Edward Whitesell, while a freshman at the University of Colorado, co-founded the CU Wilderness Study Group in 1970. After graduation, Ted ran the Colorado Wilderness Workshop, the only statewide preservation organization at the time. From 1975 to 1985, he was an activist with the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, campaigning to secure designation of the first wilderness areas in the Tongass National Forest . Later, he earned a Ph.D. in geography from the University of California, Berkeley, investigating grassroots proposals for conservation and development in the Amazon rainforest of Brazil . He now teaches environmental studies at The Evergreen State College.