“Sometimes, I like to think I get paid to hike”
January 18, 2021 5:05 PM   Subscribe

[Warden Praveed “Abe”] Abraham, 32, is the first full-time warden of color in the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s 115-year history. His path to conservation law enforcement was an unlikely one — he once planned to become a doctor — and it began in the unlikeliest place: Yonkers, N.Y. Abraham, of Indian and West Indian descent — his father was born in India, his mother in Guyana — grew up there with his family. Wildlife in Yonkers consisted of pigeons and squirrels. “Once, I saw a turkey there when I was a kid,” he said. “I didn’t know what it was.”
posted by sepviva (9 comments total) 25 users marked this as a favorite
 
"Abraham said he recently had to climb a tree to retrieve a bear that had been tranquilized and gone to sleep in a tree." I really wish I could hear him tell this story! Thanks, sepviva!
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:36 PM on January 18, 2021 [2 favorites]


Oh, hey: Warden's Watch has a podcast, and here's Abraham's interview (starts around 7:30).
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:43 PM on January 18, 2021 [4 favorites]


That would be my dream job for like one day a week. Would pair very nicely with four days of office work; one would constantly make me appreciate the other more.
posted by Harald74 at 12:40 AM on January 19, 2021 [1 favorite]


I lived in and work in Yonkers and I am going to do my part to make sure that Warden Abraham's story gets shared in the Yonkers community.

(ps. we have more wildlife than pigeons and squirrels, I promise.)
posted by sciencegeek at 9:20 AM on January 19, 2021 [2 favorites]


(update on trying to share this story with Yonkers people: I got told that the article was "Race baiting [BS]")
posted by sciencegeek at 10:17 AM on January 19, 2021


It’s 2021 and we’re talking about the first non-white game warden in Pennsylvania not on the occasion of his retirement after blazing a trail in the 1970s. He’s 32 and just getting started.
posted by interogative mood at 3:51 PM on January 19, 2021 [2 favorites]


Very cool to learn about him and the work he does!
posted by mixedmetaphors at 4:45 PM on January 19, 2021


Science geek, I'd like to hear more about why your Yonkers friends didn't like it. There is something a little wide-eyed or something, I can't put my finger on it but....

And yeah, I'm embarrassed for PA that this took so long. Then again when I was in 4-H my county may have had the only non-white members I saw at state-wide events, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
posted by sepviva at 5:56 PM on January 19, 2021 [1 favorite]


It wasn't friends, it was a Facebook group.
They didn't like it because they're racist.
They didn't like it because it wasn't flattering to Yonkers.
They didn't like it because Abraham's description of growing up in Yonkers didn't match their nostalgia of the "good old days."

There's a lot of history in this city.
posted by sciencegeek at 6:06 AM on January 20, 2021 [1 favorite]


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