It is a gift when an author transports you to the place he loves most. Writer Bill Broyles and photographer Michael Berman accomplish this in Sunshot: Peril and Wonder in the Gran Desierto, an exquisite portrait of place. Arizona’s Cabeza Prieta and Mexico’s Sierra Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar lie at the heart of […]
Travels in a sublime wasteland
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
A river dribbles through it
Matt Jenkins did a nice job of covering stream restoration on the middle section of the Deschutes river, but he completely ignored the significant problems in the upper river. He writes, “Upstream from Bend, the river boils silvery green … charging through craggy chutes resplendent with ponderosa pine and Douglas fir (actually there’s a lot […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
The Jefferson state bird is not the spotted owl, either
It was exciting to see an article on the State of Jefferson. However, the article was not historically accurate. The State of Jefferson is not “a dream that has been around since 1941” as alleged by Emma Brown. Actually, a state was proposed for northwest California and southwest Oregon in 1852 — the State of […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Pie in the sky, a la carbon
In the story about Montana Gov. Schweitzer, Samuel Western seemed confused by the terms “pollution” and “climate change.” In the science community, we rarely refer to either of these words. They tend to be used by people who study policy. Typically, climate change is used to mean changes in long-term average patterns of temperature and […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
So where does that leave Marie Antoinette?
I am always appreciative of those narrow-minded, ignorant folks who see themselves as bigots and fascists when they openly declare themselves as such. So it is with much thanks that I welcome the neon sign that Laura Pritchett has placed on her forehead blinking “FASCIST” — it will warn others to stay away from her. […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Have knives and hooks, will travel
Name The Mobile Matanza Hometown Taos, New Mexico Measurements 36 feet long by 13 feet, 6 inches tall Items on her wish list Gloves, hook-eye sharpener, meat band saw blades, meat grinder plates, three-way oilstone, platters, long butchering aprons, butchering supplies and knives, brushes and scrapers. She’s sleek, full-figured and gleaming white, though not […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Environmental change
In a startling post-election turn-about, Sen. Domenici moves to protect New Mexico’s Valle Vidal
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
River Redux
Thanks to a historic and grudging compromise, water and salmon head back to the San Joaquin River, six decades after they were taken out.
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Two weeks in the West
“You guys caused the problem.” — John Mudre of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, blaming a biologist and the media for drawing too many people to a public hearing in Eureka, Calif., to consider Klamath dam relicensing. Two hundred people packed a hallway after the room reached its capacity of 350. FERC booked the same […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Whistling in the park
Thanks largely to Bob Woodward and his trusty Deep Throat, whistleblowing is a vastly overromanticized endeavor. Government professionals who wish to publicize, and thereby alter, official behavior that they find unethical or illegal actually have few attractive options. Speaking openly about the problems of the agency that employs you is apt to be extremely unhealthy […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
They should shoot horses, shouldn’t they?
Our national obsession with keeping “wild” horses and burros on public lands that are incapable of supporting them has always struck me as bizarre, especially since it’s the result of our alleged love for them. Ask most any wild horse advocacy group and you’ll be told that wild horses are native wildlife and anyone who […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
A director from central casting
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Old but Faithful.” She calls herself a “city gal” who emigrated as a child to the U.S. from Leicester, England, where her family owned a large manufacturing company. After a 16-year career working her way up the National Park Service bureaucracy, Mary Bomar is […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Dear friends
CONGRATULATIONS, RICK CRAIG Former HCN intern Rick Craig (Summer ’91) of Missoula, Mont., recently won top prize in the Chicago Tribune’s 24th annual Nelson Algren Awards. The awards honor previously unpublished short fiction works by American writers, amateur or professional. Nelson Algren, “the voice of America’s dispossessed,” is best known for his novels The Man […]
Posted inDecember 11, 2006: Old but Faithful
Old but Faithful
How a feisty group of government retirees faced down the Bush administration and changed the future of America’s national parks
Posted inWotr
Of salvage logging and salvation
Salvage is a word that is much in the air these days, not just in the woods, but also in the lecture halls of universities and in the marble corridors of Washington, D.C. It is a word of power, a soothing word implying many virtues: prudence and profit, rescue and redemption, both exploitation and, somehow, […]
Posted inWotr
Running wild in Yellowstone National Park
In Yellowstone, it’s never unusual for a car to halt smack in the middle of the road. Nor it is unusual for a car’s driver to stand in the road, gawking at wildlife. It is unusual for a driver to be shouting — at me. I was riding my bike on Yellowstone’s northeast entrance road, […]
Posted inWotr
Watching with wonder a parliament of snowyowls
One by one as the afternoon shadows stretched across the winter fields a few miles north of Pablo, in the Flathead Valley of western Montana, the parliament of snowy owls began to fly up to sit on the neighboring fence posts. Along the dirt roads circling the fields, cars were already pulling over and spotting […]
Posted inWotr
Scooter blues: When you’re environmentally correct and get no respect
I wish I knew why Harley riders stare straight through me when I’m coming down the street on my scooter from the opposite direction. Sadly, I’m beginning to suspect American motorcyclists of subscribing to a caste system in which Harley Davidsons occupy the top tier, followed by the Euro-touro blends, the bullet bikes, dirt bikes, […]
Posted inWotr
Westerners sure love their mountain monikers
The first thing I noticed when I was plucked from a sound sleep by aliens and we started flying around was that all the Western towns and cities were conveniently labeled. Lifting off from Logan, Utah, I could clearly see the big mountainside “L” get smaller as we zoomed skyward. Heading west, it only took […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
This dog believes
“Each week we’ll hear from a banker or butcher, a painter or social worker as they discuss the principles that guide their daily lives. We realize what a daunting prospect this is — to summarize a life’s philosophy in just 500 words and share it with a national audience. But that’s exactly what we hope […]