{{Short description|American environmentalist}} {{other people|Peter Bauer}} {{Infobox person | birth_date ={{birth year and age|1982}} | citizenship = American | occupation = {{unbulleted list|Environmentalist|Primitive skills educator| Rewilding advocate}} | known_for = {{unbulleted list|Rewild Portland|"Urban Scout"}} | movement = Rewilding | website = {{URL|petermichaelbauer.com}} }} '''Peter Michael Bauer''' (born 1982) is a Portland, Oregon-based environmental and primitive skills educator, rewilding advocate, and performer. Bauer is the founder of Rewild Portland. He is known for his performance persona "Urban Scout", through which he helped bring the rewilding movement to broader public attention in the United States during the 2000s.
==Early life== Bauer, a fourth-generation northeast Portland native, grew up in the suburbs of Portland.<ref name="Klepfer2012">{{cite news |title=Rewilding and surviving |last=Klepfer |first=Mike |date=May 2012 |newspaper=The Southeast Examiner|url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67a408db21d59f29a4135c82/t/6926993930fd813aaa6f85eb/1764137273444/SE_Examiner.pdf}}</ref><ref name="Wilkinson2008">{{cite magazine |title=On the Trail of the Urban Scout |last=Wilkinson |first=Sarah |date=2008 |issue=45| pages=07–08 |magazine=Positive Living|url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67a408db21d59f29a4135c82/t/69cbf029c591c80706b64822/1774972971399/positive_living_magazine_optimized.pdf}}</ref> At the age of eleven, he earned his first Boy Scout merit badge for basketry.<ref name="Kraftbook2012">{{cite book |last=Kraft |first=Jessica Carew |title=Why We Need to Be Wild - One Woman's Quest for Ancient Human Answers to 21st Century Problems |year=2023 |page=39 |publisher=Sourcebooks |location=Naperville, Illinois |isbn=978-1728276595}}</ref>
At sixteen he and his friend, author Lisa Wells, dropped out of high school in 1998 and traveled to New Jersey to study under naturalist and survivalist Tom Brown, Jr..<ref name="Klepfer2012" /><ref name="Wells2008">{{cite magazine |title=Urban Scout on Creating A World Beyond Civilization |last=Wells |first=Lisa |date=2008 |issue=55| page=23 |magazine=Green Anarchy|url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67a408db21d59f29a4135c82/t/69e927c2187a2966bc5bfbea/1776887751732/Green+Anarchy+%23+25.pdf}}</ref><ref name="Pocock2019">{{cite book |last=Pocock |first=Joanna |title=Surrender The Call of the American West |year=2019 |page=178 |publisher=House of Anansi Press |location=Toronto, ON |isbn=9781487007249}}</ref> Bauer has cited the novel ''Ishmael'', by Daniel Quinn as an early influence to pursue what would become the rewilding movement.<ref name="Distefano2008">{{cite news |title=Prepping for the end of days can be one (re)wild party |last=Distefano |first=Anne Marie |date=Feb 1, 2008 |newspaper=Portland Tribune|url=http://www.portlandtribune.com/features/story.php?story_id=120174245621124800|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100726145457/http://www.portlandtribune.com/features/story.php?story_id=120174245621124800|archive-date=July 26, 2010}}</ref><ref name="Boule2007">{{cite news |title='Urban Scout' hopes to prepare us for civilization's collapse |last=Boulé |first=Margie |date=Aug 12, 2007 |newspaper=Oregonian|url=https://oregonlive.newspapers.com/article/the-oregonian-urban-scout-hopes-to-pre/198005900/}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=2007-08-21 |title=Boulé (cont.): Earth-friendly messages were the key |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-oregonian-boul-cont-earth-frien/198006216/ |access-date=2026-05-21 |work=The Oregonian |pages=69}}</ref>
In 2002, Bauer founded Mythmedia,<ref name="Sommer2006">{{cite news |title=Big-ban theorists |last=Sommer |first=Joshua |date=Feb 3, 2006 |newspaper=Oregonian|url=https://oregonlive.newspapers.com/article/the-oregonian-big-bang-theorists/198007076/}}</ref> a nonprofit dedicated to "creating cultural and environmental change through the arts." It functioned as a hybrid art collective, film forum, and community advocacy organization, running programs that included writing classes for homeless youth and a summer camp teaching wilderness and urban survival skills.<ref name="Wells2008" />
==Urban Scout== Bauer began appearing as Urban Scout in the early 2000s,<ref name="Baumgarten2009">{{cite magazine |title=Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out…Rewild! |last=Baumgarten |first=Mark |date=April 2009 |page=39 |magazine=Sound Magazine|url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67a408db21d59f29a4135c82/t/68fff0036490541eaf7cf06b/1761603587152/Sound_Magazine_optimized.pdf}}</ref> dressed only in a covering of mud, soleless Adidas, and a rectangle of gray wool loincloth.<ref name="Klepfer2012" /><ref name="WellsBook2021">{{cite book |last=Wells |first=Lisa |title=Believers: Making A Life at The End of the World |year=2021 |page= |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |location=New York |isbn=978-0374110253|pages=169–176}}</ref> He performed the character publicly throughout Portland, demonstrating primitive skills in Pioneer Courthouse Square, like lighting cigarettes with a bow-drill fire.<ref name="Boule2007" />
One reporter described Urban Scout as "a playful response to a real set of problems."<ref name="WellsBook2021" />{{Reference page|page=169}} Bauer also began going barefoot and fashioned what he called "Urban Scout Shoes" — soleless Adidas that let him walk barefoot while technically satisfying no-shoes policies.<ref name="Parisi2006">{{cite news |title=We're All Gonna Die Anyway |last=Parisi |first=Laura |date=Jan 25, 2006 |newspaper=Willamette Week|url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67a408db21d59f29a4135c82/t/692692a1ba45eb5baa8246da/1764135585913/NWF06-ww.article.pdf}}</ref>
Events organized under the persona included The Silent Spring Fling, the Nuclear Winter Formal (an annual "preemptive post-apocalyptic" dance party)<ref name="WellsBook2021"/>{{rp||page=172}} and a summer survival camp covering fire-making, gas siphoning, lock picking, and urban foraging.<ref name="WellsBook2021"/>{{rp|174}}
In 2006, Bauer launched the blog urbanscout.org.<ref name="WellsBook2021"/>{{rp|176}}
==Rewild Portland== In 2009, Bauer founded the nonprofit Rewild Portland, which offers instruction in wild skills and ecological restoration for children and adults.<ref name="Kraftbook2012"/>{{rp|39}} The mission of the organization is "to foster cultural and environmental resilience through place-based arts, traditions, and technologies".<ref name="RewildPortlandMission">{{cite web |title=About Rewild Portland |url=https://www.rewildportland.com/about |website=Rewild Portland |publisher=Rewild Portland |access-date=May 5, 2026}}</ref> Bauer says, "rewilding is about returning to a more wild and natural state".<ref name="Boule2007" />
The organization works with several Native groups in the Willamette Valley. Classes have covered basket-weaving using invasive species (such as English ivy and Himalayan blackberry), stone tool-making,<ref name="Kraftbook2012"/>{{rp|39}}<ref name=oregonlive>{{cite news |url=https://www.oregonlive.com/hg/2016/03/invasive_english_ivy_basket_we.html |title=Invasive English ivy: Don't hate it, weave it into a basket |last=Eastmann |first=Janet |date=23 March 2016 |newspaper=The Oregonian |access-date=5 May 2026}}</ref> archery,<ref name="Kraftbook2012"/>{{rp|39}} hide tanning, bow-making, herbal medicine, cooking roadkill, and urban foraging.<ref name="Klepfer2012" />
He learned to speak the Native trade language of his local region, Chinook Wawa.<ref name="Kraftbook2012" /> Bauer also leads an annual wild skills gathering workshop called "Echoes in Time".<ref name="Kraftbook2012"/>{{rp|39–40}} In 2010, he self-published his book Rewild or Die.<ref name="Pocock2019" />
In Jessica Carew Kraft’s book ''Why We Need To Be Wild: One Woman’s Quest for Ancient Human Answers to 21st Century Problems'', Kraft describes Bauer as "one of the most prominent popularizers of the craft in the rewilding scene today…"<ref name="Kraftbook2012"/>{{rp|38}}
In 2026, the peer-reviewed journal ''Hunter Gatherer Research'' (Liverpool University Press) published an article by Bauer: "The human rewilding movement: Iterative application of hunter-gatherer studies at Rewild Portland."<ref name="HunterGatherer2026">{{cite journal |last=Bauer |first=Peter Michael |title=The human rewilding movement: Iterative application of hunter-gatherer studies at Rewild Portland |journal=Hunter Gatherer Research |publisher=Liverpool University Press |year=2026 |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages= |doi=10.3828/hgr.2026.4}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist}}
== External links == * [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-rewilding-podcast-w-peter-michael-bauer/id1490811038 The Rewilding Podcast w/ Peter Michael Bauer] * {{YouTube|id=7V9j5y0T9Uw|title=Peter Michael Bauer, Siren Theater Stand Up Level One Showcase}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bauer, Peter Michael}} Category:1982 births Category:Living people Category:Activists from Portland, Oregon Category:American environmentalists Category:Rewilding advocates