Board of Governors

Shirley Mason

Founder/Executive Director/Secretary B.E.A.C.H.E.S. Foundation
execdir@beachesfoundation.org
Miami, FL

Affiliation: South Florida Free Beaches, Tampa Bay Free Beaches, Treasure Coast Naturists

While President of South Florida Free Beaches (SFFB), Shirley, along with a small group of leaders of that organization, was involved in every aspect of working with local and state governments and area businesses to establish and secure Haulover Beach in Miami, FL for naturist skinny-dippers. Shirley literally wrote the book(let) on How to Establish and Secure a Clothing-Optional Beach. She served on the founding Board of Florida Association for Nude Recreation (now known as AANR Florida, the Florida Region of the American Association for Nude Recreation) and, as Past Chair, Executive Director, and Treasurer of two national organizations, the Naturist Action Committee and Naturist Education Foundation. With her husband Richard Mason, current SFFB President, they individually received two distinguished, meritorious and continuous service and lifetime achievement awards in the cause of nude recreation from The Naturist Society the Lee Baxandall Naturist of the Year Award and in 2014 AANR's prestigious Jim Cossins Memorial Award.

She has appeared as a guest on the talk shows of Oprah Winfrey, John Walsh and the Rolanda Show. For years she lobbied elected officials in Florida’s State Capital and spoken before several community councils, trade associations and county commissions and federal agencies from Key West to Washington DC for naturists safe use of clothing-optional beaches and to help in the defense of well over 150 skinny-dippers wrongfully cited or arrested.

Shirley has organized numerous successful projects to educate the public and governmental agencies concerning the viability of clothing-optional recreation as a financial asset for communities as well as individual well-being. 

Shirley and Richard collaborate as social activists and partners in business and life. She is a strong voice with revolutionary cutting-edge ideas for clothing-optional recreation in Florida, nationally and internationally. Those ideas have become program realities, successful for the naturist industry-movement and profitable for businesses and government. She’s lived, studied and traveled internationally. That combined with her professional experience, skills and leadership have led to Shirley’s numerous achievements as an entrepreneur in private business and nonprofit arenas.

Education:
Bachelor of Science (credits)
Major: Interior Architectural Design
Minor: Business Administration

Schools:  
University of Minnesota (Duluth, MN) 
University of Maryland (Misawa, Japan)
Sogetsu-Ryu Iemota Academy of Design (Misawa and Tokyo, Japan)
Miami-Dade College (Miami, FL)

Professional Licenses/Certifications: 
Securities Series 6, 22; Certified Financial Planner; Real Estate; 
Nonprofit Executive Management Certification Barry University/FANO (Miami Shores, FL)

Michelle Jackson

blacknaturistsassociation@gmail.com
Dallas, TX

Affiliation: Black Naturists Association

Growing up in Oklahoma in a conservative home, nudity wasn’t anything that was often embraced or even spoke about.  Matter of fact, it was and still is to an extent, considered to be something that should be done in private, behind closed doors.  Every period of my life, from childhood to becoming an adult, I kept my body hidden in clothing, even in my own home, around family.  It didn’t matter if it was my mother, sister, friend or cousin, I never walked around in the nude.  We were taught to always “cover up” and that our body isn’t for others to see.  It wasn’t until I started experiencing international travel.  Being able to get a glimpse into other cultures, I saw firsthand, nudity isn’t as “taboo” as it is in America, especially in the Black community.  I was always somewhat hesitant to be naked among strangers, more so around people of other ethnic backgrounds than mine.  When you are the only Black walking into places where you’re not often represented, people tend to look at you.  Well, that has certainly been my experience.  I guess subconsciously I felt that people would be looking at my body as if it was on display in a spot light; observing how distinctively different in color and shape it is than their “norm.”  It in some ways reminded me of reading the stories of how slaves had every inch of their bodies looked at prior to be being sold into slavery.  Although I didn’t live in that era, those experiences lived through the lineage of my ancestors and somewhat in me at a time or another.

It wasn’t until my mid-20’s, when I visited Jamaica for a girlfriend’s wedding.  We were staying at one of the sister properties of Hedonism and had heard a lot about the property.  My friends and I were curious about what all the talk was about, so we decided to take a day trip over.  I’d never forget the feeling I had of walking through the property to get to the pool area, seeing everyone of all colors, sizes and ages, walking by with so much freedom and confidence about them that was contagious.  But it wasn’t until after the first 10 minutes of me being in shock, wondering how people could be so free without the feeling of judgment.  My friends and I all looked around and at each other, having a full conversation of unspoken words.  It was almost as if time stood still for a moment, as we took in the experience.  We continued to the pool area, where surprisingly, I was the first one to bare it all!  Once I shed the clothes, I jumped into the pool and asked what they all were waiting on.  It wasn’t too long before others quickly followed, some faster than others.  It was right then, I realized how that wouldn’t be my last time baring it all in public.  It was such a liberating feeling, I wanted more of it!

Wendy Metts

Treasurer B.E.A.C.H.E.S. Foundation
metts.wendy@gmail.com
Leesburg, FL

Affiliation: South Florida Free Beaches, The Naturist Society

Wendy graduated with a B.S. degree in Marketing and continued her career as a retail manager on Long Island, NY. When notified by the New York State Department of Social Services the summer following graduation that she qualified for a social worker position, she accepted it and began a five-year struggle with a burdened system that offered few options for her caseload of predominantly female welfare recipients. She resigned, believing she could better effect the changes needed on a grassroots level out in the community. Wendy began a 17-year career as a Clinic Director in the field of reproductive health care in the socioeconomically depressed areas of Long Island and Manhattan. A pro-choice advocate, she headed the clinic for The Bill Baird Institute, offering birth control and gynecological care in the early '80s. She formed the Speakers Bureau, which got her invited into suburban classrooms, where the facts about pregnancy STDs, and birth control could be presented to at-risk youths, to the relief of health education teachers, who were not permitted to address these issues.

When the early '90s ushered in the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Wendy was a Clinic Director for the largest non-profit healthcare agency in the City of New York. As funding for reproductive health care was scarce, she worked with grant writers to apply for federal funding to treat HIV+ clients. Her clinic in the East New York section of Brooklyn was chosen as one of two clinics in the country to be awarded a $3.4 million grant. This was the agency's first of ten Primary Care Programs throughout the city for HIV+ clients, providing medical treatment, case management, and clinical trials at a time when there was limited knowledge of this disease and a crippling bias due to fear and misunderstanding. Education became her focus — of the public through networking and outreach and of politicians through marches and meetings with representatives in Washington, DC When Long Island was hit with 17 snowstorms in 1997, Wendy, a beach lover and house nudist, moved to South Florida and found Haulover Beach. Her joy at being topless on Bondi Beach in Australia ten years earlier was surpassed. Her advocacy for nude recreation had begun.

Holding a Real Estate Broker's license in New York since 1981, she became licensed in Florida and, in 2000, opened Wendy L. Pierro Realty. With the Internet becoming the preferred housing search tool, Wendy became the Director of Sales and Marketing for ehome.com. In 2003, Wendy partnered with a client in setting up a public company, acting as a Board Director, Secretary/Treasurer, and Director of Marketing. The multi-level marketing model was used to develop an online DVD rental company. Just shy of $1 million was raised the first year. Wendy's health care advocacy continued as an Ombudsman in Central Florida and as a licensed Certified Nursing Assistant. Wendy's passion for naturism has her committed to educating and advocating to realize her vision of nude recreation as an accepted choice. Boating on the St. John's River with husband, Jim, raising monarch butterflies, and frequent travel refuel her.

Martin Novoa

President B.E.A.C.H.E.S. Foundation
Martin.Novoa@gmail.com
Pompano Beach, FL

Affiliation: Florida ACLU, South Florida Free Beaches

I am a longtime naturist, since college, and have been an advocate for nude recreation nearly as long. My earliest nude beach experiences were at Gunnison Beach at Sandy Hook, New Jersey and Wreck Beach at the campus of UBC in Vancouver, Canada, and I made many friends in the naturist community. For several years, in grad school and afterward, I lived in Chicago and frequented Mazo Beach near Madison, Wisconsin. I was a member of FOMB (Friends of Mazo Beach) and WBPS (the Wreck Beach Preservation Society). More recently, after moving to Florida from California, I have been a regular member or board member of several local nudist groups and organizations.By profession I was an investment Banker in New York, Chicago and San Francisco. My undergraduate degree is in business administration from the College of William & Mary, and I did my graduate studies in business (MBA) and law at William & Mary and the University of Chicago. My main focus in naturist advocacy is accessibility — creating nude social and recreation opportunities in as many places as possible, in the European model, with an emphasis on appealing to more young adults to try nudist resorts, beaches, festivals, gatherings and other events. It is important to make naturism a norm across all ages, for people of all backgrounds. I’m also interested in shaping laws at the state and local levels to be as nudist-friendly as possible, so that everyone can enjoy wholesome nudism without concern. 

Claudia Kellersch

claudiakellersch@gmail.com
San Diego, CA

Affiliation: Black's Beach Bares

Claudia is an international naturist activist. Born and raised in Bavaria, Germany, she first learned about social nudism from her uncle as a child. She experienced nudism for herself during a school trip, when her classmates dared her to strip at a naturist beach. It was the first beach of many worldwide.

After graduating with her second master's degree from the University of Heidelberg, Germany, she accepted a relocation offer and began working in Seattle, WA. There she also started a high-tech and medical translation business. She has provided simultaneous conference interpretation services nationwide for over twenty years in many industries, as well as mentoring, organizing, and event planning.

As a trained and experienced public speaker and media contact, she has dedicated her life to promoting body acceptance and family naturism worldwide.

Linda Weber

TrueBlueNude@gmail.com
Ventura, CA

Linda has visited all seven continents and 86 countries to date. She’s a private pilot, skydiver and lists among her affiliations AANR, AANR-West, British Naturism, Irish Naturism, INF, The Naturist Society, Southern CA Naturist Association and the Southern Utah Naturists Society. She currently serves on the AANR-West Board of Directors.

Linda co-founded the “Naturist Hub,” an invitation-only naturist social media platform and has been a featured speaker several times on British Naturism’s “The Forum.” Additionally, Linda has held regular Zoom conferences with women in South Africa and the U.S. and worked with the Irish Naturist Association. She is a published author of stories within three of the four naturist anthology books that donate their proceeds to Doctors Without Borders.

Marv Frandsen

Compliance Officer, B.E.A.C.H.E.S. Foundation
marv.frandsen@gmail.com
Melbourne, FL

Affiliation: AANR, TNS Life Member

Shortly after graduating with a Ph.D. in experimental and theoretical solid state physics from the University of Illinois, I made a real discovery - naturism. While flying to interviews, I had become enamored with Florida and took a job as a defense contractor at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. A colleague whispered to me that there was a nude beach nearby at Navarre, Florida. Of course I had to visit and was quite taken with wonder of the experience in the setting of the beauty of the Emerald Coast. The freedom and joy of naturism was also a revelation for my then-wife. She definitely appreciated the healthy effects of all-over sunlight for our baby daughter, who at the time suffered from multiple food allergies.

Shortly afterward I took a civil service defense job in east central Florida. I arrived just as the local national park superintendent began a long fight against naturist recreation at Canaveral National Seashore (CNS). For the next many years I helped form and worked with Space Coast Naturists and then Central Florida Naturists to battle this misguided effort. Over time, as part of a team effort, I worked with the Titusville City Council, Brevard County Commission, Florida State Legislature, and the National Park Service (NPS) to keep naturist recreation alive and healthy in central Florida. I researched voluminous case law and scientific literature on many aspects of public nudity. I ended up being cited twice under the new Brevard County anti-nudity ordinance. I fought both citations in court both with and without a lawyer. I also was a plaintiff in a first amendment civil rights lawsuit in federal court (with a very bright civil rights attorney).

I represented myself to challenge the state park service free speech rule in state administrative court. This resulted in a state appellate court opinion upholding the rule as such but changing the rule's effect by disallowing the state park service to set different conditions based on the content and effect of the speech.

Along with other members of Central Florida Naturists, I was cited for not having a permit while engaging at a (clothed) protest at the gate of Canaveral National Seashore. I represented myself to contest the charge and overturn the permit scheme in federal court. Along with a co-defendant and friend, I succeeded in overturning the permit scheme by setting a first amendment precedent in the federal 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. This precedent still stands and is a cited case. Eventually, the NPS completely rewrote its permit scheme. The NPS has since conformed its national level free speech regulations to the results of my case and another later case out of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Shortly after the federal appellate win, I was contacted by our state ACLU lead attorney. He wanted to use my legal briefs to help a Cuban American who was protesting in front of a federal courthouse in Miami over losing his boat. Of course I said yes, and the ACLU effort was successful in protecting this man's free speech rights.

I also supported and encouraged a state level and then a federal level legal challenge for female topfree rights for which my then-wife and growing daughter were both co-plaintiffs. These efforts were ultimately not successful but were very educational.

Ultimately the National Park Service posted signage at both Apollo and Playalinda Beaches of Canaveral National Seashore formally recognizing naturist recreation. At this writing naturist recreation at Canaveral National Seashore continues to be very active, popular, and healthy. We have also been joined by our good friends, the Treasure Coast Naturists to the south, who have established Blind Creek Beach as a naturist beach with county approval.

Since the earlier efforts, I have served as B.E.A.C.H.E.S. President and on the board of AANR-Florida. Life has taken its many turns. However, I still live in central east Florida and support naturist/nudist recreation. I am re-engaging with the B.E.A.C.H.E.S. Foundation board. I am hopeful for good positive achievements for human freedom and naturism in Florida and the nation and beyond.

Juan Marcos Castañeda

juanmarcos.cc@gmail.com
Mexico City, Mexico

Affiliation: Federación Nudista de México A.C. (FNM), Confederación Latinoamericana de Nudismo (CLANUD), Cultura Nudista México, Bi Shieeladi Festivales y Cultura, A.C.

I studied Fine Arts at the National University (UNAM) in Mexico City and became a graphic designer and commercial photographer with a diploma in Cinematographic Production.

The first time I met nudist people was at the WNBR 2009 in México City. I went as a photographer and finished nude with all the other participants.

After the 2009 WNBR, I began attending weekend nudist meetings with my new friends and some months later began organizing my own meetings in my apartment.

In September 2010, we held a first meeting to talk about organizing the first nonprofit nudist association in México, and a year later, eight people, including myself, signed to officially create the Federación Nudista de México (FNM). I was the first president from 2014 to 2018 and organized the 6th Latinoamerican Nudist Encounter (6th ELAN) in 2016 and worked with Jair Flores promoting the first nudist festival in México, both at Zipolite, state of Oaxaca.

In 2018, still been FNM president, I was invited to the 7th ELAN celebrated in Brazil. There we, the representatives from Argentina, Brazil, and México, signed as founders for the CLANUD (Latinoamerican Confederation for Nudism), and I became the first president.

CLANUD is an association looking for fraternity and work between different nude associations and groups in countries from México to Argentina. Right now, we have monthly meetings with friends in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica, Bolivia, and México.

In 2019, I joined full time to Jair Flores and the Zipolite Nudist Festival. The festival has grown from 2000 people attending in 2016 to more than 5000 people in 2019, and it has became the second biggest festival in the state of Oaxaca and the biggest nude fest in the world on a public beach. In 2019, four people signed to constitute our second nonprofit association for promoting nude festival and activities in public and private beaches and facilities named Bi Shieeladi, Festivales y Cultura A.C. (Bi Shieeladi means Naked Wind in Zapoteca, an old language from Oaxaca state.)

Right now, I continue working with the CLANUD, Bi Shieeladi, and our own nude group in México City, Cultura Nudista.

Evan Nix

evan@planetnude.co 
Southern California

Evan Nix is the founder and editor of Planet Nude newsletter, and the creator and host of the Naked Age podcast, and a co-host and producer of the New Nudist Podcast. His background is in media and advertising. He lives in Southern California with his wife and son.  

He serves on the board of governors for the BEACHES Foundation Institute and holds positions on the board of the Western Nudist Research Library and the AANR PR committee. His efforts have earned him the AANR Presidential Meritorious Service award. His newsletter and podcasts have earned sponsorship support from the Naturist Education Foundation, the Naturist Action Committee, and the AANR Education Foundation. 

Evan's commitment to nudism is inspired by his family history, particularly his 2x great-grandfather, Rudolph Johnson, who was president of the American Sunbathing Association—now AANR—from 1950 to 1952. Evan's work today champions the principles of body freedom and strives to inspire and shape the nudist community.

Nancy Samuelson Solvin

nancysolvin@gmail.com
Austin, FTX

Temporarily Stepped Down. Serving as Professional Business Advisor

Nancy co-founded and led with her former husband the Bare Necessities Tour and Travel Company until her retirement in 2019. With two of her grown children now supporting the business, she currently works as an active advisor.

Nancy helped develop Bare Necessities’ strategy of chartering a ship from top-rated cruise lines and then filling it with nudists—often thousands of them. That seemed a daunting challenge at first, but now—more than seventy cruises later—each trip fills up with about seventy percent repeat customers. The company usually offers a big boat trip each winter and then a clipper ship (sailing ship) voyage each summer. Far-flung destinations have included Tahiti, Thailand, Fiji, the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, Greek Islands, Russia, Scandinavia and Egypt.

Nancy is also an experienced fund-raiser. When Club Orient was destroyed by a hurricane several years ago, she and her co-workers raised more than $150,000.00 in three weeks to help the employees of the resort and their families.

Carlos Eduardo González Hernández

carlos.gonzalez@uacm.edu.mx
Mexico City

Affiliation:  Playa Zipolite, Oaxaca Mexico

I discovered naturism from my father who had grown up in a rancho in the Mexican state of Oaxaca. He used to sleep without clothes and loved going and taking us to the sauna where we would be naked as well.

Unfortunately, he died when I was eight and my mother and the rest of the family were not into nudism or naturism. Nevertheless, I enjoyed spending time in the nude in my room, enjoying the sun shining through the window.

Catholic Mexico has been rather opposed to naturism and, as a result, it wasn’t until I was 30 that I got the courage to visit the only official clothing optional beach in Mexico: Zipolite. Since my first visit it became my favorite beach in the country not only because of its being clothing optional but also because the whole atmosphere there was considerably more relaxed and less judgmental than in the other beaches I had visited.

Eight years ago, I started attending social naturist events and that was another revelation for me since I could experience how naturism not only allowed for much more meaningful contact with nature but also for much less prejudiced interactions with other people.

I joined the Mexican Nudist Federation and have attended and taken part in groups, meetings and congresses for the promotion of naturism like the 7th and 8th ELAN, the Zipolite Nudist Festival on many occasions and, in October 2024, the 39th World Congress of the INF-FNI, held for the first time in Mexico.

I have also been vey much interested in the arts and have engaged in a wide variety of artistic endeavors and am now very much interested in exploring and promoting the connection between art and naturism in all its forms.

I studied history and philosophy at the National University of Mexico and have been teaching for over twenty years at the Mexico City Autonomous University all of which also reinforces my interest in the relationship between culture, history, philosophy and naturism.