Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 8 - 10.28.15

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 7 - 10.27.15

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project: Student Template!

Want to paint, draw, or collage your own Polar Bear Post Card? The template above is designed for a 6 x 4.25 final trim and will be perfect for your polar bear post carding needs.

1.) Download a hi-res version HERE
2.) Print on a heavier card stock or water color paper (the BEST options for sturdy cards!)
3.) Trim to marks
4.) Paint a polar bear
5.) Write a quick note about why we should protect the Arctic
6.) Add a stamp, and finally...
7.) Send it to:

President Barak Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, D.C. 20500

With GRRRattitude!

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 6 - 10.26.15

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 5 - 10.23.15

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 4 - 10.22.15

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 3 - 10.22.15

My 12-year old daughter Keeley jumped in to participate as well!

Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 2 - 10.21.15

The “1002″ is the currently unprotected area of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 

For the sake of explanation, this was my second Presidential Post Card as mailed last week. I will post three additional images in due course and then adopt a schedule of updating the images as they are created and mailed. Stay tuned!

Dear Mr. President: Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project No. 1

Last week, after over a month since visiting Kaktovik, Alaska and many hours spent thinking about my own potential contribution to protecting Alaska's Coastal Plain, I made a decision: The Presidential Polar Bear Post Card Project! 

For further explanation, you can scroll down for my complete letter to President Obama. I'm five days in and on a roll. I'll add additional images to this blog as the project unfolds and will collect them all as well at: http://polarbearpostcardproject.tumblr.com

That being said, stay tuned for many MANY polar bears in the next 62 weeks and a template as well so that you can send your own.

Enjoy!

*****

10/19/15

Dear Mr. President, 

Six weeks ago my family and I returned home from a trip to Kaktovik, Alaska. Tom Campion, who you know is passionate about protecting the Arctic, had graciously invited us along due to some cancellations by other parties. We jumped at the chance! The Campions know my wife Sarah through their philanthropic and conservation works here in Washington State, and I am a children’s book author/illustrator with a particular fondness for polar bears.

Having spent my elementary school years in Anchorage, the trip was extra special for the inclusion of our 12 year-old daughter Keeley, and for the opportunity to view this amazing place in the company of the Campions, author Terry Tempest Williams and her husband Brooke, and LatinoGreens founder, Mark Magaña. Truly, what were we doing on this trip? 

As you know from your own recent travels, Alaska is complex. It is vast and wild, but somehow fragile and precious. It evokes a curious mix of awe and empathy, and it leaves a lasting impression. You know the politics far better than I, and there are many sides and interests. Still, in the simplest terms, the 1002 and the unprotected areas of Alaska’s Coastal Plain have an immeasurable value far beyond their short-term life as a commercial good. This “one last place” needs to remain intact. 

Yes, it is important for polar bear den sites and reindeer calving grounds, for a diversity of species and for many other reasons of environmental nature, but it’s also important for “us” — as the greater extensions of Keeley and Sasha and Malia — as an example to the rest of the world that we can stop — that progress and change might mean finding a better way — and that saying “no” in permanent terms to short-sighted development will in fact spur innovation in other areas and directions — both for the country and for affected Alaskans.

I’ve been illustrating books for 15 years. I draw a comic strip in my local newspaper. I teach. I coach, and I volunteer in my schools and community. I have a quiet voice and a small platform — certainly nothing like that of our Kaktovik companions — but I also know that you are smart and that you seem to listen. So I bring you this, both as a serious outreach, and as hopefully something a little different to your every day: 

THE PRESIDENTIAL POLAR BEAR POST CARD PROJECT! From now until the end of your term, I will paint and send you five polar bear postcards each week! I know that Tom is bending your ear about protecting the 1002 — about preserving for all time a Monument status for something worth saving — so I am jumping into the fray with my best children’s book illustrator swagger. If a polar bear postcard five days a week keeps even a glimmer of hope alive — or provides an occasional pause for thought - then it will be well worth the effort. 

With many thanks for your service to our country, for taking the time to listen, and for your Presidential actions so far.

Sincerely yours, 

Erik Brooks

PS The actual letter looks likes this:

Harts Pass No. 270

In the spirit of the season -- a little mischief with a nod towards making a difference.

Harts Pass No. 269

Reading the latest news on teens and social networking... and feeling older all the time.

Harts Pass No. 268

It's that time of year again -- hopefully-- and the turn of seasons is finally under way. From all of us fine and furry critters here at Harts Pass comics, bring on the snow (and nighty night to the Ursus americanus and others of their ilk)!

Harts Pass No. 267

A polar bear cameo in this week's Harts Pass. To understand why, read the post below... GRRR!

Kaktovik, AK - part II

A few more photos from our trip to the Arctic in early September. I'll post a few photos here and then a slightly larger batch in an album on Facebook. The recent end to Shell's summer oil exploration in the Chukchi Sea only puts more pressure on the desire for drilling in the coastal plain and the last unprotected area (1022) of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Keep it wild!

Harts Pass No. 266

We lost our dog last week... but there is new snow in the mountains and the salmon are spawning in the river.

Harts Pass No. 265

Stranded in Kaktovik last Monday I missed my deadline for Harts Pass. Back in the swing of it this week and I will be posting more polar bear photos a little later today as well!

Kaktovik, Alaska!

Away from the studio over Labor Day weekend - and a few days on either side - because my family and I were in Kaktovik, Alaska on the far northern end of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. A special trip really, that will resonate with me for years to come. I'll write more as I sort my thoughts and get back to the work at hand. For now, a collared mother bear on a gravel bar not too far from our boat!

Harts Pass No. 264

A little retro-active publishing here as recent arctic travels put a damper on my computer timeliness - and prevented me from doing a comic for 9/9 :) WIFI certainly exists - and is a much appreciated facet/modern convenience of life above the arctic circle - but nothing was incredibly quick and I left my laptop at home!

To wit, the rain that preceded our Alaska trip DID do a fine job of changing the game for fire activity in the region. Summer will take another good shot at us with hot temps into the Sept. 12-13 weekend, but these cooler and slightly damper weeks have been a blessing.

Harts Pass No. 263 - For Tom Zbyszewski, Andrew Zajac, and Richard Wheeler

For those of you farther from home, the three young firefighters remembered above, recently lost their lives while keeping our community safe. Famous is a poem that Tom Zbyszewski, a local kid working summer fires, performed in his state finals for Poetry Out Loud in the spring of 2013. He may also have performed it here at Twisp's Merc Theater, as I swear that I can picture him reciting it.

In any case, it is a fine poem and a worthy tribute (I hope) to the everyday but still heroic efforts that our firefighters and many others make to keep others safe -- even at times at great cost. A humble kind of service that is inherently heroic of course, but never demanding of any particular praise or recognition. Thank you all for your service and rest in peace.

And... done.

What a difference a week makes. Just seven days ago I returned from vacation -- a nice little respite from an otherwise busy patch of summer reading visits and the nearly final stretch of a quite overdue book illustration project.

Seven days ago I was refreshed and ready to go. Ready to dive back into my work - to put the final touches on Beluga Whales and then wade gracefully into my new book with Sterling and the fast-approaching fall high school xc season. Hmph. The best laid plans.

On Wednesday afternoon about 1pm, a wildfire started in the Twisp River area - about 8 miles south of my home near Winthrop, WA. One more fire added to an already boiling-over cauldron of activity here in eastern Washington. While my home and family remained -- and continue to remain -- generally out of harms way, there is, once again, a widespread impact to these events that will resonate for many months to come. In this case too, a tragic loss of three young lives that tends to put everything into even greater perspective.

And so. With some personal stress finally relieved by the generator-powered, evacuation-notice-bedamned completion of Beluga Whales, Grizzly Tales, my heart goes out to all that are much more in the thick of it than I.