Breaking the law for trees With acts of civil disobedience reminiscent of the 1960s civil rights movement, some people in Missoula, Mont., have begun protesting emergency salvage timber sales. One week after President Clinton signed the salvage sales into law, 15 people occupied Montana Sen. Max Baucus’ Missoula office. They refused to leave until the […]
Books
Posted inAugust 21, 1995: HCN's founder fights his last fight, yet again
Better range, better cows
BETTER RANGE, BETTER COWS If you’re a rancher, environmentalist, or just plain interested in how better range makes for healthier cows and land, then come to Delta, Colo., for a Sept. 11 conference sponsored by the Delta/Montrose Public Lands Partnership. Program speakers include well-known ranchers such as Doc and Connie Hatfield of Brothers, Ore., Bob […]
Posted inAugust 21, 1995: HCN's founder fights his last fight, yet again
Broads say: Take a hike
BROADS SAY: TAKE A HIKE Great Old Broads for Wilderness will head for the hills this fall to rally support for Utah wilderness. From Sept. 17 through Oct. 14, the group with the great name will schedule day hikes for supporters of America’s Redrock Wilderness Act. The Act would protect 5.7 million acres of land […]
Posted inAugust 21, 1995: HCN's founder fights his last fight, yet again
Losing the border blues
LOSING THE BORDER BLUES Since the North American Free Trade Agreement was signed, exports to Mexico haven’t boomed nor have jobs increased in the United States. If you’re searching for better news on NAFTA, take a look at the summer 1995 issue of The Workbook. In its feature article, “Cleaning Up the Border: Will Sustainability […]
Posted inAugust 21, 1995: HCN's founder fights his last fight, yet again
Save the Sonoran
Save the Sonoran “After five years of watching them bulldoze the desert and pack the sardines in, those people living in Del Webb’s 1,400-home Terravita development will need a therapist,” says David Phelps. He’s a local carpenter and board member of Sonoran North, a grassroots group battling the blade in the booming communities north of […]
Posted inAugust 21, 1995: HCN's founder fights his last fight, yet again
Short takes
The Montana Environmental Information Center will discuss recent state legislation that weakened water quality standards – plus mining, right-wing movements and Montana’s energy future – at its annual meeting Sept. 23 at Flathead Lake Biological Station. For more information, or to register by Sept. 8, contact MEIC, P.O. Box 1184, Helena, MT 59624 (406/443-2520). Desert […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
Where the saguaros stop
WHERE THE SAGUAROS STOP We know of several copies of the seminal reference book – Biotic Communities, Southwestern United States and Northwestern Mexico – that have worn out, riding around for years on the dashboards of pickup trucks. The Boyce Thompson Southwestern Arboretum in Arizona, which published the book in 1982, sold out its stock […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
The spoken word
THE SPOKEN WORD If you haven’t heard Page Stegner, the son of Wallace Stegner, read the long story, “Genesis,” from Wolf Willow, you are in for a wonderful three and one-half hours. (Or seven hours, if, like me, you listen twice.) The same is true of another father-son combination, as John Maclean reads Norman Maclean’s […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
Four-cornered falcon
FOUR-CORNERED FALCON In his book, The Four-Cornered Falcon: Essays on the Interior West and the Natural Scene, Reg Saner ruminates on everything from the power of wind to the naming of plants and animals. As varied and thought-provoking as the terrain, Saner’s essays meander through familiar landscapes of the interior West, fusing details of the […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
A vanishing breed
A VANISHING BREED Roping the Wind: A Personal History of Cowboys and the Land is a eulogy on the life of the cowboy, written by Lyman Hafen, a fifth-generation Utahn and editor of St. George Magazine. Narrated in a down-to-earth style, the book takes a personal and nostalgic look at the cowboy’s vanishing legacy while […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
We don’t crack the whip
WE DON’T CRACK THE WHIP Global capitalism and not rugged individualism shaped the West from its start, writes William G. Robbins in Colony and Empire: The Capitalist Transformation of the American West. Building on the work of historians William Cronon and Patricia Limerick, Robbins charts the loss of local economies across the West and the […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
New prints on wolves
New prints on wolves It’s not the O.J. trial, but for environmentalists, wolf recovery in Idaho and Yellowstone Park warrants almost as much press. Now come the books. In Wolf Wars, Hank Fischer tells the sometimes compelling, other times snoozy, inside scoop on two decades of political maneuvering that led to the release of the […]
Posted inAugust 7, 1995: Fighting fires, and indignities
Tilley was a Westerner
TILLEY WAS A WESTERNER In the United States, weather moves from west to east, while culture generally travels from east to west. But in the case of The New Yorker, culture moved with the weather. The New Yorker was created by a Westerner – Harold Ross, a Coloradan from Aspen, when Aspen was a mining […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
Logan Canyon: Round 1,000
LOGAN CANYON: ROUND 1,000 A controversy that began in 1959 over widening and straightening the road through scenic Logan Canyon in Utah continued in May when the Forest Service decided against a citizens’ group. The group, the Logan Canyon Coalition, had submitted an 187-page critique of the state highway department’s plan to enlarge the road […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
Grazing thickens forests
GRAZING THICKENS FORESTS A June 12 report from the Oregon Natural Resources Council blames livestock in addition to the usual culprits – fire suppression and poor logging practices – for the declining health of Western forests. The group’s ecologists, Joy Belsky and Dana Blumenthal, reviewed four case studies from Washington, Utah, Idaho and the Southwest, […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
The Subdivision Massacre: Part II
THE SUBDIVISION MASSACRE: PART II Hot on the heels of his blockbuster video, Subdividing the West: Implications of Population Growth, Colorado State University wildlife professor Richard Knight has released a sequel: Saving the West: Protecting Open Space, starring a county commissioner, a Nature Conservancy staffer, the originator of one of the nation’s most successful open […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
Polluter Pork
POLLUTER PORK Renewable energy is on the congressional chopping block again. An 80-page report by the Sustainable Energy Budget Coalition blasts congressional budget cuts in the Department of Energy’s renewable energy programs. The coalition’s study, Congressional Energy Budget Proposals: Penny-Wise, Pound Fuelish is a state-by-state analysis of budget cut effects. Congress was far kinder to […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
Toughen the ESA, scientists say
TOUGHEN THE ESA, SCIENTISTS SAY In the midst of efforts to water down the Endangered Species Act, two scientific panels announced support for the beleaguered law. Convened by the National Academy of Sciences, the first panel called for swifter action by the government to denote and protect “survival habitat.” Panel chairman Michael Clegg, a geneticist […]
Posted inJuly 24, 1995: Making a mountain into a starbase
Short takes
To help people understand the complicated issue of water rights in New Mexico, Recursos de Santa Fe is organizing an Aug. 9 conference in Silver City, N.M., The Prehistoric Basis for Water Use in New Mexico: Options for the Future. Registration is $25. For more information contact M. Susan Barger at Recursos de Santa Fe, […]
Posted inJune 12, 1995: The Southwest's last real river: Will it flow on?
Rescuing Colorado’s rivers
Rescuing Colorado’s rivers The rivers of Colorado have a new advocate. The nonprofit Colorado Rivers Alliance aims to protect and restore Colorado’s rivers and hopes to gain members from all streams of life, including environmentalists, farmers and politicians. Although the group’s mission is broad, it has more specific intentions as well, such as re-establishing riparian […]