Dan O'Neill

Dan O’Neill was born and raised in San Francisco, educated at U.C. Berkeley, and moved to Alaska in 1975, settling near Fairbanks. He worked construction jobs, built log cabins, hunted, fished, trapped, and ran dogs--once driving his team 800 miles to Nome. As research associate at the University of Alaska, O'Neill produced award-winning radio and television documentaries for public broadcasting. For several years, he also wrote a newspaper column of political opinion for an Alaska daily. He has three books of literary nonfiction: "The Firecracker Boys" (1994), "The Last Giant of Beringia" (2004), and "A Land Gone Lonesome" (2007). A nonfiction children's book, "Stubborn Gal" appeared in 2015, and his most recent book, "The Impertinent Question: The Words & Adventures of a Liberal Columnist at a Conservative Newspaper in the Red State of Alaska," collects his newspaper columns. O'Neill has twice received the Alaska Library Association’s award for the best book on Alaska published anywhere, and the Alaska Historical Society named him Alaska Historian of the Year. In 2021, O'Neill was awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks for his contributions to Alaska history and literature. He is married, has a son and three grandchildren.