In Hush of the Land: Stories from the Bob Marshall Wilderness, Arnold ‘Smoke’ Elser and Eva-Maria Maggi take the audience on a journey with horses and mules deep into the mountains of Western Montana. This engaging, hands-on campfire storytelling event is based on the inspiring memoir Hush of the Land, which chronicles the six-decade quest of packer and outfitter Arnold ‘Smoke’ Elser to protect wild lands by bringing thousands of people deep into Montana’s mountains on horseback.

Experience the joys and thrills of summer rides, harrowing grizzly bear encounters, fishing in clear mountain streams, and many nights around a campfire in some of the West’s last wild places. In this lively program, Maggi shares how meeting Smoke ignited her love for storytelling, while Elser recounts how his testimony for the Wilderness Act and his fight to preserve and expand Montana’s wilderness lands influenced his career as an outfitter and educator, giving him a voice at the center of Montana’s conservation movement.