Photo by Alex Roberts
AMC board member Mardi Fuller advocates for racial equity through writing, speaking, and community building. A lifelong backcountry adventurer, in January 2021 she became the first known Black person to hike all 48 of New Hampshire’s high peaks in winter. She is a contributing writer to Outside magazine, SKI magazine, NRDC.org, Melanin Basecamp and more. Mardi organizes BIPOC-centered hike, ski, and climb events, and has led Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion workshops and webinars for the AMC community. Mardi & the Whites, a film that celebrates Black liberation in the wild, explores Mardi’s relationship with the White Mountains, the great outdoors, and the community that surrounds them.
This month, Mardi sat down with AMC’s Jenny O’Connell for a conversation on ice climbing and winter adventure, equity in the outdoors, her evolving relationship with AMC, and All Out: AMC’s new action plan.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Jenny O’Connell: Tell me a little bit about your background in the outdoors. What gets you out there? What lights you up?
Mardi Fuller: You know, that’s a question I sometimes have a hard time answering, because I feel like it’s just — innate. I am made of dirt, and to dirt I will return. I love to be outside with all that nature offers in order for me to feel more human, and more in tune with myself: my emotions, my physical state, my spiritual state. It has always felt so natural. I think you know the expansiveness of being not within four walls.
JO: Yeah, I can really relate to that.
MF: I grew up in the suburbs of New York City, spending a lot of time playing outside. My parents did, too, but not in the kind of categorized ways that we speak of in American culture. They didn’t buy special gear to do things outside. My parents grew up in Jamaica in the 40s and the 50s—like kerosene lamps, before TV and electricity. My mom would always say the only thing to do inside was chores. So why would [she] be inside?
You know, my mom’s not athletic. My dad is, but I think there’s unfortunately this association in the U.S. of being outdoorsy with being athletic, which I really feel strongly about decoupling, even though I do a lot of athletic things. I do them proudly, with mediocrity.
JO: [Laughs] Same.
MF: I’m not trying to always be stronger, faster, more competitive. I do like to push myself, but it’s really about just being out there and feeling my body. That sense of knowing. Of feeling like I know myself, or like I know the world a little bit better because I’m outside.
JO: I’ve been glad to see the shift in some of the mainstream outdoor culture from that conqueror mentality—gotta get up the summit, gotta be the fastest, gotta have the nicest gear—to being more focused around connection and joy. It’s happening slowly, but it’s exciting. I’ve been deconstructing what I learned about the outdoors coming into it as a guide fifteen years ago.
MF: Yes, it’s moving into prominence in the discourse. It’s not yet really front and center, but we’re moving it there.
JO: How did you get involved with AMC?
MF: I went on my first chapter-led AMC trip in 2005. It was a winter hike up Moosilauke, and it was my second or third winter hike ever. It was just immediately a special and needed community. I had some other friends who winter hike, but it was such a great resource to be able to learn skills in a safer environment with people who are experienced.
I participated in the winter hiking program in 2006 or 7, and I even did an AIARE 1 avalanche training course. I became a co-leader in 2008 and did that for a few years, and then I actually kind of left the AMC because I just felt it was too homogeneously white of an environment. I had learned a lot technically and met some great people, but I also had some bad interpersonal experiences. I was often having to suppress my identity and code switch into a mainstream culture in order to exist there. And I decided I wasn’t going to do that anymore.
I watched the AMC kind of dig in its heels about its obliviousness about equity for many years. The AMC didn’t–and probably still doesn’t–have a really good reputation among some BIPOC, at least in Boston and New England. The DEI work that’s going on in the AMC I think is largely happening because a bunch of individual volunteers across the chapters pushed for it. It was the volunteers who were like, oh, look at [Mardi and the Whites], we should show this. And [AMC] had me finally give a talk in the DEI series. Nicole [Zussman, AMC’s President and CEO] was immediately like, can we meet? I want to talk to you. She, to her credit, built a relationship with me over a year.
I hesitated about joining AMC’s board for a long time and then finally decided to join because I like Nicole. I didn’t fully trust her yet, but I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt that she did want to make change. And I wanted to influence this institution that has such significance in the areas where I recreate. I spend so much of my life there. I care so much about it. I honestly came to the board not because I felt like I’m so in love with the AMC, but more because I want to influence protecting these lands and ensuring that everyone can recreate, and everyone can become a leader.
Whether it’s in the AMC or other conservation agencies or nonprofits, everyone can contribute to the leadership of the conservation space in the outdoors so that we get to a point of equity where people from marginalized backgrounds, as well as white [cisgender, heterosexual] people, are all sharing equal leadership. That’s my goal and hope in life, and in my work. And being on the board seems like a pretty great way to influence that.
JO: Thanks for sharing that. I feel like in 150 years there’s a lot of time to mess up and make mistakes, and it’s interesting to see what people are trying to do about it, and where the gaps still are.
I imagine as a board member you’re pretty tapped into the All Out action plan. What resonates most with you about the work you’re doing right now with AMC?
MF: Well, obviously I care a whole lot about the DEI plan and seeing it executed well. And I think the membership has seen some fits and starts around DEI and I really want to prove that we can do this, and commit to it, and carry it out in a sustainable way. So that’s my priority. I also just care a whole lot about how the chapters operate and how our DEI initiatives impact volunteer leaders so that they can be creating inclusive spaces in their chapters and have the support and resources they need to do so.
But as I’ve been a part of the board, I get very jazzed learning more about the conservation initiatives, and the research that our science team is doing. It’s all really exciting.
JO: We’re really lucky to have you. Thank you. I’m so glad you’re here.
Mardi Fuller finishing the winter 48’s on Mt. Madison, White Mountains, NH. Photo by Joe Klementovich.
JO: I want to ask you about ice climbing and winter adventure. I’ve been ice climbing once, and there was so much to learn about what’s dangerous, and so much to understand about the gear. How did you break into that sport? And what do you love about it?
MF: I feel really fortunate. I met a bunch of Mount Washington Valley ice climbers and guides maybe four years ago, and they really encouraged me and started taking me out. Because I volunteer with the organization Outdoor Afro, I would set up some events with those guys and make opportunities for Black people to try ice climbing. So, I kind of became part of the community, and now I help run the Mount Washington Valley Ice fest.
It’s a sport full of inside knowledge, but there are a lot of friendly people trying to open the doors, and more affinity clinics for women, or people with disabilities, or people of color, queer folks. So that is a great thing about this era in climbing.
It brings me joy and terror intertwined. I’m really drawn towards that type of activity.
JO: Ice climbing, hiking, skiing…you do so much winter adventure! What would you want somebody to know who is just starting out?
MF: That you can be warm while you do it. People don’t know this. You’re hot when you’re hiking.
JO: So hot.
JO: You know, I’m thinking about all the work you do in equity and inclusivity in the outdoors. That’s clearly your passion, and you have a lot of energy for it. Do you ever feel like you get to experience the outdoors in a way that’s just…joyful and uncomplicated? What does it look like when you get to put that down and just be?
MF: Yeah, that’s a good question and something that I have to remind myself of, especially when I’m calendaring. I have to establish boundaries to achieve that because I can book my weekends up with events that I’m leading. And so I try to do things alone, and make sure to schedule time with my friends. I just have to be pretty intentional about it.
JO: Is there anything else you want to mention about your life and work in the outdoors, or about AMC?
MF: I invite folks who maybe knew the AMC in the past and have moved on to come take another look. Things are changing. Things are different here. You might like what you see.
You can contribute. You can become more active. I’m glad that I did that after leaving for a season. I’m excited about our mission. And I just feel very hopeful about where we’re going to go.
