Co-sponsor

Ken Ilgunas is an author and adventurer whose 2016 book Trespassing Across America: One Man’s Epic, Never Done Before (and Sort of Illegal) Hike Across the Heartland journals his trek by foot across the entire 1,700-mile proposed route of the Keystone XL pipeline. A fascinating account of one man’s remarkable journey,  Trespassing Across America is filled with harrowing physical trials; strange encounters with the weather, terrain and animals of the Great Plains and eye-opening discussions with the people of America’s Heartland. Ilgunas grapples with difficult questions about our place in the world: what is our personal responsibility as stewards of the land? As members of a rapidly warming planet? As mere individuals up against something as powerful as the fossil fuel industry? Trespassing Across America has been selected as the “Common Read” for all Donnelly College students and faculty for the 2019-20 academic year. We welcome Ilgunas to campus to share his experience and frame his perspective on environmental ethics and the Keystone XL pipeline in this lecture that is free and open to the public.