Dear Friends

Raven wordplay: Corvus, Corvax and Corax.

At the HCN headquarters, young poets and seasoned reporters.

High Country News is building a new team and correcting old errors.

New faces at the headquarters; catching up on old errors.

As a nonprofit newsmagazine, High Country News has always been dedicated to independent reporting about the West and its communities. A big thanks to all our supporters and donors for helping us continue to dig deep into important stories. We’re going to be listening to and relying on our readers more than ever, and we […]

In September, we hosted “On the Wild Road,” our inaugural tour for High Country News Travel. The trip, which was co-sponsored and organized by Seven Directions Tours of Santa Fe, took a small group on a whirlwind tour to places like Yellowstone National Park, the Wild Animal Sanctuary in Denver, the Raptor Center in Wyoming, […]

At the end of September, High Country News staff and board traveled to Berkeley, California, for one of our annual meetings. We love these trips afield, where we get to connect with members of the broader HCN community. One highlight was a talk by Dave Rolloff, professor of recreation, parks and tourism administration at California […]

It’s starting to feel like autumn in Paonia. Breezes are getting crisper, ripe apples are dropping, and the aspen leaves are turning gold. The season has been busy here at High Country News headquarters, as we make some staffing adjustments. Tay Wiles, our former online editor, is moving to the San Francisco Bay area, where […]

As summer fades, we’re wrapping up our annual photo contest, in which we solicited images of the West’s national parks. While it’s too late to submit a picture, you can still vote for your favorite until Sept. 15 at  hcn.org/photos16. Meanwhile, we’ve been busy catching up with visitors. Dave Morris, who works at the Wild […]

This issue we’re saying goodbye, in a way, to longtime High Country News writer and old friend Jonathan Thompson, who is leaving his post as senior editor in Durango, Colorado, to move to Bulgaria with his family. There he’ll be hard at work turning his extensive reporting on Colorado’s Gold King Mine spill into his […]

It’s been a long, hot summer, but by the time this issue comes out, we’ll all be complaining that it’s almost over. If you’re an academic type, already contemplating the new semester, you might need an extra mood boost. And we have just the thing: the HCNU classroom program, which provides free subscriptions for you […]

During our publication break, which just ended, we bid a fond farewell to former intern Bryce Gray, who wrapped up his session at the end of June. He’s now the full-time energy and environment reporter at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Congrats to Bryce, and even more to the Post-Dispatch: Y’all have landed yourself a fine […]

Paonia, Colorado, home of High Country News, has been in the middle of a heat wave, with temperatures lurking around 90 degrees for far too long. We’re looking forward to skipping an issue, per our usual schedule, and will see you again in July! Despite the heat, Claire Goodis-Baker and Lynell Kyser of Denver stopped […]

Our biannual HCN board meeting is fast approaching. We hold “virtual” electronic meetings each year as well, but they can’t compete with the energy of our face-to-face real-life gatherings. That’s why staff and board are venturing out from our widely scattered burrows to convene in Basalt, Colorado, June 10-11.    We’ll welcome six new board members: […]