The Founding Fathers of Westcave Preserve

Westcave Preserve continues to enjoy the ongoing engagement of its three founding fathers: John F. Ahrns, the original and only Preserve Manager from 1975 to the present; E. Lee Walker, the Chairman of the Board from the creation of Westcave Preserve Corporation in 1983 – 2007, and; John Covert Watson – the landowner who had the wisdom to create Westcave Preserve and move this extraordinary property out of private ownership and make it available to the public.

John F. Ahrns is a true Westcave icon and is a member of a rarefied group of unsurpassed naturalists in Texas. He has been the sole preserve director and lead educator since Westcave’s beginnings in 1976. John, together with his wife Brenda, raised a wonderful family in the “double wide” mobile home that also served as the visitor’s center. He began his work at the Preserve by hauling more than 100 full-size garbage bags of trash out of the canyon. The trash had been brought and left there by decades of trespassers who were literally “loving Westcave to death”!

Years later, when he had accomplished astonishing restoration and protection for the Preserve, John set out to build an environmental education program by traveling to area schools encouraging teachers to bring their class rooms out to see Westcave. Our weekday offerings now attract more than 6,000 children each year. John also oversaw the construction of our Warren Skaaren Environmental Learning Center, staff headquarters and residence in the early part of this decade and the development of a field-based program for middle school students

In 2008, we created the John F. Ahrns Award for Environmental Education, presented at our annual Celebration of Children and Nature, to recognize exemplary natural science educators in our community. Past recipients include educators Danna Keyburn, Redeemer Lutheran School and David Matthews, Small Middle School.

E. Lee Walker is Westcave Preserve’s long-time friend and mentor on all things related to strategic development. In fact, it’s fair to say that Westcave Preserve may not even exist were it not for Lee’s ongoing generosity and leadership. He served as the chair of the Westcave Board, and has been its primary benefactor, for more than 25 years. Imagine, more than a quarter of a century of dedicated leadership and support to Westcave Preserve!

It was Lee’s skills in collaborative leadership that generated the funds to build our fabulous Warren Skaaren Environmental Learning Center and those same skills have guided us in a new and expanded strategic direction. Three years ago, after reading Last Child in the Woods, Lee picked up the phone and invited its author, Richard Louv, to come to Austin to speak. Since then we have launched the Children and Nature Collaborative of Austin which has a mission of getting more kids from Central Texas out into nature more often.

Fortunately for Westcave, Lee is the quintessential collaborator -- many would say a collaboration magnet. In fact we have named an award, presented at the annual Celebration of Children in Nature in his honor: the E. Lee Walker Award for Collaboration. Past recipients include Youth Launch for their Urban Roots Program and Texas Wildlife Association, together with National Wildlife Federation for their collaboration in creating the public sector’s Partnership for Children and Nature.

John Covert Watson is a visionary architect who has studied with Frank Lloyd Wright and has created a number of organically designed homes. John was the private landowner of what is now Westcave Preserve. He would tell you that during the time he cared for this property, he often had the difficult task of chasing away hundreds of trespassers, many of whom didn’t share his conservation ethic.

In the early 1980s, John recognized that the public had a great desire to visit this very unique hill country canyon and he had the vision to partner with our life-long friends at the LCRA to create the private non-profit Westcave Preserve who’s early mission was dedicated to the restoration and preservation of our extraordinary property.

We created the John Covert Watson Award for Vision at our 2008 Celebration of Children in Nature and have honored others in our community who have shown vision in their own efforts to connect children to nature. Recipients include Dell Children’s Medical Center for their spectacular “healing gardens”, and Bamberger Ranch Preserve located in the Texas Hill Country.