Josh began traveling at an early age. When he was seven his family moved from
New Mexico to upstate New York via a circuitous route that visited 15 National Parks.
Though the long car rides have long since vanished from memory he has vivid
recollections of staring across the vast expanse of Death Valley, climbing up granite
boulders at a Yosemite campground, and exploring tide pools along beaches of the
Olympic Peninsula. These early experiences planted the seed for a love of beautiful
landscapes.
Though his focus shifted to organized sports in high school, Josh didn’t forget his
love for travel and wild places. The woods and fields around his house provided a
peaceful retreat where he could wander and enjoy the beauty in nature. A course in the
geology of National Parks taken his freshman year of college at Duke University gave
Josh the inspiration to drop his engineering courses and major in geology. He became
fascinated by the landforms that make up the earth’s surface and by the processes that
create and alter those landforms. Geology gave insight into why landscapes look the way
they do, but a world view limited to one discipline didn’t satisfy him. He wanted a more
comprehensive view that included the life above the rocks.
After graduation Josh set out to see more of the world for himself. Living,
working, and traveling in as diverse places as Colorado, New England, California,
Honduras, and Chile reinforced his love of landscapes, and fueled in him the desire to
understand how the natural world works from a multidisciplinary perspective. “I’ve
come back to school to focus my energies on understanding how landscapes work by
integrating pieces, patterns, and processes into a synthetic whole. Of equal importance to
understanding landscapes is to be able to effectively convey the wonder, beauty, and
complexity of nature to others. My hope is that through understanding people will
develop an appreciation for the natural world that will grow into a determination to
protect the beauty everywhere around us.”