Stephen Silha is a writer, facilitator, futurist, and longtime creative contributor to Vashon Island. He lived on Vashon for 43 years before moving to Ruston Point in Tacoma.

In this episode, Stephen reflects on Vashon’s past and future, sharing stories from his decades of work in journalism, community dialogue, youth media, and LGBTQ history. The conversation also touches on his friendship with filmmaker and poet James Broughton and his role in producing the documentary Big Joy.

Earlier in his career, Stephen was a reporter for The Christian Science Monitor and The Minneapolis Star before becoming communications director for the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. He was a leading voice in the arena of socially responsible journalism and co-founded Journalism That Matters. He also co-led a research project on community communications called Good News/Good Deeds: Citizen Effectiveness in the Age of Electronic Democracy.

On Vashon, Stephen worked with young people to help bring their voices into the media and to facilitate youth-adult dialogues. Along with Ellen Kritzman, he helped organize the Vashon Heritage Museum’s groundbreaking exhibit IN AND OUT: Being LGBTQ on Vashon Island, which showcased the stories of many Islanders.

A personal friend of the groundbreaking filmmaker and poet James Broughton, Stephen produced Big Joy, a documentary celebrating Broughton’s remarkable life and creative spirit.

References from the interview

You can see the IN AND OUT exhibit here: vashonpride.com

To learn about the Villages: meetvillage.org

To learn more about Journalism That Matters: journalismthatmatters.org

To learn more about Big Joy: bigjoy.org

GRBells—the beautiful bell company that will be at Strawberry Festival: grbbells.com