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[{"type":"text","text":"Now we take this break from Wyoming to check in with Wisconsin....."}]

Bonus vid 1 9 23 24

Cowboy State Daily is Wyoming’s largest newspaper with Wyoming’s most experienced journalists. 

<title>Bonus Video 1: Monday, September 23, 2024 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Now we take this break from Wyoming to check in with Wisconsin.....

Bonus Video 1: Monday, September 23, 2024

 Now we take this break from Wyoming to check in with Wisconsin.....

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Government & Politics

Politics

In the first significant poll of Wyoming’s primary election season, Secretary of State Chuck Gray leads a crowded GOP U.S. House race with 21% support.

Casper businessman Reid Rasner is second at 14%, Teton County philanthropist Steve Friess at 10%, former Superintendent of Public Instruction Jillian Balow at 8%, and state Senate President Bo Biteman at 7%, according to a poll memo Gray sent to Cowboy State Daily.

The poll also shows 33% of those surveyed are “hard undecided.”

Fabrizio, Lee & Associates, a survey and research firm that ran polls for President Donald Trump’s campaigns,

 compiled the poll of 400 Wyoming Republican voters from May 13-16.

Casper-based veteran Kevin Christensen followed at 5%, with Moran rancher Frank Chapman at 1% and David Giralt at less than 1%.

The poll lists former state Rep. John Romero-Martinez at less than 1%, but Romero-Martinez did not register to run for the seat by Friday’s 5 p.m. deadline. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"But What ‘Information’?"}]

The pollster’s methodology says the survey 

 gave voters “information” about Gray, Rasner and Friess. 

Gray told Cowboy State Daily on Monday that the “information” included “different points on our records” but upon inquiry, he did not list those points by publication time.  

 jumped to 48% over “hard undecided” at 22%, with Rasner and Friess falling to 3% and 6% respectively.

Balow, whose record was apparently not included in the “information” discussion with each voter, rose to second place in the post-information survey at 8%.

“Chuck Gray is currently best positioned to win this race,” the pollster’s memo asserts.

Half the survey recipients were male, half were female, and 90% were white, says the poll memo.

“This race is about focusing on the truth — my track record of advancing the America First, conservative priorities of the people of Wyoming and my record of getting those priorities to the finish line,” wrote Gray in a statement. 

“I do not back down, even in the face of false attacks from insiders and the radical Left. That is what the people of Wyoming want, and that is why we are in a strong  lead,” he added.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Kinda Early"}]

Rob Wallace, a longtime Wyoming politico, cast skepticism on a poll conducted so early in the race.

The filing period for candidates ended Friday, and the primary election is Aug. 18.

Wallace served as assistant secretary to the U.S. 

nterior during the first Trump administration and years prior worked multiple political campaigns as an advisor for the late U.S. Sen. Malcolm Wallop. 

He also ran for Congress in 1994 and finished second in a crowded primary to Rep. Barbara Cubin.

“Polling this early in the campaign is like endorsements,” he said. “It’s good to have favorable information, but the real part of the race isn’t going to get going until probably after the Fourth of July.”

Wallace also hesitated to attach significance to the poll since the “information" the Fabrizio team gave voters is unknown.

“Without really understanding all the pieces of the poll, it’s hard to give a complete assessment of what it means,” he said.

Now that the filing period has ended, the other nine candidates in 

 are going to burst into public view as much as they can, Wallace said.

Between the poll and the filing deadline, two more candidates registered: Keith Goodenough and Richard Dodson.

[{"type":"text","text":"That puts the primary race at 10 contenders."}]

Whoever wins that race will have to face the Democratic candidate, plus the Libertarian nominee Shawn Johnson, who gained momentum when his party selected him unanimously at its Sunday convention.

“There are a couple reasons for putting a favorable poll out” at this phase, said Wallace. One reason could be to dissuade others from running; and another could be to reassure one’s base and supporters.

“It’s like a good-news story for the people you want to attract,” he added.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Hey, Trump"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"The big unknown, said Wallace, is what Trump will do."}]

The president has endorsed Megan Degenfelder for governor over her GOP opponents.

[{"type":"text","text":"He has not endorsed anyone in the crowded U.S. House primary race."}]

Friess, Rasner, Gray, Balow, and Biteman all have dispatched messaging indicating alignment with Trump.

Rasner and Gray tout themselves as MAGA-style candidates. Biteman has for years had a collaborative relationship with the president. And Friess reportedly helped Trump formulate executive orders ahead of his 2017 inauguration.

Christensen is a strong outlier there: he condemned the president’s April social media post of an AI-generated image depicting Trump as a Jesus-like figure, healing an ailing man while others circle him in gestures of prayer.

A Trump endorsement, said Wallace, “could be a game-changer if he decides to do it. And maybe he won’t — maybe he won’t endorse anybody.”

Chuck Gray 6 1 26

<title>Chuck Gray Leads U.S. House Poll With 21%, Followed By Rasner And Friess | Cowboy State Daily</title>

In the first significant poll of Wyoming’s primary election season, Secretary of State Chuck Gray leads a crowded GOP U.S. House race with 21% support. Casper businessman Reid Rasner is second at 14%, and Teton County's Steve Friess is third at 10%.

Chuck Gray Leads U.S. House Poll With 21%, Followed By Rasner And Friess

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily reporter, Jackie Dorothy.

Jackie Dorothy

Wyoming Life

Around Wyoming

In the early 1960s, the stress of being an advertising executive in New York was taking a toll on Paul Newman’s health. 

Calling himself Paul Newman “The Original” — he’s not the Oscar-winning actor — he was on a fishing holiday in Wyoming when he told his wife Georgina (Gina) that instead of dying on the streets of New York, he was going to buy the old Carpenter Hotel in Atlantic City as their new home.

Gina wasn’t ready to give up her career and friends in the East, according to her former employee Lynn Kinter. 

Twenty years younger than Paul, Gina loved her job as executive editor of Living for Young Homemakers, a popular ladies magazine based in New York City. 

“As she described it, Gina sat in a bar in Lander for three days drinking double vodkas and asking herself, 'New York or Paul? New York or Paul?'" Kinter wrote years later for the Atlantic City Historical Society in its book  

“Atlantic City Wyoming, Voices from a Powerful Place.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Ultimately, Gina chose her husband."}]

Then for more than 30 years, their restaurant Miner’s Delight put Atlantic City on the national map with its gourmet meals, colorful proprietors and guests who came from miles around just for dinner.

It was upscale French cuisine in the middle of nowhere in Wyoming with deep Old West roots.

“One patron said it was the only place where she was willing to wear heels through cow manure to get in,” Marjane Ambler, president of the Atlantic City Historical Society, told Cowboy State Daily. 

The Carpenter Hotel Becomes Miner’s Delight

Paul and Gina had taken a fishing vacation to Wyoming in the spring of 1958, and that was when they met brother and sister Jim and Ellen Carpenter of Atlantic City. 

Paul would go fishing on the Sweetwater River with Jim while a friendship developed between Gina and Ellen. 

During the next several years the Newmans made regular trips to Atlantic City and were grieved when Ellen died in 1961.

When Ellen’s family put the 16-room Carpenter Hotel up for sale, Paul became determined it would be theirs. In 1963, the couple bought the hotel, intending to make it their private residence.

Ambler said that by 1965, they had renovated the hotel and made the pantry into a bar. Ellen had an aversion to alcohol so in deference to her, the Newmans named their new business Miner’s Delight, another name for the nearby ghost town of Hamilton City. 

According to Bob Tipton in the Atlantic Historical Society's book, he met the Newmans as a teenage employee and was impressed by their culinary skills. 

Gina wanted to expand her cooking talents and had talked Paul into taking a six-week cooking course that led to an additional four-week course in France. 

Paul attended Paris’ most famous cooking school, Le Cordon Bleu, where he took a six-week sauce course. 

To further their skills, in 1966 the couple left Atlantic City to work at the Silver King Restaurant in Park City, Utah. They learned to cook steak and lobster and opened the Miner’s Delight for dinner on June 10, 1967. 

Paul and Gina served just two guests on their grand opening night. 

“Their menu was not the normal fare for your typical Wyoming eating establishment as they served meals like crepes stuffed with crabmeat, French onion soup, coq au vin, and a parfait for dessert and coffee,” Tipton wrote.

The serving season for Miner’s Delight started the first weekend in May and was finished by early fall. 

The Newmans served dinner four or five days a week, Wednesday or Thursday through Sunday, depending on their reservations and their own schedules. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Elegance In Atlantic City"}]

Paul and Gina hosted 20 to 40 guests each night they were open and regulars knew better than to request salt and pepper or, worse yet, ketchup. 

Everything was perfectly seasoned and there was no reason to mess with this perfection, according to Gina.  

In the 1970s, Karyn Aarthun Ervin was a repeat guest for four years who would drive up the winding road with her husband and friends to the remote mining town for a night of luxury. 

She said Paul’s gin and tonics were unmatched and he only carried top-shelf liquor. 

“Gina and Paul really introduced us to elegant dining,” Ervin said. “I tasted pate for the first time — delicious — and have been trying for about 50 years to duplicate their Cuban Black Bean Soup.”

Magnus “Max” Helmers of Sweden told Cowboy State Daily that eating at the Miner’s Delight was an experience of a lifetime.

“Sitting in that room in a restaurant in a ghost town in Wyoming and being served these great meals was just unreal,” Helmers said. “Gina had class and she know how to carry herself. You were only allowed to photograph her from one side, just like Clark Gable.”

Cowboy State Daily’s columnist Bill Sniffin was a young journalist when he would take his wife, Nancy, to Miner’s Delight for special occasions. 

He said that a meal would cost an average of $50 or more for a couple, unheard of when a large steak could be purchased for $16. 

“It was pricey, but it was worth it,” Sniffin said. “You'd make that 30-mile drive up the mountain up South Pass and it was a real tradition for everybody all over Wyoming and all over the region.”

Bob Tipton wrote that Gina was often quoted saying, “If it were left up to Wyoming men, they would only eat steak.” 

The Newmans claimed their women customers drove their success as their menus were designed to please women. Once the men got a taste they became hooked.

There were a few exceptions. Atlantic City resident Craig Newman, no relation to the Newmans, recalled taking a date to the Miner’s Delight as a young man. He had made reservations and saved for their special night out. 

Craig was shocked when instead of steak, he was served chicken and cold potato soup. 

“She gave it a fancy name and said it was supposed to be cold,” Craig said. “She was quite fussy.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"The Go-To Place"}]

Bob Tipton's brother, Harry Tipton Jr., wrote in the Atlantic City book that he was given a front-row seat to the clientele the Newmans served after being hired for a job in 1975. 

Before the summer ended, Harry had served drinks to Gov. Ed Herschler, U.S. Sen. Cliff Hansen, Congressman Teno Roncalio, State Sen. Robert Peck, State Rep. Harry Tipton (his father) and soon-to-be U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson. 

“They all liked to have big fun,” Harry wrote. “I learned much while bartending at the Miner’s Delight, much of which I am sure my mother would have preferred I did not.”

Harry said that he was shocked when Paul told him that they had repeat customers who would fly down from as far away as Alaska just to eat at the Miner’s Delight. 

Most of these customers would then fly home after dinner. 

Part of the allure was that Paul was well-known in his social circles and knew how to entertain.

“Paul was always dressed up and would make a big show of making drinks,” Sniffin said.  “Paul and Gina were both very elegant and made you feel like a million bucks.”

Everyone was given the red-carpet treatment at Miner’s Delight regardless of their social status. 

Sally Webster, a nurse, and Dave Slovisky who was working for NOLS were married on October 9, 1976. They reserved the Miner’s Delight for their dinner and were treated to a night to remember.

“I didn't know the Newmans’ but Paul was quite effusive,” Webster said. “He greeted us like we were old family members, and he was dressed up with an ascot.” 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Goodbyes"}]

When Paul died in 1986, Gina upheld a pact they had made to be cremated and not embalmed. 

Since the local funeral home would not transport a body to the crematorium in Cheyenne without embalming it, Gina put Paul in the trunk of their car and drove to Cheyenne, sobbing and cursing during the 285-mile drive. 

She was stopped for speeding on the way home but only given a warning when she told the officer her husband was in the urn beside her. 

Paul’s obituary later appeared in The New York Times with a long list of his accomplishments. 

Gina ran Miner’s Delight for a number of years after Paul’s death with the help of her employees. 

Krista Guthridge wrote that Gina would always encourage her not to just talk about what she was going to do, but to do it.

In 1997, Gina fell, broke her hip and covered herself in the barroom’s plush rugs until friends found her three days later, her pooch snuggled at her side. 

After this, Gina moved to the Showboat Assisted Living facility in Lander and died the following year at the age of 78. 

The Miner’s Delight has since been closed, but the legacy of Paul and Gina Newman live on in Atlantic City and in the hearts of all who experienced their gourmet food in remote Wyoming. 

Miners Delight 8 Miners Delight 5 30 26

<title>For Upscale French Cuisine, ‘Miner’s Delight’ in Atlantic City, Wyoming, Was Tops | Cowboy State Daily</title>

For 30 years, the Miner's Delight restaurant in remote Atlantic City, Wyoming, was the place to go in the Cowboy State. Started by an advertising executive from New York, the upscale French cuisine attracted diners from hundreds of miles away.

For Upscale French Cuisine, ‘Miner’s Delight’ in Atlantic City, Wyoming, Was Tops

Employee kate meadows cropped

Kate Meadows

BLACK HAWK, S.D. — Six years after a massive sinkhole opened in a residential neighborhood in the South Dakota Black Hills about 55 miles from the Wyoming border, homeowners are still living in financial limbo.

The 85-foot-deep sinkhole — and roughly 100 feet wide and 650 feet long — revealed a sprawling abandoned underground gypsum mine beneath the Hideaway Hills subdivision near Black Hawk, South Dakota.

In the years since, dozens of homes have sat abandoned and deteriorating while property owners wait for answers, compensation and accountability.

Their homes are essentially worthless. Many families are still making mortgage payments on houses they can’t safely live in while a lawsuit over who bears responsibility inches through the court system.

A pending South Dakota Supreme Court decision could determine whether affected residents have any path forward financially.

“We do not yet have an opinion from the Supreme Court,” said Kathy Barrow, an attorney with national law firm Fox Rothschild, who represents the homeowners in the case.

“There is no timeline, unfortunately,” she added. “It could be six months, next year sometime.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"What Lies Beneath Hideaway Hills"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"The disaster traces back decades."}]

For more than 50 years, gypsum mining operations carved a network of underground tunnels beneath the area. ‘

In the mid-1980s, the state of South Dakota bought land there for gypsum mining activities connected to a nearby cement plant.

The state later reclaimed roughly 16 acres of mined land and reseeded it for rangeland use before selling the property to a developer in 1994. The land was eventually sold again to other developers, who built the Hideaway Hills subdivision in the early 2000s.

[{"type":"text","text":"Residents began moving into the neighborhood around 2005."}]

Just a few years later, homeowners started noticing cracks in foundations and shifting ground.

[{"type":"text","text":"Then in April 2020, the earth gave way."}]

The sinkhole opened near where resident Albert Reitz had been mowing his lawn.

Authorities initially evacuated residents from 13 homes because of concerns about ground instability.

Subsequent testing revealed the problem was far more extensive than initially believed.

Studies later determined all 153 homes in the subdivision were uninhabitable because of underground instability tied to the abandoned mine workings.

A study led by geological engineering professor Mohammad Sadeghi of Montana Technological University found additional underground tunnels beneath the subdivision and warned of continuing geologic risk. 

Researchers also raised concerns that mine workings could extend beneath Interstate 90.

[{"type":"text","text":"Meanwhile, property values collapsed."}]

“The ground is continuing to deteriorate,” Barrow told Cowboy State Daily.

She said the instability reaches far deeper than anything tied to subdivision construction.

“What the developers did was not the cause,” Barrow said. “The ground instability goes deeper than any ground the developers would have touched.”

In 2024, Hideaway Hills homeowners filed a class-action lawsuit against the state of South Dakota seeking more than $60 million in damages.

The lawsuit argues the state bears responsibility because of its mining activities and because homeowners were never informed about the risks lurking underground.

Barrow argued the land was originally intended for pasture use — not residential development — and said residents had no warning about the underground dangers.

[{"type":"text","text":"The state disputes those claims."}]

South Dakota argues it is not liable because it did not conduct underground mining operations at the site and says the mine collapse would have happened regardless of the state’s activities.

South Dakota Circuit Court Judge Eric Stawn ruled in favor of the state in September 2024, finding the state immune from tort liability claims.

Barrow argues the case was never framed as a tort claim in the first place.

A year after the circuit court ruling, victims asked the South Dakota Supreme Court to hold the state accountable. That decision is pending.

[{"type":"text","text":"Meanwhile, the subdivision remains largely frozen in time."}]

A chain link fences surrounds the sink hole. The concrete is cracked and pale with weeds growing up in the cracks. Uncut grass is brown and long.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Why Wyoming Is Different"}]

The Hideaway Hills disaster highlights a major difference between South Dakota and Wyoming when it comes to abandoned mine reclamation.

Wyoming participates in the federal Abandoned Mine Land program, an initiative designed to protect public health, safety and the environment by identifying, reclaiming and restoring lands and waters degraded by historic mining practices.

The program is funded by fees collected from every kind of coal that is produced, according to Keith Guille, outreach manager for the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality. 

Wyoming, a coal-producing state, maintains a state-administered Abandoned Mine Land program through its Department of Environmental Quality.  

Because South Dakota is not a coal-producing state, it does not administer such a program, according to the South Dakota Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources.

Guille said Wyoming’s abandoned mine reclamation work is funded through fees collected from current coal production.

“Obviously it’s about public health and safety,” Guille said. “That’s why we do abandoned mines.”

Wyoming’s AML division routinely performs underground reclamation work by grouting abandoned mine tunnels with concrete slurry to stabilize the ground above them.

Some of those abandoned mines lie hundreds of feet beneath existing communities, Guille said.

Rock Springs is one example where underground mine reclamation has continued for years. Similar abandoned mine concerns also exist beneath parts of Gillette and the Hanna area, Guille said.

Because abandoned mines predate 1977, before modern mining regulations existed, maps are often incomplete or inaccurate, making underground reclamation especially difficult.

“It’s a moving target when you talk about underground abandoned mines,” Guille said. “It’s a long work in progress.”

Wyoming residents also have access to the Wyoming Mine Subsidence Insurance Program, which allows homeowners to purchase insurance coverage against ground collapse caused by abandoned underground mines.

South Dakota has no comparable state-administered abandoned mine land program because the federal AML system is funded through coal production fees, and South Dakota is not a coal-producing state.

For Hideaway Hills residents, that distinction has become painfully clear.

Six years after the sinkhole opened, many are still waiting to learn whether anyone will ultimately be held responsible for the ground beneath their homes giving way.

Sinkhole 4 5 31 26

<title>Six Years Later, Black Hills Sinkhole Victims Still Waiting For Relief | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Six years after a massive 85-foot-deep sinkhole opened in a residential neighborhood in the Black Hills, homeowners live in financial limbo. Dozens of homes have sat abandoned and deteriorating while property owners wait for answers, compensation and accountability.

Six Years Later, Black Hills Sinkhole Victims Still Waiting For Relief

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's business and tourism reporter, Renée Jean

Renée Jean

Entertainment

EVANSTON — David Biebinger didn’t know what to think when a friend texted him out of the blue asking if his home was the “Clown House” in Evanston.

“I’m like, ‘Clown House? What does that mean, 'Clown House' in Evanston?” Biebinger told Cowboy State Daily. “I had no idea what that was about.”

More texts followed from other people, all asking the same strange question. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Curious, Biebinger finally Googled it. "}]

“That’s when I saw it,” he said. “It came up in a 'Rehab Addict' (search). And then all the comments — there were hundreds of comments.”

The commenters were reacting to images of his home in the background of the subject house in Season 10, Episode 1, particularly a couple of creepy-looking light-up clown faces on his roof during filming. 

he realized the clowns kept photobombing scene after scene, even as cameras stayed trained on the renovation of an 1890 historic home across the street. 

Fans of the show had definitely noticed, and were asking all kinds of questions about Biebinger’s home, dubbing it the “Clown House.” 

That’s because the largest, most noticeable Halloween decoration was a giant clown head on the roof, flapping its jaw in time to the display's Halloween music.

Fans had freeze-framed shots of the clown head reflecting in the rehab home’s windows, zooming in on the glass to see it better. 

Some even tried to hunt his place down online to see it more directly. Others wanted to know why the show had never mentioned the bizarre, glowing “Clown House” during the episode.

The irony of that question, in particular, isn't lost on Biebinger. 

When the crew had been in town filming, he’d offered to let the show film a quick, two-minute display of his lights. They’d turned him down.

“There were more comments about my ‘Clown House' than there was about her rehab,” he said, chuckling a little bit.

When an episode of HGTV’s “Rehab Addict” was being filmed in Evanston, Wyoming, the creepy “Clown House” across the street inadvertently photobombed the shoot and was all its viewers were talking about. Now fans won't leave the house alone.

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