Crude Conversations

Julie Decker is the director and CEO of the Anchorage Museum. But before that she practiced as an artist and ran her own art gallery. Since then she’s fostered a belief in the power of museums to spark action — whether that means picking up a paintbrush, reading a new book, or seeing the world differently. Her connection to the Anchorage Museum runs back to childhood, when it was little more than a single room with a borrowed collection. Her dad was a visual artist and an art teacher; he was her earliest and most influential guide into that world. He taught her to be an observer — to notice the small things — and she watched as his own work appeared in solo shows and juried exhibitions at the museum. So, for Julie, the Anchorage Museum isn’t just a workplace; it’s been a constant presence in her life, shaping her sense of art, community and possibility. In the work she does now, Julie envisions the Anchorage Museum as less a keeper of artifacts and more of a living platform for Alaska’s stories. It acts as a collaborator and a partner — a place that listens to communities, amplifies the voices of Alaskans and connects local narratives to global conversations. In her view, Alaska’s relatively small population allows individual creativity and innovation to ripple widely, making it vital to highlight imaginative thinkers, cultural disruptors and non-Western ways of knowing. That means rethinking what it means to collect — not simply holding objects, but being a responsible host and steward of the stories they carry.  In Alaska, where the natural world shapes identity and guides daily life, the museum’s role is to reflect how environmental change, Indigenous lifeways and community resilience intersect. Some projects take the form of exhibitions, others emerge as films, books, podcasts, newspaper series, or collaborations with musicians. Whether the work is local or part of an international conversation, Julie believes it must be rooted in place — fluid, adaptable and focused on a shared future that feels possible and inhabitable. In this Chatter Marks series, Cody and co-host Dr. Sandro Debono talk to museum directors and knowledge holders about what museums around the world are doing to adapt and react to climate change. Dr. Debono is a museum thinker from the Mediterranean island of Malta. He works with museums to help them strategize around possible futures.

In this one, Cody talks with Eric Heil. He’s an educator and a legendary Arctic Man competitor. Alongside his longtime snowmachine partner, Len Story, Eric won five times. He started competing in Arctic Man in 1990 at the age of 30, and from the beginning, he immersed himself in the event — not just as an athlete, but as part of the crew. He helped with course safety and setting up markers at First Aid, the critical release point where the skier detaches from the snowmachine at the top of the uphill tow. He was the first skier to break the five-minute barrier, clocking in at exactly four minutes — an Arctic Man record at the time. It would take 30 years before anyone broke four minutes, something he attributes to better snow conditions, evolving course design, improved equipment and a rising level of competition.  He was also one of the first racers to bring a technical mindset to the event, experimenting with waxes, analyzing the terrain, monitoring snow temperatures, tracking weather patterns, adjusting his line based on changing snowpack, and timing his transitions to maximize speed and efficiency throughout the course. After nearly three decades of running the course — his last race was in 2018 — Eric says he’s run it more than anyone else.  Eric's path to becoming a high-speed athlete started early. He learned to ski when he was just four years old, and by six he was skijoring. That early exposure to speed and unpredictability planted the seed for a lifelong pursuit of elite competition. In college, he raced for the University of Alaska Anchorage and set his sights on becoming a world champion downhiller. As a world-class athlete, he was comfortable reaching 90 miles per hour on his skis. That kind of speed requires more than just fearlessness — it demands focus, precision and the ability to see what isn’t always visible. Eric says downhill skiers rely heavily on visualization because when you're racing across long stretches of terrain at speeds so fast they blur your vision, you can’t always react in real time — you have to anticipate. That means memorizing every feature of the course ahead of time and trusting your muscle memory to guide you through. He says that even now, he can close his eyes and mentally replay the details of every downhill course he's ever raced.

Annesofie Norn is the Head of Communications and Lead Curator at the Museum for the United Nations, or UN Live for short. With a background in placemaking and art practice, she specializes in designing experiences that resonate across borders and mediums. Her work often explores how art and storytelling can serve as powerful tools for social transformation on a global scale. Before joining UN Live, she worked on art exhibitions and contemporary theatre productions, which often explored hidden stories by posing unexpected questions and making surprising connections. She brings that same curiosity and creative instinct to her work today, helping reimagine how global stories are told and shared. At UN Live, Annesofie is helping shape what she calls a “borderless museum” — one without a physical building — designed to meet people where they already are. UN Live operates through the power of popular culture, creating immersive experiences that extend beyond traditional museum walls. It aims to tap into the cultural spaces people already love — like music, film, sports and gaming — and use those genres to spark awe, empathy and meaningful action. Rather than asking people to enter a curated space, UN Live enters theirs, collaborating with local communities and cultural traditions to develop initiatives that feel relevant and transformative. Whether it’s amplifying unheard voices or suggesting new ways of being in the world, the work of UN Live is about using the material of society to imagine better futures. In this Chatter Marks series, Cody and co-host Dr. Sandro Debono talk to museum directors and knowledge holders about what museums around the world are doing to adapt and react to climate change. Dr. Debono is a museum thinker from the Mediterranean island of Malta. He works with museums to help them strategize around possible futures.

Mike Radke is the co-founder and executive director of The Ubuntu Lab, a global education nonprofit that teaches people how to navigate cultural differences with curiosity, humility and empathy. Mike approaches the world with a learner’s mindset, believing he almost always has more to learn than to contribute. For him, that belief isn’t abstract, it’s personal, shaped by years of travel, work in public health and education, and a formative interaction nearly two decades ago with Archbishop Desmond Tutu in South Africa. The two met after a sermon in Cape Town, where Tutu spent hours speaking with Mike about his research on post-apartheid reconciliation. That conversation planted a seed: that forgiveness and collective healing aren’t just moral ideals, they’re practical tools for building communities that can hold disagreement, endure pain and still move forward together.  The Ubuntu Lab began as an academic project, Mike’s dissertation on nonviolence. It’s since grown into a living, breathing network of workshops, learning spaces and small-scale initiatives in over 40 countries. Its mission is to foster empathy and understanding — especially among young people — by encouraging honest, sometimes uncomfortable conversations about identity, belonging and conflict. At its core is the African philosophy of ubuntu: “I am because we are.” Mike and his collaborators co-create experiences that are less about delivering answers and more about sparking dialogue — sessions built around provocation, open-ended questions and the idea that everyone in the room has something to contribute. Rather than build a single institution, they embed within communities, remaining flexible, responsive and grounded in relationships. In this Chatter Marks series, Cody and co-host Dr. Sandro Debono talk to museum directors and knowledge holders about what museums around the world are doing to adapt and react to climate change. Dr. Debono is a museum thinker from the Mediterranean island of Malta. He works with museums to help them strategize around possible futures.

In this one, I talk to Katie Ringsmuth. She’s the Alaska State Historian, the Deputy State Historic Preservation Officer and the creator of the NN Cannery History Project, a seven-year effort to preserve and interpret the stories of the people who powered one of Alaska’s most historic salmon canneries. For Katie, this story is personal. She grew up around the NN Cannery in South Naknek, where her dad worked for decades, eventually becoming the last superintendent of the Alaska Packers’ Association. He started in 1964 as a young college graduate in Kodiak, doing whatever odd jobs needed doing — from sorting crab to running the entire operation at the NN Cannery. Under his leadership, the cannery shifted away from the rigid, old-school model of command-and-control superintendents — “Tony Soprano–style,” as Katie puts it — and toward something more humane. He created housing for families, hired women and built a workplace that people returned to year after year. The NN Cannery History Project is more than just about the processing plant, it’s about preserving its historical importance and honoring its workers. The cannery itself was a cultural crossroads with a workforce that included Alaska Native peoples, Scandinavians, Italians, Japanese, Chinese, and Filipino laborers. Canned food revolutionized how people ate. It made it possible to preserve and transport perishable foods across vast distances, reshaping global diets and economies — and the NN Cannery was a key player in that transformation. Originally built as a saltery in 1897, the NN Cannery went on to produce more canned salmon than any other cannery in the state. Katie’s work on the NN Cannery History Project ultimately led to the site being listed on the National Register of Historic Places, a recognition that underscores its national significance. Throughout the project, Katie explores how Alaska fits into the global history of canned food and how preservation — both of fish and of stories — can change the way we understand place, labor and legacy.

Dr. Stefan Brandt is the Director of Futurium in Berlin, a hybrid museum experience and public platform dedicated to exploring the future. With a background in literature, philosophy, cultural studies — and a lifelong interest in music — Dr. Brandt has worked at the intersection of culture, science and civic life. Before leading Futurium, he held senior roles at major cultural institutions across Germany, where he championed interdisciplinary thinking and public engagement. He says it’s always been his intention to make a change, to improve the institutions he leads and, more broadly, to contribute to a better society. At Futurium, that mission continues: creating a space where people are invited to learn about the future and how they can help shape it. Futurium isn’t a traditional museum, it doesn’t have a permanent collection or fixed exhibitions. Instead, it operates as a dynamic, evolving space designed to spark curiosity and conversation about the future. Dr. Brandt describes this absence of static artifacts as both a freedom and a challenge: it allows Futurium to be more agile and responsive, but it also requires continual reinvention. At its core is a question posed to every visitor: “How do I want to live?” To help people grapple with that question, Futurium presents ideas and scenarios grounded in science, media trends and public discourse. Each major theme — like the future of housing, health, nutrition, or democracy — is developed over time through in-depth research and collaboration with experts. Rather than offering definitive answers, Futurium encourages people to imagine and help shape a sustainable, participatory future. In this Chatter Marks series, Cody and co-host Dr. Sandro Debono talk to museum directors and knowledge holders about what museums around the world are doing to adapt and react to climate change. Dr. Debono is a museum thinker from the Mediterranean island of Malta. He works with museums to help them strategize around possible futures.

In this one, Cody talks to journalist and retired professor Brian Patrick O’Donoghue, whose decades-long investigation into the wrongful convictions of four young men of Alaska Native and Native American descent — known as the Fairbanks Four — helped reshape one of the most important criminal cases in Alaska history. Brian’s investigative reporting class at the University of Alaska Fairbanks became more than an academic exercise, it turned into a collaborative effort that collected interviews, uncovered new evidence, and helped bring national attention to the case. In his new book, The Fairbanks Four, he traces that journey in painstaking detail, from questionable confessions and buried evidence to the grassroots push for justice that eventually caught the attention of The Innocence Project.  When Brian joined the faculty at UAF, he knew exactly what he wanted to focus on. Even though he hadn’t covered the Fairbanks Four case as a reporter at the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, it had always raised unanswered questions for him, ones he couldn’t ignore. So, when he was asked to identify a research area, he returned to that case and built a class around it. At a glance, it might have looked like a traditional classroom, but in reality it functioned more like a working newsroom, with students knocking on doors, flying to remote communities, and surfacing details that hadn’t been fully explored in court. And then when their findings began to gain traction in legal filings, Brian realized they were no longer just reporting on the case, they were influencing it.

In this episode of Chatter Marks, we explore the lingering impact of the Cold War on Alaska, a state that stood on the frontlines of a global standoff. Through perspectives rooted in art, journalism, history, and geopolitics, we trace how Cold War-era decisions reshaped Alaska’s communities, economy, environment and sense of identity. And how it continues to influence Alaska’s security policies and relationship with the rest of the world.

Ben Kellie is an entrepreneur, a writer and someone who’s spent a lot of time thinking about how to build things that matter. He grew up in Alaska, learning to fly planes with his dad. It was a hands-on education in problem-solving, resilience and staying calm under pressure. That mindset carried him through early work on rocket launches and landings at SpaceX, and later, into founding The Launch Company, a startup that developed modular, scalable launch systems for rockets. He sold it in 2021. These days, he’s working on a new venture called Applied Atomics, building compact nuclear power systems that are designed to provide energy-intensive industries with clean, reliable power. More than anything, though, he’s interested in where Alaska fits into the global future: how we move beyond boom-and-bust cycles, invest in our own talent and create businesses that are both rooted here and relevant everywhere. Ben says that the investment he’d like to be known for hasn’t happened yet, but his goal is to demonstrate what’s possible in Alaska. That includes moving beyond our dependence on oil, and considering where Alaska’s people and economy might be in 50, 100, or even 1,000 years from now. While the specifics of future technology are hard to predict, some needs remain constant: food, clean air, clean water and reliable energy. These are the issues he focuses on when he thinks about the problem he would like to be known for solving. They’re ones that meet basic human needs. And writing helps him work through these ideas. He says it’s a tool for making sense of complex decisions, checking assumptions and mapping the long view. It’s also how he slows down, reflects and emotionally processes what he’s building. Because, for him, it all comes back to family and community.

Jamar Hill is a coach now, but before that, he was a pro baseball player in the Mets organization. He grew up in Anchorage, where playing baseball wasn’t always easy: limited facilities, long winters and not much opportunity to play year-round. He says that in Alaska, you get about a quarter of the playing time compared to other places. But in a way, that made him love the game even more. As a kid, he followed the Alaska Baseball League, one of the best summer leagues in the country. It brought in top talent every year — future first-round draft picks — and watching those games gave him an early sense of how the baseball world worked. By the time he was 16, most of the teams he played on included at least one future Major League player. And by the end of high school, he was drafted by the Mets. He became one of their top power prospects — a lefty bat who hit right-handed pitching especially well. He went on to hit over 100 professional home runs. But beyond the stats, it was his early exposure to high-level talent, and his ability to adapt, that shaped his perspective. That perspective is still with him today — as a coach, a mentor and someone who’s all about creating opportunities for the next generation. Today, Jamar is focused on giving back to the community that raised him. As a youth coach and founder of RBI Alaska, he’s spent the last 10 years helping young athletes grow — as players and as people. He’s currently leading the development of the Mountain View Field House, a year-round indoor training facility that will give local kids access to the kind of resources he didn’t have growing up. For him, coaching isn’t just about skill development, it’s about building character, creating opportunity and showing kids that their environment doesn’t have to limit their ambition. He mentors with intention, using his own experiences in professional baseball to help young players navigate the mental, emotional and physical sides of the game. Through that work, he’s helping shape confident, resilient athletes who are prepared for whatever comes next, on the field or off.