Steve Barnett, adventurer, skier, photographer, author, and the grandfather of telemark skiing, died June 16, 2026, in Bellingham, WA, after contending with Parkinson's disease. He was 79 years old.

Steve was born in Chicago to parents, William and Rae Banett. and grew up alongside his brother, Mark. Starting in childhood, Steve was a precocious, voracious reader, the kind of kid who once gave his class an impromptu lecture on plate tectonics. Throughout his life’s travels, Steve carried a suitcase full of books instead of clothes, and never really stopped teaching the people around him.

He studied math at Harvard, and it was a college trip to Colorado that changed everything. He rented a pair of skis, headed into the wilderness, and never really came back; the freedom of it lodged itself in him permanently. Alpine skiing felt too locked down; pure Nordic skiing couldn't turn the way he wanted. So, when he came across an article on free heel telemark turns, he taught himself the technique on the gear of the day and then, in 1976, wrote it all down in Cross Country Downhill, the book that is widely credited with sparking the American telemark revival. Its cover, a photo of a bearded Barnett, arms skyward, turning somewhere in the Cascades, became the defining image of the sport; a Colorado ski shop turned it into a bumper sticker, and the pose is still recognized by skiers who've never read the book. Powder Magazine profiled him for his influence in the 1990s, and as recently as this May, a Powder retrospective on telemark's countercultural roots ("When Telemark Was Revolutionary," May 26, 2026) named his book as the foundational text of the sport's American revival, placing him alongside other pioneers of the era.

He lived briefly in Seattle in the late 1960s before the mountains pulled him east. He met Grace Cisneros the day after the Seattle SuperSonics won their NBA championship, when he noticed the Spanish phrase on her T shirt and struck up a conversation. They exchanged numbers, started hanging out, and in 1980 Grace moved with him to Mazama, into a hand-built A frame cabin with a wood stove, an outhouse, kerosene lamps, and a shortwave radio for company. Room by room, over the years, it grew into a real home. They were married on Friday, January 13, 1989, at the Riverside Rib, by a universal life minister who had them sign the papers between the main course and dessert while a Hawaiian magician worked the crowd. Steve was welcomed as a beloved member of the Cisneros family. For their honeymoon Steve and Grace flew to Cabo San Lucas with an inflatable kayak and paddled around Isla Espíritu Santo.

From the mid 1980s until 2000, Steve and Grace ran a photography business together, following the outdoor sporting calendar around the state: spring bike races, whitewater rafting trips through the fall, more races after that, developing and selling photos on site so people could walk away with a keepsake of their own good time. Winters were left open for skiing and travel. Steve was also an accomplished mountaineer and climber known for bold, spontaneous calls in the backcountry, and he took part in mountaineering rescues, including one that made the front page of the Vancouver Sun.

In 1999 he had a double bypass, and in 2000 he and Grace moved to Ferndale, closer to medical care and family. They would call Whatcom County home for the next 26 years. A stroke followed not long after the move, then diagnoses of skin cancer and bladder cancer, and in 2020, Parkinson's disease. Even so, he kept biking, skiing, and photographing birds for as long as his body would allow. He and Grace marked their special occasions the same simple way for decades: sharing a chocolate milkshake.

Those who knew Steve remember a man who never put on airs despite his accomplishments, a legend in skiing, mountain biking, and photography circles who was just as happy talking with anyone about the things he loved. He had a staggering intellect, a wry sense of humor, and an unusual gift for being fully present: energetic and calm at once, exacting to a fault, and all the more frustrating and endearing for it. People who spent time with him say the hours had a way of simply dropping away. Watching him ski was its own kind of communication, his whole way of being expressed in motion, unhurried and sure, like watching someone entirely at home in the world.

He is survived by his wife, Grace Cisneros; his brother, Mark Barnett, and Mark's wife, Jenna; nieces Nora Barnett and Yatta Hohnbaum; and nephew Levi Barnett.

His family remembers him as an uncle, a father figure, and a friend who made every hike, every conversation, and every argument about the world's problems feel like it mattered. He taught by example that adventure doesn't require a passport, only curiosity, patience, and a willingness to climb one more ridge to see what's on the other side. The mountains have lost one of their most devoted regulars, and every trail, every peak, and every quiet moment spent watching wildlife will carry a bit of his voice from now on, still urging everyone forward toward the next bend.