Have Pen, Will Travel
Welcome. Enjoy the adventures & misadventures of author Hank Nuwer with photos by wife Gosia Nuwer. Scroll down to very bottom of this main page for archived stories.
Bio: Hank Nuwer is the 2023 Alaska Columnist of Year and 2021 Ohio SPJ Columnist of the Year. His current books in print are Hazing: Destroying Young Lives, Wrongs of Passage and The Hazing Reader (Indiana University Press). Contact Professor Emeritus Nuwer at Hnuwer@franklincollege.edu
Hank pens weekly columns for the Cordova (AK) Daily Times and. teaches as an adjunct at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.
A leading international expert on hazing in youth and adult groups, Hank Nuwer was honored to be named an “Alaska Champion” by the Alaska Children’s Trust in 2024. He has appeared as an actor in seven plays in Fairbanks in the last year, including Kris Kringle in The Miracle on 34th Street. His database on hazing deaths has been cited by many scholars and included in numerous scholarly publications and doctoral dissertations.
Gosia Nuwer photographs Alaska and its wildlife. She and Hank reside in Fairbanks, Alaska, with 20 acres in remote Alaska. She hold a master’s degree in Economics. She and her family hail from Warsaw Poland, and she is a U.S. citizen.
Hank Nuwer stories
Why Alaska absolutely, positively needs a state hazing law: Cordova Times column
During the fall of 1993, the Cordova Times published a letter from a concerned parent of a Cordova High School ninth grader. The mother said she wanted an end to the “degrading” practice of hazing — or “freshman initiation” — as “the tradition” euphemistically was...
In Memoriam
Just a year ago our Aunt Sabina and friend Anna came to Fairbanks to visit us. Now, both are deceased from cancer. This column was about their visit. Enjoy What an exciting and beautiful week for our two relatives from London and Gosia’s aunt from Warsaw to visit us....
The one I wished I had let get away
When it’s the angler who gets caught dead By Hank Nuwer Heard the one about two anglers who hoisted a fancy trophy in triumph after “winning” $30,000 in prize money at a Lake Erie Walleye Trail tournament. Before they cashed that check, a suspicious...
The Miracle on 34th Street
Last night was the first day of rehearsal for the Fairbanks production of Ken Ludwig's "T'was the Night Before Christmas." Last year I acted as Kris Kringle in :A Miracle on 34th Street." This column was written right before auditions. Two years in a row I play Santa...
Sad news from Warsaw
Wife Gosia phoned me with the sad news that. Aunt Sabina Seliborska, 77, youngest sister of Gosia's late mother, passed after a three week ilness with cancer. I never knew a kinder, more gentler person. Her loss is immeasurable to us. --Hank Nuwer
Swimming in That Big Toilet Bowl in the Sky
by Hank Nuwer Julia Plessinger decided that she was not meant to be a fish mom. The Union City (IN) wife and mother kept her kids’ goldfish tank on her kitchen table. “I would sit and drink coffee and watch the fish every morning,” she said. But one day she discovered...
Antlers and Down home hospitality in Dillingham by Hank Nuwer
Weekend traveling all over Alaska by plane or car brings excitement and pleasure to my wife Gosia and me. Last weekend, we drove to the IGA Food Cache’s European section in Delta Juntion to stock up on the goodies Gosia enjoyed growing up in her native Warsaw. We...
Video: Congressional Record
Thank you so much, Representative Lucy!!!IMG_3051 Honored to be included in the Congressional Record. VIDEO of Georgia Rep. Lucy McBath https://realalaskadaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/IMG_3051.mp4
The River of Death by Hank Nuwer
Hollywood came to Cordova in 1927. The filmmakers planned to make an action thriller. The movie ended up a tragedy for three men on set. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s “The Trail of ‘98” was directed by Clarence Brown. The movie loosely was drawn from the novel about Alaska...