For decades, the iconic routed wooden signs, in national parks across America, were a familiar sight to tourists. They were works of art…
But leave it to the government to find one. Someone in the Department of Transportation, his/her identity lost to history, decided to take a look at the park signs and saw red flags everywhere…
“These signs! These signs are NOT in compliance with federal highway safety standards!!!”
He once said, “ If America could be, once again, a nation of self-reliant farmers, craftsmen, hunters, ranchers and artists, then the rich would have little power to dominate others. Neither to serve nor to rule. That was the American Dream.”
Many of the older New Westerners love Ed Abbey but have no idea what that means. They’ve read all his books and they follow and “LIKE” his quotes on Facebook, but they understand far less than they realize. Many of the younger New Westerners are too busy recreating to care. Solitude isn’t even a priority (And please note, in the spirit of Abbey, I’m generalizing here and judging a generation who I know has its own shining stars. If there is any hope to be found, it is in those young people.)
What Abbey always hoped we’d take away from his writing and from his life was a sense of ourselves as individuals, as men and women who could take control of our own lives and our own destinies. Abbey spoke disapprovingly of a “nation of bleating sheep and braying jackasses.” He longed for a people with dignity and courage and he loathed the mindless “bleating” that he found even in his own readers
Note: this article first appeared in the October/November 1999 Zephyr… When the Sierra Club council, years ago, turned its back on Glen Canyon and essentially permitted the building of the Glen Canyon dam, I was stunned and bitter beyond belief.…
Tonya and I have been together for more than a decade now. Being married has brought me more happiness than I deserve but it’s also been revelatory. I was a bachelor for most of my life and apparently, according to my…
Take it or Leave it: IN SEARCH OF DOCUMENTS—MY BLM/FOIA “RECAPTURE CANYON” REQUEST …by Jim Stiles Edward Abbey Needs No Defense: A Response to Amy Irvine’s “Desert Cabal”… by Tonya Audyn Stiles The Slovenly Wilderness… by Stacy Young The Open…
(photos by the author except where noted) Author’s Note: For more than three years , I have spent most of my keyboard time writing “informational/investigative” long form articles (some might suggest ‘long-winded’) about excruciatingly serious topics…Moab politics, San Juan County politics,…
The reduction of the Escalante/Grand Staircase National Monument, and the Bear’s Ears National Monument by the Trump administration has unleashed howls of anguish and anger from many of my friends. The emotional response seems to me to be out of…
“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view..until you climb into his skin and walk around in it… until you stand in his shoes “ Harper Lee, “To Kill a Mockingbird” I moved…
In the 1970s, Edward Abbey often spent time with his old pal, the great Southwest painter, John De Puy. Abbey and De Puy had a hideaway–actually De Puy owned the property, Abbey was a frequent visitor— somewhere in southeast Utah.…
Click Here to Visit John’s Website In 2001, the Zephyr interviewed John Depuy. Here’s an excerpt… Jim Stiles: Where did you grow up? John DePuy: My grandfather’s buried in New Mexico. But unfortunately he lost everything in the Depression,…