Vonnegut Bio; Hank Nuwer Stories
Grab a coffee and enjoy the story clearinghouse of Hank Nuwer with photos of Alaska and its wildlife by Malgorzata (Gosia) Nuwer.
You’ll find that I’ve added some finished and partially finished biography-in-progress of Kurt Vonnegut, “The Man in the Hole.”
Hank Nuwer’s Indiana University Press books on hazing. Podcast in The Culture
Podcast of “Weed in the Garden of Academe” with Hank Nuwer
Scroll down for archived Realalaskadaily stories.Thank you for reading. Got a compliment or gripe? Drop a line to Hjnuwer@Alaska.edu. Gosia and I want to keep this site ad-free. Trying to raise funds for last-minute research on my Kurt Vonnegut biography: “Kurt Vonnegut: The Man in the Hole. A Life of Reinvention.” (“Not authorized, but authentic scholarship”). Your donation would be so helpful: Hank Nuwer, PO Box 73446; Fairbanks, AK 99707-3446.
Poem: A Prayer for Alex Pretti
A Prayer for Alex Pretti By Hank Nuwer I saw a murder on the news today. The victim died with no time to pray. His attackers came like bees in a swarm. Their every movement meant him harm. They sprayed, swung, slammed his head. They took his gun and shot him dead....
“Doc” Roland A. and Louise Lombard: Mushers from New England
“Doc” Lombard: The Vet Who Was Always Off to the Races Part One in a series from the Cordova Times By Hank Nuwer At his office in Massachusetts, Dr. Roland Arnold Lombard was regarded as the veterinarian of choice for the city’s dog and cat owners. ...
New Mexico: You can go home again. But that home no longer is the same.
What greeted my family and me was a nightmare of the worst kind.
Nina Whaley: Representing Alaska, 1963
By Hank Nuwer The year 1963 proved magical for an 18-year-old Alaska girl with her heart set on competing in a number of top beauty pageants. She was Nina Whaley, the daughter of well-known Alaska bush pilot and photographer who also lobbied to institute the World...
A Musher’s Mercy Errand
Legendary sprint mushers long will stay household names in Alaska. One of the all-time best was veteran racing champion and veterinarian Roland Lombard. His eight wins in the Anchorage Fur Rendezvous World Championship Sled Dog Race were the most ever until George...
Herbert Gold: Man of Letters
from Rendezvousing with Contemporary Writers Copyright Hank Nuwer Interviewed by Hank Nuwer Novelist Herbert Gold is the kind of man people fail to notice at parties until they bump into him at the shrimp bowl to find out what they’ve missed all evening. Thin and...
John Hegness: Alaskan Pioneer Musher
Last Frontier Days. By Hank Nuwer John Hegness liked to tell people he’d come from Hell. And he had. His birthplace was Hell, Norway, which wasn’t named for a hotspot you’d like to avoid in the afterlife. Nope, his own personal Hell took its name for the Old Norse...
Ray Wise Mala: Front & Back of the Camera
Last Frontier Days By Hank Nuwer Right from the start, a man rarely had more strikes against him than did Ray Wise Mala. For starters, he was born Ray Wise in the mining town of Candle on the Seward Peninsula. That’s about 140 miles northwest of Nome. Snow drifts in...
Video: Hank Nuwer, History of Hazing
Video Link Nov 13, 2025 Hank Nuwer is an adjunct professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and discusses the history of hazing