Bill Donahue is a writer for Outside, Harper’s, Wired, The New York Times Magazine, and more…
Skier Bill Johnson won the gold medal in the downhill in the 1984 Olympics. Then in 1999, when he was 39 years old and ravaged by years of hard drinking, he tried to make a comeback. He crashed, incurring permanent brain damage.
Outside
Edited by Laura Hohnhold. Photo by Michael Lewis.
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When my daughter was almost six, I thought it would be a good idea to take her kayaking down Oregon’s Tualatin River.
National Geographic Adventure
Edited by Mark Jannot. Photo by Brown W. Cannon III.
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As a travel destination for kayakers, the Los Angeles River—that 50-mile concrete channel that cuts through the heart of the city—is underrated.
Mother Jones
Edited by Monika Bauerlein. Photos by James Rexroad.
Nominated for a National Magazine Award.
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I didn’t really know my hardscrabble Portland neighborhood until I floated the local creek in a $49.95 inflatable raft.
DoubleTake
Edited by Toby Lester.
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In the love letters he wrote to his sweetheart, my grandfather extolled the joys of fighting in World War I. In one 1918 note from Paris, he wrote, “The beauty here is punctuated by the boom of long range shells (one just went off in the front of the hotel), but no one seems to mind, unless they are actually hit.”
The Washington Post Magazine
Edited by David Rowell. Photo by Michael Grimm.
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Gilmanton, New Hampshire, population 3,000, is where novelist Grace Metalious wrote Peyton Place—and also where I spent every summer of my childhood. Local rumor holds that, in fact, Grace did not write the book.
Salon
Edited by Laura Miller. Photo by Larry Smith.
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Long the debate has raged: Did Frederick indeed summit Mount McKinley in 1906? Edited by Alison Osius.
Climbing
Edited by Alison Osius.
Republished in 20 Years of Climbing Magazine.
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Pray Here Ministries’ Rick Schneberger offers absolution in a gravel parking lot on the strip mall fringes of Portland.
DoubleTake
Edited by Rob Odom. Illustration by Charles Anderson.
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My great-great-uncle, Tim Donahue, played catcher for the major league Chicago Colts in the 1890s. When he came to bat once in 1899, according to the Chicago Tribune, “It appeared as though the select party on top of a neighboring building would jump off in excess of delight.” Edited by Bob Hicks.
The Oregonian
Edited by Bob Hicks.
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