The oldest surviving map of the world—the Babylonian Imago Mundi—circumscribes a landmass between the Mediterranean and Caspian Seas. The world it describes is only as long as the Euphrates River. At its center lies the city of Babylon. To the…
The wealthiest personIs a pauper at timesCompared to the manWith a satisfied mind —From the song “A Satisfied Mind,” by Joe “Red” Hayes and Jack Rhodes “I don’t think Mr. Harriman is very rich. He has not as much money…
Before Moab, Utah became the absurdly expensive, over-built, over-wrought, contrived and conflicted population center that it is today, it was a different kind of town. Somebody once said, “Moab used to be a hard place to get rich, but it was a…
I don’t feel like coming up with a narrative or story arc here. I’m a bit discombobulated. I just want to throw some stuff up against the wall, some words and some photos, and let it stick or watch it…
By early December there was not much snow, and by the end of the December there was not any snow. I took a long walk on a day between then and now. A walk in the far north in winter…
The local high school kids called it PCP: Plane Crash Pot. The source of the PCP was, logically enough, a plane crash. The craft went down late the night of Tuesday, Feb. 15, 1983, about five miles south of Canyonlands…
Longtime Zephyr readers won’t need any introduction to Herb Ringer. His photography has appeared in this publication for nearly our entire existence. As a photographer, and a chronicler of the 20th century, he has always been right at the heart of…
Recently, while most of the country’s attention was focused on the riots in Washington, DC, NBC News reported another disturbing event, two thousand miles west. As a former law enforcement ranger at Arches National Park, so many moons ago, the story…
This article first appeared in the November 1989 Zephyr… No doubt, when traveling, you have stopped for a passing freight train. Chances are, on one or more of those occasions, you have seen someone riding on a car. What crossed…
Several of my lean years here at Slade, in the Red River Gorge area, were spent alone at special times like Christmas and New Year’s. A couple of times I broke up with my girlfriend to avoid buying non-affordable gifts.…