Daily Smile

[{"type":"text","text":"Bear saw the honey and began applauding...."}]

Smile 2 11 25 24

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

<title>Daily Smile: Monday, November 25, 2024 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Bear saw the honey and began applauding....

Daily Smile: Monday, November 25, 2024

 Bear saw the honey and began applauding....

Daily Darwin

[{"type":"text","text":"If the ladder is a rocking’, don’t come a knockin’ "}]

Darwin 7 4 26 no play

<title>Daily Darwin: Saturday, July 4, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

If the ladder is a rocking’, don’t come a knockin’

Daily Darwin: Saturday, July 4, 2026

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's Feature Reporter, Andrew Rossi.

Andrew Rossi

Wyoming Life

The Cody Stampede Parade made a big impression from the start Friday with Miss Rodeo America, Olivia Favero of Taylor, Utah, riding “Clyde McBuffalo,” 

 from the Mortenson Ranch in New Mexico.

What better way than a buffalo to kick off a parade celebrating 250 years of America in Buffalo Bill’s town?

Clint Mortenson, Clyde’s owner, was happy with how well his bison did strolling down Sheridan Avenue with an experienced rider on his back.

[{"type":"text","text":"“He did good,” he said. “So did Miss Rodeo America.”"}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Big Names And Bands"}]

The Cody Stampede Parades, on July 3 and 4, attract some of Wyoming’s biggest names, bands and patriotic exuberance.

“Cody knows how to celebrate Independence Day,” said Mack Frost, a member of the Cody Stampede Parade Committee. “We wowed the hell out of the folks from Pasadena, California, who do the Rose Bowl parade. They couldn't believe that we were doing what we did.”

One sign of a parade’s prominence is its grand marshal. “The Duke” himself, John Wayne, was given the honor during America’s bicentennial celebration in 1976.

For the semiquincentennial, the Cody Stampede Parade Committee looked closer to home. Instead of one grand marshal, they had five.

A surprise last-minute addition to the grand marshal group was actor Dougie Hall. He’s had prominent roles in the series “Landman” and “1923," one of the many “Yellowstone” spinoffs and starring Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren.

After the U.S. Marine Corps Mounted Color Guard, the last one remaining in the Marine Corps, and the Cody Stampede Rodeo’s Renegade Riders and rodeo clowns, the grand marshals appeared.

While Hall was on horseback, the others rode in a wagon built for the 1990 Wyoming Centennial Wagon Train.

“It made the 260-mile trip ending in Cody on July 4, 1990, and it's back in 2026,” Frost said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Rifle And Royalty"}]

One of the most anticipated entries in the parade was 

Originally built for the 1976 bicentennial parade, it was removed from the roof on which it had perched for the last half-century, restored and returned for the nation’s semiquincentennial.

“We put it back to what it was in 1976, as best we could,” said Mike Darby, owner of the Irma Hotel and the giant Winchester. “We’re putting it right back where it was on July 5 and, hopefully, it’ll be there for the next 50 years.”

The giant Winchester was escorted down Sheridan Avenue by the Cody Gunslingers, who have been performing in front of the Irma’s porch for decades.

Since the Cody Stampede is the place to be for rodeo riders, a lot of royalty appeared in the parades. The “Miss Rodeos” of Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska were all there, along with the Rodeo Queens of Cody, Cowley, Sheridan, Meeteetse and Fremont County.

Miss Rodeo Wyoming, Kate Budge, was going to accompany Miss Rodeo America until Favero decided to lead the parade via celebrity bison.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"More Georges And Johns Than Bills"}]

For some, it’s an annual tradition to see how many Buffalo Bills appear in the Cody Stampede Parade. In 2026, the consummate showman was upstaged in his own town.

While Buffalo Bill was certainly present, he was outnumbered by multiple appearances of Betsy Ross, Paul Revere, and no less than six George Washingtons.

Abraham Lincoln appeared multiple times as well. He was even driving one of the two dozen vintage John Deere tractors, meticulously restored and making their memorably noisy appearance for another year.

Jim and Jess Brittain’s “Johnny Poppers” are always a crowd favorite. The lineup of tractors extended uninterrupted for three blocks.

No parade is complete without vintage vehicles, and the Cody Stampede Parade had more than a few.

The Big Hat Ranch has one of the 16 surviving 1925 White Model 15-45 passenger touring buses from the Yellowstone Transportation Company. It carried hundreds of tourists into Yellowstone from 1920 to 1925.

The biggest cheers were for the Team USA and Team Canada Can-Am All-Stars. The 6-Man football teams, with players from Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, Texas and Nebraska, are competing in the 28th annual Can-Am Bowl in Meeteetse on July 4.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Glorious Returns"}]

There have been many hallmarks of the Cody Stampede Parade that have come and gone over the years. For the 2026 parade, many people were delighted to see some familiar sights.

Hope Sheets, “The Pink Lady,” had been a flamboyant fixture of Cody’s parade for 40 years until she passed away May 18, 2025, at age 88. Her poignant absence was felt by many in the 2025 parade.

In 2026, Lisa Kealey honored her mother’s legacy by getting pretty in pink.

Dennis Haugen made his own mark as the stilt-walking “Long Tall Uncle Sam.” He started during the 1976 bicentennial and walked tall through Cody until he retired in 2016.

For the semiquincentennial, Haugen returned, stilts and all, to honor the nation’s 250th birthday. He stood even taller than before, riding rather than walking.

Nobody seemed more eager to be back in the Cody Stampede Parade than the Cody Volunteer Fire Department. Absent in protest in 2025, the entire fire engine fleet was the parade’s grand finale, with plenty of water for everyone.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Another 250 Years"}]

One of the biggest additions to the 2026 Cody Stampede Parade was also one of the most subtle.

A livestreaming webcam was installed on the balcony of the Irma Hotel, overlooking the intersection of Sheridan Avenue and 12th Street, offering one of the best views in town as the parade rolled through.

That was a first for one of the biggest parades in Wyoming, and a step into the 21st Century in a town seeped in the history and mythology of the American West.

For Frost, Independence Day in Cody is too fun, popular and strategically placed to pass up.

“If you plan your vacation properly, you can have one heck of a good time in Cody and northwest Wyoming in general,” he said. “If you're in Cody, it's just a short hop up the highway to Yellowstone National Park. We're just a magnet for the tourists. It's a great way to spend the Fourth of July. There's no doubt about it.”

Cody Stampede Parade 5

<title>America At 250: Thousands Pack Downtown Cody For Stampede Parade | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Thousands of people packed along the route of the Cody Stampede Parade on Friday to kick off America’s 250th birthday. There were six George Washingtons, five grand marshals and a restored 40-foot Winchester that made its parade debut 50 years ago.

America At 250: Thousands Pack Downtown Cody For Stampede Parade

Heinz mark

Mark Heinz

Four the fourth year in a row, Cowboy State Daily proudly brings you “The Star-Spangled Banner” played on a chainsaw by yours truly.

There’s a lot to reflect on this year. Though I was just a kid when Americans celebrated our nation’s Bicentennial in 1976, I still remember it clearly.

And now here we are, celebrating 250 years of these United States of America.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"America The Beautiful"}]

As I was standing in the back of my pickup on Thursday doing a take of my rendition of our national anthem as my daughter-in-law Veronica Zazueta took video, a thought crossed my mind.

What would the 1976 kid me have thought if someone could have told him that, “In 50 years, you’re going to be in the back of a pickup, playing the national anthem on a chainsaw while one of your beloved family members takes video of it.”

I’m guessing the thoughts might not have been flattering.

Regardless, this is an amazing time to be alive as our nation passes a huge milestone.

Are things the greatest right now? Maybe not. There seems to be quite a bit of division and angst over the state of the nation at present.

But I’m an eternal optimist. I think Americans are built different. We have a grit in us. We’ve been through a lot before, and we’ll get through this.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"How It Came To Be"}]

The chainsaw nation anthem tradition goes back to before I worked for Cowboy State Daily. The July before I was hired as the outdoors and wildlife reporter, my wife, our youngest daughter and I were living in a townhouse in Laramie.

Neighbors were piled right next to each other, and college kids who were renting units on either side were cutting loose with fireworks.

My wife or daughter said something along the lines of, “They’re being obnoxious.”

I replied with something like, “Oh, I’ll show them obnoxious,” grabbed one of my chainsaws and had my daughter take video as I “played” the national anthem.

Months later after CSD Editor Jimmy Orr hired me, I showed him the video and he said something like, “That’s ridiculous, and awesome. You have to do that for Cowboy State Daily.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"And so a tradition was born."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"What’s With The Oil?"}]

This year, we headed out to some fishing pond near Riverton, where the family now lives, to do several video takes, which Veronica edited into the final version you see here.

We certainly got some strange looks. I can’t imagine what was going through people’s minds when they showed up to toss a line, never expecting to see some yahoo with a chainsaw.

Because it’s a special anniversary for the USA, I upgraded from the Stihl MS 261 I’ve used for previous videos to my flagship saw, the 500i. 

It’s Stihl’s first fully fuel-injected model, which cuts like an absolute beast.

I noticed, as I did last year with the MS 261, copious amounts of bar oil leaking from the saw — which you might also notice in the video.

I did some research, and it was as I thought. If you run a saw at high speed for extended periods without cutting wood, the bar oil that’s constantly lubricating the chain has nowhere to go, and thus starts spilling out of the saw.

I hope you enjoy this year’s Cowboy State Daily chainsaw salute to our great nation.

Mark Heinz plays the Star Spangled Banner on a chainsaw 2026 1

<title>The Tradition Continues: Mark Heinz Plays 'The Star Spangled Banner' On His Chainsaw | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A Cowboy State Daily patriotic Independence Day tradition continues for the fourth straight year with outdoors writer Mark Heinz belting out “The Star Spangled Banner” on a chainsaw.

The Tradition Continues: Mark Heinz Plays 'The Star Spangled Banner' On His Chainsaw

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

Clair McFarland

Government & Politics

A federal judge declined Thursday to make Wyoming and Nebraska irrigation districts open a competitive bid for the sake of a drilling company that missed out on the chance to bid a $100 million job on the Goshen County tunnel project.

But the judge also ruled that Drill Tech Drilling & Shoring Inc. 

, at this phase, in claiming that the Wyoming-based Goshen County Irrigation and Nebraska-based Gering-Fort Laramie Irrigation Districts violated their states’ public-records laws by not giving information the company had requested.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Lock In"}]

Drill Tech Drilling & Shoring Inc. filed a federal lawsuit against both districts in May.

The lawsuit asked U.S. District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl, of Wyoming, to intervene in what Drill Tech called an unlawful bidding process that cut it out of the opportunity to win a job on the massive tunnel repair.

One of the two 119-year-old tunnels suffered a catastrophic failure in 2019. The other is reportedly in dire need of a rebuild.

The districts assigned Atkinson Construction LLC as construction manager at-risk (CMAR) over the project, which means Atkinson can oversee and work with subcontractors, court documents say.

Drill Tech alleged that for the $100 million drill project it had sought to perform, the irrigation districts should have held — and didn’t hold — a competitive bidding process. The districts gave the job instead to their CMAR, Atkinson, court documents say.

[{"type":"text","text":"In his Thursday order, Skavdahl countered. "}]

He said the laws of both Wyoming and Nebraska appear to support the CMAR’s authority to self-perform this kind of work. Drill Tech has not shown substantially that it has a right to enter a competitive bidding process for this project, he added.

Skavdahl wrote that requiring the districts to pause or backtrack their work and hold that bidding process could harm the agricultural community by stalling the long-awaited repairs even longer — and he declined to do that.

The public has an interest in government entities abiding by the open bidding process, wrote Skavdahl.

“On the other hand, the Irrigation Districts are right that ensuring irrigation water to the thousands of acres of farmland served by the tunnels is also in the public interest,” he added. “In light of Drill Tech’s failures (to show it deserves court intervention) as well as the serious risks to the farmers and public from another tunnel collapse following any delay in this construction project, the preliminary injunction requested by Drill Tech is more contrary to the public interest than in support of it.”

Drill Tech had waited several months to sue, though it had reportedly learned it had been cut out of the job last summer, Skavdahl noted.

He declined to let that delay kill the case altogether, but he factored the delay into his decision not to order the open bid.

The judge’s order doesn’t end the case. It just denies Drill Tech’s request to have Skavdahl intervene in this early phase.

Skavdahl gave his early conjectures that Drill Tech isn’t likely to win on the bidding question, only for the purposes of declining to compel the districts to change course immediately.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Might Win That One"}]

Drill Tech had also accused both irrigation districts of violating their states’ open meeting laws and assigning the job in secret.

[{"type":"text","text":"Skavdahl said the company looks unlikely to win that challenge as well."}]

But, the judge wrote, Drill tech appears likely to win two of its claims: that the Wyoming irrigation district and the Nebraska one both violated their states’ public-records laws by not giving Drill Tech information it had requested.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Background"}]

The complaint says the two districts contracted Atkinson to be the construction manager at risk and provide oversight for the Fort Laramie Canal Tunnel 1 and 2 rehabilitation project.

That project is expected to benefit more than 100,000 acres of farmland across eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska.

 that the U.S. Department of Interior has chosen to use $100 million of its $889 million One Big Beautiful Bill appropriation on the tunnel project.

The tunnel collapsed July 17, 2019, cutting off irrigation water to the region and flooding fields. The infrastructure was more than a century old.

Temporary repairs restored most of the system’s capacity in time for the 2021 season, but it still needs long-term solutions. Repairs to Tunnel 2 also are in the works so that it doesn’t suffer the same catastrophic failure.

During the bidding process, Drill Tech’s complaint alleges, the two irrigation districts confirmed Atkinson would have to comply with Wyoming and Nebraska laws, and that it may be able to self-perform the construction work in the project, but would competitively bid that work.

But 18 months after Atkinson became the project manager, the districts “fundamentally changed the (manager’s) agreement to allow Atkinson to self-perform all the construction work for the Project under the guise of a contract amendment,” the complaint alleges.

This transformed the contract into a standard prime contract for the massive project “with no competition for the construction work,” says Drill Tech’s complaint. 

The project manager no longer had to open competition to the public bidding process, it adds.

Drill Tech Drilling and other interested parties were cut out of the process, the complaint says.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Asking For Documents"}]

Drill Tech didn’t ask to become the project manager because it wanted to work on the tunnel rehabilitation work packages instead, the complaint says, adding that Drill Tech has experience with the method that project requires.

On July 25, 2025, Drill Tech sent a letter to the two districts, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and one of the project designers, HDR Inc., to raise concerns that Atkinson was no longer required to bid projects competitively and in public.

Drill Tech noted in that letter that it had been monitoring the project for two years, waiting for the bid advertisement.

Nearly a month later, the Goshen County Irrigation District’s attorney acknowledged the district had received the letter and thanked Drill Tech for its “continued interest in the Project,” court documents say.

That December, Drill Tech submitted public-records requests to both districts under the public-records laws of each state, the complaint says, asking for all post-award modifications and amendments regarding the project manager’s agreement, and for a copy of the procurement plan.

The Nebraska-based district never responded to that request, the complaint says. The Wyoming-based district reportedly responded two months later, Feb. 10, 2026.

Goshen District’s public records yield was “heavily redacted,” says Drill Tech’s complaint. The district claimed those redactions were justified as trade secrets, privileged information, confidential commercial, financial, geographical or geophysical data.

The complaint disputes that. It shows a side-by-side comparison of the same page of the scope of the project manager’s services.

The page that was publicly released in the request for proposal, and the page Drill Tech received in its public records request, are vastly different, with the latter about 75% or more redacted.

“Reactions such as these were pervasive” throughout the agreement, the complaint says.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Transparency"}]

Copies of the changes to that agreement also had “pervasive redactions,” it adds.

Still, says the document, Drill Tech learned that the agreement was amended before Drill Tech’s July 25, 2025, letter requesting information about whether public bids were still required.

The complaint says the district knew the agreement had already been changed to edge out competitive bidding, but didn’t tell Drill Tech that when the company asked.

The complaint also says the district didn’t provide notice of an important public meeting.

By Feb. 20, 2025, the Goshen district board voiced concerns about HDR’s original maximum price estimate of $87 million swelling to more than $120 million, the complaint relates from the meeting minutes.

HDR proposed a confidential guaranteed maximum price proposal and non-disclosure agreements so there would be “no worry about (Atkinson) getting underbid,” the document alleges.

There was, the complaint says, no documented vote for Atkinson to self-perform the task they were discussing without publicly bidding the work packages, but the district did vote to approve changing the design plan.

It’s “entirely” unclear what role the Nebraska-based district played here because it didn’t respond to Drill Tech’s public records requests, the complaint alleges.

The document says that on July 8, 2025, the Goshen district and Atkinson signed an amendment to change the agreement, so that the latter was no longer required to advertise bids or publicly open them.

In the July 17, 2025, meeting minutes, “Atkinson was already apparently working with a vendor for the digger shield, but there was no indication that Atkinson has publicly bid or competitively awarded the subcontract for the digger shield.”

Irrigation Tunnel Gary Stone Nebraska Extension 5 4 26

<title>Judge Says $100M Goshen Tunnel Project Won’t Stop For Company That Couldn't Bid | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A federal judge declined Thursday to pause the $100 million Goshen Tunnel project for a company that missed out on a chance to bid on the work. He also ruled the company has a valid case against two irrigation districts in charge of the tunnel.

Judge Says $100M Goshen Tunnel Project Won’t Stop For Company That Couldn't Bid

Kolby fedore

Kolby Fedore

Crime & Courts

Courts

The Haitian truck driver convicted of killing one Rawlins EMT and severely injuring another in a catastrophic Interstate 80 crash more than three years ago is asking the Wyoming Supreme Court to overturn his convictions, claiming prosecutors failed to prove the one thing jurors had to find beyond a reasonable doubt: that he acted recklessly.

Saviol Saint Jean, who was convicted last September after a weeklong jury trial in Sweetwater County, filed his opening appeal brief Tuesday.

Rather than claiming juror misconduct or errors by the trial judge, Saint Jean's attorneys contend the evidence itself wasn't enough to support guilty verdicts for aggravated homicide by vehicle and aggravated assault and battery. 

The case stems from the predawn hours of Dec. 21, 2022, when Saint Jean's semitrailer slammed into a parked ambulance that had responded to an earlier crash on Interstate 80 near Green River.

 and seriously injured ambulance driver 

Earlier this year, District Court Judge Suzannah Robinson 

Saint Jean to serve 12-14 years in prison, saying Harris' death was "preventable" while acknowledging Saint Jean had shown genuine remorse. 

During sentencing, Saint Jean apologized through an interpreter, telling Harris' family he wished he could "turn back time" and had never intended to hurt anyone.

[{"type":"text","text":"Now he is asking the state's highest court to erase those convictions."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Reasonable Doubt?"}]

The appeal focuses almost entirely on one legal question: whether prosecutors proved Saint Jean acted recklessly.

Under Wyoming law, prosecutors had to convince jurors that Saint Jean consciously disregarded a substantial and unjustifiable risk — not simply that he made a mistake or caused a terrible crash. 

"The state failed to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Mr. Saint Jean acted recklessly," Assistant Appellate Counsel Brittany Thorpe wrote.

Instead, Thorpe argues, the evidence showed Saint Jean "misperceived the risk and defaulted to his training, which told him to slow down and change lanes."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"'Like The Las Vegas Strip'"}]

Jurors heard dramatically different explanations during 

Sweetwater County Attorney Daniel Erramouspe argued the crash scene was impossible to miss.

"It was lit up like the Las Vegas Strip," he told jurors during closing arguments, pointing to emergency lights, flashing hazards and other truck drivers who had safely navigated the area before Saint Jean arrived.

Erramouspe argued Saint Jean tried to "thread the needle" between disabled vehicles instead of slowing enough to safely negotiate the scene, calling that decision reckless.

The prosecution also emphasized that another commercial driver encountered the same wreck moments earlier but successfully avoided it.

Saint Jean's trial attorney, Joseph Hampton, painted a very different picture.

He argued Interstate 80 had become an extraordinarily dangerous maze after an initial collision between another semitruck and a pickup hauling a trailer blocked both lanes of travel with wreckage and debris.

The interstate, Hampton argued repeatedly, should have been closed before Saint Jean ever arrived.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"'Imperfect Decisions'"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Those same arguments now form the backbone of Saint Jean's appeal."}]

According to this week’s appeal, the initial crash blocked the right lane with one semi while trailer debris clogged the left lane. Another commercial truck stopped on the left shoulder after narrowly avoiding the wreckage, leaving little room for approaching traffic.

The appeal adds that no one had deployed emergency triangles, flares or warning cones before Saint Jean reached the scene. Instead, the brief argues, flashing emergency lights were the primary warning to approaching drivers. 

Attorneys also point to trial testimony that investigators could not determine the ambulance's exact location before it was struck.

"There was very little evidence" showing exactly where the ambulance had been parked, the appeal notes, citing Wyoming Highway Patrol testimony. 

[{"type":"text","text":"The defense says Saint Jean wasn't ignoring danger."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Instead, the appeal argues he responded exactly as he had been trained."}]

Testimony highlighted throughout the filing says Saint Jean reduced his speed by at least 20 mph, changed lanes away from emergency lights and began braking after realizing the ambulance was actually occupying the lane he had entered. 

Commercial driving instructors testified during trial that slowing down and moving away from emergency vehicles is nationally accepted CDL training.

The appeal also points to defense experts who testified Saint Jean likely misjudged the ambulance's location because of glare from emergency lights, darkness and the unusually complex geometry of the crash scene.

One defense expert testified that drivers often recognize hazards but still make imperfect decisions when confronted with sudden emergencies.

According to the appeal, Saint Jean wasn't distracted by a cellphone, wasn't listening to the radio, and wasn't fatigued. His attorneys also note he had only been driving commercial trucks for a few months and had traveled that stretch of Interstate 80 only a handful of times. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Comparing Cases"}]

Saint Jean's conduct doesn't resemble other Wyoming aggravated vehicular homicide cases that have survived Supreme Court review. 

Thorpe contrasts Saint Jean's case with previous decisions involving drivers who inhaled intoxicants before driving, knowingly drove while dangerously fatigued or sped recklessly through traffic while ignoring obvious hazards.

Instead, the appeal relies heavily on a 2020 Wyoming Supreme Court decision overturning another aggravated vehicular homicide conviction because prosecutors failed to prove the driver consciously disregarded fatigue before a fatal crash.

The Haitian truck driver who killed one Rawlins EMT and severely injured another in a catastrophic I-80 crash more than three years ago is asking the Wyoming Supreme Court to overturn his convictions. He claims prosecutors never proved he was “reckless."

Daily Smile: Monday, November 25, 2024

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