Tom Habecker spent 32 years as a ranger in five national parks, including Yosemite and Gettysburg. Over the years, he wrote daily in a journal, and after his retirement, he used his diaries as the basis for a book, Send a Ranger: My Life Serving the National Parks.

Habecker ’69 H&HD says he was inspired to become a ranger when he was a Boy Scout. “In 1963, I had an opportunity to go to Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico, and there was a staff of young men who were called rangers,” he says. “These guys looked over everybody and taught skills classes and handled emergencies, and they could do just about everything. I was very impressed by that, and I always wanted to work somehow outdoors.”

It was a busy life. Winters were filled with ski patrols, avalanche training, and preparing for the busy summer season, which almost always presented some kind of emergency. In his first year as the Lake McDonald subdistrict ranger in Glacier National Park in Montana, Habecker says, he saw it all—a climbing death, a car going over the wall on Going-to-the-Sun Road, and a fatality on a concessioner-led horse ride. While working in Alaska, he experienced dog mushing; in Yosemite, which Habecker says was his favorite park to work at, he learned about law enforcement, search and rescue, emergency medicine, and bear management.

Habecker and his wife, Donna, live in Bozeman, Montana, and continue to enjoy the parks. “Our advice is to visit the lesser-known parks,” he says. “The small places are wonderful.” —Julie Engelhardt