It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Monday, July 14th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - Brought to you by Cheyenne Frontier Days. Ten days of rodeo thrills, Xtreme Bulls, live concerts, carnival rides, western heritage, and unforgettable cowboy spirit in Cheyenne, Wyoming! Don’t miss the 129th Daddy of ‘Em all July 18-27th.
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Controversy over unpopular proposed changes to Wyoming’s landowner hunting tag policy could come to a head Tuesday when the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission meets in Casper.
At issue is whether the commission should vote to raise minimum property requirements from 160 acres to 640 acres. Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that opponents of the changes estimate that hundreds of landowners could show up ready to push back against the changes, which some claim could cut as many as 60% to 70% of the current allotment of landowner tags.
“We reported earlier that the whole topic of the landowner tags, you know, changing to up the acreage, and up the ownership requirements, that kind of seemed to have died down or been settled. I'm hearing now that really isn't the case, and … I've heard speculation that there could be hundreds of people at that meeting in Casper, that it's going to be a doozy… Game and Fish Commissioners are really going to be on the hot seat Tuesday.”
The agency recently recommended that the commission should reject the proposed changes. However, the decision isn’t the agency’s call. That authority rests solely with the commission.
Read the full story HERE.
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More than 40 years ago, a young bank robber shot a 26-year-old Wyoming Highway State Patrol Trooper and left him for dead.
Looking back today, the robber, Mark Corbett, and the Trooper, Steve Watt, recounted the events of that day to Cowboy State Daily’s Jen Kocher, in what they now see as God’s hand in bringing them both together in ways that drastically altered the course of their lives.
“He robbed a bank in Colorado… he encountered Steve watt, who was a Wyoming trooper. So the trooper pulled him over, and as soon as he started to get out of his car, Mark shot him… then Mark came back to his car and shot him four more times in the side and left him for dead. Steve, however, was able to get back, kind of fall out of his patrol car and get several shots off through that hit his car… but he was just being eaten alive by anger… he figured it was better to forgive him, because he couldn't live with himself anymore… And then he started advocating for Mark's release from prison.”
Largely owing to Watt’s forgiveness, Corbett is one of six inmates who have had their sentences commuted under Governor Mark Gordon since he took office in 2019. He had served 41 years in prison.
Read the full story HERE.
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High up in the Snowy Range Mountains — off grid, out of cellphone range and deep into black bear country at 9,500 feet — two old guys are building a cabin.
Keeping busy in retirement is key to maintaining a healthy body and sharp mind. Yet this enterprise seems designed to wreck what’s left of their bodies. At least, that’s what Dave Simpson and Larry Ash told Cowboy State Daily’s Zak Sonntag.
“We're talking about two guys that are 74 years old, hauling bags of 30 pounds cement, lifting sheet would plywood over their heads, doing a lot of physical labor that seems for people this age to just be, frankly, a little bit too much, but it is the product of a long history and a long friendship that began in 1969… and together back in the 1980s they built a very rudimentary pioneer cabin with just bare bones labor and the absolute essentials… the plan was always for these two friends to have cabins side by side up in the snowy range. And so 40 years later, that second cabin and the dream of having two best friend cabins side by side in the snowy range finally starts to take shape.”
While you may question if septuagenarians are wise to take on such a toilsome project, the image of these two lifelong friends rocking side by side after a long day's work seems to justify their undertaking, whether they survive the effort or not.
Read the full story HERE.
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Juan Reyes knew nothing about the American West, cowboys or the United States when he arrived in Florida in 1962 at age 11. He was part of a secret exodus facilitated by the Catholic Church to get young Cubans off the Communist-controlled island.
But Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that Reyes, now 74, has spent decades riding Wyoming’s open ranges as one of the state’s successful and respected ranchers, running MR Angus Ranch near Wheatland.
“He was attending a college in Washington, helped a buddy go to UW, and when he got to Wyoming, he decided, I love it here. And so he transferred to UW, met the wife at UW, she had 12 registered Angus cows, and so they got married. Eventually took those Angus cows, and in a long story, very short, they started their ranching career.”
Reyes was recently named as one of two people who will be inducted this year into the Wyoming Agriculture Hall of Fame. MR Angus Ranch specializes in producing purebred Angus bulls for high altitude ranches and more.
Read the full story HERE.
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I’ll be back with more news, right after this.
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Someone slides through an icy intersection and collides with your car, what do you do?
If you’re Bryan Pedersen, a Cheyenne financial advisor, you buy the other driver — who was at fault — a new car. Cowboy State Daily’s Greg Johnson spoke to Pedersen, who realized that the young girl behind the wheel was more traumatized than he was.
“He got out of his car. He drives a big Escalade. He had his family, and then he checked his family. They're fine… his Escalade had a little, you know, a dent in it… But Gracie, his car was totaled. It was literally David and Goliath match up between, between their vehicles… She was crying. But her first thoughts were, hey, Is everybody okay? Are you all right? She wasn't thinking about, Oh man, my car… this wasn't, you know, some kid just out joyriding. She was dressed nice. She was on her way home from church. So this is a genuinely good kid, 4.0 student… She already worked to buy this car… So he put out a few feelers on his Facebook to his Facebook friends, and they all popped in and said, Sure, we'll donate. And he put in a few $1,000 and they got almost $15,000 and he bought her a new car.”
The story of Pedersen and Gracie caught the attention of CBS Mornings, and was featured on the show last Monday. While Gracie is a little overwhelmed by the attention the national television story has brought, it’s a story Pedersen said shouldn’t be about him. He says it’s about a good, upstanding young woman who needed a break.
Read the full story HERE.
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Wyoming is home to some legendary mythical creatures, including bigfoot and the jackalope. Another that could end up on that list is the “Swamp Moose” of the northern Wyoming Bighorn Mountains, spotted over the Fourth of July weekend by several people driving on U.S. Highway 14.
The elusive Swamp Moose is a bipedal creature covered in green camouflage with a single large antler prominently growing out of the top of its head. But… Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi has uncovered the secret behind this particular mysterious creature - an eight-year-old prankster named Bridger Knox.
“The Knox family… had a ghillie suit that they had brought for another prank, and they found a moose antler they decided to make their own cryptid, and so the swamp moose was spotted wandering along fence lines and in and out of open fields and the big horns as Wyoming's newest cryptid… you have to wonder what the people who are driving on the highway were thinking as they just rode past and saw a a short little monster. Camouflage half-blended with his environment, holding a moose antler over its head.”
The elusive Swamp Moose was highly visible for about two hours. Bridger kept wandering the fields and fence lines near the campground until it was time for the mythical creature to disappear into the forest.
Read the full story HERE.
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It’s been nearly three decades since a 27-year-old Maryland man disappeared in the Wyoming mountains during a weeklong camping and fishing trip with friends.
David Crouch had been camping in the Wind River Range in late August 1997 and was last seen on the banks of Island Lake with a fishing rod in hand. Cowboy State Daily’s Jen Kocher spoke to former Sublette County Sheriff Hank Ruland, who was the lead investigator on the search for Crouch. He said nearly 30 years later still vividly remembers it to this day - along with other unsolved cases that still haunt him.
“Hank Ruland is one of those retired lawmen who the his career is still with him. You know, he these stories still the people who went missing are still very much part of his memory…with Hank's memory, he's able to keep all of these cases alive in some ways too, and he hasn't forgotten them. And when I contacted him, he was very eager to advocate both that these somebody take a second look at him and to keep these people's names in the collective memory.”
To date, other than one potential sighting by hikers, no trace of Crouch or his fishing pole have been located in the decades since he disappeared.
Read the full story HERE.
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Rising out of rich pastureland in southeastern Wyoming, a 60-foot-high pyramid known as the Ames Monument is an architectural oddity even many Wyomingites know little about.
The pyramid was built from massive granite blocks and completed in 1882 to honor Oakes and Oliver Ames, key dealmakers in the completion of the first transcontinental railroad. But Cowboy State Daily’s Zakary Sonntag reports that the monument didn’t end up being as visible as planners hoped.
“In a bit of an ironic twist, they moved the rail line, and the monument has ever since, more or less been out of sight, out of mind… for a long time, these chambers were open, and passerby could go in there, and they could even carve things on the walls. And then the 1980s they closed it off, and it was more or less intended to stay closed forever, but the great-great-great granddaughter of Oakes Ames, Annalee Ames Robinson, was bent on getting inside the monument… when she finally made it in… It was one of the highlights of her life.”
Robinson may be the last person of this century to experience the inner chambers of the Ames Monument.
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, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for tuning in - I’m Wendy Corr, for Cowboy State Daily.
