User:Joel Russ

Who, Where, What

This user has been editing Wikipedia for more than 15 years.

This user has been on Wikipedia for 20 years, 3 months and 4 days.

This user comes from Canada.

This user loves the Great Outdoors.

This user is interested in his local history.

This user enjoys bicycling.

This user enjoys writing.

This user supports the use of green energy.

This user is a participant in WikiProject Environment.

This user is a carpenter.

This user is a Welder.

This user enjoys jazz music.

This user enjoys classical music.

This user enjoys rock music.

This user's garden is full of as many useful plants as possible.

This user is a railfan.

This user enjoys XC skiing.

This user plays bocce.

This user enjoys volunteering.

This user recycles waste when possible.

I'm in western Canada.

Career life: I've been a journalist, photographer, freelance general researcher, teacher of journalism, administrator, garlic farmer, ghostwriter, non-fiction author... not in that order. Have written for Canadian and American national magazines, as well as for regional magazines and newspapers, and for academic and business journals.

Projects: I'm a board member of our valley's Streamkeepers environmental society.

In the past, I've been a regional columnist on country living and food gardening, and prior to that had worked as an administrator of an agricultural association.

My degree is jointly in Psychology and Social Science. I took further education in Magazine Journalism, Ecology, and Experimental Design.

Interests include: Positive community interfaces with natural environments (especially forests, rivers, lakes). Hiking. X-C skiing. Building. (This is a covered, timber-frame bridge I worked on as a volunteer.) Gardening & trees. Bench-Carpentry & Mechanics (designing and building useful things of wood, metal, and other materials). Movies (including vintage and classic films).

I've been a traveller. I'm interested in technology, but don't feel that technology is the sole (or even the foremost) answer to the problems of humankind. “Tacking another billion transistors onto a CPU is not going to solve most of the world’s problems.” – Simon Clark, tech mentor, Guelph, Ontario.

Frequent reading: Biographies. Aspects of history. Various topics in botany, general biology, arboriculture, and gardening. Sustainability strategies. renewable-energy technologies. Successful projects for the public good (esp. at the community level).

Miscellaneous: Organized the first "third-party" forest-certification seminar in Canada's Columbia region, for lumber-industry professionals. Was awarded the "British Columbia Forests Excellence Award" 1999/2000.

Also, have done copy-editing for English translations from Far Eastern languages as well as editing of material to be presented in learning institutions in the Far East.

I believe in the importance of NGOs.

My longer writings:

The Chosen Spot - 2010 - Archive, Sonoma County Museum, Santa Rosa, California.

Paper - 1992 - Canadian National Exhibition Centre (Castlegar) ISBN 0-9696576-0-9 A brief international history of paper from ancient times to present; also, a guide to small-batch production of paper for teachers, students, craftspeople, and others.

Planet Earth Pages (writer/editor) - 1992 - Banyen Books (Vancouver)

Contemporary Stained Glass - 1985 - Doubleday ISBN 0-385-23338-8 A compendium of Canadian architectural glass and independent panels. Full-colour plates. Seventeen artist/deigners from six provinces.

A Bibliography for a New Library - 1979 - New Seeds Information, New Denver, B.C., Canada.

[Edited: two volumes in the series A Life in the Woods, oral histories concerning forestry and lumber milling in British Columbia; for the Nelson Museum. On-line: http://touchstonesnelson.ca/exhibitions/forest/ ]