I grew up in the country. We ranched, worked hard and did virtually everything ourselves. That kind of upbringing instills resourcefulness,...
Mike Blakely
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True Westerners
The Mona Lisa of the Range
I was teaching photography at Prescott College in Arizona when I met 19-year-old Julie, the daughter of renowned wildlife artist Grant Hagen. She...
Crookedest Railroad Turns New Bend
Model railroads didn't do a thing for Jim Clark when he was a kid growing up in Milwaukee and California in the 1940s and 1950s, but the real thing...
Hampton Sides
At first, I thought of Kit Carson as a quasi-fictitious character, some mythic gunslinger or Wild West show performer. I didn't realize he was a...
Melody Webb
My favorite Park Ranger uniform is the pants, long-sleeved shirt, “Ike” jacket and cross tie. Is the National Park Service (NPS) unique in the...
Saving Dalton Days
Brent Demmitt grew up with Dalton Days in his hometown of Meade, Kansas, and remembers “it was everything to me—it was always a big deal, especially...
Jimmy Palmiotti
The worst advice I’ve ever gotten was my first girlfriend said there’s no money in comic books and that pursuing my dream is a stupid thing to do....
Frank History
That our mailman didn’t hoard some of the crazy packages we got from Phil Frank always surprised us. Luckily, he was a man with morals, because each...
Massacre Site Open to the Public
Dozens of honorific titles have dignified the name of Ben Nighthorse Campbell—senator, congressman, judo champion and award-winning jewelry...
Ranchers vs. Army
Lon Robertson is a third generation Colorado rancher and patriotic American who never dreamed he’d be fighting the United States Army. But these...
Harvey House Hero
Somewhere, Fred Harvey, a visionary from the 19th century, is smiling down on Allan Affeldt, a dreamer in the 21st century. Fred Harvey was a plain...
Fort Stanton’s Angel
The “Savior of Fort Stanton” is too modest to claim that title for herself, but anyone who has watched the reversal of fortune at one of the West’s...