About the Authors

Wayne and Jan Anderson are husband and wife, both retired after careers as Iowa educators. Since the summer of 1996, they have been seasonal residents of rural Custer County, Colorado. They were active in the Sangre de Cristo Mountain Council for a number of years.

Wayne taught geology for 37 years at the University of Northern Iowa (UNI) in Cedar Falls, where he served for 25 years as Head of the Department of Earth Science. Although perhaps best known for his professional work on Iowa geology, Wayne has maintained an interest in the geology of the western United States for more than 40 years. He completed a summer geology field course in the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming. During other summers in Wyoming, he completed field work for a Master of Science degree and worked for Shell Oil Company. Wayne earned his Ph.D. in geology from the University of Iowa. For seven summers during the late 1960s and early 1970s, he taught field geology to secondary science teachers at National Science Foundation programs at the Philmont Scout Ranch in the mountains of northern New Mexico. While teaching at UNI, he led numerous geology field trips in Iowa, the Midwest, Grand Canyon, Arizona, and Big Bend Texas.

 Jan taught elementary school for 27 years. During her teaching career, she had the opportunity to take her classes on many field trips to the woods and natural prairie areas of Iowa. She was also involved with the wildflower garden on the school playground in Cedar Falls. She has a masters degree in elementary education with an emphasis in science teaching. Course work in botany, plant taxonomy, prairies, entomology, etc. provided helpful content background for planning outdoor experiences for her classes. Now that she is retired, Jan enjoys sharing the Colorado outdoors with her grandchildren.