K.D. Kemp was born in the 1900s in Southern California. She grew up in the cookie-cutter suburbs of Los Angeles where TV shows were filmed, kids went home when the streetlights came on, and the most exciting day of the year was when the Scholastic Book Fair rolled into town.
K.D. loved reading and learning but she didn’t love school and homework. She graduated from high school in the bottom half of her class, then spent six years at four different colleges. It took her a while to figure out what she wanted to be when she grew up. She thought about becoming a teacher or lawyer, until one night she watched a movie that changed her life.
Suddenly she had it! She knew that she wanted to be Nicolas Cage. Who doesn’t? But really, she knew she wanted to become an archivist and learn how to preserve and uncover stories from the past.
K.D. graduated from college, this time with honors, and set out on a path to live a life like National Treasure. As fantastical as that sounds, she went on to work for some pretty fantastic places including the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Central Intelligence Agency, and yes, even the National Archives in Washington DC, though sadly she has not yet been asked to save the Declaration of Independence from being stolen.
She has, however, sought out her own adventures. She’s dived on shipwrecks and researched real underwater pirate artifacts, and she’s traveled all across the country in search of lost history, hidden mysteries, and forgotten stories. Her favorite thing in the world is asking questions, discovering new things, and encouraging others to do the same.
When she’s not busy teaching others how to turn curiosity into evidence, K.D. enjoys stepping back into the 1900s, collecting books and VHS tapes and other physical media from her childhood. She also enjoys repairing vintage electronics, photographing the world on a 35mm film camera, and spending time in nature helping out with citizen science and conservation projects.
If you’ve ever come across something odd, something old, or something that didn’t quite make sense, and felt the need to keep looking, then you’re in the right place. K.D won’t just hand you the answers, but she will hand you a question, a spark, and the tools to investigate the past, protect what matters most, and maybe even change the world. Curiosity is the key. Let’s see what we can unlock.