My Favorite Americans: Drawing Inspiration from Ordinary Lives

There are some people for whom everyone knows their names. There are others that make life richer in their own unsung ways. These down-to-earth individuals live out the values of dedication, optimism, wisdom, faithfulness, nonconformity, creativity, strength, and hospitality in their everyday lives. This book is about those people.

Frank Johnson documents a trail of encounters with eight unique characters from his small hometown in Mississippi through his assignments at various wildlife refuges across the southeastern U.S. His list reflects his own unique perspective as both a caretaker of natural resources and a bridge-builder among people of various ethnicities and belief systems. When his co-author and daughter Lee Ann Johnson Linam posthumously researched these lives, Frank's appreciation for diversity that is both respectful and humorous emerged, leading Lee Ann to include her father among these admirable characters. Exploring and celebrating these lives reveals the best in all of us.

Earl Franklin "Frank" Johnson, Jr. worked for the U.S. Fish & National Wildlife Refuge System for more than 35 years, traveling with his family throughout the southeastern United States until landing at Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, winter home of the whooping crane. Throughout his career in conservation, he built bridges among people, recognizing the admirable human attributes in each of us. This work, inspired by notes found in his work desk is published posthumously.

Lee Ann Johnson Linam is a wildlife biologist with a passion for bringing people and wildlife together. She started her career with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department at the J.D. Murphree Wildlife Management Area in Port Arthur, where she served as a waterfowl and wetlands biologist and Alligator Program Leader. Eventually, Lee Ann transferred to Austin, where she served as the Endangered Species Program Leader. During those volatile years she participated in diverse working groups to address concerns of the Endangered Species Act and encouraged the development of the first endangered species management guidelines for private landowners. Following her interests in the intersection of people with wildlife, she went on to develop TPWD's citizen science program, Texas Nature Trackers. After retirement from TPWD, Lee Ann taught high school science in homeschool academies and private schools for eight years, where she developed a unique Texas Wildlife Science course for middle and high school students.Lee Ann holds a bachelor's degree in Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences from Texas A&M University, a Graduate Diploma in Environmental Studies from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, and has a graduate certificate in Global Nutrition Programming from Tufts University. She is currently engaged in community-based conservation projects and education programs in Zimbabwe through the nonprofits Bridges to Birding and Noah's FARM.Lee Ann credits her interest in wildlife, education, and community involvement to her father and mother and the years they spent exploring the outdoors together with people from various cultures--an experience she hopes to share with other families through her writings.