Month: September 2006

Buena Vista Rocks

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Article by Margery Dorfmeister

Buena Vista Geology – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

THAT’S NOT THUNDER you hear rolling off the mountains around Buena Vista. Nowadays, it’s more likely the rumble of rocks rolling off the bucket of a huge front-end loader into a semi dump truck. For generations, Buena Vista’s huge boulders have distinguished the town as surely as her Old Court House steeple. But with the present spate of building going on, her boulders — like her once prime lettuce heads — are being harvested for exportation.

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Four jobs in the Wet Mountain Rat Race

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Column by Hal Walter

Mountain Life – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

IT’S A SOURCE OF WONDER to me how a life intended to be lived simply could suddenly become so overwhelmingly busy and complicated.

I like to joke that I have four jobs, but it’s really no joke. The irony, of course, is that while most people move to the mountains to escape the rat race I’ve somehow created my own right here in the Wet Mountains, albeit without rush-hour traffic. While the neighborhood has grown considerably in recent years, the actual “working class” consists only of about a dozen at last count.

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A haven for animals

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Article by Sue Snively

Politics – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

THEIR NAMES ARE MARMALADE AND JIGGS, and they are very close. They may be seen sleeping in their cage with their front legs wrapped around each other. When together they are secure and content.

Marmalade and Jiggs are two adult cats that have been housed at the Ark Valley Humane Society, Inc. (AVHS) for almost a year. They were leftovers from a full group of kittens, but because they were the least tame of the group, they didn’t get adopted. And now, even though they’re no longer wild, no one wants them. They’re not “the cute little kittens” that are so easy to place. But they are beautiful animals that would make wonderful pets if placed in a loving home.

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Zipping across a canyon

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Article by Columbine Quillen

Recreation – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

“I take lemons and make them into lemonade,” replied Monty Holmes when asked what made him think of the idea to open a zip line park on an old mining claim east of Salida.

And sweet it is that he was able to make a desert box canyon that was not producing any gold into a modern- day adventure gold mine that houses five different zip lines, plus caverns, and lime kilns.

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Points well taken

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Letter from Slim Wolfe

Global Warming – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Editors:

Ed Quillen’s editorial assertion that we the people should not need the prod of global warming to steer us towards more sensible consumption was well-taken. In a culture which worships excess few of us are attuned to the subtleties which civilization has sometimes enjoyed. Nothing less than the brashest sounds and the brightest colors (and the goriest images) registers anymore, and achievements are measured by our skill at manipulating buttons and keyboards. The human soul is at stake here, whether or not the oceans rise. We don’t know how to enjoy unless we’re abusing.

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Global warming doesn’t matter

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Letter from Ide Trotter

Global Warming – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Dear Ed,

Let me congratulate you on your very rational letter “Why Global Warming Doesn’t Matter” in the August Edition. You are so right. There are many valid reasons for steps we can take that move in the right direction.

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Global Warming does matter

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Letter from Leslie Willoughby

Global Warming – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Dear Ed,

It matters because measurable, repeatable experience enables us to act on our motivations most effectively.

I agree that the motivations for acting in our own best long-term interest are many (Why Global Warming Really Doesn’t Matter, p. 51, August 2006). Actions to decrease use of fossil fuels certainly seem more important than whether your motivation is to save money, to save the planet, or to save your soul. At the same time, the most effective actions are based on a foundation of measurable, repeatable experience (science), so getting the science right is fundamentally important.

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The source of Bayou Salado

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Letter from Virginia McConnell Simmons

Place Names – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Editors:

The origins of Bayou Salado’s name have long been debated, and the appearance of a Bayou Salida in an advertisement only makes the issue slightly more confusing. Now I will add a few words to Ed’s take on Bayou Salado while some tenderfoot in an ad office somewhere is deciding exactly where we should put the X for Bayou Salida on our maps.

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The Pike Expedition in September 1806 and 2006

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Article by Ed Quillen

History – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

WHEN WE LEFT Zebulon Montgomery Pike and his party at the end of August, 1806, they were camped in Vernon County, Missouri, near the Kansas line about 80 miles south of Kansas City.

There Pike abandoned his boats and acquired horses for the rest of the trip.

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Search history for lessons

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Essay by Martha Quillen

Politics – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

RECENTLY, AN AUDIENCE MEMBER on C-Span2’s Book TV made an observation that I suspect most of us have made at one time or another. (For those unfamiliar with C-Span, it’s a cable channel which airs U.S. Senate proceedings, congressional committee hearings, interviews with foreign dignitaries, and the like, and the programming includes CSpan2’s Book TV, which features 48 hours of non-fiction book discussions every weekend.)

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Why do Mexicans migrate to the U.S.?

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Sidebar by Nancy Hiemstra

Immigration – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Current immigration trends from Mexico to the United States can be most directly tied to changes in the global economy in the last 40 years. In the 1960s and ’70s, Mexico and other Latin American countries were encouraged by the Western world to borrow heavily in order to develop national industry and infrastructure. It was easy to get loans because the profiting OPEC countries deposited a lot of their profits in U.S. banks as the world’s oil dependence grew; and these banks, in turn, gave huge loans to developing countries at variable interest rates, which were initially very low.

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The Community Immigration Initiative

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Sidebar by Nancy Hiemstra

Immigration – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

In 2004, a local non-profit organization in Leadville, Full Circle Youth and Family Services, applied to join the Colorado Trust’s Immigrant Integration initiative. After an intense selection process, Leadville was designated as one of the Trust’s ten Immigrant Integration Communities. Consequently, the Trust is giving Lake County $75,000 each year through 2009 to foster integration.

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Modern Leadville: Two worlds, one town

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Article by Nancy Hiemstra

Immigration – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

AS THOUSANDS OF TOURISTS drive through Leadville every year, they likely remember it as an Old West mining town. They pass signs inviting them to visit local museums, take a train ride, and walk on the Mineral Belt Trail. Some might notice there are several stores with Spanish names, and fewer still will observe that the trailer parks outside of town are mainly populated by Latinos.

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Ambition and Immigrants

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Column by George Sibley

Immigration – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

ONE OF MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE Coloradans is former Governor Dick Lamm. There’s never a dull moment around the Guv; he makes us think about the things we need to be thinking about, usually by taking a strong and extreme stance himself — as when he suggested some years ago that, rather than trying to live forever in a useless dotage, aging Americans had an obligation to “move over” and make room for the succeeding generations. And he always gets all the howls of conventional knee-jerk outrage you would expect from the generally ahistorical and thoughtless masses of an immensely wealthy, arrogant and increasingly fragile imperial culture driving relentlessly toward its decline and fall but not wanting the closing party interrupted yet with reality.

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Regional roundup

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Brief by Ed Quillen

Regional News – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Water from the sky

It’s been raining a lot this summer. The traditional explanation is that the rain comes just after ranchers have cut their hay and have it spread out to dry before baling and stacking it.

To scientists, the summer rains are from the North American Monsoon (also called the Southwest U.S., Mexican or Arizona Monsoon). An area of high atmospheric pressure develops over the Four Corners, changing the wind flow so that moisture arrives from the tropical Pacific Ocean and the Gulfs of Mexico and California. It typically begins in early July in southern Arizona and moves north, with drier weather returning in September.

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Buena Vista Rocks

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Article by Margery Dorfmeister

Buena Vista Geology – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

THAT’S NOT THUNDER you hear rolling off the mountains around Buena Vista. Nowadays, it’s more likely the rumble of rocks rolling off the bucket of a huge front-end loader into a semi dump truck. For generations, Buena Vista’s huge boulders have distinguished the town as surely as her Old Court House steeple. But with the present spate of building going on, her boulders — like her once prime lettuce heads — are being harvested for exportation.

Read more

UAWCD won’t expand in 2006

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Brief by Central Staff

Water Politics – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

The Upper Arkansas Water Conservancy District will not be expanding into eastern Frémont County this year.

The district currently comprises Chaffee, Custer, and western Frmont counties, and for the past two years, annexation petitions have circulated in eastern Frémont, which included Cañon City and Florence.

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Last Chance Mine’s access disputed by neighbors

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Brief by Central Staff

Mining – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

The Last Chance Mine near Creede, featured in the July edition of Colorado Central, has run into some trouble with its neighbors.

The mine, owned by Jack and Kim Morris, allows visitors to collect specimens from the dump rock — some of it gorgeous “sowbelly agate” from the fabled Amethyst Vein. People pay for specimens, but are not charged to use a guest house, although donations are welcome.

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Briefs from the San Luis Valley

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Brief by Marcia Darnell

San Luis Valley – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Smashed Potatoes

You knew it could happen, and it did. The San Luis Valley, now teeming with passenger trains and potato trucks, saw its first collision of same. The truck burst into flames, but there were only a few minor injuries (except, presumably, to the spuds). An investigation is pending and the train is back on track.

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Some people just don’t want addresses

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Brief by Allen Best

Mountain Life – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

Sometimes when people move to the country, they’d just as soon not feel like they were on a street in town. That’s true at many places, and it came up again recently in San Juan County, where Telluride is located.

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Enjoy those aspen leaves while ye may

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Brief by Central Staff

Forestry – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

The blue spruce is Colorado’s official state tree, but this time of year, no one drives to the mountains to look at the unchanging conifer. Instead, it’s the glowing aspen leaves, spread across the mountainsides like spilled sunshine, that draw the visitors.

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Watch out for hijackers in our national parks

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Essay by Alan Kesselheim

Wildlife – September 2006 – Colorado Central Magazine

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, spring last year. Marypat and I have stopped for a picnic break on our annual April ride through Yellowstone. We prop the bikes against a bridge railing, take our sandwiches and stroll to a grassy patch near a creek. It is quiet and tranquil in a way it never is during tourist season. The sun is warm. A herd of bison grazes in the distance.

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Western Water Report: September 3, 2006

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WATER MAY BE DEFINING ISSUE OF GLOBAL WARMING IN THE WEST

The Rocky Mountain West is one of the United States’ most arid regions, and a region where population increases are exploding, making the management of increasingly scarce water of utmost importance, and an area where global warming may have its most profound impact. Salt Lake Tribune; Aug. 8 <http://www.sltrib.com/ci_4149629>

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