ABOUT US
In 2019, a small group of former students of Peter Matthiessen’s Ocean Zendo met with a few members of Peter’s family to explore the idea of acquiring and rehabilitating the author’s former property in Sagaponack, NY to establish a writer’s retreat, permanent meditation center and gathering place for social and environmental activists. With that initial vision, the Peter Matthiessen Center was born. We came very close, securing the support of the local municipalities and raising nearly all the money needed to purchase the property. Ultimately, the offer to buy the property was rescinded and for now that effort is on hold.
In the intervening years, the PMC has organized myriad popular events on the East End of Long Island–Peter’s home of 55 years where he wrote the great majority of his 33 books–in furtherance of the issues he cared and wrote about most: protection of the environment and native peoples and (hu)man's spiritual search for meaning. In 2025, we launched the Matthiessen Talks, a series of public events, or “dialogues,” designed to amplify the views of writers and activists who are working and organizing on behalf of nature and indigenous peoples. In addition to sponsoring the series, we aim to establish an international literary prize in Peter’s name to support and promote writers producing works of fiction and non-fiction that aim, directly or indirectly, to address the most challenging issues of our time–and, in this way, further empower and mobilize the grassroots movements toiling to save civilization and the planet, as we know them.
Should you wish to volunteer your time as we continue with outreach and fundraising efforts, we would be most grateful.
Please feel free to reach out to us at info@matthiessencenter.org & thank you!
BOARD
Alex Matthiessen
President
Alex is a professional environmentalist who has worked or consulted for a variety of not-for-profit organizations, including World Wildlife Fund, Conservation International, Rainforest Action Network, and (Hudson) Riverkeeper–which he led for a decade and transformed into New York’s premier clean water advocate. Previously, Alex served as a political appointee (for President Bill Clinton) at the U.S. Department of the Interior, winning White House Presidential Awards for two different initiatives. Since 2010, Alex has headed up his own environmental consulting firm, Blue Marble Project, best known for spearheading the "Move NY" campaign which led to New York City's first-in-the-nation congestion pricing program. Currently, Alex is thinking about what’s next in his lifelong effort to help save the planet.
Scott Chaskey
Vice President
Scott is a poet, farmer, and educator. For 30 years he cultivated crops and community at Quail Hill Farm in Amagansett, NY, one of the original Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) projects in the country. He has served as a founding board member for The Center for Whole Communities (Vermont), Sylvester Manor Educational Farm (Shelter Island, NY) and is past president of the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA-NY). A former student of Muryo Roshi (Peter Matthiessen), he is the author of This Common Ground; Seedtime, On the History, Husbandry, Politics, and Promise of Seeds; and Stars are Suns. His most recent book, Soil and Spirit, was published by Milkweed Editions in 2023.
Michael Haggiag
Secretary Treasurer
Michael has had an extensive career as a filmmaker, television producer and publisher in the United Kingdom, as the founder of Aurum Press, Global Arts Productions, Indie Kids, and most recently the Zen Gateway magazine. He was instrumental in the preservation of the Selous Game Reserve in Tanzania when he published Peter Matthiessen’s classic Sand Rivers in 1982.
COMMITTEE
Biddle Duke
Biddle is a widely published writer of non-fiction and journalism and a community activist around sustainability and nature. He has covered city halls, statehouses, governors, the environment, the arts, and our changing world as a reporter and editor for weekly and daily newspapers in New York, New Mexico, Vermont and South Carolina. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker online, and The Surfers Journal. In the 1990s he was the executive editor of The Buenos Aires Herald, a daily newspaper in Argentina, and for 20 years until 2018 he owned and ran a group of weekly newspapers and magazines in northern Vermont. Biddle began his journalism career at The Southampton Press the year Peter Matthiessen’s Men’s Lives was released. That intimate portrait of the inshore fishermen of the South Fork of Long Island and their struggle to survive and a brief conversation with Peter a year later on the beach inspired Biddle’s own journey as a writer and activist fired by both love and indignation.
Paul Winston Rogers
Paul is a writer and investor living in Sag Harbor, New York. Ever since his first summer in Sagaponack in 1967, when his family began what would become an annual pilgrimage to Long Island, renting homes in Sagaponack, Sag Harbor and Bridgehampton, he has felt drawn to this magical spot. His mother moved to Bridgehampton in 1978 and, in 2000, inspired by a dream and disenchanted with urban life, Paul followed suit. He has never regretted that choice. Currently he is committed to helping restore some of the artistic vibrancy and natural beauty that were such an integral part of this community during his youth.
Lee Carlson
Lee Carlson is a writer who was a longtime Zen student and friend of Peter Matthiessen. As a yachtsman, he lived on the North Fork of Long Island for twenty years before recently moving onto his 50-foot sailboat - splitting his time between the Northeastern U.S. in the summer and Southern Florida & the Bahamas in the winter. His discussions with Peter before Peter’s death, and what the writer would like his legacy to be, have been part of the genesis for the Peter Matthiessen Center. As he writes about his friendship with the late novelist: “We were both adventurers and inveterate travelers who loved the outdoors. We were both water people, having worked on the sea, he as a commercial fisherman, me as a sailing and yacht captain. We both enjoyed sailing and fishing. We had both written books set on the ocean.”
STAFF
Daniela Kronemeyer
Project Director
Daniela Kronemeyer is a marketing and development consultant focused on working with nonprofits dedicated to environmental conservation, Indigenous traditions & rights, and spiritual practice. Honoring her love of cultures from around the world, Daniela’s work encompasses the gifts of literature and art to encourage a more conscious way of connecting with the natural world. Born and raised on the East End of Long Island, Daniela has enjoyed collaborating with members of her local community over the years, including closely collaborating with members of the Shinnecock Nation for over a decade, as well as with the Southampton Arts Center, bringing forth a variety of programs focused on environmental awareness and Native culture. In 2022, she co-curated the acclaimed ecological exhibition “A Celebration of Trees”, which she is currently working to expand to a global audience. She is the Director of Marketing for the Tribal Trust Foundation, an organization committed to safeguarding Indigenous wisdom around the world, and recently as the Director of Outreach for the Curtis Legacy Foundation, which highlights Native American culture through the photography of ethnologist Edward S. Curtis. Daniela is currently in the process of co-founding Lúnasa, a consulting agency focused on the natural world and unique travel experiences while collaborating with people and organizations dedicated to healing the planet through Indigenous knowledge, equine therapy, and ancient spiritual traditions.
ADVISORS
John v.H. Halsey
John is the founder and President of Peconic Land Trust, a non-profit land conservation organization serving Long Island. Since 1983, the Peconic Land Trust has worked diligently with landowners, communities, municipalities, and partner organizations to protect nearly 14,000 acres of land, conserving more working farms on Long Island than any other private conservation organization, and securing millions of dollars from the public and private sectors for land protection. John serves on the boards of the Nassau Land Trust, South Fork Land Foundation, and the Southampton Youth Association. He is a member of the Land Trust Alliance’s New York Advisory Council and its National Leadership Council, and board member emeritus of the Long Island Community Foundation and the North American Land Trust.
PECONIC LAND TRUST
We are thankful to have the wisdom and support of the Peconic Land Trust, a non-profit land conservation organization serving as the fiscal sponsor for the Peter Matthiessen Center. Since 1983, the Peconic Land Trust has worked diligently with landowners, communities, municipalities, and partner organizations to protect nearly 14,000 acres of land, conserving more working farms on Long Island than any other private conservation organization, and securing millions of dollars from the public and private sectors for land protection. Involved in over 500 projects on Long Island, the Trust has helped protect farmland, meadows, woodland, dunes and wetlands. Throughout the year, the Trust hosts many events and educational activities to connect people and communities to the land around us.