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Recent Articles
Native plants are important assets to a healthy Apostle Islands National Lakeshore
After a winter of record-breaking snowfall – approaching 185 inches – the native plants are slowly...
Welcome Aboard! Annual Friends Cruise planned for August 10th
It is the highlight of the season at Friends of the Apostle Islands: a time to gather with...
Marigolds: A simple tribute to a different era in the Apostle Islands
If you are ever lucky enough to be invited to sit on the deck at photographer Mark Weller’s home,...
“Why I support the Meyers Beach accessible ramp may surprise you.” Public comment period ends May 12th
An unseen patch of late-winter black ice changed my life in an instant. My feet took flight as I...
Friends endorses Meyers Beach ramp, Little Sand Bay trails, encourages you to show your support before comment period ends
With the public comment period winding down, now is the time to show the National Park Service...
Special Series
Stewardship Symposium
Sense of Adventure!
History Mystery
Where’s Neil?
Lakeshore Logbook
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We curated articles focused on topics that you may find interesting.
Features | Park Information | History | People | Science
Features
Tongues in trees: Celebrating National Poetry Month
In Act 1, Scene 2 of his famous play “As You Like It” William Shakespeare wrote “And this our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.” Shakespeare never visited Lake Superior or the Apostle Islands, but if he had, he would have certainly found “good in everything” in these islands as well as heard the poetry in this place. The summer wind strumming the waves, the slow repeating verse of the surf, birdsong in the bogs at sunrise. There is a beauty in these islands that speaks to the poet’s soul, and...
A Time Capsule Letter to the Future Stewards of the Apostle Islands
What would you say to the future? Our 50th anniversary celebration of the creation of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore is over. The speeches have been given, the cupcakes eaten, the candles blown out. But the legacy of all we have accomplished in the park, our honoring of the past and excitement about the future, will live on in a kind of “time capsule” being submitted to the National Park Service commemorating this anniversary year. It will include pamphlets and pins, photographs and invitations and the texts of speeches given. It will include the proclamation issued in honor of the...
Explore the Top 10 Friends website stories of 2021
DRUMROLL PLEASE! It has been a big year in the Apostle Islands -- from fun and fanfare to tragedy averted. During this last week of the year,, Friends of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore is counting down its TOP TEN Island stories of 2021. In sharing these stories, we thank you, our readers and supporters, for your support and we wish you an adventure-filled 2022 in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. 10 HERE WE GO: Weather stories always resonate with Island Lovers, so the #10 most popular story of the year goes to the tall birch trees dancing in the big gale. 9 At #9 on our...
Park Information
National Lakeshore delivers record-setting boost to northern Wisconsin economy
The Apostle Islands National Lakeshore provides unmatched natural beauty, rich cultural history and amazing adventures, but that's not all. The park is an economic engine, generating nearly $64 million for the economies of gateway communities along the south shore of Lake Superior in 2021.Park Headquarters - Bob Jauch photoThe National Park Service released a report in August on the economic impact of national parks on their surrounding communities. The report says 291,000 people visited the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore in 2021. They spent money on places to stay, food to eat, fuel and...
Dave Cooper awarded John L. Cotter Award for Excellence in NPS Archeology
(NPS News Release) Join us in congratulating David J. Cooper, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore Archeologist and Cultural Resource Manager, in being awarded the John L. Cotter Award for Excellence in NPS Archeology for Professional Achievement. “Dave Cooper’s work shows the impact one person can have not only within a park, but across a whole landscape,” said Apostle Islands National Lakeshore Superintendent Lynne Dominy. “Dave has spent his lifetime protecting the historical and cultural resources on and around Lake Superior. From portages to fish camps to lighthouses and shipwrecks, Dave...
Attention Paddlers and Boaters: The Buoys are Back!
“The lake is the boss” and “know before you go” are literally words to live by when kayaking in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. Before your next paddling or boating adventure, it pays to learn as much as you can about the weather forecast and wave conditions. Lake Superior can be glass-calm in one instant and a short time later you might face three-foot waves from a fast-moving storm. The islands themselves influence wind and wave patterns every day and the cold water presents and ever-present risk of hypothermia. That’s why proper gear, training and forecast knowledge are so...
History
Marigolds: A simple tribute to a different era in the Apostle Islands
If you are ever lucky enough to be invited to sit on the deck at photographer Mark Weller’s home, you may notice a small planting of marigolds. Flowers on a deck are nothing unusual and you may not give the potted flowers a second thought. But look again. These flowers have more than beautiful blossoms: they have a story.“I am a lighthouse man,” Mark Weller says. “Over the past decade, I and a team of talented photographers have traveled to the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore to photograph the Milky Way behind some of the park’s famous lighthouses. We sell the images to support the...
Restoration of historic dock completed at Little Sand Bay
The fabled gales of November couldn't stop reconstruction of the historic Hokenson Brothers Fishery dock at Little Sand Bay in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. Battered by storms for decades, the dock and related buildings are listed on the State and National Registers of Historic Places and are the focus of a $1.4 million preservation and restoration effort by the National Park Service.This summer, construction crews from Pearl Beach Construction Company of Michigan used heavy equipment and a barge to rebuild the dock as historically accurately as possible, using wooden pilings and...
52 candles – celebrating Founders Day in the Apostle Islands
September 26th marks 52 years for the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore and kicks off a new commitment for FriendsIt was September 26, 1970. After years of meetings, negotiations, revisions, and debate, there finally came these words: “for the benefit, inspiration, education, recreational use, and enjoyment of the public … there is hereby established the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore.” With those words, Public Law 91-424 officially established the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, a place that preserves beauty, adventure, and offers reconnection to nature. The twenty-one islands and...
People
Jewels on the water: Two artists share the inspiration of the islands
The Apostle Islands have long inspired artists, from songwriters to painters, potters, and poets. Recently, two local artists – photographer Jeff Rennicke and silversmith Lissa Flemming – combined their talents in a unique tribute to the inspiration they find among these islands. The result was a one-of-a-kind line of jewelry created by Flemming inspired by Rennicke’s photography, both unveiled during a joint presentation at Canoecopia, the country’s largest paddling expo recently held in Madison, Wisconsin. It began with a photograph.Photographer Jeff Rennicke aboard Little Dipper“I have...
Deep roots and a love of fishing: the passing of former Friends Board Member Charles “Chuck” Ludwigsen
For some, the ties to the Apostle Islands and Lake Superior run deep. For Charles “Chuck” Ludwigsen, who passed away peacefully on October 12th, those roots ran as deep as a fishing line. Born in Lombard, IL on April 17, 1937, Chuck traveled widely for both business and pleasure. Yet he never forgot his deep connection to the big lake and the Apostle Islands. His childhood summers were spent working the nets with his grandfather who had immigrated from Norway and became a commercial fisherman in the islands. When not fishing with nets, Chuck could often be found trolling or casting a line...
Friends mourns the passing of sailing pioneer and Island friend George Hansen
If you have been in Bayfield in the days surrounding the Fourth of July and seen the bay filled with the colorful sails of Bayfield Race Week, you have witnessed at least a part of the legacy of George M. Hansen. Hansen, the founder of Bayfield’s famous Race Week and a long-time supporter and member of Friends of the Apostle Islands passed away in his sleep on October 4th at his home in Medina, Minnesota. Born September 25, 1936, Hansen grew up in Minneapolis, served as a tank commander in the Army, and worked as an accountant for Haskins & Sells as well as the George M. Hansen Company...
Science
Connecting people and the Apostle Islands to Costa Rican parks
10 Bayfield area volunteers, including Friends of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore board members Neil Howk and Mark Peterson, recently left snowy Wisconsin to complete two weeks of conservation work on Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula, under an agreement between Lake Superior’s national parks and Costa Rica’s National System of Conservation Areas (SINAC).The parks are linked by migratory birds that winter in Costa Rica and breed in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore and other parks around Lake Superior. The agreement signed in 2013 encourages both institutions to work for the benefit of...
“Discover the night” in the Apostle Islands during International Dark Sky Week
30 miles offshore, Devils Island and Outer Island offer some incredible views of the Milky Way set in a field of innumerable stars. And if you’re very fortunate, you'll witness the spectacular northern lights dancing in some of the darkest skies in Wisconsin. The featured photo above captures the northern lights as seen from the top of the Outer Island lighthouse. In fact, most of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore offers great night sky viewing; night sky lovers, stargazers and photographers want to protect those views for generations to come.Milky Way over Stockton Island - Jon...
Like being inside of a diamond: Apostle Islands shimmer with northern lights
It began with just a faint rippling of light. The sun had barely set, its light still coloring the sky, but already it was clear: something special was happening.NOAA northern lights forecast - click to enlargeOn the night of March 23, 2023, the sky over the northern United States glittered in one of the strongest displays of northern lights in decades, visible as far south as northern Missouri. In the Apostle Islands, clear skies and just a sliver of moon, meant perfect viewing conditions.Our Executive Director Jeff Rennicke caught the display over the national lakeshore. “To stand beneath...
