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[{"type":"text","text":"These people should be banned....."}]

Bonus vid 1 9 13 25

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

<title>Bonus Video 1: Saturday, September 13, 2025 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

These people should be banned.....

Bonus Video 1: Saturday, September 13, 2025

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily reporter, Jackie Dorothy.

Jackie Dorothy

Wyoming Life

Around Wyoming

Dietz was once a busy and bustling community made up of a collection of mining camps scattered along the Tongue River Valley.  

Barefoot children were full of mischief, baseball games were played between rival camps, and then the explosions would come. 

Families would rush to the mines to discover if the men who were working that shift had survived.  

Stanley A. Kuzara of Sheridan was born on Oct. 15, 1906, into this dangerous and poor — but lively — life. Along with many others, found that growing up in a dangerous coal town, the first life lesson was survival.

His parents were Polish immigrants and his father was working in Mine No. 5, so the family lived at the coal mining camp of Dietz No. 5 at the time of Kuzara's birth. 

The Kuzara family, which eventually grew to seven boys and five girls, lived in a converted barn that was formerly a camp grocery store and post office, Kuzara wrote in his book “Black Diamonds of Sheridan.” 

Later, their camp would be renamed Dietz No. 8 when Mine No. 5 closed and a new mine established in the same area.

By the early 1900s, Dietz was among the largest coal-producing communities in northern Wyoming with 800 men working the mines in the winter and 400 in the summer. 

[{"type":"text","text":"Unlike a single town, Dietz was a collection of mining camps. "}]

G.B Dobson of Wyoming Tales and Trails wrote that each town bore the number of its corresponding mine, thus when Mine No. 5 was closed and replaced by Mine No. 8, the camp was renamed Dietz No. 8.   

Other mines in the region included the Hotchkiss, Acme, Model, Carneyville (later Kleenburn), Monarch, and Kooi.

Nearly every European country was represented in the camps which Kuzara listed as Polish, Hungarians, Welsh, Scotch, English, Italians, Czechoslovakians, Bulgarians, Austrians, Germans, Serbians, Montenegrans, Irish, Slovaks, Japanese, and French.

[{"type":"text","text":"Life was precarious in the camp. "}]

When Kuzara was a year old, his parents had to live in a tent with the family while they waited for their new house to become available. That would be the John Hecht Place located about midway between the Dietz No. 7 and the Dietz No. 5 camps.

It was while in this tent that Kuzara said his mother had him in a high chair placed near the coal range to keep him warm. 

One of the other small boys began to climb on the high chair and, when it became unbalanced, Kuzara fell on top of the hot range. 

He severely burned his right cheek and carried the scar for the rest of his life.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Dangerous Games"}]

Kuzara said that the kids in the coal mining camp would have to get inventive in their games.

He remembered how at times, they would “borrow” a handcar from the CB&Q railroad. 

These carts would be left on the siding of the tracks by a maintenance crew and proved too tempting to the boys who found it. 

Some of the older boys would carry them to the interurban tracks whose bed was not level as the railroad tracks.

“We would all push the hand-car up to the top of an incline just to experience the sensation of coasting down at quite a speed,” Kuzara said. “It was a wonder that we survived as the handles of the hand-car would be pumping up and down of their own accord.”

Another favorite pastime in the winter was to slide down the hills on homemade sleds, bobsled and toboggans.

The children would also ice skate on the sloughs and river, the latter which was kept clean of snow by flooding.

“Of course, skating on the river was sometimes very dangerous since the ice was either very thin where the water was naturally swift or was even non-existent,” Kuzara said. “We had to remain constantly on guard and did have some narrow escapes.”

A game unique to the coal mining camps was playing with carbide, a compound of carbon and a metal.

Kuzara explained that it was the habit of the miners to clean out their carbide lamps of the residue of carbide. 

He said that near the exit of the mine, one miner after another would unscrew the base of his lamp, knock it against the post and deposit the residue until there was quite a pile of spent carbide powder.

“As the men would empty their cans, we children would finger through the carbide dust, picking out all granules of unused carbide,” Kuzara said. “Sometimes we would merely pile it, drop water on it and light it; other times, place a supply of carbide in a bottle and after watering it, quickly cap the bottle and get quite a charge out of the resulting explosion.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Different Rules"}]

Kuzara recalled that even the men had their games that were usually of various contests of strength such as boxing, wrestling, weightlifting, and throwing horseshoes.

“My father once bet one of the more husky miners, Joe Stucca, that he could not lift a certain water-soaked oak railroad tie about 20 feet long,” Kuzara said. “The bet was $5.”

Stucca not only lifted one end of the tie on his shoulder, but gradually worked to its center until he had it balanced. Then the miner walked off with it. 

[{"type":"text","text":"It was estimated that the tie weighed about 800 pounds."}]

Kuzara said that all ages played baseball. Each camp had its own team and there was real rivalry among the various camps as well as with teams from Sheridan and the surrounding area.

“Even with us younger boys, baseball was one of our principal activities,” Kuzara said. “However, instead of competing teams, we used to play work-up.”

A player would begin at left field position and as a batter was struck out, the players would gradually move up a position until finally, the boy would arrive at the batter’s box where he remained until he was put out. 

This made it so that the younger boys became very adept in each position, and they became particularly good batters. 

The end results were that when they were older and joined the men on the baseball teams, they were already very good at the game.  

Even in the wintertime, Kuzara said the men were able to keep involved in physical activities when not working their long hours in the mine

“Frequently with a keg of beer nearby, the frozen river became the scene of a game called Pravo, sometimes referred to as curling,” Kuzara said. “In this game of competition, one would run to a foul line and slide a disk or quoit along the ice, as in bowling, to an objective spot or line, frequently glancing off another’s quoit to gain advantage.”

Kuzara said that as a young boy, he also played on the frozen river in the wintertime. One of the games was called Shinny, which resembles hockey today.  

“Instead of owning any manufactured hockey stick and puck, we used to find a willow or some other tree which had a crook in it shaped like a hockey stick, and for a puck we used to use a bung from a barrel,” Kuzara said.

In the summertime as they tramped around in the trees, he said they were always on the lookout for a better “shinny stick.”

Another game Kuzara said was played by the men on the ice was called Bolina. 

He described this as similar to curling except that balls were used. A smaller target ball was rolled a distance, then the larger ball rolled, or lagged, to see how near one could get to the target ball.

[{"type":"text","text":"In all of these games, enthusiasm ran very high."}]

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

Each of the mining camps had its own polka band that appeared in many of the big parades that were held in the early 1900s. They also played at the many Polish weddings and christenings.

Instead of celebrating birthdays, it was the accepted custom at the camps to celebrate their “name days.” 

On St. Joseph day, for example, every Joe in the camp set that day aside for celebrating his patron saint. On St. Maria Day, all Marys would celebrate. 

By the time all the Joes or Marys got together to celebrate they would have quite a party, complete with a band, Kuzara said.

The union hall in practically each mining camp would usually also serve as an auditorium for functions of other organizations and also for school plays and programs. 

Frequently, officials at the mine would give gifts to children at the Christmas party and, if times were good, these were quite elaborate.

Despite all the fun and community spirit Kuzara experienced, he also saw a lot of tragedy at a young age. 

Deaths were all too common from explosions, gas leaks and other accidents. 

His own father tried to stay out of the mines, and throughout Kuzara’s childhood, his father opened up stores that sold a wide range of goods, from liquor to furniture. 

Despite his efforts, his father would often have to return to the mines to feed his large family. 

Kuzara said that knowing he did not want a low-paying mine job, he studied hard in school. He pursued many careers to keep himself out of the mines. 

However, he also ended up doing his time underground, but kept striving to get other jobs that would get him above ground.

It was when looking back at his childhood that Kuzara appreciated what he had survived. 

Not just the hard labor, but the antics of the boys and men who lived in the coal mining camps of Wyoming, especially now that most of these coal mining camps are ghost towns with fading memories. 

"As I look back retrospect, I feel now that it really was a unique privilege to have been born in the mining camp of Dietz No.5, Wyoming," Kuzara wrote. "The fun, the frivolity, the pathos, and the hardships."

7 Dietz schoolchildren 1920s

<title>Wyoming History: Surviving A Dangerous Childhood Growing Up In Coal Town Of Dietz | Cowboy State Daily</title>

The ghost town of Dietz was once a thriving coal mining community near Sheridan. Stanley Kuzara grew up around the mines where explosions were commonplace. Families would rush to the mines to discover if the men working that shift had survived.  

Wyoming History: Surviving A Dangerous Childhood Growing Up In Coal Town Of Dietz

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

Renée Jean

Business & Tourism

Business

Some of Wyoming’s 1860s prospectors would be rolling over in their graves if they knew just how narrowly they might have missed striking it rich in South Pass City and other 19th-century gold hotspots.

Gold was there in those arid hills. All those poor pioneers really needed to find it was a helicopter and some artificial intelligence.

Not to mention modern geological science, which has led Relevant Gold founder and CEO Rob Bergmann down a multi-billion-year-old channel called the Abitibi Belt, to what he believes is a hidden gold belt underneath Wyoming.

“We can’t promise anything,” Bergmann told Cowboy State Daily. “But we do believe that all of the data indicates there’s a lot of opportunity that has really just never been tested in Wyoming — especially along these Archean belts that were once connected to the Abitibi.”

The hypothesis that those were once connected is the geological theory that’s brought Bergmann to Wyoming. 

The Archean belts arc from the CK Gold Project in southeast Wyoming, sweep through South Pass near Lander, and continue on to Bradley Peak near Rawlins. 

All three areas once drew gold seekers when the West was still untamed, from about 1867 to 1881. Each fizzled long before living up to their hype — even at the comparatively successful Carissa Mine in 

 with a toolkit the state’s pioneer miners could scarcely have imagined.

Instead of panning streams and digging random holes in the rock to find gold veins they could mine with hand tools and dynamite, Bergmann’s crews are flying helicopters to conduct geophysical surveys over the company’s projects at South Pass and Bradley Peak. 

The surveys can see hundreds of meters beneath the surface, mapping out rock types and identifying structures that commonly travel with gold and other precious metals. 

“It’s an incredible data set that’s never existed in the state of Wyoming before,” Bergmann said. “It allowed us to see up to 400 meters below the surface of some of these rock characteristics. It doesn’t necessarily find the gold, but it helps us find the things that might be associated with the gold.”

A Wyoming state grant helped fund the airborne surveys at Bradley Peak and South Pass, creating the new, high-resolution, geophysical picture of grounds that have been prospected off and on for more than 150 years.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Big Drilling Plans"}]

This summer, Relevant Gold will stage large drilling programs at Bradley Peak and in the South Pass area, fresh off raising more than $12 million in Canadian dollars. 

The drilling is about collecting sample cores from likely areas to map out where a mine might be economically feasible.

The company will focus on two targets this summer, but there are 17 targets in all. That’s a multi-year runway of possible follow-up work if the results remain encouraging. 

High-grade ore samples have already been collected, Bergmann added — samples that also contained significant percentages of silver, copper and lead. 

“We’ve already drilled gold, found gold,” he said. “What we have to start defining is whether there’s something over, say, a million ounces. We’re really targeting larger-scale gold and critical metal opportunities.”

While the word “mining” might conjure images of vast coal pits or 

 Relevant Gold’s footprint will look different. 

“Gold can be mined a lot of different ways,” Bergmann said. “But underground mining is the most common type.”

Those tunnels will likely be much narrower than trona or coal-mining tunnels. 

The company has set up a field office in Riverton, and has been working extensively with local contractors for drill-pad construction and reclamation. Its headquarters is in Canada, and it has an operational office in Minnesota.

Under state rules and bonding requirements, all the baseball-sized drill holes must be reclaimed and reseeded within a year, which will make it difficult to tell a rig was ever there.

Right now, Bergmann has a staff of between six to 12 local workers in Wyoming, along with support from three outside geologists and a small array of local suppliers and services.

Ultimately, if a mine is realized, that could balloon to a hundred or more workers.

South Pass City Witold Skrypczak via Alamy 6 20 26

<title>How Modern Technology Is Reshaping The Search For Gold In Historic Wyoming Mines | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Helicopters, artificial intelligence, and geology are giving a modern mining company a second shot at finding gold in historic Wyoming mines. The company believes there's a hidden gold belt and technology allows them to see 400 meters below the surface.

How Modern Technology Is Reshaping The Search For Gold In Historic Wyoming Mines

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

Clair McFarland

Crime & Courts

Courts

RIVERTON — A 33-year-old Lander man faces up to 42 years in prison and fines in connection with the Wednesday evening Riverton crash in which two people died.

Micheal Odom was already on probation for DUI, police interference, and reckless driving convictions out of Campbell County when the truck he was driving sped through Riverton’s busiest 30 mph thoroughfare at more than 75 mph, Fremont County deputy attorney James Weck told the Lander Circuit Court on Friday.

Odom, who is in custody, appeared in court for his initial hearing that afternoon.

Weck noted that besides the Campbell County convictions, Odom is also on parole for 

heft, burglary, and property destruction felonies out of Natrona County.

Friday’s filing marks his third DUI charge in five years, and Odom tried to flee the scene of the crash, Weck added. 

The prosecutor asked Lander Circuit Court Judge Jefferson Coombs to set Odom’s bond at $5 million cash-only.

Coombs warned Odom that he doesn’t have to incriminate himself, but asked if he wanted to speak about his life in response to Weck’s bond argument.

[{"type":"text","text":"Odom took that opening to apologize instead."}]

“I’m terribly sorry about what happened,” he said. “I’ve just been fighting addiction my whole life. I do not really know what happened or remember anything. I just apologize to the victims’ family and everything.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Coombs set Odom’s bond at $1 million, cash-only."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"The Scene"}]

Cowboy State Daily arrived on scene Wednesday to find a white Dodge pickup with front-end damage on its side in the middle of Riverton’s busiest thoroughfare, Federal 

About a half-block away sat the mangled remains of what eyewitnesses said had been a Jeep.

An evidentiary affidavit by Riverton Police Department Officer Jesse Francher, filed by the Fremont County Attorney’s Office, says a 23- or 24-year-old woman lay on the ground at least 20 feet away from the Jeep. 

A man that same age, the Jeep’s passenger, remained inside the vehicle, the document says.

Officers arrived on scene and pulled Odom, who was bleeding, from the pickup.

“While waiting with Odom he was worried that he was going to jail,” wrote Francher. "Odom was very agitated as if he did something wrong.

"I suspected Odom was intoxicated but was unsure if it was caused by the accident or him being under the influence.”

The affidavit says that after a short time on scene, Odom fled and ran to a nearby parking lot “where he ran into a truck.”

It’s unclear if this means Odom ducked into the cab of the truck or collided with the truck.

Officers apprehended and handcuffed him and put him in Francher’s patrol vehicle, the affidavit says.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"The Hospital"}]

Francher took Odom to SageWest Health Care, where a nurse drew Odom’s blood at 9:13 p.m. — about one hour after the crash.

“I did not apply for a blood warrant first due to the exigent circumstances of a fatal accident and the suspect being injured,” wrote Francher in the affidavit. “I did not read Odom implied consent before the blood draw due to forgetting because of the circumstances at hand.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Francher later applied for a blood search warrant, the document says."}]

“While waiting with Odom, he stated that he was drunk,” wrote Francher.

[{"type":"text","text":"At that point Odom was given his Miranda rights. "}]

The document does not distinguish who interviewed Odom, but says he was asked if he’d been drinking and when.

 two 4-Loco drinks at 7 p.m., the affidavit says. He “was read” implied consent at 10:55 p.m. and did not consent, says the affidavit.

Medical personnel found he had a fractured wrist and fractured orbital floor. 

He was cleared and taken to the police department, where he submitted to a breath test and logged a 0.134% breath-alcohol concentration, the document says.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"What Happened?"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Meanwhile, another officer interviewed bystanders on scene."}]

The witnesses reportedly said the Jeep was on Webbwood Road, which intersects North Federal 

 and runs along Walmart’s southern lot — and that the Jeep entered the intersection heading west when Odom sped through the red light and struck the Jeep.

The woman, Taylee Dresser, was declared deceased on scene. The man, Gregory Trosper, was taken to the hospital after 

 perceived a “flicker” of his eyes. 

He was declared deceased at SageWest Health Care that night at 1

due to internal bleeding, says the affidavit.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"The Tally"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Coombs read Odom's charges Friday in court. "}]

Those include two alternative counts pertaining to Trosper's death: one accusing Odom of aggravated homicide by vehicle due to being drunk, and the other accusing him of the same but due to driving recklessly. 

Each is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, and since they're in the alternative, a jury in this case would have to choose one or the other if it chose to convict Odom. 

The state alleges the same set of alternate charges pertaining to Dresser's death, which makes for another potential 20 years in prison. 

And the state also charged an enhanced DUI misdemeanor that ranges from 30 days to six months in jail and $3,000 in fines; one count of interfering with police ( up to one year and $1,000 in fines); and one count of reckless driving (up to six months in jail and $750 in fines).

Odom's preliminary hearing, where he'd have a chance to argue whether the state has probable cause to keep prosecuting him, is set for June 29 in Lander Circuit Court. 

Michael odom crash 6 19 26

<title>Lander Man Faces Homicide Charges, 42 Years In Double Fatal Riverton Crash | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A Lander man faces homicide charges and up to 42 years in prison in connection with a Wednesday Riverton crash that killed two people. “I’m terribly sorry about what happened,” he said in court on Friday. “I’ve just been fighting addiction my whole life.”

Lander Man Faces Homicide Charges, 42 Years In Double Fatal Riverton Crash

Employee kate meadows cropped

Kate Meadows

Energy

Coal

Solar-generated electricity surpassed coal power in the United States for the first time in May, marking a symbolic milestone in the nation's changing energy landscape.

But Wyoming energy experts say the crossover suggests more about shifting demand, aging coal plants and seasonal trends than it does about coal disappearing anytime soon.

According to a report released this week by Ember, an independent energy think tank, solar supplied 12.8% of U.S. electricity generation in May, while coal fell to a record low of 12.2%.

Natural gas remains the nation’s leading source of electricity, accounting for about 37% of generation in May, the U.S. Energy Information Association reports. Combined with coal, fossil fuels were behind nearly 50% of U.S. power generated last month.

"You take those snapshots with a grain of salt," said Travis Deti, executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association, in response to solar passing coal.

Dr. Rob Godby, an economist at the University of Wyoming who studies energy and environmental economics, said May is exactly when such a crossover would be expected.

Coal plants often reduce output or temporarily shut down for maintenance during what the industry calls "shoulder season" — the period between winter heating demand and summer air-conditioning demand. 

[{"type":"text","text":"At the same time, longer days and sunnier weather boost solar production."}]

"May would make perfect sense as the month to see it," Godby told Cowboy State Daily. "I've never seen coal as low as 12%, but if there was going to be a month where it happened, this would be the time."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Growing Demand, Different Sources"}]

The milestone also reflects a larger shift happening with the nation's electric grid, Godby said.

Electricity demand, which remained relatively flat for years, has begun climbing sharply as data centers, advanced manufacturing facilities and other energy-intensive industries expand across the country.

"Very often developers prefer having a renewable source of energy, both for climate and cost reasons," Godby said.

Solar has become the least expensive source of new electricity generation, he said, often competing directly with wind power on price.

“Solar energy is neck-and-neck, and often lower than wind,” Godby said. “Renewable energy is just cheaper, and that’s why so much has been produced.”

At the same time, little new coal generation has been built in the United States in more than a decade.

"The (energy) market is growing," Godby said. "Coal has stayed constant. As we add new generation to the fleet, it has primarily been wind, solar or gas."

[{"type":"text","text":"The dynamics are easy to visualize in a fraction, Godby said."}]

If the top number of the fraction is coal-generated power and the bottom number is total energy demand, the top number is not growing while the bottom number is. 

As the bottom number grows, coal takes on a smaller and smaller share of the market.

[{"type":"text","text":"Solar demand is growing, while coal is not, Godby said."}]

“The market is growing. We haven’t built any new coal (plants). Therefore, coal share goes down,” he said.

Deti agrees electricity demand is surging, but argues that growing demand ultimately benefits coal producers.

He said data centers are the next wave of modern technology that will require all types of power, from coal to renewables, to function.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Coal Plants Getting A Second Life"}]

The picture becomes more complicated because many coal-fired power plants once slated for retirement are now being granted additional years of operation under coal-friendly Trump administration policies.

Utilities and grid operators increasingly worry that electricity demand is rising faster than replacement generation and transmission infrastructure can be built.

"We have to maintain coal-fired power plants to keep the grid stable," Godby said.

For the first time ever, more U.S. electricity was generated from solar power than coal in May. Wyoming energy experts say that’s a reflection of greater demand for power than a decline in coal, and that “coal's not going away anytime soon."

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