How a gathering of gay men in the Sonoran Desert started a worldwide movement rooted in nature.
The desert’s Radical Faeries
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
Issei poetry between the world wars
The rich history of Japanese-language literature challenges assumptions about what counts as U.S. art.
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
‘We have been here and are still here’
#iamthewest: Giving voice to the people that make up communities in the region.
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
Killer kitties, no-drama llamas and a brand-new arachnid
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
The value of awe
Being dumbstruck by the beautiful complexity of nature is good for you.
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
A new digital us
HCN has new tech systems and new (real) editorial fellows.
Posted inArticles
The good, the bad and the ugly of the state legislative season
While Congress does nothing, Western state lawmakers pass a flurry of consequential and/or crazy — bills.
Posted inApril 2024: Epic Journeys
How states make money off tribal lands
Ten states own 1.6 million acres of land within 83 tribal nations’ reservations. How did they get there?
Posted inApril 2024: Epic Journeys
Is it cowboy poetry if it’s not written by a cowboy?
An event protesting the cowboy poetry festival faces questions of growth and authenticity.
Posted inMarch 2024: Fertile Ground
Can affordable housing for Indigenous communities work?
The question looms large as Denver breaks ground on its first affordable housing project for Indigenous people.
Posted inArticles
Oil industry profits don’t pay for cleanup
A failure of regulation has allowed industry to avoid the true cost of cleaning up its unplugged wells.
Posted inArticles
The great Clean Girl vanishing act
The search for an ‘invisible’ perfume is rooted in frontier aesthetics.
Posted inArticles
How a small town with limited resources is planning for climate change
Oregon’s Grants Pass is known for its climate, and its sustainability plan aims to keep it that way.
Posted inArticles
A cartography of loss in the Borderlands
Mexicali’s Colorado River Family Album documents what is no more.
Posted inArticles
How the Colville Tribes are restoring traditional lands and wildlife
The tribes are re-establishing native species wiped out by systematic colonization.
Posted inArticles
See how bad your community’s air will be in 30 years
New data forecasts the nation’s future air quality, all the way down to individual addresses.
Posted inArticles
During climate chaos, a witness and champion of the West
A Q&A with author and educator Laura Pritchett.
Posted inArticles
What happened to the Great American Outdoors Act?
A historic public lands act passed in 2020. Here’s what it’s done so far.