About Waterstone Writing

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Jeff Gunderson

Owner, Waterstone Writing

Highlights:

  • 17+ years of content/technical writing and editing experience.
  • Specialization in the water industry including technological and engineering-
    focused disciplines.
  • Nearly four years of experience as a faculty and adjunct university instructor of
    professional and technical writing (Portland State University).
  • Professional background in environmental consulting and impact analysis.
  • Master’s degree in environmental science and engineering from the Colorado School
    of Mines.
  • Bachelor’s degree in general science from the University of Oregon.

My Journey Into Writing

I found my way into writing in a roundabout way. After finishing graduate studies, I initially worked for a small geotechnical firm in Boulder, Colorado. Later, I transitioned into the environmental consulting field, first with a firm in Monterey, California and then with a larger company based in Irvine, California where I focused on environmental impact assessments of commercial development and infrastructure projects.

Eventually, I left the field altogether to travel and pursue writing. I had my sights on a story in Costa Rica and so I went down there and traveled to a mountainous region called Monteverde (“green mountain” in Spanish), which is renowned for its Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. There, I met Marvin Rockwell, a quaker who at the time was in his early 80s and was part of a community that had migrated to the area from the U.S. state of Alabama in the early 1950s.

In a small café, Marvin told me his remarkable story. As conscientious objectors, Marvin and three other Quakers in 1949 had refused to register for the U.S. draft and were sentenced to a year a day in prison. After being paroled early for good behavior, the four Quakers along with others began searching for a new home more aligned with their beliefs. They found that in Costa Rica—a country that had abolished its military.

 

The Quakers moved to the area and bought land in the foothills of the Tilarán Mountain Range. They also decided to set aside 1,350 acres, a move that would ultimately shape Monteverde’s history. Over the ensuing years, the Quakers would team with scientists to preserve the biologically significant ecosystems in and around their protected lands. These efforts ultimately culminated in the establishment of the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. The story Marvin told me would later be chronicled as part a feature article I wrote for the June 2005 issue of Americas Magazine.

From that beginning, I continued to write. I started contributing to various industry trade publications, leveraging my educational background and professional experience. I developed a niche by focusing on certain markets and along the way realized a skill in being able to unravel complex concepts and express them in more understandable terms. Fast forward to today and I’ve been honored to work with many different public and private organizations across the broader realms of water, technology, engineering, and more.