Patty Limerick's Articles
Click the links to view the articles written by Patty. All articles are in .pdf format.
"Fighting Fires in an Overheated Climate"
01/23/2006 – Los Angeles Times
In 2002, Wildfires raged in many parts of the West and pressed the nation's firefighting capacity to its limit. In Colorado's Front Range, the huge hayman fire filled the sky with smoke for days... Read more
"A Way to Clean Up Toxic Mines, Time to Ease Legal Shackles"
02/05/2005 – Denver Post
O Fellow Westerners, we offer you a once–in–a–lifetime opportunity: a chance to push for a good cause that has no opposition. Acid mine drainage, the toxic brew of heavy metals and acidic water that drains from thousands of long–abandoned hard–rock mines, has no supporters, no fans, no advocates and no champions... Read more
"Make Way For Angels"
07/02/2005 – New York Times
Concluding his First Inaugural Address, President Abraham Lincoln expressed his hope for a resurgence of "the better angels of our nature." As national unity dissolved in 1861, those angels were ducking for cover and rarely to be seen. And even though our own times cannot match 1861 peril, our angels seem at the moment to be heading for the hills... Read more
"Live Free and Soar"
06/29/2005 – New York Times
A week ago, at the conference of the Council of Energy Resource Tribes (CERT) meeting at the Morongo Casino Resort, the evening banquet opened with a ceremony that begins most formal Indian gatherings. Several Indian men, often military veterans, march in with flags and place them on the stage... Read more
"Dining With Jeff"
06/25/2005 – New York Times
Founding a democracy, rather like living in a democracy, can be very tough on friendship. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson began as friends. The tensions and frictions of the early Republic took care of that. Then, after years of silence between them, a mutual friend persuaded them to write to each other... Read more
"Hope and Gloom Out West"
06/22/2005 – New York Times
The American West, Wallace Stegner once wrote in one of the region's most quoted aphorisms, is "the native home of hope." Having put this very cheerful sentiment on public record, Mr. Stegner soon began to wonder what on earth had possessed him... Read more
"Region Has Many Views on the Issue"
02/09/2005 – Denver Post
Debates over energy production in the West generate an abundance of friction and heat. Regrettably, no engineer has yet seized on this opportunity and designed the equipment to generate electricity from what seems to be an endlessly renewable resource: human contention... Read more
"For One, Familiarity Breeds Comraderie"
09/18/2003 – Rocky Mountain News
For close to a quarter century, I was an archetypal academic liberal. All of my friends were Democrats. I did my thinking and writing in a community of the politically like-minded. I begin with this admission because it adds drama to the twist that this confession is about to take... Read more
"West Holds Key to Energy Puzzle"
08/17/2003 – Denver Post
When it comes to making decisions about the nation's energy future, the West is the linchpin. With riches in conventional fuels as well as an abundance of sun and wind, the West can play the key role... Read more