His performance made the highlight reel for the parade, and his grandfather could not be more proud of “Baby E,” as Brown is known as on the powwow circuit.
He danced hard on the on the asphalt for 2-and-a-half miles,” Abeyta said. “He just stopped and danced his little heart out up to 30 times along the route.”
The pair had been invited this year by Native Pride Productions to perform in New York City over the Thanksgiving holiday.
The pardon of Michelino Sunseri comes after Wyoming Republican U.S. House Rep. Harriet Hageman said she was investigating the case as a possible instance of overzealous prosecution.
"We are thrilled that Michelino's nightmare is over, but we're not done fighting against unconstitutional regulations that give low-level park officials the power to criminalize harmless conduct," said Michael Poon, an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation, which defended Sunseri. "We are ready to help other Americans who face criminal prosecution for breaking park rules that were illegally created."
As the country edged closer Tuesday to a federal government shutdown, Walt Schweitzer worried about the two-party checks issued to young grain farmers, which can’t be cashed without the signature of the U.S. Farm Service Agency.
Farmers who use crop proceeds to collateralize FSA direct operating loans must split those checks for grain sold to the local elevator. Those checks will go uncashed as long as FSA signatories are furloughed, said Schweitzer, president of Montana Farmers Union. There were 1,142 Montana farmers with FSA direct operating loans last year. The money they’ve borrowed to pay for seed, fertilizer and other farm basics totaled $118.6 million.
“It’s frozen funds,” Schweitzer said. “These are people that are living on a shoestring, the young farmers.”
Wednesday marks the beginning of a new federal fiscal year, but without a federal budget passed by Congress and no agreement on a short-term funding bill, it appeared agencies would begin the new budget year without money to function.
To excel as a ballerina, Skylar Lippincott, 17, of Thermopolis, Wyoming said you must learn to ignore the pain and push yourself beyond your limits.
“It's a big misconception that ballet is easy,” Lippincott said. “It looks easy but it's so complex because you have to be paying attention to what your body is doing and counting your music at the same time.”
In the Cowboy State when most female athletes are in rodeo or pursuing volleyball and track, Lippincott said that being a ballerina requires nerves of steel and should not be discounted since it is a tough sport.
“A lot of people don't know how difficult it is on your body,” Lippincott said. “It's definitely a full-time commitment that you have to dedicate your entire life to.”
According to Annie Carlson a research coordinator at Yellowstone, the hotel was a ‘cut above the rest.’ which was located just north of Fountain Paint Pot in the Lower Geyser Basin. The three-story structure cost $100,000 to build and could accommodate 350 guests. It boasted 143 rooms, steam heat and baths that used the hot springs water.
“The hotel was fancy given its rustic surroundings, and guests would wear their finest clothes to regular evening balls,” Carlson said.
By David Madison, 09/27/25
Before Wyoming World War II hero Sgt. Thomas L. Cotner left to serve in the Pacific, his mother hosted a dinner party at Club La Vida in Evansville, a restaurant and night club known for its roulette wheel.
The event was noteworthy enough to earn coverage in the local newspaper, which reported the dinner was to honor Tom, who had just finished training at an air base in Illinois.
Tom’s brother and fraternal twin, Ted Cotner, was also in the Army Air Corps and would be stationed at Hickam Field in Hawaii, where on Dec. 7, 1941, he saw his first action.
Ted Cotner’s commander praised the young airman for his heroic response to the Pearl Harbor attack.
With a key component of the 2020 Great American Outdoors Act set to expire at the end of this month, the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources is set to meet Friday in Grand Teton National Park to consider whether to continue funding infrastructure in national parks.
The committee includes Wyoming Republican Rep. Harriet Hageman. It’s scheduled to hold an oversight hearing at 10 a.m. at the Jenny Lake Visitor Center in Grand Teton National Park. Several people are scheduled to speak before the committee, including Grand Teton Superintendent Chip Jenkins and Julie Calder, chair of the Jackson Hole Travel and Tourism Board.
The main topic will likely be the Legacy Restoration Fund section of the Great American Outdoors Act, which was signed into law by President Trump in 2020. The Legacy Restoration Fund (LRF) authorized $1.9 billion per year for five years. That included $1.3 billion for the National Park Service, and the rest for other federal land-management agencies.
Most state and federal agencies in charge of public lands have a standing policy to go after every blaze with everything they’ve got, as soon as possible.
“The State of Wyoming, we do not have a let burn policy, we have a put-out policy, immediately,” Wyoming State Forester Kelly Norris said during a recent interview with Cowboy State Daily Show with Jake Nichols.
“The Bureau of Land Management has that same policy, obviously private lands have that same policy,” she added.
In remote areas of vast National Forest land in Wyoming, the U.S. Forest Service has a more leeway to allow natural fires to burn.
However, that can have dire consequences if a fire escapes a wilderness area, as did the massive Pack Trail Fire in northwest Wyoming in October 2024, Norris noted.
A slurry bomber airplane, under contract with the Wyoming State Forestry Division, helps fight the Muddy Fire near Casper. (Courtesy Russell Haynes, Wyoming State Forestry Division)
The last of summer isn’t for another three weeks, but it’s taking a shockingly large chunk of its daylight before it goes. Between now and the autumnal equinox on Sept. 22, Wyoming will lose more than an hour of daylight.
“We lose an average of 55 minutes a month after the equinox,” said Max Gilbraith, planetarium coordinator at the University of Wyoming. “In the next 18 days, we will lose about an hour and 10 minutes of daylight.”
The loss of daylight will go hand-in-hand with the first bites of winter. Cooler nights, lower humidity, and the first snowfall of the season are all possible before summer’s officially over.
“The first half of September is the period of the year when we lose daylight the fastest,” Gilbraith said.
