If it’s named for a scoundrel, change the namesake
Ed Quillen
Posted inGoat
Returning soon to a bookstore near you
By now you’ve likely read about the new movie Crazy Heart, which is getting good reviews and some Oscar buzz. Not having seen the movie (in my backwater, it will likely be on DVD before it gets to a theater near me), I can’t address it. But it’s based on the book by […]
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The count is coming
All sorts of numbers emerge from the U.S. Census Bureau, but only one set of numbers is required by the U.S. Constitution. That’s the population of each state, which determines how many representatives the state has in the U.S. House of Representatives. The total is fixed by law at 435, and each state […]
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Walking with Sawdust
For a few months a couple of years ago, my daily dog walk usually involved joining two old-timers — Lloyd “Sawdust” Wilkins. then 82, and his blue-heeler Cindy, who was about 70 in dog years. Sawdust walked his daily mile — it was on doctor’s orders — slowly with a cane, but he […]
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An official state microbe
Colorado may not hold the record for “Official State Whatevers,” but it’s got to come close with both a state rock and a state gemstone, two official state songs, a state insect and a state reptile, as well as the usual flower, bird, fish, tree, mammal and the like. But Wisconsin may […]
Posted inArticles
A local business, and old friend, dies
The news came as a shock, but not a surprise. The Gambles store, a mainstay of downtown Salida, Colo., for more than 60 years, was going out of business. At heart it was a hardware store, but it sold nearly everything you could imagine. Every time our local newspaper ran one of those “best of” […]
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A new line of defense
The attorneys for Tim DeChristopher, the University of Utah student who made bogus bids at a BLM drilling-rights auction last year, have come up with a new line of defense: selective prosecution. DeChristopher is charged with such federal felonies as interfering with a government auction and making a false representation. If convicted, he […]
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The law of necessity
Tim DeChristopher won’t be allowed to put global warming on trial when he’s on trial. DeChristopher majors in economics at the University of Utah. Last fall, he went into a BLM auction and successfully bid on 13 drilling leases, also driving up prices for other successful bidders. But he didn’t have the $1.7 […]
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Veteran namesakes
It’s Veteran’s Day. A military post, Fort Hood in Texas, has been much in the news of late on account of a tragic mass murder. And I’m a history buff. These threads all came together when I found out that Fort Hood was named for an army veteran — Gen. John Bell Hood. […]
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Mules aren’t burros
Lately I’ve encountered two novels which annoyed me because they treated burro and mule as synonyms, which they are not. The most recent was Abandon, by Blake Crouch; the title of the other one does not leap to mind. Mules and burros are related, but they’re not the same animals. Start with the […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Socialism and the West
This region was built on government subsidies and aid
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Recession blessings
Christina Davidson, a correspondent for The Atlantic, has been touring the country on a “Recession Road Trip.” One recent stop was in Lolo, Mont., where local rancher Tom Maclay has been trying to build a major ski resort called Bitterroot on Lolo Peak. Some ski runs have already been cut. Now it […]
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Resilience, not sustainability
The annual Headwaters Conference at Western State College in Gunnison often presents some concepts worth chewing on, and this year’s gathering (held Oct. 16-18) was no exception. Headwaters, as I’ve come to understand it after 20 years of attending, is something of an idea fair for little mountain towns. For some time I’ve […]
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Good reading
If you need to stay indoors because it’s cold, wet and windy outside, or because you worry about being mistaken for an elk if you go outdoors, here’s some good reading. In the New Republic, Jackson Lears provides a thought-provoking essay that combines review of six environmental books, among them an anthology of […]
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Snowpacks melting sooner
Why are mountain snowpacks melting sooner these days? Part of it may be climate change associated with increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but there’s something else in the air — dust (a/k/a airborne particulate matter). Snow reflects sunlight quite well, as evidenced by the blinding glare it produces and […]
Posted inArticles
Water and the National Parks
What you probably won’t learn about America’s best idea
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Light bulbs and big government
The precise number of people who recently rallied in Washington, D.C., for a national “tea party” is hard to come by. Left-wing reports have it at less than a hundred thousand participants, while some right-wingers put it over a million. Whatever the count, it was refreshing that so many people were concerned about […]
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‘Tis the season
In the Rocky Mountains, wedged between Summer Tourist Season and Fall Big-Game Hunting Season, is a relatively brief interval of crowded highways known as Aspen Season. It has nothing to do with the Colorado resort town, and everything to do with the tree, whose leaves change color. Technically, the leaves don’t exactly change […]
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Nestle water plan approved
Last week, Nestle received approval to tap mountain spring water and haul it to Denver for bottling and distribution under its Arrowhead label. The approval came from a unanimous board of Chaffee County Commissioners, following months of deliberations and lengthy hearings. Chaffee County, with about 15,000 residents, sits along the Arkansas River in […]
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Rural renaissance redux
It wasn’t really my intention, but I was part of the “rural renaissance” of the 1970s when, for the first time in generations, many rural areas starting gaining population. In 1974, my wife and I, both Baby Boomers, moved from the civilized Front Range piedmont of Colorado to a rather remote rural area — […]