Bay View Association's Bridges: Crossing Cultural Divides

Join Bay View Association’s Bridges: Crossing Cultural Divides 2023 – a discussion with James Edward Mills about his book The Adventure Gap: Changing the Face of the Outdoors.

About James Edward Mills 

James Edward Mills is a freelance journalist and independent media producer based in Madison, Wisconsin. Mills has worked in the outdoor industry since 1989 as a guide, outfitter, independent sales representative, writer, and photographer. The co-writer/co-producer of the documentary film “An American Ascent,” Mills is a 2014 Fellow of the Mountain & Wilderness Writing Program of the Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada, and the 2016 recipient of the Paul K. Petzoldt Award for Environmental Education. 

Outdoor Magazine named James Edward Mills’s book The Adventure Gap: Changing the Face of the Outdoors one of the 10 outdoor books that shaped the last decade. Sierra Club Vice President Spencer Black called it “an important new book about a crucial challenge facing the conservation movement.”  

The challenge, Mills explains, is that while the nation’s wild places—national and state parks, forests, preserves, and wilderness areas—belong to all Americans, not all of us use and value these resources equally. Minority populations are much less likely to seek recreation, adventure, and solace in our wilderness spaces.  As our country grows increasingly multicultural, who then, will become the stewards of our natural legacy?