Onalaska resident Dave Kennedy was a graduate student at the University of Arizona when he first encountered the teachings of Aldo Leopold, the author of “Sand County Almanac.”

His professor asked Kennedy, who was doing research on the southern reaches of the Colorado River, if he was familiar with Leopold’s writing. Kennedy said he wasn’t. The professor tossed him a copy of the Almanac, saying, “You ought to read this.”

Kennedy did, in one sitting, and was so impressed by it that he remembers being awake all night reading and thinking about the book and what it meant to the work he was doing.

Kennedy was among those who read the book out loud, cover to cover, at Saturday’s Coulee Region Reads Leopold event at the Holmen American Legion. About 35 people turned out for the first of what is hoped to be an annual event.

Kennedy prefaced his reading by telling the group about the experience, pointing out that he found accounts by Leopold of how the Colorado River looked before humans had altered it, information he had been unable to find elsewhere.

Kennedy, who now serves as quality assurance officer at the Upper Midwest Environmental Services Center, was one of the readers from the Brice Prairie Conservation Association. The reading brought together representatives of many conservation- and environment-oriented organizations including Mississippi Valley Conservancy, Coulee Region Trout Unlimited, Sierra Club, La Crosse Marsh Coalition, Coulee Region Audubon Society, La Crosse Ducks Unlimited, La Crosse County Conservation Alliance, Prairie Enthusiasts and Friends of the Holland Sand Prairie.

Another reader at the event, Deb Klaeser, a fifth-grade teacher in the La Crosse School District, said she has her students read from Leopold’s “Almanac.” She said she hoped to obtain the PowerPoint presentation that accompanied the reading to use in her classes.

The Aldo Leopold Foundation provides supporting materials for the readings, which were held in more than two dozen communities around the state last weekend. The first weekend in March is observed as Aldo Leopold Weekend, according to proclamation by the governor signed in 2004.

Leopold, who is regarded as the father of wildlife ecology and one of the leading conservation thinkers of the 20th century, was a prolific writer. His “Almanac” was written in 1948 and published posthumously in 1949.

Leopold graduated from the Yale Forest School in 1909. His early career with the U.S. Forest Service was in Arizona and New Mexico. He was instrumental in developing a proposal to manage the Gila National Forest as a wilderness area, the first such official designation in 1924, according to the Leopold Foundation.

He came to Madison in 1924 where he published the first textbook in the field of wildlife management. He became chairman of the game management department at the University of Wisconsin, a first in the nation.

Leopold and his family spent weekends restoring a worn-out farm they purchased along the Wisconsin River outside of Baraboo. The foundation maintains the property today, including “the shack” that is so much a part of the “Almanac” essays.

Organizers of the first local reading are interested in suggestions about how to observe next year’s Leopold weekend. To make suggestions or get involved, contact Marc Schultz (schultzma@charter.net), John Wetzel (john769@centurytel.net), Rick Kyte (rlkyte@viterbo.edu) or Dave Skoloda (dskoloda@earthlink.net).