Americans have become increasingly supportive of environmental protection. Ironically, however, recent battles to save endangered species jeopardize the survival of this conservation movement. The Endangered Species Act (ESA) itself may be endangered. How have we gone astray with endangered species? Let’s first consider the Act’s history. The 1973 passage of the ESA expanded the federal […]

What do Cyanide leach mining, dredges, and hydraulic mining have in common? Ecological, social, political, and economic destruction. First consider the most dramatic, hydraulic mining. Here’s how it works. Water is captured at an elevation above the site to be blasted. It is piped downward, picking up four tenths of a pound of pressure for […]

Each year the Center of the American West at the University of Colorado grants the Wallace Stegner Award to a writer who has contributed to “the cultural identity of the American West”. Stegner would no doubt be pleased by this year’s recipient, Paul Schullery, a long term Park Service contractor and defender, and husband of […]