Trego's Mountain Ear

by Skylar Baker-Jordan, The Daily YonderJune 11, 2026 I live in a ghost town. No, really. In March, I took a job editing a local newspaper in Glasgow, Montana. Yet, unable to find a house in town, I wound up living about 20 miles north in Saint Marie – dubbed “Montana’s newest ghost town” in a recent lecture hosted by the Montana Historical Society. What was once military housing for those…

by Ilana Newman, The Daily YonderMay 26, 2026 Libby, Montana, sits on the banks of the Kootenay River in the far northwest corner of the state, closer to the Canadian border than any major city. In the summer, the hills are ripe with huckleberries, and every turn might reveal a big horn sheep, one of the region’s native animals. At golden hour, the huge tamaracks and pines glow in the setting…

We’ve had a doe hanging out in the backyard – and from her behavior, she has been leaving her fawn there. Obviously the right thing to do was to stay out of the backyard as much as possible. So we’ve been doing our best not to bother the fawn. The best of intentions can always be altered by a cat. This fawn was lucky – it encountered Mittens, the small female tuxedo cat – and the mutual…

Here’s a link to take you to the FBI’s most wanted Fraudster list – with names and photographs: https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/most-wanted-fraudsters The first page I clicked on had eight smiling faces – and, well, click the link and see what you find.

by Donavyn Coffey, The Daily YonderJune 24, 2026 Mandy Withers was in her late 20s when she first realized she was more than tired. Then, a young mom of three, just out of graduate school, and training for her new position as a pulmonary and sleep medicine nurse practitioner, she thought falling asleep after dinner and foggy mornings were just the price of doing business. But as she stood in…

It was the end of Summer, 1960, when we left Puget Sound for Montana. Over the next couple-five years, I learned that the intelligentsia and established elite of Eureka sneered at Trego – accepting their repeated story that my community was composed of socialists and wobblies. There was a Wobblie Johnson place, and Jack Cheevers claimed to be a socialist, so, as a kid, I thought there might be…

There’s a simple idea that could change our society’s views and practices on immigrants. I want immigrants who have the skills to make our nation better. I want immigrants who are better than the average American. Frankly that doesn’t seem like much to ask. Albert Einstein was an immigrant – and his presence improved my country. My grandfather was an immigrant – and to me, at least, one of the…

I’m using a jackhammer for the second time in my life. The sidewalk in front of the old service station is two inches higher than the floor. That two inches of concrete holds the board and batten siding in – not a good thing, and worse, water runs downhill. It has to go. So, at 76, I’m operating a jackhammer. It isn’t the first time. I spent two days on a jackhammer when I was 18 or 19 – a…

The Acting Attorney General announced that 455 people are charged with taking 6.5 billion in health care fraud. It’s another spot where I have to put everything in numbers to be able to get my thoughts around it. A billion has nine zeroes – so this translates to 455 people getting $6,500,000,000 – so if I round up to 500 thieves, that let’s me estimate that 5 crooks got 650,000,000 – so it’s…

Back in 2021, the Census released its numbers for Representatives. This is the constitutional reason for the bureau’s existence: “Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for…

An Internet search tells me that there are over 24 million millionaires in the United States. That’s almost nine percent of the population. Every eleventh person. 88 percent of millionaires are self-made – reading the report makes me believe that self-made actually translates to ‘did no inherit a million bucks.’ They very much tend to live below their means. 80 percent are first-generation…

I’ve spent most of my working career in jobs that aren’t highly needed. Everyone is familiar with demography, and recognizes that it’s great information to have – but there isn’t much use for a demographer in the private sector. There might be gig work available if the government paid demographers weren’t already there – I did get private funding for various projects. But in general, it takes a…

After posting some of Oliver Cromwell’s thoughts, in the interest of fairness, here are some of the things King Charles said before being beheaded (obviously, he had no comments after being beheaded).