Michael “Skeeter” Pilarski admits he has never seen a fairy, but that doesn’t mean they’re not around. “Fairies manifest themselves differently to different people,” he told The Seattle Times, “and besides, only about 10 percent of people have ‘the sight.’” Pilarski is the founder and organizer of the ninth annual Fairy and Human Relations Congress, […]
Communities
Posted inWotr
Whose Valles Caldera is it?
When people try to describe the Valles Caldera National Preserve in New Mexico, they sometimes compare it to Yellowstone National Park. Both offer stunning landscapes born of volcanic activity, and both are filled with wildlife. Though only 89,000 acres, Valles Caldera contains thousands of elk, vast grasslands, streams and mountains, all within the sunken remnant […]
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
A wedding, a story
Here in Paonia, Colo., the peaches and tomatoes are finally ripening and High Country News is still welcoming lots of summer visitors. Dale Benjamin and his son, Jordan, of Vancouver, Wash., dropped by the office with Dale’s cousin, Hal Brill, a Paonia local. A USDA consumer safety inspector back home, Dale said he was glad […]
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
Romancing the stone
NAME Maurice McKinneyAGE 83HOMETOWN Whittier, Calif.OCCUPATION Retired gold miner and gemologist HCN SUBSCRIBER SINCE 2008 (longtime reader) For some time now, we’ve been receiving occasional — and very entertaining — letters from HCN reader Maurice McKinney. The self-described rockhound writes about his love of gems, Mexico and the great outdoors. “All my life I was […]
Posted inGoat
Funding to fight domestic violence
In recent weeks, the Obama administration has made safety on Indian reservations a major priority, doling out a slew of grants to tribes all over the West. “The Department of Justice is well aware that Indian Country is struggling with complex law enforcement issues involving violent crime, violence against women and crimes against children, and […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
Suspicious habit
Can running from the cops become a lifestyle? That was the explanation in the Kitsap Sun from a 33-year-old man in Bremerton, Wash., who hightailed it to a roof as police searched his neighborhood for a suspect. After police got the man to climb down and asked him why he was hiding, the man explained: […]
Posted inRange
Still Trout Fishing in America
I catch fish with my hands. In the Wyoming Rockies, where I have spent my best summers, the high meadow streams are thick with brookies, cutthroats and rainbows. I hide behind willows and boulders, spying, greedy to catch, kill and eat them. The fish hang suspended in liquid moments then shear off like startled birds, crowding […]
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
Dairy injuries and deaths 2003-2009
At least 18 people died working in Western dairies between 2003 and 2009; many more were injured. This list of deaths and injuries, compiled from state and federal safety agency reports, is certainly incomplete, thanks to loopholes and differences in state and federal reporting requirements as well as underreporting by workers. When possible, supplementary information […]
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
Extinguished
Wildfires have intensified in the last 10 years, says Michelle Ryerson, chair of the National Wildfire Coordinating Group’s Safety and Health Working Team. More extreme fires require more complex methods of firefighting, leading not only to higher costs but a change over time in the risks that firefighters face. In 1987, Ryerson’s team began keeping […]
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
The new Third World
People are desperate for medical care in the West’s inner cities and rural areas.
Posted inAugust 31, 2009: The dark side of dairies
From Tuscany to the Mohave
A war bride’s journey West
Posted inGoat
Classroom innovation
In eastern Idaho, one small rural school recently gained international fame. In late July, the Teton Valley Community School of Victor, Idaho, was recognized as one of eight finalists in the 2009 Open Architecture Challenge: Classroom. The competition, sponsored by Architecture for Humanity, received 400 submissions from 65 countries. Finalists included two other U.S. teams […]
Posted inRange
This Week’s HCN Reader Photo
This week’s reader photo comes from Flickr contributor T. R. Baker, and features Nevada, in black and white. You can add your photos to HCN’s Flickr photo pool. We’ll pick one to feature each week on our Web site. Don’t forget to tag them “highcountrynews.” You can also check out last week’s selected reader photo […]
Posted inRange
Birdwatching in the desert
Lightning flares in the bruised afternoon sky over the Arizona-New Mexico line. Wind scrapes across the grey-green flats from the west, flinging a fistful of gray birds through the air. Purple rags of cloud stream ahead of the storm. A chill strikes the desert. Thunder claps. I take cover under the overhung cut bank of […]
Posted inRange
The health care debate comes home
If you pay attention at all to the network news, you’re no doubt aware of controversy surrounding August Recess town hall meetings which Members of Congress have been conducting in their districts. The news reports I’ve seen show folks making angry accusations and claiming that aspects of health care bills which have been moving forward […]
Posted inGoat
Clash along the Columbia
Ten simple words. For the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde in western Oregon, ten words introduced into an existing law would restore their relationship with the land upon which their ancestors lived. Other tribes, however, consider the move risky. Last month, Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-OR) introduced a bill in Congress that would add the Grand […]
Posted inAugust 17, 2009: From Corn to Cabernet
Brushed aside
Washington’s floral greens industry falters as beleaguered harvesters leave
Posted inWotr
Off the road again
Jack Kerouac wrote his entire novel “On the Road” in just three weeks. He used a continuous roll of teletype paper, as if pausing to put in a new sheet of paper would have caused a pile-up on his imagination’s highway. Lawrence Ferlinghetti said that Kerouac provided us with “a vision of America seen from […]
Posted inAugust 17, 2009: From Corn to Cabernet
Desperate people
The Mechanics of Falling and Other StoriesCatherine Brady227 pages, hardcover: $25.University of Nevada Press, 2009. In 11 deftly rendered short stories, Catherine Brady’s latest book, The Mechanics of Falling, introduces us to fragile people whose precarious lives are unraveling. Most of the book takes place in California, especially in and around San Francisco with its […]
Posted inAugust 17, 2009: From Corn to Cabernet
From Corn to Cabernet
A burgeoning wine industry takes Colorado agriculture uptown