Our Mission
The Wellstone Center in the Redwoods helps create the writers of tomorrow, helps nurture and develop writers of all levels, and helps free the writer living inside all of us. We do this by bringing people together in a tranquil and peaceful environment to provide them with inspiration and fellowship, and also by publishing a select number of books through our Wellstone Books imprint. Through residencies and regular Author Talk events, we help writers find new direction and encourage them to make a deeper commitment to the long haul of writing seriously, nourished by living in harmony with nature and the environment and finding balance between hard work and ways of unwinding, from yoga to long hikes through the redwoods to conversations over delicious meals prepared in our kitchen.
Our Vision
We believe that writing matters more than ever, as an era of distraction further disrupts our collective ability to focus, and believe books can still matter as much as ever. We also believe in writers helping writers, and we are proud of the many connections writers have made in residence with us that have sustained and nourished their work. We seek to offer an environment that is healing, replenishing, thought-provoking and also inspiring. We hope to build a community of people who can inspire one another to work to bring more creativity and beauty into their lives, toward the goal of battling complacency and hopelessness, and ultimately, making the world a better place.
Co-founder Sarah Ringler
It was Sarah’s vision that prompted us to take on the challenge of bringing the Wellstone Center in the Redwoods into being as a place where people could be inspired. Sarah gathered most of her practical experience working for NGOs and international organizations in Kosovo, Belgrade and elsewhere in the Balkans. She grew up in Germany, with a couple years in Kalamazoo, Michigan, as a child, and got her undergrad degree at Hunter College in New York, then a Masters’ degree in international relations at Berlin’s Free University. She did a year abroad in Madrid and speaks Spanish, besides German and English. Right now she is much occupied with being a mother – she and Steve were very happy to welcome their daughter, Coco Marie, into the world in September 2014 and her younger sister, Anaïs Ailene, in August 2018. What an adventure! She hopes that life will always give her opportunities to learn and expand her horizons. Although having lived in cities most of her life – or maybe because of? – she gets lots of joy from working in the garden with Coco and Anaïs nearby and believes in talking to plants. Sarah loves to eat and cook rich, tasty and traditional food. Her best dish is Rinderbraten mit Knoedel.
Co-founder Steve Kettmann
Steve is Publisher of Wellstone Books, which is proud to publish Remember Who You Are: What Pedro Gomez Showed Us About Baseball and Life in July 2021, as well as other recent titles, including I Wish I Was Billy Collins: Poems by Pete McLaughlin. Steve, a contributor to The New York Times and other publications, is at work on a book about baseball managers. A former staff reporter for New York Newsday and the San Francisco Chronicle, he left California in 1999 and moved to Berlin as an Arthur F. Burns Fellow, where he served as Berlin Correspondent for Wired News and later wrote a weekly column for the Berliner Zeitung as “an American in Berlin.” Steve’s first book was One Day at Fenway and as a co-writer/ghost-writer, he’s written six New York Times bestsellers. In order to work off some stress from writing like a madman and gather new inspiration, Steve runs the trails or down toward the ocean. His best dish is paella, which takes him a couple hours to prepare, but tastes like love.
Resident Intern Charlie Gleason
Having retired from two decades in the restaurant industry (thanks, Covid!), Charlie is embarking on an educational tour of small farms around the country. She is on a mission to learn enough about self-sufficient farming to run her own homestead one day. In order to share her travel experiences and food philosophies, she’s compiling essays to share on her blog and eventually maybe even as a book. When not playing in the kitchen or clicking away on a keyboard, Charlie loves to hike and read and go out for ice cream. All things vegetable excite her chef’s brain and palate; it’s impossible to single out a favorite dish..
Resident Intern Alaina Jolene
Alaina is a Mexican-American fiction writer from Southern California. She graduated from California State University Monterey Bay with a B.A. in Humanities and Communication with a focus in Creative Writing and Social Action. She currently attends Goddard College, working toward her MFA in Creative Writing. Her current work in progress is a novel told both fromthe perspectives of a young mother – who risks losing her daughter as she struggles to leave an abusive relationship – and her young-adult daughter, who sets out on a journey of self-healing and must decide between saving her mother and saving herself.
Permanent resident Sally
Permanent resident Sally has been an asset to the Wellstone Center from the very beginning. Her duties include greeting new guests to the Center, being the eyes and ears for us in the nighttime hours, and leading people on hikes through the redwood forest. Although Sally has gotten into some trouble with the chickens in the past, she makes up for it with a cute face and a lot of love to give – and she’ll give it, whether you are ready or not. Her hobbies include bone and shoe collecting, and romping through the bushes. When she’s not busy, she enjoys trips to the dog beach, lounging in the sun, and chasing our outdoor cats. Her favorite meal is anything Sarah cooks for her. We’ve been trying to get her to cook a delicious meal, with no success thus far.
Permanent residents Doris and Butterfingers
Notice that Doris (on the right) appears to have bobbed ears, though actually her tiny ears are a genetic trait. Both our goats will soon be expecting, so we will have more kids running around come springtime. Doris and Butterfingers love alfalfa and special snacks and, sometimes, some of Sarah’s hair. Like any health-conscious individuals, they drink a lot of water – in their case, pure well water – but their favorite treat is dried leaves from our cherry tree, which they chomp down like candy. Both have a lot of personality, but Doris is more social and loves to meet visitors.
