Around the 307
News, commentary, and other items of interest from the greater Wyoming landscape.
[Note: We’re expanding the distribution of our weekly email content. That said, please see the end of this email if you want to modify the number of emails you receive from Close to Home 307. Thank you for reading and we always welcome your feedback!]
For the holiday week of December 24th, 2023 here are news items of interest from around the Cowboy State:
Although the full moon we had on Christmas Day this year wasn’t technically at 100% illumination it was pretty darn close! Full illumination for December’s aptly named Cold Moon occurred at about 5:33pm MST on Tuesday, December 26th. The Native American Mohawk people called the December full moon "tsothohrha," meaning “time of cold”. Read more in this Farmer’s Almanac article.
Here’s a Christmas morning Cold Moon photo from the U.S. National Weather Service Riverton, Wyoming’s Facebook page. On Wednesday, December 27th, Cowboy State Daily reported on the U.S. Postal Service's plan to move existing Wyoming mail processing and distribution centers in Cheyenne and Casper to Denver, Colorado and Billings, Montana respectively. Governor Gordon and other lawmakers are pushing back. [I hope they push back hard as those of us that live in Lincoln County know how fabulous our mail service has been ever since western Wyoming’s mail sorting facility in Rock Springs was transferred to Salt Lake City back in 2015.] If Cheyenne and Casper’s facilities go, there will no longer be any U.S. Postal Service processing and distribution centers in the Cowboy State. What’s up with that?!? Read the full story here.
Also, this week the Wyoming Game and Fish Department continued its outreach to obtain public comment on the proposed Sublette antelope migration corridor. [Read more about the antelope migration corridor here.] The deadline to submit comments is January 5th 2024. Comments can be submitted online or by mail to the Pinedale Regional Game and Fish Office, PO Box 850, Pinedale, WY 82941. Written comments will be presented to the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission before its tentative March 2024 meeting in Pinedale. The Commission determines the next steps toward identifying and designating the corridor.
[Photo courtesy of Wyoming Game and Fish Department website.] Lastly, I thought it might be interesting (and fun) to list a few Wyoming historical events (some well known, others obscure) that have occurred during the month of December. Hope you enjoy these!
December 10th, 1869—John Campbell, governor of the Wyoming Territory, approved the first law in U.S. history explicitly granting women the right to vote. Commemorated in later years as Wyoming Day, the event was one of many firsts for women achieved in the Equality State.
December 21st, 1866—Capt. William J. Fetterman and 80 men were killed by Lakota Sioux, Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians near Fort Phil Kearny. This event was the worst U.S. Army military disaster in the Indian Wars with the exception of Lt. Col. George Custer’s defeat at the Battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876.
December 26th, 1922—Bandits held up the Casper army store and took $112 in cash!
Thanks for reading and have a safe and Happy New Year ya’ll!
Want to customize your Close to Home 307 subscription? Please read on!
The Close to Home 307 website is currently made up of three main sections. You can elect to receive email posts from all of these sections or just some or even one of them. Here’s the rundown on each section:
“Close to Home 307” news email—comes out once a week on Sunday afternoons/evenings and focuses on happenings in and around Star Valley Ranch often with tidbits about other parts of Lincoln County and the State of Wyoming.
“Around the 307” news email—comes out once a week usually on Saturday afternoons/evenings and contains highlights and links to newsworthy events from across the Cowboy State.
“307 Video” email—this section of the website contains a slowly growing collection of my personal video and short film compositions from daily life in the 307. There is no set schedule for this email, I’ll just send one out whenever a newly created video is posted.
Don’t want to get an email every time I post something? No problem, here’s how you do that:
Go to your Substack profile (top right corner).
Go to “Settings”. Scroll down and you’ll see your Subscriptions. It should look like the image below.
Click on the “>” next to Close to Home 307 to edit your subscription notification settings.
Turn off the button next to any of the Close to Home 307 emails you do not want to receive. Here’s an example that shows a subscriber who only wants to receive the “Around the 307” email from Close to Home 307.
Hope this is helpful to provide the content you want to read! Thank you for being a subscriber!