Field Notes

Essential gear, history, and all things Filson, broken down by experts in the field.

black and white image of denali peak
Field Notes

The Tall One: The Story of Denali

In a land already renown for a larger than life landscape, the mountain known as Denali inspires awe from those that observe it. Wreathed in an eternal cloak of snow and ice, it looms over the Alaska range’s surrounding peaks like a reserved ruler, the king of the north. Rising over three and a half vertical miles into the sky, it was for most of its life one of the most remote mountains on the planet. Yet, it is visible for hundreds of miles on a clear day.

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5 Min
snow covered lit cabin in forest with green northern lights above
Field Notes

Mythology of the Northern Lights

When the northern night skies light up with brilliant streaks of light during the long winter months in a phenomenon known as the Aurora Borealis, it can take people’s breath away. As the multicolored ribbons of ghostly light twist and dance across the sky, they seem almost to come from another realm, one out of reach to those of us on earth. As long as humans have roamed the planet, they have created myths and legends to explain these ever-elusive denizens from another realm.

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5 Min
yukon Quest promo image
Field Notes

The Yukon Quest: The Toughest Race in the World

Toiling along in relative anonymity, Yukon Quest is a much grittier and demanding race than its older and more established cousin, the Iditarod. t has a relationship akin to that of K2 and Mt. Everest in the Himalayas. While the latter is the tallest peak on the planet and acts as a magnet for public attention, K2 is renowned among climbers as the harder and purer peak to summit. It’s the one that doesn’t have huge lines of people snaking up its slopes.

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5 Min
old black and white photo of men standing in front of tent in snowy forest
Field Notes

Walter Harper: The First to Summit Denali

By the time they established their final high-altitude camp at 17,500 feet both Stuck, and Tatum were struggling. The archdeacon, in particular, was in trouble. A forty-nine-year-old lifelong smoker, each breath was a struggle, and he would periodically blackout. But the team decided to try for the summit. The decision to put Harper in the lead was a simple one. “Karstens recognized that any chance they had to succeed hinged on having their strongest climber lead, and that was Walter,”

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10 Min
plane parked on a snowy runway in a pine forest
Field Notes

Rainy Pass Lodge

At age 17, Steve Perrins paid $1 to watch a home movie that rearranged his brain. It was March 1974. The 16mm reel, screened at a New Hampshire high school, was filmed by Buckey Winkley, an Alaska hunting-and-fishing guide, who was there fresh from the backcountry. Sitting in the audience, Perrins was transfixed by the images of bears, Dall sheep, trout, and salmon. Afterward, thirsty for adventure, he approached Winkley. “I’m going to Alaska,” he said, definitively, and he asked the guide for help.

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group of men working on clearing a path with a bulldozer in a pine forest
Profiles

Black Regiments of the Alcan Highway

Seventy-eight years ago, the Army Corps of Engineers completed one of its most ambitious assignments of World War II—the Alaska-Canadian (Alcan) Highway. After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the Alcan Highway became a high priority. Eight engineer regiments were assigned: 18th, 35th, 340th, and 341st, and Black 93rd, 95th, 97th, and 388th reluctantly added. Race relations in American were very different in 1942, which was still in the era of Jim Crow and a segregated Army. Opportunities for Blacks were rare, and expectations low. They were unwanted for duty in the front lines and often treated with condescension or contempt by their White leaders and other White soldiers.

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5 Min
vintage and new ford broncos parked in a field
Field Notes

Ford Bronco x Filson Wildland Fire Rig

As far back as the 1940s, Filson Cruiser jackets were the official Class A attire of the U.S. Forest Service, and many still see the iconic green U.S. Forest Service-badged Broncos out in the wild. That rich history comes through to today’s Bronco + Filson Wildland Fire Rig Concept. Based on a 2021 Bronco four-door SUV, the concept vehicle blends advanced off-road capabilities with rugged design details, using Filson materials and a full firefighting skid built into the back.

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5 Min
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Field Notes

A Brief Look at the Origin of Denim in North America

The history of denim in America dates back to the 1840s, when the durability of the warp-faced, twill textile was a proven choice for workwear clothing, with pants and overalls much in demand. The blue threads of woven cotton were dyed with indigo through a process known as “rope dying” or “chain dying,” while the weft threads were left white and visible only on the reverse side. Over time, other weights of denim were made available, along with different colors: tan, black, and gray. For laborers in the fields, coal mines, forests, and mills, denim was an inexpensive clothing option that was widely available and came in all sizes. During the California Gold Rush of 1848 to 1855, the prospector dressed in his denim work clothing, field jacket, and hip waders was a common sight.

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3 Min
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Field Notes

The MAPLAND ACT: Digitally Mapping to Simplify Public Land Recreation

Digital mapping and GPS technologies have become an essential part of outdoor recreation. By pinpointing on a handheld device a user’s precise location, hikers, hunters, anglers, boaters, and others can see exactly where they stand relative to landmarks and property boundaries. However, the full potential of these technologies to enhance our enjoyment of public lands is hampered by incomplete and inconsistent mapping data from agencies such as the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, and Army Corps of Engineers. Thankfully, a bipartisan bill introduced in both chambers of Congress in March 2020, the Modernizing Access to our Public Land (MAPLand) Act, addresses this shortcoming.

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3 Min
North Mountain Lookout_14
Field Notes

Something Worth Saving: Fire Lookout Restored by Logging Town Community

As you climb up the tower steps, layers of jagged peaks within Washington’s Cascade Range emerge in every direction. Below, wild river valleys carve through the sea of forests around the small town of Darrington. The million-dollar view from the historic North Mountain Lookout was once used by the Forest Service to spot fires, but the structure fell into disrepair once technology and other fire detection methods took its place. Now a small group of dedicated locals are on a mission to restore the abandoned piece of history sitting on top of North Mountain.

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5 Min
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Field Notes

Jen Judge: Becoming an independent Outdoorswoman

For me, becoming an independent woman in the outdoors has been about mitigating fears. After all, the backcountry is full of potentially scary things. There are wild and unpredictable creatures, as well as creepy-crawlies. There are existential risks to worry over, including injury (of either myself or others), over-exhaustion, running out of food and water, being stuck out in the elements, or simply getting lost. And then there are fears caused by how society sees women, such as lack of competence or not measuring up.

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10 Min
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Field Notes

One Common Goal: 
Farming & Hunting for conservation

Across the Great Plains region stretches a vast network of protected grasslands and wetlands, from the never-ending grain fields of Kansas and Nebraska to the dusty prairie pothole regions of the Dakotas and Montana. These crucial ecosystems teem with wildflowers and tall swaying grasses, while cattails and bulrushes rustle next to quiet ponds, and throughout it all untold numbers of insects and small animals thrive. Overhead, all manner of birds soar, often stopping here during their crucial summer and winter migration periods to rest and raise new families. But here is the really interesting part of this story: Almost all of this land is privately owned, and if it weren’t for hunters, farmers, and ranchers, none of it would probably be here.

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5 Min
hands holding a long freshly milled board
Field Notes

The Lifecycle of Timber

The lifecycle of logging is both simple and complex. It’s a carefully balanced relationship between man and nature that allows for the production of everything from homes to solvents and even LCD screens, while simultaneously preserving the resource that makes it all possible. It’s important to understand the ways in which logging has evolved into a sustainable practice — a circle of planting, harvesting, respect, and renewal that ensures we don’t miss the forest for the trees.

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3 Min
logger using a tool to manipulate a log in a river
Field Notes

Lost Language of American Loggers

Fill a forest with five-hundred-year-old trees, up to a few hundred feet tall. Season it with native Americans, native-born pioneers, and immigrants from every corner of the Atlantic and Pacific. Into this wilderness introduce sharp tools, ornery teams of oxen and several thousand-pound logs pulled by wire and chain under tension. Add steep hills and log-filled ponds, rivers, or bays, where even a nimble logger might slip. While you’re at it, drag through a testy steam engine throwing sparks into a forest dry enough to be a tinderbox. Then borrow some sailors who speak and weave in the local jargon. Sequester these workers from the rest of civilization for months at a time. Distilled from this mash came the language of the North American logger.

A few of these words tramped out of the woods and joined the larger culture. Perhaps you’ve flung a few around yourself, without noticing the sawdust that clung to them.

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5 Min
hand holding a silver tool and a black tool working on creating a floral design on a piece of dark leather
Field Notes

The Art of Hand Tooled Leather

Hand-tooled leather goods is an art form that combines durability and creativity, with a material that only gets better with time. Hand-worked leather has its own long history. In the United States, this includes items of everyday use like horse saddles, bridles, and other tack used throughout the old West from the 19th century to the present day. Clothing and personal items, like belts, wallets, gun holsters, and carrying cases for long guns like rifles were also popular and considered worth the time and expense of having specialized designs added to the leatherwork. Footwear for both men and women have been a staple of leather-worked designs as well.

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5 Min