Flood News

Gov. Brian Scheitzer this week declared a state of emergency in Montana, where flooding has closed a 50-mile stretch of I-90, isolated communities in the central and eastern parts of the state and killed an elderly woman who fell into a flooded ditch.

Water continues rising, with rainfall adding to record snowmelt. The state emergency Coordination Center has received numerous declarations of emergencies from local and tribal jurisdictions. Perhaps hardest hit is the Crow Reservation near the Wyoming border, where those at Crow Agency who have not evacuated are essentially trapped by surrounding water. Potable water there is becoming scarce. The American Red Cross is assisting and several families are staying at high school located on the highest hill in the area.

Big Horn County Emergency Services Coordinator Ed Auker told the Associated Press the flooding was concentrated in the town’s business district and extended for several blocks.

“We’ve got water everywhere,” Auker said. “It took out the major infrastructure, which in Lodge Grass consists of the grocery store. They are pretty isolated until the water goes down.”

I-90 is closed from Hardin to the Wyoming border. 

Bob Wire Has a Point (It's Under His Cowboy Hat)

Bin Laden is in a bad mood, and his day is starting out poorly. The cacophony of the children playing on the third floor has reached a deafening pitch, and he throws his hands up in the air. “Enough! You little beasts go play in the basement! I can’t even hear myself terrorize!” He mutters to himself: “Oh, if I could go back in time I would trade one thousand goats for a single package of condoms.”

Food and Ag Bites

President Barack Obama came out against subsidies to agribusiness this week, saying in a CBS News town hall meeting that the whole system “needs revamping.”

The President was answering a question from a fruit and vegetable farmer, Matt Harsh, when he said:

“Part of what we want to do is to make sure that help is going to family farms in crisis situations. Drought, disaster and so forth,” Obama said. “That we’re not just giving ongoing subsidies to big agri-business. Which is the way that a lot of our farm programs work right now.”

Also in this week’s food and ag roundup: ag boom misses small towns, the legality of urban farming and farmers get smaller and smaller share of the American food dollar.

Western Book Roundup

Each year readers and writers gather to celebrate the written word at book festivals, fairs, and writing conferences throughout the West. Although there are a few spring festivals, everything really begins to pick up in June, and the schedule remains busy through November.

The offerings vary from those that concentrate on helping writers improve their craft, such as the Lighthouse Writers Workshop’s retreat in Grand Lake, Colo. (July 10th-15th), to those that introduce writers to readers through panels, readings, and book signings, such as the Montana Festival of the Book in Missoula (October 5th-7th). Some, such as the Aspen Summer Words Festival (June 19th-24th), combine workshops and readings. The workshops charge fees, but plenty of the festivals are free to attend, including the Montana Festival of the Book in Missoula and the Equality State Book Fair in Casper. Most workshops are already accepting applications for this year.

I’ve updated the Book Festivals of the West map with this year’s information when it was available. Please let me know if there are any more events to add or update—I’ll even throw this open for events in California and Texas. New West will run reports from the festivals again this year—we already have correspondents lined up for the Jackson Hole Writers Conference, Aspen Summer Words, and the Montana Festival of the Book, and are looking for more contributors.

Bob Wire Has a Point (It's Under His Cowboy Hat)

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t be into NASCAR, nor am I trying to cast aspersions on fans of racing. It’s just not my cup of Mountain Dew. Still, I have to wonder how the hell hundreds of thousands of fans will spend wheelbarrow-loads of money to see these races every weekend, and then bitch about paying $4.00 for a gallon of gas to run their Chevy Avalanche or F250. 

New West Festival

We hosted a stellar lineup of speakers at the New West Festival on Friday, May 6. By request, here are copies of the PowerPoint presentations by several speakers who appeared at the festival

New West Film

Years from now, when the official American Prairie Reserve stretches 3 million acres, Ken Burns’ team may show up, as they did in the National Parks, to tell the story of who made it happen and how.

But right now the story of protecting the grasslands largely contained in Montana and traveled by Lewis and Clark is still in progress. What “The American Serengeti,” a new National Geographic film screening this weekend at the 34th International Wildlife Film Festival, makes clear is that there is a lot of work to be done before this ambitious, possibly unrealistic, dream can become real.

An unfinished story, of course, is still worth telling and this one doesn’t need Ken Burns when it has writer/producer and NatGeo veteran, Andy Mitchell. Mitchell’s film, the winner of the IWFF’s Best Made in Montana award, will be shown in Missoula’s Roxy Theater Saturday at 3 p.m. 

A New Take on Old West Lit

When we did the Western Literature Association survey of Most Important Authors, very few women made the list. Willa Cather got her fair share of votes. Mari Sandoz was the next favorite, followed by Leslie Silko and Mary Austin. After that came such names as Amy Tan, Sandra Cisneros, Pam Houston, Terry Tempest Williams and Ann Zwinger. With the exception of Cather, none had sufficient support to be called “important.”

For my list of significant Western women writers, I chose the four I find most unforgettable, four women I have spent many evenings with and who belong in the library of any well-read Westerner.

1. Mary Austin’s The Land of Little Rain

Mary Austin’s The Land of Little Rain (1903) will not tempt you to hoist the family bungalow onto a flatbed truck and move to the Mojave Basin; however, Austin can lead you to wonder why you live where you live. The Mojave hills, the colors, the seasons of the place “trick the sense of time, so that once inhabiting there you always mean to go away without quite realizing that you have not done it.” Austin treats individuals—the Basket Maker, the Pocket Hunter, the Mule Driver on the borax wagons—as the equals of the coyotes, the scrawny rabbits, the soaring hawks and cruising vultures.

New West Festival 2011

Dozens of people attending the 2011 New West Festival filled the Missoula Art Museum Thursday night for an evening of food, drink, art and architecture.

The kickoff reception featured a talk by Warren Hampton, one of the lead architects for the renovation and remodeling of the museum. Hampton discussed the transformation of the historic Carnegie Library building and the inspirations for the updates to the building.

The event also featured a “citizen-juried” art show in which attendees met local artists and voted on their favorite pieces.

The New West Festival continues Friday at the Holiday Inn Downtown at the Park in Missoula, featuring speakers and panels exploring climate change, digital branding, food and agriculture, economic development and entrepreneurism.

Food and Ag News Nuggets

The discussion about “food deserts” in recent years has largely focused on the lack of access to food in urban areas. But, as a cool new map released by the USDA this week shows, when it comes to finding fresh, healthy food, ironically, farm country has it pretty rough too.

Also in this week’s roundup: Prince Charles keynotes the Washington Post’s Future of Food event, energy consumption rising in food production and the Gates’, the Fords and the Kelloggs announce a new foundation help bridge the gap between sustainable and industrial ag.