National Scenic Visitors Center
Earthwalk USA
Sharing the wonder of America’s diverse landscapes, instilling the passion to explore and the will to protect.
Click on their names to find out more about these cool people.
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The National Scenic Visitors Center project has been ‘making strides’ as it were, towards our goal of creating the largest walkable relief map in the universe. (Or at least on the Earth – in case extraterrestrials have beaten us to it on Altair IV.)
We’re moving forward with the creation of the Earthwalk Traveler exhibit, which will enable us to showcase walkable relief in museums across the USA. We’re registering to attend national museum tradeshows both this year and next. Our booth will feature a sample of the map and information on our plans and progress. We’re looking forward to a great stretch ahead, feet to earth and relief in sight. Stay tuned! At a recent April NSVC Board meeting, our Mission Statement was finalised and approved.
To share the wonder of America’s diverse landscapes, instilling the passion to explore and the will to protect Thanks to all the contributing Board Directors. It’s the end result of an intense and passionate work session. Professional Museum Consultant Amy Hollander brings her far-reaching expertise to the NSVC project
Farmstead, The Eversole Hall House, and Historic Walnford . Hollander has worked with thousands of students and visitors to inspire them to use their imaginations and to become engaged in creating their own places in history.
Hollander’s most recent project was to lead the team which successfully completed a 16 month, $8.5 million contract to design the National Museum of Industrial History (NMIH) in the historic 1914 Bethlehem Steel Electrical Repair Shop. For this project, she developed a 13,000 square foot permanent exhibit on America’s industrial history while supervising the interior renovations of the historic structure to insure historical integrity was maintained. Her contributions have extended the museum’s visibility and reputation locally, nationally and internationally. Amy has assisted the NSVC effort since last year and begins an expanded role this spring. We extend a hearty and appreciative welcome to two new NSVC board directors; Dr. Phil Reeder and Stacy Krenn.
Dr. Phil Reeder is Dean of Duquesne University’s Bayer School of Natural and Environmental Sciences. Phil’s research and areas of expertise focus on environmental change, paleo-climate and landscape evolution; environmental education, sustainability and the human role in environmental change; and paleo-environments, geoarchaeology and cultural landscape evolution. Prior to joining the Bayer School as Dean, Dr. Reeder served as Director of the Environmental Science and Policy Program in the College of Arts and Sciences, Geography Department, at the University of Southern Florida. In 1994, Reeder served as a prestigious Fulbright Scholar in Peru, where he led workshops about the environment for Peruvian educators and conducted environmental contamination and geoarchaeological research. Dr. Reeder’s work has appeared in the Journal of Cave and Karst Studies, Focus on Geography, Professional Geographer and Geoarchaeology and Karst: A New Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. in Geography from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, his master’s degree in Geography from Western Kentucky University, and his bachelor’s degree in Earth Science from Frostburg State University. Stacy Krenn is a young Pittsburgh-based photographer, adventurer and distinguished employee at REI (Recreational Equipment, Inc), a leader in the outdoor equipment field. REI is a co-op business with roughly a million members. In 2015, Stacy distinguished herself at REI as their Anderson Award Winner, a national award given to an outstanding employee. In a recent leave of absence from REI, Stacy spent 14 months on the road, visiting and photographing 52 National Parks in 52 weeks, as well as parks in Canada and other natural sites. A Penn State graduate, Stacy has previous non-profit and social media experience. THANK YOU to all who have helped us start the year with your support…!
If you want to join those who have responded to our Family & Friends Appeal, please consider a contribution. Matt Kambic, Mary Ellen Snyder, Dan Beaupre, Ray Ghelardi, Vicki Kulifay, and Waverly Walker established the National Scenic Visitors Center / Earthwalk USA non-profit in January 2016. Together, we’re creating a tactile, immersive experience that showcases the remarkable physical nature of the USA. When completed, you and your friends and family will be able to walk across the largest relief map on Earth. And help us champion environmental stewardship along the way. We hope you’ll consider making a contribution to this slightly audacious, expressly adventurous, and sure-to-be iconic national project. In a time when the world is spinning with sensory overload from flat screens, our map will be a meeting place of feet, minds, and hearts over our common and shared ground, featuring real air, walkable distances and actual gravity! * * * Clicking on the Donate link will take you to our secure, encrypted, SSL web menu, where the organization we work with, Flipcause, will attend to the transaction. (You can read about Flipcause’s comprehensive security measures here.) Now back to our map-making…! Click below for a preview of the NSVC and Earthwalk USA map. (Copyright 2017 National Scenic Visitors CenterSM / Earthwalk USASM.) 3D renderings courtesy of CADnetics, Inc. Music courtesy of Matthew Walker/Alan Berliant.
A brief update on our traveling, smaller version of the Earthwalk USA map.
The Earthwalk TravelerSM (ET) exhibit is being designed as a compact but powerful traveling museum exhibit. The ET team is expanding weekly, with a host of contributors adding to the pool of creativity and knowledge as we move forward. By creating a transformative proof-of-concept piece, the NSVC can achieve several goals:
We’ll be updating this site with concept sketches and more glimpses of the EWT in the next few months. For more details, click here. Onward…! NSVC Board Member Ray Ghelardi reports on his visit to Alaska this summer…
‘Alaska is incredible…I have never seen such wild, spectacular and savagely rugged terrain before, and with nobody living in it. There are more bears in Alaska than people. Flew into Denali National Park, visited Skagway, Ketchikan, Juneau, Sitka and others. Saw the Hubbard and Mendenhall glaciers among others. Spent time with a four time winner of the Iditarod (Jeff King, a wonderful guy) etc. We will have a challenge presenting the wonders of Alaska in the map project! Amazing terrain! The largest national park in the US is in Alaska, the Tongass National Forest…..HUGE and beautiful.” Monticello
August 2017 A recent trip to Charlottesville VA (after the recent news of the confrontations there) included a tour of the mountaintop home of Thomas Jefferson. The tour guide very well informed, expressive, and responsive to visitors’ questions. Jefferson was trained as both a lawyer and an architect, ever curious and inventive, and that is revealed in his residence. His most important achievements were (according to himself): • The Declaration of Independence • Virginia’s Freedom of Religion law (he said he was a ‘sect of one’) • Founding of the University of Virginia – America’s first secular University. (Looking from the West veranda, there is a little window between the trees through which you can see the UVA rotunda.) There is insightful history in the story about the enslaved people who built and operated the estate, especially the Hemmings family. Of the many amazing technological devices Jefferson left, the spherical sundial is a favorite. There are also clocks and windspeed/direction indicators built into the mansion. Originally there was a gong on the rooftop, audible for miles, to chime the hours! |
Engineering the largest walkable relief map in the universe
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