Jim Henterly

Jim Henterly worked his first season on US Forest Service fire crew in 1977, following time in the Army as an infantry medic and paratrooper. In 1979, his wife Ann Marie got hired to staff a fire lookout tower on the Snake River in Idaho and — by the end of the season — Jim had left the fire crew to join her, commencing nine consecutive seasons as a lookout couple.

During this time, Jim completed his first published book illustrations while earning a BA in English and Secondary Education at WWU in 1982. He also drew the first North Cascades Institute logo during this time!

In addition to serving as a fire lookout, he began career as an illustrator of picture books, textbooks, posters, cards and other products under the moniker Jamichael Henterly. His illustrations have been published internationally with several major publishing houses and has garnered many awards. He has a K-12 teaching certificate and taught Illustration and Drawing classes at Western Washington University from 2005-2014. He continues to serve actively as a volunteer Firefighter/EMT and officer in his rural Whatcom County community and to staff remote fire lookouts during the fire season for USFS and NPS (27 seasons on lookouts & counting!).