It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Monday, January 27th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - brought to you by Visit Casper. Visit Casper invites you to come enjoy the Casper International Film Festival, January 31 through February 2. A broad range of films from local and international filmmakers will be shown. Learn more and get your tickets at visitcasper.com.
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With President Donald Trump back in office — and his pick for Interior secretary openly favoring removing grizzly bears from the endangered list — supporters of delisting the apex predator in Wyoming are optimistic it will finally happen.
Outdoors reporter Mark Heinz spoke with Wyoming Representative Harriet Hageman, who told him that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision on January 8th to reject Wyoming and Montana’s petitions to delist grizzlies was a violation of the Endangered Species Act.
“I talked personally to representative, our Congresswoman, Hageman. She said, Yes, I want to continue pushing for this. Senator Barrasso says, Yes, I want to keep pushing for it. So there are people in Wyoming that want to keep pushing for delisting, and at least from what we can tell so far, this incoming administration and the new Secretary of Interior might tip things back in favor. So the grizzly delisting seesaw, has gone from one direction to the other. We'll see if it goes back again, the the never ending saga.”
The Wyoming Game and Fish Department does have plans in place for a grizzly hunting season, should the bears be delisted.
Read the full story HERE.
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Chris McDonald isn’t a guy who loves attention. As a commander for the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation and former undercover narcotics investigator, he’s used to operating behind the scenes.
McDonald oversees what’s arguably one of the most difficult roles in law enforcement: sexual crimes against children. Cowboy State Daily’s Jen Kocher spoke to McDonald about his work.
“He described it as the most righteous mission ever, because every day… despite how hard it is, he said, when there's… a child connected to the crime, it just motivates you to keep doing the hard work… He wants to operate behind the scenes, but … he got outed by DCI director Ronnie Jones, who wanted to publicize the fact that Chris just returned from the FBI National Academy…. only 1% of senior law enforcement has the opportunity to attend, and that's from not just the US, but from, I think, 147 countries throughout the world… Lucky for Wyoming, he comes back with a wealth of knowledge.”
McDonald says he and his team have saved hundreds of young victims from being exploited, including about 20 children last year alone. He said his co-workers are some of the most talented people in law enforcement, who show up every day to do the hard job of investigating these horrific crimes.
Read the full story HERE.
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As a kid, Geno Stecks made jets with firecrackers and balsam wood. As a teen with his dad in Pine Bluffs, he bought a 1934 Hudson Terraplane and turned it into a rat rod.
As an adult, the Cheyenne resident told Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck that he’s graduated to be a full-blown redneck engineer, making potato cannons, a meat smoker, and now his own moonshine with a tiny hobby still.
“He had watched his favorite show on TV, the Moonshiners, and had got inspired by them over the Christmas holiday, got himself a little still, and now he's in the process of trying to make some moonshine. But this man is an inventor. He's made a smoker out of a beer keg in a wood stove. When he was a kid with his dad, he made his own rat rod out of a Hudson, and now he's got his own rat rod out of a Ford Model A so he's a real interesting Wyoming character.”
Stecks said the moonshine still was kind of a Christmas present to himself. He said his son got a beer-making kit for Christmas for his wife, so now the projects for the new year will center around perfecting their crafts.
Read the full story HERE.
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The Oscars of the food world, and one of the highest honors a chef or restaurant can ever earn, is a James Beard award.
After just four months in operation, Le Reve Restaurant and Raw Bar in Sheridan has made the exclusive list of James Beard Award semifinalists for best new restaurant in the nation. Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that that’s what happens when you hire filmmaker George Lucas' chef for your brand new restaurant.
“It's a total experience at Le Reve and it starts the minute you walk in the door, the attention to the decor and the details… And then, of course, the food gets just as much attention from the chef Zoilan Ruiz. He has a celebrity background, you know, he was the private chef for George Lucas at the Skywalker Ranch for a while… and the food is just next level best. I've eaten at really good restaurants in Paris, and this is right up there with them.”
Founded in 1990, James Beard Foundation Awards are given annually to recognize the best of the best chefs, restaurateurs, authors and journalists in the United States. While two other Wyoming restaurants earned spots on this year’s James Beard list for regional honors, La Reve is the only Cowboy State dining experience considered for a nationwide award.
Read the full story HERE.
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Thermopolis residents were shocked and saddened Friday when an active member of the community was killed in a hit-and-run collision.
The woman was Bernie Blacketer, who was on her way to open up the St. Francis Catholic Church, as she did every morning. Blacketer’s tragic death hit close to home for Cowboy State Daily features reporter Jackie Dorothy, who considered Blacketer a close friend. Jackie and Crime and Courts reporter Clair McFarland reached out to Thermopolis residents who felt the blow of the woman’s passing.
“As Jackie and I were trying to get information about the crash, what we were finding was that anyone in a position to know about the crash had wonderful things to say about Blacketer… that she was just a pillar of the community, that she was there for her church, that she was, you know, a mother to several people. And the mayor, who was very emotional during our interview, said that Bernie would be preaching forgiveness in this situation.”
The only information that has been officially released as of this weekend is that the driver did not stop to render aid - however, the driver and vehicle were located by law enforcement within hours of the crash.
Read the full story HERE.
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President Donald Trump has tasked Elon Musk and his new Department of Government Efficiency to ferret out wasteful bureaucratic spending. It seems one of the department’s first targets is the lowly penny.
Not only are they not used much anymore, they also cost more than 3 cents each to make, costing the U.S. Mint to lose $179 million making pennies in 2023 alone. But Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that Wyomingites aren’t so quick to give up their coins.
“The business people are saying that it's not a big deal, because a lot of people use cards for their money now, but the big deal comes when they have to pay taxes, when their sales tax, you know, on a product. So how is that going to work? And will it affect their accounting, especially at the year end… and as far as collectors know, those wheat pennies would not be available anymore.”
Getting rid of the penny would mean changes for banks as well as other businesses because there are still many transactions that involve the coin.
Read the full story HERE.
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Fans of the Netflix blockbuster “American Primeval” have been calling up Fort Bridger in southwest Wyoming looking for the hangman’s spot.
But there is no ‘hangman’s spot’ at the real Fort Bridger, between Evanston and Rock Springs. There never was. And Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that that detail is just one of many that the producers of the hit series got wrong.
“When I talked with Fort Bridger, they're taking all kinds of calls now with people looking for the hanging spot at Fort Bridger, which doesn't exist, and, you know, trying to find other things in the movie that don't exist, because the movie is not all that factual… If you watch it expecting history, you'll be very disappointed, because it gets so many things wrong. It portrays the Mountain meadows massacres as if it occurred 10 minutes from Fort Bridger, it was actually hundreds and hundreds of miles from Fort Bridger. And then Brigham Young is kind of portrayed as a villain here, ordering the attack on those mountain meadows massacre. But the historians I talked to said that's a very debatable point…
The miniseries has become a blockbuster around the globe, with 27 million views and counting, and a solid hold on the No. 1 spot in Netflix’s Top 10.
Read the full story HERE.
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A nearly 100-year-old airmail station near Medicine Bow was once part of a critical network moving the mail across America.
Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi reports that Nathan Finneman, a Colorado pilot and historical aviation enthusiast, is on a mission to save this remote outpost, which may be the last of its kind in the United States.
“This was part of an experiment when the US Postal Service was debating whether trains should be used to carry mail across the country or whether planes should be used to do that… It was called the Woodrow Wilson airway, which stretched between New York City and San Francisco… It was a relay, pilots would fly and land and hand the mail off to get it across the country. Was the nation's first transcontinental mail system. And in order to make this function and to ensure that pilots were safe, there were dozens of airports along this route, and one of them was built in Medicine Bow.”
In his effort to save the still-standing structures at the Medicine Bow airstrip, Finneman has started a grassroots campaign to raise funds and increase awareness of the historic airport. He sells clothing, mugs, bags, and other items on his website, Airmail Aviator, where he also posts about the airport’s history and urgent maintenance needs.
Read the full story HERE.
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And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on Cowboy State Daily Dot Com - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our YouTube channel! And don’t forget to drop in on the Cowboy State Daily morning show with Jake Nichols, Monday through Friday from 6 to 10 a.m.!
Thanks for tuning in - I’m Wendy Corr, for Cowboy State Daily.
