We were all outside watching the sunset from the casita, which had a high view of the city. From there, the “big picture” was not abstract. It was real, tangible, visible – we could just make out the Burger King sign towering beyond the border fence. The sun was blood red, and then the whole […]
Books
Posted inMay 21, 2001: Quenching the big thirst
Sacred Objects and Sacred Places
“When Col. John M. Chivington and his drunken troops killed Cheyenne Indians in the infamous dawn massacre at Sand Creek, Colo.,” writes Andrew Gulliford in Sacred Objects and Sacred Places, “the troops also cut off their victims’ heads for shipment to Washington, D.C.” There, the severed heads were used in attempts to establish a racial […]
Posted inMay 21, 2001: Quenching the big thirst
Tribal leaders go to school
Freshmen congressmen go to Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government to learn the ropes. Now, tribal leaders have a comparable resource. This winter, the University of Arizona and the Morris K. Udall Foundation, in conjunction with the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, established what could become the premier training center for Indian leaders – […]
Posted inMay 21, 2001: Quenching the big thirst
Hard work in progress
When Dale Shewalter talks about hiking the Arizona Trail, he describes a “sense of elation with what it does for your life.” In the next breath, though, he admits, “I kinda wore out my knees through the years.” Shewalter, who’s long been a fan of long-distance backpacking, started looking for a north-south route across Arizona […]
Posted inApril 23, 2001: The Big Blowup
Benigna’s Chimayo: Cuentos from the Old Plaza
And then Grandma sits down on an old wooden wheel, leans on her knees, tucks her skirt between her legs, and begins her favorite of the old stories. I listen, watching the dust motes float in shafts of sunlight … To a young Don Usner, summers in the New Mexican hamlet of Chimayo meant chili […]
Posted inApril 23, 2001: The Big Blowup
Fool’s Gold: Telluride’s ‘magical realism’
Rob Schultheis moved to Colorado in 1973, when pop stars began singing about the Rocky Mountains and asking whether you’d ever been “mellow.” His newest book, Fool’s Gold, zooms in on his home turf of Telluride, where “summer is briefer than a butterfly’s dream … autumn an afterthought, and winter rules.” When Schultheis arrived, Telluride […]
Posted inApril 23, 2001: The Big Blowup
Billboards blast bomb industries
Tourists driving I-25 between Albuquerque and Santa Fe expect to see billboards extolling ski resorts, restaurants and casinos, but may be surprised by a series of evocative ads that question the nuclear-weapons industry in New Mexico. The Los Alamos Study Group, a nonprofit, research-oriented, nuclear disarmament organization in Santa Fe, has placed five billboards with […]
Posted inApril 9, 2001: The water empress of Vegas
Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian
Visionary photographer Edward Sheriff Curtis spent 30 years documenting the waning cultures of North American Indians. But following his death in 1952, his work plummeted into obscurity. Curtis’ photographs were a mix of stoic portraiture, peopled landscapes and illustrations of tribal life. He photographed Nez Perce Chief Joseph, Apache leader Geronimo, and a host of […]
Posted inApril 9, 2001: The water empress of Vegas
How Utah got that way
Geology is a hard thing to miss in southern Utah. Unless you travel through the state blindfolded, you have probably wondered about the evolution of the region’s dramatic cliffs, spires and canyons. Maybe that’s why there are so many guidebooks that aim to decipher the area’s layered landscape. Unlike most popular guidebooks, The Geology of […]
Posted inApril 9, 2001: The water empress of Vegas
Wild in the city
Too often when we speak of wildness in the West, we only envision vast untracked settings like the Bob Marshall Wilderness, High Unitas or the Owyhee Canyonlands. It is easy to forget that wildness can still be found within our ever-growing urban landscapes. Now, editors Michael Houck and M.J. Cody have released a new book, […]
Posted inApril 9, 2001: The water empress of Vegas
Mystery on the Colorado
Glen and Bessie Hyde floated the Green and Colorado rivers on their honeymoon in 1928. Aboard a two-ton sweep scow made from scrounged wood, and with a little experience gleaned from rivers in Idaho, the newlyweds made their way through Labyrinth, Stillwater, Cataract and Glen canyons before facing the awesome power of the Colorado in […]
Posted inMarch 26, 2001: Teach the children well
Columbia Champion
In the early ’80s, when construction started on the massive Glen Jackson bridge across the Columbia River, opening up the Washington side of the river to Portland commuter sprawl, Nancy Russell took action. She founded the 3,200-member Friends of the Columbia Gorge, parlayed hard-won media backing for protection of the Gorge into support from local […]
Posted inMarch 26, 2001: Teach the children well
Not your average Paul Bunyan
Not all forest workers wield axes and chainsaws. In the oral history compilation Voices from the Woods: Lives and Experiences of Non-timber Forest Workers, 32 mushroom harvesters, tree planters, medicinal herb gatherers, and wild huckleberry harvesters articulate their lives and work in the forests of the Pacific Northwest (HCN, 2/15/99: An entrepreneurial spirit). Antonio Perez […]
Posted inMarch 26, 2001: Teach the children well
Watershed Wars
“Rather than follow a time line, I’ve followed the river, pursuing an upstream journey that began in Wind River Canyon and will end at the headwaters near the Continental Divide.” With these words, former High Country News editor Geoffrey O’Gara embarks on a meandering course through Indian dispossession, legal wrangling, floundering farm communities, and reservation […]
Posted inMarch 26, 2001: Teach the children well
Idaho wants to help manage federal lands
Idahoans may soon have more say about how federal forestlands are managed. In 1998, the Idaho State Land Board appointed a group of eight recreationists, teachers, lawyers and timber company executives to devise ways that locals could work with the federal government to manage public lands. In late February, the committee released Breaking the Gridlock. […]
Posted inMarch 12, 2001: Divided Waters
The other Mexico
Certainly the press, other governments and tourists are most aware of the official, elite, corrupt Mexico; the Mexico that won’t allow a poor man a chance; the Mexico behind the sunglasses. I’ve even been told by people, including Mexicans, that this is Mexican culture. But I know that’s not true. There is another Mexico. — […]
Posted inMarch 12, 2001: Divided Waters
Keeping ranchers’ options open
Among his fellow New Mexico ranchers, Sid Goodloe is known as a contrarian (HCN, 4/15/96: Raising a ranch from the dead). His newest project, the Southern Rockies Agricultural Land Trust, is keeping that reputation intact. Goodloe hopes to convince his neighbors that conservation easements – voluntary legal agreements that prohibit development of private land – […]
Posted inMarch 12, 2001: Divided Waters
Priests preach to the choir: Protect the Columbia
The Roman Catholic Church isn’t traditionally considered the home of radical greens. But 12 bishops from the Pacific Northwest and Canada have jumped into the environmental fray, and in late February, they released a long-awaited and controversial pastoral letter about the Columbia River (HCN, 9/11/00: Holy water). The letter, nourished by three years of discussion […]
Posted inMarch 12, 2001: Divided Waters
Water Watch
Boulder, Colo., residents can now check on the health of their watershed by surfing the Web. The Boulder Area Sustainability Information Network (BASIN) Web site publishes water quality indicators and trends in the Boulder Creek watershed, which provides water for the city of Boulder. The site also includes snowpack information, an air-quality index, and information […]
Posted inMarch 12, 2001: Divided Waters
Land Use Conference
Las Vegas Mayor Oscar B. Goodman, Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., and author John Maclean will speak to planners, attorneys and developers at the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute’s Land Use Conference, April 19-20, at the University of Denver. Thirty panels and 100 presenters will cover topics such as Western wildfires, smart growth and regional planning. […]