAL Alaska women.
Now, if Sarah had any type of leadership ability, she would acknowledge this magnificent woman with recognition of some kind. Thank you for sharing and I wish this story would make it’s way to the MSM.
What a remarkable woman. Congrats to Helen (and to Alaska for having Helen as a resident) from way over here in CT!
@12 JRC: Ummm…I don’t know about this…I also grew up in CT (and I’m in my 40s) and have met some really cool women here in the numeg state. Maybe it’s because I’ve been active in the Democratic Party since I was 18?
Is there any kind of talk or movement to name a park , trail , lake after Helen ?? We did so here. I’m serious. Helen is very deserving of such an honor.
http://www.austinexplorer.com/Hiking/HikeDetails.aspx?HikeID=4
It may be generational Pat, but I also think it’s geographical. I grew up in Connecticut and never met a woman who liked to wear purple until moving to the Boston-closer-to-Vermont-and-NH area. Just an observation. (I’m in my 40s).
Hey now… the pockerno’s are mountains! don’t be telling the peeps between Scranton and Stroudsburg that them there ain’t mountains!
I think I encountered Helen Nienheuser in PA. prior to 1957. I was involved with th American Friends Society at that time.and her name just sounds so familiar!
JRC”
“My mother in law and the mother’s of many of my friends fall into this category. Most live in either Vermont or New Hampshire.”
I think you are barking up the wrong tree…………I think its more generational than geographical. The neo-cons started infiltraiting and altering the publishing & education industries, 30-40 years ago……….feminism became the norm and a lot of women, advancing their careers, were caught up in the bottom line instead of the IMPORTANT STUFF! Electronics happened!
We were saturated in nature, the quiet, study, & OBSERVATION OF. Today the kids science classes are more about studying, the inner workings, little emphasis on just sitting in the woods watching a mushroom expand and grow with a new rainfall. If you took a contemporary group of kids into the woods to try that, how many cell phones would be ringing, who would be twittering the experience?
Wow – who knew !! I mean you and Alaskans obviously know , but now we know of this wonderful woman. We were blessed in Austin to have the same caring , forward thinking woman to teach us.
http://www.wildflower.org/
Excuse my extreme north east person ignorance, but is Alaska sort of like Vermont, but way bigger and further away and ….well, way bigger? I live outside of Boston but know many women in the north east who look and sound alot like your admirable Helen Nienheuser (but maybe not quite so impressive). Environmentalists, feminists, politically active, super smart, warm. My mother in law and the mother’s of many of my friends fall into this category. Most live in either Vermont or New Hampshire. It feels sort of silly to realize how much Sarah Palin and her strip-malled Wasilla image has really colored my image of Alaska.
OMG, the table looks amazing.
Congratulations to Helen and thanks to AKM for introducing us to her. She sounds like a powerful person who gets things done quietly without promoting herself (unlike other Alaskans we know). Mazel tov!
I’d just like to say as a lifelong Alaskan of almost fifty years, thank you Helen and Lanie. We need more citizens like you in our state! God bless you both.
Happy Anniversary to Helen! What does Helen think of Alaska’s popularity now that palin shines the light on your state?
I bet she’s disappointed in all the negativity.
For those of you who didn’t know Alaska before Sarah Palin, the story of this woman is more of what Alaska is, in essence and reality, than SP could ever dream of. This woman – she’s why I live here! Her, and the trails, and the beauty, and the amazement of just being in Alaska. It takes my breath away, even after 30 years! Go Helen – you are one of the REAL persons of Alaskan royalty!
Household name here……fine writeup, great life, important work. A-1 !.
fantastic woman. one of many people i’ve met here who you can expect to still bump into out on the hiking trail, even though they’re not young anymore. quite humbling to be passed on bird ridge by someone 40 years older than you, and they don’t even look winded!
any single one of those achievements would have been monumental. everyone i knew in the ’80s had a copy of ’55 ways’.