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“Time sure does change things,” said an airline passenger to his companion. “When I was a boy, I used to sit in a flat-bottomed boat on that lake down there below and fish. Every time a plane flew over I’d look up and wish I were in it. “Now I look down . . . and I wish I were fishing.” Time (or the lack of it) has always been a prime topic for people who work hard and miss out on all the fun activities that living in Wyoming can provide. This time stress is especially bad about this time of year. Spring and summer are times for fishing, go...
Thank you, Foster. You could sum up Foster Friess in one word: Generous. He did more for more people than anyone I have ever known. He and his wife Lynn gave away $500 million in their lifetimes. Amazing. Foster Friess died May 27 at age 81. My story with Foster is a personal one. I had worked with him and Lynn some 20 years ago on some obscure project and had not had any contact for many years. Out of the blue in April of 2018, he called and asked me to help him with his governor’s campaign. There is no hesitation when Foster Friess asks f...
“I love you, pop.” “I love you, too, son.” ·The last words exchanged between a father and son. As a long-time newspaper writer, I knew that someday I would be writing Dad’s obituary. Some twenty-one years ago on May 23, 2000, was that day. I said good-bye to my 81-year father a few days before he died. Tom Sniffin Sr. was being treated for an assortment of ailments at the Boulder, CO Community Hospital. When Nancy and I left him Friday, May 20, 2000, he was just being prepped for an experimental procedure to use a special device to open up an...
Today’s grads face one of the most uncertain times in history. I call it a merging of two seemingly mutually-exclusive ideas – they have a tail wind behind them PLUS a head wind facing them. The tail wind is the fact that there just are not enough workers for the jobs that are out there. If you have skills, a good resume showing success at previous jobs, and a good attitude, your future should look very, very bright. One of my mottoes is that someone is looking as hard for you as you are looking for them – you just have to knock on enoug...
My nervous “afraid of the dark” wife is amazed that her brave husband will get up in the middle of the night to check out all the strange noises she hears. This has been going on for more than half a century and, frankly, even I am impressed by my fearlessness. Patiently, during the entire time of our marriage, I have been awakened in the middle of deep slumber to a voice saying: “Honey, did you hear that?” I roll over and say, “What? I didn’t hear anything. Go back to sleep, it will be all right.” A few minutes later: “I can’t sleep. I...
There are literally millions of Americans who will be visiting Wyoming this summer seeking out those secret spots. I will be one of them. This column is my annual “Wyoming Bucket List” of those places that I have always wanted to visit. Some of them were featured in my three- volume trilogy of coffee table books about Wyoming but many were not. Either way, I am eager to go see them. Now readers need to know that Wyoming is full of many of the most scenic places in the world, such as Yellowstone National Park, Teton National Park, Devils Tow...
Even though the idea of Wyoming spending a billion dollars on a gigantic swath of land had some of us scratching our heads about one year ago – well, at least you had to give the project (and Govenor Mark Gordon) high marks for bold imagination. That deal went away when a company outbid Wyoming. But thinking back about that, it makes me wonder if Wyoming should be just a little brash. Be a little bold. Just a bit? Our leaders sometimes act like the proverbial guy who was up to his waist in alligators and forgot all about draining the swamp. W...
Wyoming’s current economic situation reminds me of the famous business book Who Moved My Cheese? After living off severance taxes from the energy industry for half a century, the Cowboy State is enduring a time when the state is trying to maintain services without the money to pay for them. As fossil fuels decline, severance taxes paid by energy companies for coal, oil and natural gas extracted from Wyoming are diminishing rapidly. That famous Cheese book by Spencer Johnson is about how people react to unpleasant change. It stars some mice a...
Using both tight budgets and a Covid pandemic as excuses, the dumb idea of limiting printed public notices in Wyoming newspapers has reared its ugly head again in the Legislature in Cheyenne. Wyoming citizens should be both outraged at this proposal plus the fact that their taxes are paying for the lobbyists who are pushing for it. Crazy. Here is a fact: There are some people in government who like working out of the public’s eye. They do not like reporters or, worse yet, pesky citizens poking their noses into their work. To many of our city a...
Enough already. Enough about politics. Enough about the deadly virus. Enough about complaining. Today, folks, this column will be totally devoted to GOOD NEWS. And there is plenty of it. First of all, the days are getting longer. Our long winter of discontent is over in many ways. And our dawns and sunsets are spectacular with brilliant reds. Stop and take in these wonderful and colorful marvels. The weather this winter has been relatively mild in most parts of the state. Interstate 80 has not been closed as much as last year. This is great...
The shocking sight of Wyoming’s lone U. S. Representative voting to impeach President Donald Trump was devastating to thousands of Cowboy State residents. Wyoming supported Trump to a larger extent than any other state, with more than 70% of its voters casting ballots for the incumbent president. When Cheney voted against Trump, it truly made national headlines and was the lead story on the nightly news. As the third-ranking Republican in the U. S. House, her vote was seismic. It sent shock waves from one end of the country to the other. It was...
Okay, it’s Christmas and it’s time to buy gifts. The year 2020 has been so difficult to Wyoming business people, it just seemed to make sense for us to reach out and support Wyoming-made products. Here are some suggestions from some friends around the state: Bob Grammens of Sheridan Media suggested: Jake’s Lures. Known worldwide but made in Sheridan. Website: https://www.jakeslures.com/ and Kim Love recommends Tom Balding Bits and Spurs. Known worldwide and all made in Sheridan. Website: https://tombalding.com/ Jim Hicks of Buffalo wrote...
It looks like a whole lot of people in Wyoming are fired up about the recent spike in COVID-19 cases and deaths here in the Cowboy State. Gov. Mark Gordon was about as emotional and angry as we have seen him during his press conference Nov. 13. He referred to a portion of our state’s population as “knuckleheads” for not practicing social distancing and wearing masks. Meanwhile in Casper, infectious disease specialist Dr. Mark Dowell and various elected officials were hooted off the stage recently by angry citizens when the officials tried...
Wyoming’s gigantic back yard—its national forests and wilderness areas—took a mighty beating this summer as Americans tried to escape from urban areas and get away from the scourge of the COVID-19 virus. From one end of Wyoming to the other, campgrounds, isolated trails, and hidden lake areas were discovered by a new kind of visitor. These were folks desperate to find pristine mountain places away from the dreaded virus that has claimed over 200,000 people in the USA since March. They wanted open air where they could breathe without masks...
National history concerning women was made in Wyoming last Tuesday – and it occurred on the 100th anniversary of national suffrage for women. You just cannot make this up. The four major party candidates for U. S. Senator and U. S. Representative will all be women in the general election on Nov. 3. This is simply amazing. The election also marked a historic statewide election when a number of prominent Republicans were knocked off by their more conservative counterparts. But first, back to the women: One of the women brings another amazing s...
Wyoming, in several ways, has been forever changed. The new systems and techniques put into place during the last 100 days will continue on into the future, I predict. The biggest things will be state wide meetings being held with Zoom, distance education and telehealth medicine. Wyoming people drive more miles per year than people in any other state, on a per-capita basis. We have good roads. We are small in population but almost desperate to get together for meetings it seems. For 50 years, my typical Wyoming day might mean driving three...
Wow, what on earth would you say to a graduate this year about his or her future? Here in the age of COVID-19, there is more uncertainty now than any time during my lifetime. With 33,000,000 Americans out of work, these are bigger joblessness numbers than the Great Depression 90 years ago. I have often given commencement addresses and always write a special “message to grads” column this time of year. For over 50 years, I have been writing columns called messages for graduates. Almost every one of the other columns was concerned about jobs and...
With energy and ag experiencing tough times, this was the year that tourism was going to help the Wyoming economy soar. And then came the COVID-19 pandemic. For the first time in our lifetimes, the whole world shut down. Wyoming is a destination reached mainly by auto and camper. With national gasoline prices hitting historic lows, it could have been assumed that we would get far more than our usual 9 million visitors per year and maybe even set new tourism records. Tourism is a powerful force. People today feel their vacation trips are an...
As a journalist, covering the pandemic has been possibly the biggest story of my life. That is the main thing I will remember about this crazy period. I reached out to some other interesting folks and asked them what they will remember: World traveler and bestselling author Mark Jenkins of Laramie says: “The world is suffering horribly, so much so that I feel guilty living in Wyoming. Due to our wide-open spaces and small population, we can still get outside without seeing a soul. I have cross country skied or rock climbed or mountain biked o...
Face it, we are living in unusual times. Probably the craziest times of our lives. The COVID-19 coronavirus has turned our personal lives, our towns, our state, our country and our world upside down. Folks that we all took for granted just three weeks ago are now recognized as heroes. I am talking about grocery store workers, janitors, truck drivers, local food delivery servicers, utility workers and many, many others. Notice that I did not mention doctors, nurses, EMTs, hospital workers and other medical personnel. Obviously, they are already...
The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated – famous quote by Mark Twain concerning American press reports of his demise while on a speaking tour in Europe in 1897. And like Mark Twain, reports of the death of media are also wildly exaggerated. Media, especially here in Wyoming, consists of a hardy lot of men and women who, although taking some blows, are still reporting the news and are nowhere near expiring. They have been pricked, pickled and pummeled, but the newspaper people, broadcast people, digital media people, and others are...
During the course of my business career, our companies have published and distributed over four million magazines promoting tourism in the Cowboy State. My first magazine was started in 1970 called Big Mountain Country that sang the praises for my Fremont County, home of the biggest mountains in the state. Flash ahead 50 years, and I am attending the annual Wyoming Governor’s Tourism Conference in Cheyenne. Hundreds of members of the 31,000-plus people who work in the hospitality industry were there. Over the years the tourism industry has f...