Chip Ward

Chip Ward spent four years living in the redrock wilderness of southern Utah while running a guest ranch in Capitol Reef National Park where he learned formative lessons about how we are embedded in the natural world. He then moved his young family to the rim of the Great Basin desert as a hazardous industries zone was being built upwind from the small rural community where they lived. After realizing that residents, including children, were beset by cancer and chronic illness, he organized several campaigns to make polluters accountable. He co-founded Families Against Incinerator Risk (FAIR) and the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah (HEAL Utah). He also served for several years on the board of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

His first two books, "Canaries on the Rim" and "Hope's Horizon" describe his political adventures as a grassroots organizer, activist, and advocate. For several years he has been a regular contributor to Tomdispatch.com. Author Rebecca Solnit has called him "one of the most acute environmental thinkers of our time." He has been interviewed widely by the likes of CNN, NPR, CBS, BBC, and more.

Ward was also a career librarian. Starting as a bookmobile librarian, he ended his career as the Assistant Director of the award winning Salt Lake City Public Library. An essay about the homeless patrons of the library was the inspiration for the forthcoming movie, "the public," written, directed, and starring Emilio Estevez.

He lives in Torrey, Utah, where he hikes obsessively and works to conserve a wilderness landscape under assault from extractive industries and developers. His most recent book, the novel "Stony Mesa Sagas," portrays the cultural conflicts in a small town like his own that is a gateway to a national park.