Hank Nuwer Alaska Yarns
My Travel Blog
By Alaska’s Columnist of the Year
Welcome. Enjoy the official story clearinghouse of Alaska author Hank Nuwer with photos by Malgorzata (Gosia) Nuwer. Scroll down to very bottom of this main page for archived stories.
Bio: University of Alaska (Fairbanks) adjunct professor Hank Nuwer lives, writes, and acts (community theater) in northern Alaska.
Awards: 2025 Hoosier State Press Association first-place winner for commentary, 2023 and 2024 Alaska Press Club (APC) First-Place Columnist of the Year, and 2022 Ohio SPJ First-Place Columnist of the Year.
Gosia Nuwer photographs Alaska and its wildlife. She and Hank reside in Fairbanks, Alaska, with 5 acres in remote Alaska, and a vacation cabin in Poland.
Gosia and her husband in 2025 contributed an article on Alaska back-road trips for Phi Kappa Phi’s Forum Magazine.
Read Hank Nuwer’s short review of “And So It Goes: Kurt Vonnegut: A Life” by Charles J. Shields at the Cordova Times, March 27, 2026, And a longer Kurt Vonnegut biography review here with notes on Ginger Strand’s “The Brothers Vonnegut” at https://www.thestatehousefile.com/
Contact Prof. Hank Nuwer at Hjnuwer@Alaska.edu
Know someone who has fought hazing in student groups, the military or sports? Nominate him/her/them here for a Hank Nuwer Antihazing Hero Award at Hazing Prevention Network.
Kurt Vonnegut interview
Hank Nuwer interview on writing tips and methods
From Slavery to Freedom to Public Service: The Healy Family
From Slavery to Freedom to Public Service: The Healy Family By Hank Nuwer First published in Cordova Times Irish immigrant Michael Morris Healy and his lifelong companion Mary Eliza Clark Smith found solace in their Catholic religion and took joy in the...
Ian Mandt’s Hazing: A weed in the garden of academe podcast
Here is the link to this powerful podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/weed-in-the-garden-of-academe/id1460320573?i=1000706636684
Highly recommended: “If Your Dreams Don’t Scare You” by Joni Tevis
Yesterday for the first time I read a sad, brilliant piece of creative nonfiction in The Georgia Review, a periodical my long-ago house mate once appeared in. And like my former house mate, the author of this story was a Pushcart Press award winner. The title is "If...
Doug Dickey: Medal of Honor winner thanked in a memorable book
by Hank Nuwer: The urge begins as a mere impulse. “I could write a book,” someone thinks. “I should write a book.” While millions have confessed a similar urge, few start — let alone finish — the task. One who has done so is John B. Lang. Californian by birth and...
Does beer pair with salmon?
Have you heard about the salmon scientific experiment underway in Oregon? Hakai magazine reports that field researchers may have found a way to persuade hatchery fish to swim upstream back to their hatchery home the way wild young salmon do. Now, as a cheechako to...
Air n B’s customer service by Hank Nuwer
My wife Gosia and I returned yesterday from a working vacation in Alaska. The mountains wore a majestic white cape of snow. As we drove hairpin turns on the Kenai Peninsula, the Avis rental car belched an ominous warning noise. Gulp, a dashboard icon predicted...
The bucket List
By Hank Nuwer My wife Gosia’s dream to ride at top speed in a stockcar will come true next month. That’s her birthday gift from me. 10 years ago, I seized my own stockcar opportunity on the Lucas track in Clermont, Ind. “Dear Hank. Congratulations. Drivetech Racing...
“A Life-Changing Trip” By Hank Nuwer;
Perhaps my most life-changing essay I ever wrote concerned the National Hansen’s Disease Treatment Center, the clinic in Carville, La., devoted since 1894 to the care of leprosy patients. The facility’s director, staff and patients inspired photographer Max...
William A. Bonney: He Put His Life on the Line
By Hank Nuwer Uncle Sam’s Signal Corps made great strides between 1900 and 1908 in establishing communications throughout Alaska. The main purpose of the lines was to keep various military command posts in touch with each other. But private citizens made ample use of...