THE
STORY TELLERS... 2005, 2006, 2007
KIM ANDERSON, Director,
Montana Center for the Book and Administrative Officer, Montana
Committee for the Humanities, joined the staff in January
2001, after being hired the preceding year as an independent
contractor to coordinate the first Montana Festival of the
Book. Anderson returned to her hometown of Missoula in 1989
and spent the next eleven years caring for her two children
and working out of a home office as both a free-lance writer
and editor and the executive director of several non-profit
arts organizations, including the Missoula Writing Collaborative
and the Montana Association of Symphony Orchestras. Before
returning to Missoula, she worked in New York City as the
editor for an international business newspaper, The
Journal of Commerce, an associate editor for a national
magazine, Quest, an associate editor at Arbor
House Publishing, a division of the Hearst Corporation, and
as subsidiary rights agent for the literary agency Lescher
& Lescher, Ltd. As a free-lance writer articles, essays,
fiction and poetry have appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Journal of Commerce, Redbook,
Ladies Home Journal, Horizon, The Financial Times, Quest,
Fodor's Travel Guides, and others. More recently
she was the project director for Eat Our Words: A
Montana Writers' Cookbook.
BARBARA
RICHARD who presented her book, Dancing
on His Grave in the book Festival, 2006, has written
a second book, Walking Wounded, which will
be available this year. Her first book won fourth out
of 310 entries in the "Life Series" category in
the Writer's Digest International Self-Published Book Awards.
The piece about the Blizzard of 1864 from the second book,
won 7th in the Life Stories category, and in the top 100 out
of more than 19,000 entries in the Writer's Digest 75th Annual
Writing Competition.
DENNIS SWIBOLD is
a professor at the University of Montana's School of Journalism,
where he has taught courses in reporting and editing since
1989. He is the author of Copper Chorus: Mining,
Politics and the Montana Press, 1889 to 1959. Before
joining UM's faculty, Swibold was managing editor of the Bozeman
Daily Chronicle, having worked previously as the paper's local
government and legislative reporter. He is a former
editor of Montana's twice-weekly Sidney Herald, and has worked
for the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Salt Lake Tribune, the
Arizona Republic and the Prescott (Ariz.) Courier.
MICHAEL K.
JOHNSON is an Assistant Professor of American Literature
at the University of Maine at Farmington. His book Black
Masculinity and the Frontier Myth in American Literature was
recently published by the University of Oklahoma Press.
He is currently working on a biography of Taylor Gordon and
Rose Gordon, past members of the White Sulphur Springs community.
CHRYSTI M.
SMITH is writer and host of the radio series "Chrysti
the Wordsmith," produced at KGLT-FM on the campus of
Montana State University-Bozeman. The series is carried
on KGLT-FM in Bozeman, Yellowstone Public Radio in Billings,
Montana Public Radio in Missoula, and Armed Forces Radio.
While searching for new topics for the "Chrysti the Wordsmieth"
radio series she has discovered dozens of delightful food-related
words in specialized dictionaries.
ELLEN BAUMLER earned her doctorate in English, classics, and history
from the University of Kansas. She is editor of Girl
from the Gulches: The Story of Mary Ronan, a
frequent contributor to Montana The Magazine of Wesstern
History, and a recipient of the magazine's prestigious
Vivian A. Paladin Award.
VALERIE
HEMINGWAY, a freelance writer and editor living in
Montana, this Irish-born author tells of her experiences as
a young reporter. As a convent-schooled nineteen year-old,
the young Valerie Danby-Smith headed for Spain and tried her
hand as an au pair while working as a correspondent ofor an
Irish paper on the side. It was this connection to the
Irish Times that landed her an interview with Hemingway at
his hotel in Spain. Hemingway extended an invitation
for her to join himself and his "cuadrilla" as they
followed the Spanish bullfighting season. She wrote
of her experiences with the Hemingways in Running
with the Bulls.
JON AXLINE is the Historian at the Montana Department of Transportation in Helena. He has a Master of Arts degree from Montana State University in Bozeman with an emphasis on the history of the American West. Jon is the author of several articles, including; Something of a Nuisance Value: The Montana, Wyoming & Southern Railroad, 1905-1953, (Montana The Magazine of Western History 1999) and a book on Montana’s historic highway bridges, Montana's Historic Highway Bridges.
MARY CLEARMAN BLEW is the author of Sister Coyote: Montana Stories, Bone Deep in Landscape: Writing, Reading and Place, Lambing Out and Other Stories, All But the Waltz, and the memoir, Balsamroot. She is also the editor of Written on the Water and a co-editor of Circle of Women: An Anthology of Contemporary Western Women’s Writing. She has also written Writing Her Own Life: Imogene Welch, Western Rural Schoolteacher published in 2004. Mary edited When Montana and I Were Young, by Margaret Bell. A Montana native, Blew is a professor of English and creative writing at the University of Idaho, Moscow.
JUDY BLUNT, is the author of the 2002 memoir Breaking Clean, and has won a coveted Guggenheim Fellowship Award. Judy is an associate professor in the University of Montana, Department of English. She is the first faculty member in U-M's Creative Writing Program to receive a Guggenheim Award since Richard Hugo in 1970. Blunt is among 187 winners of the 2006 Guggenheim Fellowships, selected from nearly three-thousand applicants in 78 different fields, from the creative arts to the natural sciences. The award will allow Blunt to take a sabbatical during spring 2007. She will spend the time working on a book of essays about strength and storytelling among women in the West.
RICK and SUSIE GRAETZ, co-publishers of Rocky Mountain Publishing, together are the authors of and photographers for books on Cuba, Vietnam, Havana, San Juan Puerto Rico and numerous Montana titles, including Lewis and Clark: Montana Trail and The Upper Musselshell.
DAVID MCCUMBER is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and co-author with Andrew Schneider of An Air That Kills: How the Asbestos Poison of Libby, Montana, Uncovered a National Scandal. McCumber’s books also include, The Cowboy Way, Playing Off the Rail and X-Rated: The Mitchell Brothers. McCumber is currently the managing editor the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
RICK NEWBY is a poet, editor and cultural journalist. He recently edited The New Montana Story and is general editor
of The Rocky Mountain Region, a volume in Greenwood Press
American Regional Cultures series. His latest collection of
poems is The Suburb of Long Suffering. Newby resides in Helena
where he directs the communications firm Zadig.
WILLIAM
THACKERAY is a professor of humanities and social
sciences at Montana State University-Northern and a member
of the Montana Committee for the Humanities board. He has
recently finished a sequel to his novel River of Milk.
LEE ROSTAD'S most recent work is Grace Stone Coates: Her Life in
Letters a biography of a Montana writer in Martinsdale
who corresponded with William Saroyan, H.G. Merriam and Frank
Bird Linderman among many others in the literary world. Rostad’s
other publications include Fourteen Cents and Seven
Green Apples and Honey Wine and Hunger Root.
She is a member of the Montana Historical Society board and
former member of the Montana Committee for the Humanities,
and recipient of the Montana Governor’s Award in Humanities.
She received the finalist Willa Award in 2005 for the book, Grace Stone Coates: Her Life in Letters.
SUE HART is an English professor at Montana State University-Billings
and a well-known voice on the central and eastern Montana
literary scene. She is a recipient of the PEN/Syndicated Fiction
Award. Sue has done extensive work on Ernest Hemingway in
Montana and Dorothy Johnson.
JOHN HEMINWAY is the author of the memoir Yonder: a Place in Montana.
In addition to natural history and travel writing, he is also
a television producer and host; best known for his PBS series Travels and his John Heminway’s Travels
on Native Soil for the Travel Channel.
RICHARD
WHEELER resides in Livingston and is a writer of
western fiction. He received the prestigious Owen Wister Award
for 2001, the highest honor bestowed upon authors by the Western
Writers of American. His literary credits include five Spur
Awards from WWA. He has written over 50 novels.
WALT COBURN was born in White Sulphur Springs in 1889 where his father
was engaged in ranching. The senior Coburn bought a ranch
north of Great Falls and moved his family to that city when
Walt was about six. He spent as much time as he could on the
ranch becoming a "cowboy." After an adventurous
life serving for a time with Pancho Villa in Mexico and a
stint with the army he settled down to writing and over the
next half century wrote over a thousand short stories and
novels. He made his home in Arizona.
GARY FORNEY is a native of central Indiana and retired college administrator.
In addition to his biographical work on Thomas Francis Meagher,
he has written several articles related to the early history
of the Montana Territory. His article subjects include the
Fenian Brotherhood, life in the early years of Virginia City,
and biographical sketches of Thomas W. Cover and William Ennis.
Gary has also presented papers to the 2002, 2003 and 2004
annual conferences of the Gallatin Historical Society. He
is currently working on his second book, a history of the
early gold discoveries and the development of the Montana
Territory. Gary serves on the boards of directors for the
Madison Valley Library, the Madison County Library and the
Virginia City Preservation Alliance. He is a member of the
Madison Valley History Association, the Gallatin Historical
Society, the Madison County Writers and the Ennis area Scouting
committee. Gary and his wife, Cathy, have made their home
near Ennis since 1999. They have two daughters and two granddaughters.
PAUL WYLIE grew up in White Sulphur Springs and went to Montana State
University, receiving a degree in Chemical Engineering. He
was out of state for the next thirty one years, obtained a
law degree from American University in Washington, D.C. and
practiced intellectual property law since the late 1960's
as a member of the Utah, California and Montana Bars. He returned
to Montana in 1990, continuing his national practice in the
litigation of financial damage issues involving the infringement
of intellectual property rights. He is now semi-retired from
the practice of law and has devoted substantial time in the
last five years to historical research projects involving
Montana. He has written a full book length biography of Thomas
Francis Meagher, and it has been submitted under the title, The Irish General, to the University of Oklahoma
Press.
MARY MURPHY, Michael
P. Malone Professor of History is the Department of History
and Philosophy, Montana State University-Bozeman, teaches
and writes in the fields of U.S. Women's history and the history
of the American West. She is the author of Hope in
Hard Times, New Deal Photographs of Montana, 1936-42.
(Montana Historical Society Press, 2003), which won the 2003
Montana Book Award. She is also author of Mining Cultures:
Men, Women, and Leisure in Butte, 1914-41 (University
of Illinois, 1997) and she edited, with Harry Fritz and Bob
Swartout, Montana Legacy: Essays on History, People,
and Place for the Montana Historical Society Press
in 2002.
BONNIE MALDANADO,
S poetry books, From the Marias River to
the North Pole and Montana, Too: A
History of Montana in Story Poems tells of her early
life in Montana and that of her family. Bonnie grew
up on a sheep ranch and oil field west of Sweetgrasss.
She earned undergraduate and graduatae degrees from Western
New Mexico University when she was a single mother and went
on to compleste a doctoral degree in counseling and psychology
at New Mexico State University. After teaching for forty
years, she is professor emeritus from Western New Mexico University
She has three grown children and lives in the mountains of
New Mexico with her husband, two canines, and the ghost of
a third.
MARY MCCARTHY was a prolific writer in the early half of the 20th century. While still a school girl she visited in White Sulphur Springs with two of her classmates and she relates this adventure in Memories of a Catholic Girlhood, giving a telling picture of the town.
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD visited his school friend Walter Donahoe in White Sulphur Springs and left a story of fantasy of Montana life. His short story, "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz" was first published in The Smart Set. Fitzgerald is well known as the author of The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald was born in 1896 and began writing in 1919.
CARRIE ADELL
STRAHORN was a part of the bargain when the Union
Pacific Railroad made in 1877 with Robert Strahorn to explore
and publicize the West. He refused to take the job unless
Carrie could accompany him. For the next thirty years they
lived mainly in the coach, the saddle, and railroad car. Our
story about travel from Diamond City to White Sulphur Springs
is from Carrie's Fifteen Thousand Miles by Stage.
LENORE McKELVEY
PUHEK, Helena, MT. graduated from Carroll, with a
degree in English/Writing. She won the A.B. (Bud) Guthrie
Writing Scholarship. Her writing focus is Montana history,
family pioneer history, and Native American history. She has
had hundreds of articles published on interesting people who
make this great state. Her interest in Thomas Francis Meagher
began as a child when she played under his statue on the capitol
lawn. She started a writers group in 1981 that still meets
twice monthly. Lenore is a member of Western Writers of America.
Her recent book, The River's Edge, is a romantic
novel of Thomas Francis Meagher and Libby Meagher. She Tells
us, "I have been collecting material for years on the
Meagher family. When I discovered a fourteen-page love letter
that Thomas wrote to Libby in 1855, I knew I had the focus
for my book."
TAYLOR GORDON was born in White Sulphur Springs in 1893 to the only black
family in town, and led a diverse and interesting life. He
worked for John Ringling of the Ringling Circus family and
then began a career as a singer. Moving to New York, he became
part of what was known as the Harlem Renaissance, which included
a rich cultural scene of musicians, artists, writers and political
activists during the 1920s. It is his story in his home town
that we explore in his book, Born to Be.
MEREDITH
AULD BROKAW founded Penny Whistle Toys, Inc. in New
York City and Bridgehampton, NY in 1978. She was president
until it was sold in 1997. Currently, she acts as a business
consultant to the new ownership. Mrs. Brokaw is the author
of eight books, bearing the Penny Whistle name, relating to
parenting and children's activities. She is the co-author
of Big Sky Cooking. Meredith has been involved
with Conservation International and served as director of
the Gannett Company, Inc. She serves on the Board of Trustees
of the Educational Broadcasting Corporation, serves on its
Education Committee and is on the Board of Directors of Neighborhood
Coalition for Shelter in New York. A native of Yankton, South
Dakota, Mrs. Brokaw is married to Tom Brokaw of NBC News.
They have three daughters and two granddaughters. In addition
to a busy professional and family life, Mrs. Brokaw enjoys
competitive horseback riding, tennis and hiking.
THERESA
BUCKINGHAM wrote the Cattlewomen's Column for the
local paper for many years. Some of her charming vignettes
were put into a book in 1980, The Old Girl in the
Feathered Shawl. Theresa and her sister, Gertrude
McStravick were major workers in the Meagher County Historical
Society for many years. Theresa died in 1999.
ART WATSON was a Meagher County rancher on the Smith River and served
as a legislator from this county. He wrote Devil Man
With a Gun - a story of his father who came to Montana
in 1864. In the spring of 1870, he was located at Diamond
City and remained in the area to ranch and start a family.
KELLY FLYNN is a longtime rancher, guest ranch owner and outfitter from
Broadwater County in Montana. Almost 30 years ago he graduated
from Western Montana College with a degree in English. In
his spare moments, he has helped compile the history of Diamond
City. Those spare moments have run over a dozen years. He
is a Farm Bureau and Stockgrower member and former president
of the Montana Outfitter and Guides Association. He served
on the Governor's Tourism Advisory Council, the Governor's
Private Land and Public Wildlife Advisory Council, as well
as the Western Montana College Alumni Board. Currently he
serves on the Board of Outfitters. The Diamond City book went
to the publishers in May, 2006.
JOHN CLAYTON is an independent journalist, essayist, and business writer.
John's new book, The Cowboy Girl, is a biography
of the Montana/Wyoming novelist, journalist and homesteader,
Caroline Lockhart. It relies on arachival materials
not available to Lockhart's previous biographers.
KIM ALLEN
SCOTT is an MSU professor and in charge of the special
collections at the library of MSU. His book, Yellowstone
Denied - The Life of Gustavas Cheney Doane, was recently
published by the University of Oklahoma Press.
DEIRDRE MCNAMER on her latest book, Red Rover,
is set in Montana and tells the story of three men who get
swept up in the machinations of that war and its fateful aftermath.
