QOL Spotlight Katharine Hastie with her children at Yellowstone Lake this summer.
Katharine Hastie League Board Member and QOL Co-Chair
H
ow does someone who intends to be an English major become a physics major and go on to earn a Masters in Environmental Systems Engineering? While this may seem like a contradiction, Katharine Hastie doesn’t see it that way at all. In fact, the world of the humanities constantly informs her world of science and engineering. Katharine would also tell you that the particulars of her scientific training provide helpful ground-truthing for the myriad abstract challenges one encounters each day in raising children and serving one’s community. That’s one reason why she is drawn to the Coastal Conservation League, with its combination of scientific knowhow and cultural awareness, and its penchant for making connections. Born and raised in Montgomery, Alabama, Katharine has always been captivated by the wider world. She grew up spending vacations in Highlands, hiking in the North Carolina mountains, and visiting her aunt in Salt Lake, with side trips to Yellowstone and other western wonders. So it’s no surprise she developed a passion for nature and the environment. Katharine is also one to let life lead her where it may. Never intending to include Sewanee (the University of the South) on her college search, she relented to her mother’s pleadings to at least stop by and take a look (her grandfather was an alumnus). She immediately fell in love with the 10,000-acre campus, calling it “an outdoor enthusiast’s dream.” At every other campus on her tour she would ask, “Where are the mountains?” It was at Sewanee that Katharine met her husband, Winslow Hastie, an art history major from Charleston. Upon completion of Sewanee, they both entered graduate school – Katharine to Clemson to earn a Masters in Environmental Engineering and Science, and Winslow to University of Georgia for a Masters in Historic Preservation. In 2000, after working and living in Athens, Ga., Katharine and Winslow took off for San Francisco, wanting to experience life in one of the West Coast’s great cities. She took a job as an environmental consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton and he found work as a planner for the City of San Francisco. Four years later they had a son – Winslow, Jr. – and it was at that time they began to feel the pull of returning to a place where they had roots and could become connected with their community in a deeper way. So in 2005, they returned to
Winslow’s hometown of Charleston and have never looked back. Daughter Eloise was born in 2007 and the family settled in the Longborough neighborhood of Wagener Terrace. Winslow now works for the Historic Charleston Foundation and Katharine was able to continue with Booz Allen, working out of their home at not quite full-time (80%). Booz Allen is very “mom friendly,” according to Katharine, and affords her the flexibility and time she needs for raising Winslow, Jr. and Eloise. Katharine also gives back to the community, serving on the boards of the Conservation League and YesCarolina. Her readings of food guru Michael Pollan, as well as her exposure to the food culture of California – its bountiful farmers markets and strong emphasis on locally grown produce – carries over into her work with the League. Katharine is especially interested in connecting the League’s younger QOL (Quality of Life) membership with the new GrowFood Carolina program. “So many young families are vitally interested in the local food movement,” says Katharine. “We want a better, right path for feeding our families and children, and GrowFood is exactly the vehicle our community needs to foster local, sustainable food production and consumption. In my role as co-chair of QOL, I see a very real and strong connection between the GrowFood mission and the aspirations of QOL members.”
C OA S TA L C O N S E RVAT I O N L E AG U E