I am Geography
I love adventures, exploring, fishing, hunting and pretty much do anything outside. Therefore, I love maps, geography, history and knowledge. I grew up in rural Southeast Missouri or Glennonville to be more precise. For my Human Geographers, Glennonville, MO is a small predominately German Catholic farm community with a population smaller than most of your high school classes. On the weekends, I spent time with my uncle land surveying clearing brush for line of sight, locating the 200 year oak referenced on the deed and digging through gravel or asphalt to find property corner markers.
The surveying experience had a profound influence in my decision to pursue a degree in Cartography with and emphasis in land surveying from Missouri State (SMSU at the time). I was hooked once introduced to John Snow’s work and the science of geospatial analysis. Two years into the college experience I was fortunate enough to land a job with City of Springfield’s GIS office. I spent time digitizing infrastructure plans and developing a routable transportation dataset.
Shortly after graduation I headed east, thanks Monster.com, to support USG work. As a young analyst at SAIC (now Leidos) I found myself working with a really talented team supporting Operation Enduring Freedom and other efforts. Over the next 15 years I would serve in a variety of different Geography focused management and technical roles. From delivering global instability forecasting at the local level to data, systems and software engineering support, I use my geography skills every day to solve national security challenges.
Today I work for Leidos as a Geospatial Solutions Developer supporting the geospatial needs of IC and DOD. I thoroughly enjoy working with other geographers and find that as a group we seek understanding, knowledge and truth to convey the facts regarding our world, how it came to be and the direction it is heading. I am fortunately enough to live in Colorado where we raise our family and can enjoy the God given geography so many travel across the globe to visit. I am Geography!
Become a member of the AGS, and let us feature you as part of our “I AM GEOGRAPHY” campaign which will light the path for all of you closet geographers to get involved in making our world a better place through Geography.