303: The Rise and Fall of Therapeutic Camps: History, Hope and Hard Lessons.
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
Release Date: 02/24/2026
314: Nature Deficit or Mental Health Crisis? Scott Shepherd on Reconnecting Young People with the Outdoors
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
What happens when a generation grows up more connected to screens than to the natural world? In this episode, Will sits down with outdoor educator and founder Scott Shepherd to explore the growing disconnect between young people, nature, and one another. Drawing from more than 15 years of experience in outdoor, environmental, and experiential education, Scott explains why time outside is no longer just recreation—it has become an essential component of mental health, emotional regulation, resilience, and healthy youth development. Scott shares his own transformative journey sailing around...
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313: Can Wilderness Therapy Be Proven Scientifically? Rob Meltzer on Research, Critics, and the Future of the Field
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
What if wilderness therapy has been helping people heal for a long time—but the field never fully understood why it works? In this episode Will sits down with Rob Meltzer, founder of the new Wilderness Therapy Institute. Rob explains why he believes wilderness therapy may function as a form of “metabolic health treatment” and shares groundbreaking efforts to study how sleep, movement, sunlight, nutrition, circadian rhythm, inflammation, and extended time in nature impact mental health. The conversation explores emerging research in metabolic psychiatry, biological mechanisms of healing,...
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312: Healing Trauma in Adolescent Girls: How ROOTs Transition Blends Nature, Family, and Residential Care
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
What happens when a clinician decides that traditional residential treatment isn’t enough for adolescent girls struggling with trauma? In this episode Will talks with Kami Black, founder of in Park City. Founded during the uncertainty of the COVID pandemic, was built around a bold idea: combine the healing power of nature, intensive family systems work, and trauma-informed residential care into one integrated model for adolescent girls ages 15–18. Kami shares how her own experiences, years in residential treatment, and deep commitment to trauma work shaped a program focused not just on...
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311: 30 Years Later: How Summit Achievement Was Built to Last
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
Thirty years later… What happens when one of the earliest outdoor behavioral healthcare programs refuses to follow the trends of the field? In this episode Will sits down with CEO Nichol Ernst to reflect on the 30-year evolution of — a program Will co-founded in 1996. Together, they explore how Summit survived massive shifts in the wilderness therapy world: the rise and fall of therapeutic boarding schools, the influx of venture capital into behavioral healthcare, the smartphone era, COVID, and growing public controversy surrounding outdoor treatment. Rather than chasing trends, Summit...
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310: How Venture Capital Grew Wilderness Therapy… and Then Ran Away
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
What happens when a field built on healing becomes shaped by money? In this episode, Will revisits a 2020 exploration of the business of wilderness therapy—tracing its evolution from nonprofit, mission-driven roots to a rapidly expanding, privately funded industry. From early non-profits programs to the rise of private-pay models in the 1980s and the explosive growth fueled by outside investment, this episode examines how financial forces didn’t just support wilderness therapy—they fundamentally shaped its direction, priorities, and structure. And what happens when that money leaves? In...
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309: The First Therapist in Wilderness Therapy: Dr. Madolyn Liebing and the Clinical Origins of the Field
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
How did wilderness therapy become outdoor behavioral healthcare—and who made that shift possible? In this re-released and historically significant episode Will sits down with Dr. Madolyn Liebing, widely considered the first licensed mental health professional to work in a primitive skills wilderness therapy program. As a co-founder of Aspen Achievement Academy in 1988, Dr. Liebing helped transform early outdoor programs from survival-based experiences into clinically grounded treatment—introducing psychological assessments, treatment planning, and family systems work into the wilderness....
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308: The Evolution of Wilderness Therapy: L. Jay Mitchell, SUWS, and the Early Days of Outdoor Behavioral Healthcare Treatment
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
Who really built wilderness therapy—and how did a lawyer with no formal clinical training help shape one of the most influential models in outdoor mental health treatment? In this episode Will revisits a powerful 2019 interview with L. Jay Mitchell, founder of SUWS (School of Urban and Wilderness Survival). Mitchell shares his unlikely path—from a difficult adolescence and early inspiration from Kurt Hahn, to law school, military service as a JAG attorney, and ultimately creating one of the first wilderness therapy programs in the United States. This episode explores the early roots of...
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307: From Prison Inmate to Wilderness Therapy Pioneer: The Story of Larry Wells
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
Wilderness therapy didn’t start with therapists—it evolved with the help of an ex-con who found his heart of service to others in recovery. In this episode Will shares the powerful story of Larry Wells—an early pioneer whose lived experience shaped the foundations of early wilderness therapy programs. From his teenage years in jail to his exposure to the outdoors in a federal prison camp, Larry’s journey reveals how connection, purpose, and challenge became the roots of a new approach to helping struggling young people through the outdoors. Through the creation of Expedition Outreach...
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306: A Mighty Change in Wilderness Therapy: Larry Dean Olsen, Anasazi, and the 1990s Crisis (Part 2)
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
How did wilderness therapy survive the crises of the early 1990s — and why did some of its earliest leaders continue to believe in the work even as the field faced national criticism? In this episode of Stories from the Field we hear a rare 2008 interview with wilderness therapy pioneer Larry Dean Olsen and his former student and colleague Ezekiel Sanchez. They reflect on Larry’s survival courses at Brigham Young University in the late 1960s, where struggling students often returned from wilderness expeditions with new confidence and direction — experiences that helped lead to the...
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305: A Mighty Change in Wilderness Therapy: How Larry Dean Olsen Impacted the Field (Part 1)
Stories from the Field: Mental Health and the Outdoors
How and why did wilderness therapy ignite in the American West? In this episode of Stories from the Field Will explores the life and influence of Larry Dean Olsen, one of the key figures behind the primitive skills model used in many wilderness therapy programs. Through his work at Brigham Young University, including the well-known BYU 480 survival course, Olsen showed that powerful personal change could happen when modern comforts were removed and people were challenged to depend on themselves, the group, and the natural world. This episode looks at Olsen’s book Outdoor Survival Skills, his...
info_outlineWhat happened to the hundreds of therapeutic camps that once shaped mental health treatment for young people in the outdoors? Long before the term "wilderness therapy" was coined, therapeutic camps were considered cutting-edge mental health treatment for young people. Backed by major hospitals, staffed by psychiatrists and social workers, and rooted in reform movements of the early 20th century, these camps believed nature, group living, and responsibility could reshape a young life. In this episode, Will traces the evolution of therapeutic camps—from Camp Ramapo and Camp Wediko’s clinically sophisticated summer programs to the long-term wilderness model pioneered by the Dallas Salesmanship Club Camp. These programs laid the groundwork for modern outdoor behavioral healthcare long before Outward Bound or the primitive survival skills model ever existed.
But over time, many therapeutic camps faded. Some evolved. Others closed quietly. And some collapsed under scandal and broken trust—most notably Anneewakee, one of the most controversial long-term therapeutic camps in American history. What can today’s outdoor behavioral health programs learn from this rise and fall? This episode offers a deeply researched historical exploration of innovation, ethics, accountability, and the enduring DNA of therapeutic camps that still shapes wilderness therapy today.
This podcast is supported by White Mountain Adventure Institute (wmai.org), offering adventure inspired retreats for men and facilitated by Will White.