FROM THE SKIOCRACY For people in ski country, the months between late September and early December are a sad and desperate time. Gray days, cold nights and nary a flake of snow drive recreationists indoors, wreaking havoc with their circadian rhythms. Everyone with any sort of sense — and a trust fund — flees to […]
Ski strangeness and caged chickens
Posted inHeard Around the West
Fish tales of yore
Before Glen Canyon Dam plugged up the Colorado River in 1963, locals in the Upper Basin states of Utah, Colorado and Wyoming reeled in fish so giant and so good to eat that they still tell stories about them. The fish they caught — squawfish, razorback suckers, humpback chubs and bonytail chubs — are all […]
Posted inWotr
The old ways sink into the earth
The farm equipment graveyard — a row of horse-drawn plows and mowers overgrown with prairie grass — is a common sight at the edge of rural fields in the West. Collapsing hay wagons, disemboweled tractor hulls and other antique machinery sinking into the earth tell a story of farming, past and future. Each item was […]
Posted inWotr
Missing pollution in the crisp, clean air
This cold-weather week, I’ve seen two pickup trucks parked in town, each stacked high with firewood. This may be a sure sign of the coming of winter in rural towns across the nation, but it’s become an uncommon sight in downtown Telluride these days. When I moved to Telluride in the 1980s, almost every house […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
The unkindness of essays
As a hunter and conservationist, I found your essay “The Kindness of Hunters” insulting, naive and decidedly inappropriate for a publication trying to advance the case of conservation in the West (HCN, 11/9/09). Hunters are somewhat used to being caricatured as a bunch of bloodthirsty bubbas, but this is the first time I recall us […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
The intolerant West
In the “Editor’s Note” in the Oct. 26 issue, Jonathan Thompson states that “many (refugees) face racism and xenophobia…” in Western cities and towns. One doesn’t need to be a refugee or from another country to face these same issues. Despite being born a U.S. citizen and having 15 years of community service in the […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Taking the high road(less)
The political campaign that was used to accomplish the Clinton roadless rule seemed open to serious criticism on the grounds that it was intentionally insensitive to the voice of many Western constituencies that would have (and subsequently have) objected (HCN, 11/9/09). A narrowly targeted minority of activists was mobilized to win the day while most […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Roadless: The prologue
I agree that tactics on both sides of the roadless issue have fouled the process and the intent of law (HCN, 11/9/09). To fully understand this matter, though, I think it’s important to go back to the RARE1 and RARE2 (Roadless Area Review) processes of the 1970s and 1980s, meant to identify potential wilderness areas […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Keep it legal
While I am all for keeping roads out of our national forests to the extent practicable, I found former Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck’s view of the process disturbing (HCN, 11/9/09). Mr. Dombeck says in your story “Roadless-less” that “(t)he bottom line is that the mechanism of how we keep wild places wild is less […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
How about a nostalgic piece on hunters shooting at bagels?
I am beginning to wonder if the “Essay” section at the end of each issue shouldn’t be re-named “My goodness! As a yuppie I had no idea!” There must be more interesting topics available for essays than just gushy nostalgia for country grandmothers, bagel lovers displaced east of the Mississippi, or unprepared hikers who think […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Holiday open house
The staff of High Country News cordially invites all readers and friends to our holiday open house. It will be at our Paonia, Colo., office (119 Grand Ave.) on Wednesday, Dec. 9, from 5 to 7:30 p.m. We’ll provide refreshments. Hope to see you there! READERS ON ROAD TRIPSThe warm Indian summer days brought traveling […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Forever roadless
Ray Ring’s article “Roadless-less” was misleading to suggest that the roadless rule was created with inadequate public process and without the support of the American people (HCN, 11/9/09). The roadless rule represents the most extensive public rule-making process ever undertaken by the U.S. Forest Service. During more than three years of review and public participation, […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Birders without borders
Border SongsJim Lynch291 pages, hardcover: $25.95.Knopf, 2009. “In war, truth is the first casualty.” It’s a quote attributed to the Greek playwright Aeschylus from the fifth century B.C., back when wars were wars, fought on actual battlefields by men in helmets who wielded swords and spears. Novelist Jim Lynch understands this adage, and he also […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
A return to the West
Name Mary Jane SkalaHometown Cleveland, OhioVocation former journalistHCN subscriber since 2005 Mary Jane Skala took some time to visit HCN a few weeks ago while cruising cross-country on a two-month-long road trip. After 40 years in journalism, she “saw the writing on the wall” and accepted a buy-out, leaving her post as senior editor at […]
Posted inGoat
A new line of defense
The attorneys for Tim DeChristopher, the University of Utah student who made bogus bids at a BLM drilling-rights auction last year, have come up with a new line of defense: selective prosecution. DeChristopher is charged with such federal felonies as interfering with a government auction and making a false representation. If convicted, he […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
Potty on the go
Speaking of camouflage, Big R stores in Klamath Falls, Redmond and White City, Ore., featured a camo-covered toilet seat in one of their newspaper inserts. The “off-road commode” for campers works this way: You attach the padded seat to a special truck hitch down by the truck’s bumper, and voila! “Now you can GO where […]
Posted inRange
What the Nuclear Boosters Don’t Tell You
On its surface, Grants doesn’t look like the Gateway to the Nuclear West. Its shuttered buildings, dilapidated store fronts, and overgrown vacant lots are what’s left of the promised prosperity from the last uranium boom. To really understand Grants’ and the region’s past and potential future, you’ve got to go below the surface. From the […]
Posted inWotr
A “shock jock” in Montana has a great fall
Environmentalists are “green Nazis … pure, unadulterated satanic evil … vile vomit.” Does that hateful tone sound familiar? Radio and TV commentary tycoons — Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their ilk — often use that kind of language against their targets, including not only environmentalists, but also liberals and gay people. Their broadcasts encourage destructive […]
Posted inDecember 7, 2009: Dueling Claims
Betting on the rails
Buffett buys BNSF as Congress considers reform legislation