COLORADO As if the recent local wildfires weren’t trouble enough, now Woodland Park, Colo, has to worry about a “strong, aggressive” 6-foot monitor lizard that might find itself tempted to dine on cats and dogs. The “pet,” known as Dino, snapped its mesh leash and wandered off in the tourist town northwest of Colorado Springs, […]
Communities
Posted inWotr
Mourning the world we’ve lost
“How do we grieve? How do we grieve for all that disappears into the maw of human appetite? How do we grieve for something as beautiful and terrifying as the polar bear?” The white-haired woman’s voice broke as she stood to ask her difficult question, the other audience members turning somber faces toward her — […]
Posted inGoat
Help us cover the New New West
Dear Reader, I need your help. No, I’m not asking for money, or even a couch to crash on or your extra ramen noodles to dine on during reporting trips. I’m just looking for your ideas and observations. When I was brought on as High Country News’ senior-editor-at-large number two in July, it was with […]
Posted inGoat
Get on the bus
One of the first things we did when we moved back to my quasi-rural hometown of Durango, Colo., this summer was ride the “trolley.” It’s actually a bus that is made to look like an old street car, complete with wood benches for passengers, but it’s mass transit, and it’s free, and it gets you […]
Posted inRange
Digital detox in the high Cascades
Turns out, I’m so far behind the curve in the electronic media I’m cutting edge. Years ago, I realized my basic neo-Luddite constitution did not square with making a living in the modern communication industry. So I learned to download and up-link. I “blog” and “friend” as verbs. I’ve got desktops, laptops, tablets and a […]
Posted inWotr
A subdivision on the edge of the wild
The subdivision in Utah where I live is bang up against the mountains, with open land between us and the Snowbasin ski resort, and more national forest beyond. Our house lies at the end of a cul-de-sac on a tributary of the Weber River. A steep hill flanks us to the south, thick with Gambel […]
Posted inWotr
No longer the safest place
My little corner of the West — southern Oregon, between the Pacific Ocean and the high Cascades — achieved a brief notoriety during the height of the world’s Cold War anxieties: It was listed as one of the safest places in the United States in the event of nuclear attack. Distant from population centers and […]
Posted inRange
Rants from the Hill: Beauregard puppy
“Rants from the Hill” are Michael Branch’s monthly musings on life in the high country of Nevada’s western Great Basin desert. Rants from the Hill is now a FREE podcast! Listen to an audio performance of this essay, here. You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes or through Feedburner for use in another podcast reader. […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
Arapaho Journeys: Photographs and Stories from the Wind River Reservation
Arapaho Journeys: Photographs and Stories from the Wind River ReservationSara Wiles262 pages, hardcover: $35.University of Oklahoma Press, 2011. For more than 30 years, Sara Wiles has photographed life on Wyoming’s Wind River Reservation, a community she first encountered as a social worker in 1973. Wiles, who was adopted by Arapaho elder Frances C’Hair, is clearly […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
Farewell, Ed Quillen
I’m not much on being anyone’s fan, but I will have to live with my failure to ever write in to thank Ed Quillen for repeatedly sharing his knowledge and sharp, long-view perceptions that felt as right and big as the West (HCN, 6/25/12, “Dear Friends”). I never met Ed. I didn’t always agree with […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
High Country News gets new interns
It’s that time of year again — when two fresh-faced interns join us in our Paonia, Colo., offices for six months of “journalism boot camp.” We’re also delighted to announce that the talented and diligent Neil LaRubbio, intern from the last session, will remain with us for another six months as our editorial fellow. It’s […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
Of balloons, littering and birthday parties
Here in the western Great Basin, the high desert is rough and remote. This topography tends to keep out the common detritus of the dominant endemic species, Hillbillicus Nevadensis (var. Redneckii). So while the dusty BLM roads in the sage-filled valley bottoms are beribboned with spent shell casings, Coors Light bottles and empty cans of […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
‘Postmortemism’
Your issue covering off-the-beaten-track Western places of interest is very appealing to those of us who prefer reality travel over canned tourism (HCN, 6/25/12, “Touring the Postmodern West”). It seems more honest than the usual “family vacation” photo ops. I also found the descriptions of land art and industrial landscape art interesting. While some of us would […]
Posted inAugust 6, 2012: Of Birds and Men
Practical pyromania: A review of The Flamer
The FlamerBen Rogers257 pages, softcover: $14.Aqueous Books, 2012. Ben Rogers’ engaging first novel, The Flamer, is the coming-of-age story of a young Nevada pyromaniac named Oby Brooks. Oby discovers his love for conflagrations when his father donates the family’s dilapidated house to the Reno Fire Department to burn “for training purposes.” The boy watches the […]
Posted inArticles
Rantcast: Puppy love
Rants from the Hill are Michael Branch’s monthly musings on life in rural Nevada. They are posted at the beginning of each month at www.hcn.org. You can subscribe to the podcast for free in iTunes, or through Feedburner if you use other podcast readers. Each month’s rant is also available in written form. Musical credits for Rantcast: Bumper sticker […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
South Dakota disses Montana
SOUTH DAKOTA The Custer County Chronicle, established in 1880 in the Black Hills of western South Dakota, is one of those weekly papers that asks the sheriff’s department to pitch in and publish its daily log of complaints, most of which seem relatively trivial, including concerns about “a big black cow” wandering the highway, a […]
Posted inGoat
From art as elegy to art as action
How do we grieve? How do we grieve for all that disappears into the insatiable maw of human appetite? How do we grieve for the eventual loss of something as beautiful and terrifying as the polar bear? The small, white-haired woman’s voice broke as she stood to ask her impossibly difficult question, the other audience […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
Food and poetry
Bear-jackers, headed down the road to bruin. Wyoming, left courtesy Julia Corbett, Colorado, right, courtesy Dave Heivly, Snowmass Village Police Department. THE NATION When New York Times columnist Mark Bittman spent a day this spring with Wendell Berry, the man he calls “the soul of the real food movement,” he found the political activist and […]
Posted inJuly 23, 2012: The Hardest Climb
Spiritual Superfund sites
I have read many stories about villains without redeeming values, but never have I read one that made me want to wash my hands — no, endure a thorough toxic-chemical decontamination procedure — until slogging through the FLDS article. I often had to stop and shake my head to cast out the demons of the […]
Posted inJuly 23, 2012: The Hardest Climb
A deep rot
Judges James Shumate and Dee Benson both had access to the rape tape mentioned in this article, solid evidence of a culture of sexual abuse in the FLDS. If they had been kindergarten teachers, they would be required to report the abuse to authorities, who would then be required to follow up. Instead, Judge Shumate […]