Kyle Ploehn is an artist, illustrator and writer living in Billings Montana. He likes to spend the few hours he isn't painting hiking the mountains of Montana.

Fishin' by Kyle Ploehn. Original 16x20 acrylic on canvas painting.Fishin' was one of those weird images that just jumped from seemingly nowhere into my head. I had enjoyed painting up the pixilation trout right before this image, but hadn't planned on doing another fish so soon when this surreal image just hit me. I found it light and funny in my sketches and decided as long as painting fish was still fresh in my mind I should just go ahead and paint it. The idea behind it plays out like life, we're going along with all these distractions and lures to catch out attention. New car, new house, new phone, we are always seeking out that new thing, but sometimes we've got to look beyond the immediate for the hand trying to catch us for dinner.

 
The original is still available, an 16x20, framed for $550.
8x10 matted to 11x14 prints are available for $45. Contact me at [email protected], if you're interested in purchasing a print. Visit my online gallery and blog at http://kyleploehnart.blogspot.com or drop by Facebook and say, hey. https://www.facebook.com/kyleploehnart

Nearly a year after Montana initiated a method to legalize collection of roadkill, more than 800 permits have been issued.

“I’m elated,” said Rep. Steve Lavin, R-Kalispell, who carried the bill in the last Legislature.

Lavin said his purpose behind supporting the bill was to get meat into the freezers of people who could use it, so animals killed in collisions with vehicles wouldn’t go to waste.

“I’ve heard a lot of positive comments about it,” said Lavin, who is also a captain in the Montana Highway Patrol. He also endured a lot of jokes about the issue.

Painless permits

Under the new law, free permits can be downloaded from the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks’ website. They can also be issued by officers, such as the Montana Highway Patrol, who respond to wildlife-vehicle collisions.

“We’ve made it pretty painless for folks to get online and do this,” said Jim Kropp, FWP’s chief of law enforcement.

Although the agency had initially opposed the measure, Kropp said the program seems to be reasonably problem-free.

MORE>>>Billings Gazette

Nearly 140 bison originally from Yellowstone National Park that were quarantined on a ranch owned by media mogul Ted Turner to create a herd free of a cattle disease will be transported late on Wednesday to an Indian reservation in Montana.

The relocation of the bison temporarily confined at Turner’s Montana ranch were part of a successful government experiment that isolated the animals to produce a band free of brucellosis, a bacterial disease that can cause cows to miscarry and affects about half of Yellowstone’s more than 4,000 buffalo.

   The Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission last month unanimously approved giving the brucellosis-free bison to the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in northeastern Montana.

  The commission chose the tribes over a proposal that would have seen animals from the country’s last wild herd of purebred buffalo sent to such facilities as New York’s Bronx and Queens zoos.

MORE>>>Reuters

6:21 a.m. Two kids, unaware of the time change, were advised that school wouldn’t start for at another couple of hours and that they should return home.

9:11 a.m. A Kalispell man reported that someone broke in and stole the weight lifting equipment out of his bedroom.

9:32 a.m. A Whitefish man reported that someone trespassed onto his property and used his porta-potty without permission and, while in the porta-potty, the trespasser’s truck rolled away and into the resident’s garage. The garage was significantly damaged.

10:36 a.m. A woman called from Columbia Falls to report that her ex-boyfriend intentionally cut her off on U.S. Highway 2 West in Columbia Falls.

10:55 a.m. Someone on Chubb Lane reported that his chainsaw had been stolen.

11:17 a.m. A woman on Nicholson Drive complained that she was unsuccessful in her attempts to “shoo” away the neighbor’s loose and sometimes vicious dog.

11:36 a.m. There was a report of a small, loose husky on Grand Drive in Bigfork.

3:10 p.m. A woman on Valley View Drive complained that the neighbor’s chocolate lab was on her front porch again.

MORE>>>Flathead Beacon Police Reports

Brian D'Ambrosio is a writer/editor living in Missoula, Montana. D'Ambrosio is the author of more than 300 articles and five books related to Montana history, people, and travel. 

At 85, Bob Newhart is still a bundle of nerves prior to a performance. Before the curtain is slung wide open, there are pangs of insecurity.

“I always have the jitters,” said Newhart, who performs at the Mansfield Theater in Great Falls on Thursday, November 13, marking his first ever appearance in Montana. “If it is six o’clock and I’m going on at eight, I am pacing around, and that’s what I do. I’ve done it since the first day and I’ll be doing it until the day that I can’t do it. I’m a pacer. I pace. There is such an adrenaline rush before a performance.”

Born in 1929 in Oak Park, Illinois, Newhart’s early jobs included pinspotter at a bowling alley, delivery runner at a meat market, as well as advertising copywriter for Fred A. Niles, a major independent film and television producer in Chicago.

“I had a degree in accounting, and I came out of the Korean War in 1954. I worked as an accountant, but that was not meant to be. They had been offering me a promotion to Poland Springs, Maine. I decided that that was not going to be my life. I had a friend in the advertising business, and I worked six months as a copywriter.”

While working at the ad agency, Newhart and a co-worker would make long, indiscriminate phone calls to one another throughout the work shift. They recorded the phone calls as audition tapes for comedy work. The friend lost interest; Newhart, on the other hand, continued doing the phone calls solo – a routine that would in due course become indispensable as a stand-up bit. In 1959, a Chicago disc jockey heard his material and introduced Newhart to the chief of talent at Warner Brothers Records.

“That disc jockey was a man named Dan Sorkin,” said Newhart. “Dan Sorkin was not your typical disc jockey, he was more of a stream-of-consciousness thinker, with a great sense of humor. I always felt like I had a creative way of looking at things. I used to listen to “Bob and Ray” and their radio show, and I would have considered it a successful life to have written for them. The nightclubs took a chance on me, a guy who never did standup, and all those things happened.”

Warner Bros. signed the 30-year-old accountant to a contract based off of his recordings. Newhart couldn’t predict whether his act – signified by politeness, orderly behavior, playful intellect, and a strong sense of convention – would have longevity.

“I figured that I would try it for a year,” said Newhart. “If it didn’t work, at least I had the satisfaction of knowing that it didn’t. One year turned into two, two to three, and three to four, and it always held promise. I’d work part-time jobs, never pretending to be there long. I worked at the Illinois Unemployment Compensation Board behind the counter and at department stores. I couldn't spend the rest of life wondering if I was any good, I had to find out. I kept thinking that it would be good to give it another three months or six months.”

The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart blended the comedian's sense of awareness with silly situations.   Button-Down was the first comedy album to reach No. 1 on the Billboard chart, even edging out Elvis Presley's 1960 album The Sound of Music.

The rest of it – the variety shows, the sitcoms, the hundreds of standup and evening performances – is television history.

It’s self-evident that the culture of television has changed – some might say devolved or coarsened – since Newhart made his first network television appearance on the “Jack Paar Show” in the early 1960s. Attention spans have shrunk and the micro-celebrity “look at me" culture of people fretting about themselves and their Facebook status fermented. Newhart keeps a broadminded attitude when evaluating these changes.

“When I was playing in 1967, “The Driving Instructor” skit used to run around nine minutes. Now it’s bang, bang, bang. Nine minutes went down to six. Six minute routines went down to four minutes. When I was doing the show, we would take a minute to set up a joke and it was well worth it. Today, you can’t take a minute. It is 15 seconds and you have to have another one. When I was working on “The Big Bang Theory,” I was worried that I was holding up the show, because my delivery is different than the timing of the show. I wanted them to be very much aware that their pace was different than my pace – and that’s a reality. But that’s a reflection of what people what. And they are the ultimate decider.”

Newhart said that adaptability is still a necessary.

“I still totally feed off of the audience,” said Newhart. “There are certain lines you use or don’t use depending on how soon they react. They are your sensors. They tell you when to speed it up or slow it down, or if you should do or don’t do a routine. There is a presumed certain intelligence in my material – and a presumed intelligence in the audience.”

Newhart’s comedy is a highly witty design – and in large part an act of spontaneity. What situational gags will he tailor to the crowd in Great Falls, if any?

“A lot of it comes at the last minute, so I won’t prepare anything about Montana just yet,” said Newhart. “I have never been there and I’ve played just about every state, except Montana, and I don’t think Idaho. I have heard a lot about what it looks like.”

Newhart said that one of the addictions of comedy is that it is dangerous.

“It’s the danger of it that I love,” said Newhart.  “Walking on the stage, it’s like a scene from “The Deer Hunter,” with Christopher Walken, and they are spinning the cylinder, with the shell in the chamber. That’s part of the reason I do it. Would I play if there were a guarantee that all of the houses would be full and all of the people would laugh? I wouldn’t take it. The danger is in performing every night under different conditions.”

Comedy is an amusing game, and Newhart proves that it can be played with elegance, that an entertainer can ensnare a crowd without behaving vulgar, impolite or rude.

“I was never into shock just for shock value,” said Newhart. “I was never into material just to hear a gasp from the audience. I do agree that anything that happens to you is comedy. But I worked clean, and there were temptations to break away and get into shock. It never felt comfortable, though. Those forays just weren’t satisfying and I never derived a satisfaction from that. I am glad that the audience has a good time without my having to have referred to that.

“But I have no problem with others doing it. Richard Pryor was a seminal comedic influence of the past 50 years. I never considered someone like Richard Pryor shocking, because there was a Mark Twain-ish concept to his work.” 

A life that is empty of purpose generally stays a life that is empty of purpose, regardless of age, geography, or socioeconomic status. Indeed, Newhart doesn’t believe in a long, comfortable retirement, only a long, comfortable purpose.

“I can’t say that I’m really tired of making people laugh, or say that I hate making people laugh,” said Newhart, who lives in Los Angeles. “I can’t imagine thinking that. I have no hobbies. I have no other plans. The alternative is a dark room on Sunset Blvd with someone coming into the room turning on re-runs of “The Newhart Show.” That’s not my ideal.”

Newhart fell in love with the sound of laughter and he is indebted to it. He appreciates the world – and as a comedian he has always strived to involve himself with it and not stand aside from it; he is quick to point out that the audience is the experience.

“I will be changing plans in, say, Denver, and invariably someone will say, ‘thank you for all of the laughter.’ And I will answer, ‘it’s my pleasure.’”

Lone Pine State Park. Wayfarers. Wild Horse Island.

This scenic area is home to many of Montana’s most popular state parks.

Through September, more than 500,000 people visited state parks in Northwest Montana, a slight bump over last year, according to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks data.

Statewide, the system of public parks attracted 1.94 million people, 3 percent more than a year ago, meaning 2014 is on pace to be the fourth consecutive record-breaking year for visitation.

With a total of 55 public state parks, Montana has the largest parks system compared to neighboring states, including Idaho, Wyoming and South Dakota.

Yet the operating budget and staffing levels are among the lowest in the region, creating a dilemma for managers hoping to maintain resources and infrastructure.

MORE>>>Flathead Beacon

The Custer's Last Stand re-enactment will not be a part of Hardin's Little Big Horn Days next year.

The Hardin Chamber of Commerce decided to cancel the annual show with Chamber Vice President Dan Kern saying it's time to re-evaluate the production.

Kern says with the Real Bird Re-enactment in Crow Agency the same weekend, the Chamber is trying to determine if there is a need for two re-enactments. But he says the plan is to bring back the re-enactment in 2016.

Lacey Middlestead is a Montana native and freelance writer currently living in Helena, Mont. She loves meeting new people and helping share their stories. When she’s not busy writing articles for newspapers like the Independent Record and Helena Vigilante, she can usually be found indulging in her second greatest passion–playing in the Montana wilderness. She loves skiing and snowmobiling in the winter and four wheeling, hiking, boating, and riding dirt bikes in the summer.

The family that skates together stays together!

When I first started playing hockey about a year and a half ago, it was at my dad’s insistence. He has played hockey since he was a kid, but when he heard the rink in Helena was starting a novice league, he couldn’t sign me up fast enough. I was skeptical of the idea at first. Sure, I’d watched NHL hockey on television, but there is a serious difference between watching and playing. Those guys on TV move like they were born with blades for feet. But after he purchased me a brand new pair of Easton skates and a full suite of hockey gear, I knew there was no going back. My only reassurance was that my dad agreed to skate in the novice league with me in addition to the advanced men’s leagues.

That first season of hockey was a total blast. I never would’ve dreamed I’d love it as much as I did. Since I’m an only child, my dad never had the opportunity to pass on his love for the sport to a son. It took me 26 years or so, but I finally filled that space for him. It felt special playing with my dad and having him right beside me on the ice when I scored my first goal. And honestly, how many men can say they play hockey with their daughters?

When my second season of hockey started up last year, I was pleasantly surprised to see a second father-daughter duo hit the ice. Paul, one of the guys my dad and I played with during my first season, recruited his daughter, Celena, to play. Celena was in her freshman year at Carroll College yet never let our 11 p.m. games on a school night slow her down. Partway through the season, Celena’s mom and brother-in-law also started playing on our league. They had enough family playing to make up their own line of forwards and have one defenseman.

I always figured it was just by sheer coincidence that the members from two different families loved playing together. This season, however, proved me wrong.

When I heaved my giant hockey bag into the locker room for the first game this season I was ecstatic to see four or five girls dressing. After beginning to converse with them, I learned that two of the ladies had been talked into playing by their husbands who also played with us. Both were beginner skaters and still learning to navigate the task of putting on all of their gear. I remember being in that same moment myself and wondering where all of the dozens of Velcro straps went.  One of the ladies mentioned having relied on closely watching her son get dressed in his gear to help.

It absolutely warms my heart to be out on the ice and see all of the encouraging and helpful family dynamics. What’s even better is that there are always smiles on all of our faces, regardless of if we fall down, miss a goal, or momentarily forget that stinkin’ offside rule. With kids, spouses, and siblings all out skating together, we make quite an interesting bunch. And during this week’s game on Sunday afternoon my fiancé, Andy, will be joining us for his first game of hockey. I watched with amusement last night as he practiced putting on all of his newly purchased gear for the first time. He had an anxious and excited look about him strapping it all on. When he finally stood up in all of and asked me to take his picture, I knew he was ready.

It is a hard task indeed to find a sport that all members of a family will participate in and truly love. But I can honestly say that hockey is one of them.     

Angela Jamison is a native Montanan and she grew up in beautiful Bozeman. I'm the mother of two girls and write a blog about our life here and taking in the simple pleasures of family and food. 

There’s an old song by Blues Traveler…”The Mountains Win Again” that sums up how I feel about the Bridger Mountains here in our our great valley.  They tend to beat me over and over.  They are in no way giant, dangerous peaks to summit but I am somewhat fascinated by them.  Maybe because they are right in our face here in Bozeman.  I see them out and about on runs, while driving in the car, from my front porch.  I gaze at the distinct peaks.  Maybe it’s because every year 250 people make the decision to take on the range with the 20-mile Bridger Run.  Part of me thinks that would be the coolest thing to have on my bucket list.  As an avid hiker in the area it seems like something one should do.  On the other hand, I really like my toe nails and don’t know that I have what it takes for all that.  I have different ideas for the Bridgers…hiking to the top of each of the named peaks.  And, this is where currently the mountains keep winning.

Hiking to Sacajawea Peak years ago gave me the first taste of wanting to stand atop each of them.  As the highest peak in the range and probably the most popular for hiking it was an obvious place to start.  Later that year I crossed Hardscrabble off the list.  Again..pretty simple because the trails for these two are so well used…totally beat the mountains on these.  But wait.  Shouldn’t get too cocky.  Next time up to Sacajawea we had to turn around at the saddle because of a wicked storm coming in.  Hmmm, things were starting to turn.

The next year (because I have young kids it’s only about once or twice a summer I get to attempt a harder hike without the family) I wanted to go for Saddle Peak.  My husband and I thought we’d try from the Bridger Bowl side.  There’s not a ton of information on trails that lead to many of the peaks in the middle of the range.  This is good and bad.  Good…the trails are less popular and you are more likely to get solitude on your hike.  Bad…it’s easy to go the wrong way.   In our case, the way we went did not work.  After hiking for a couple hours we looked up and realized we were actually further away from Saddle Peak than when we began which is very hard to do when you are hiking up.  Mountain wins.

We didn’t get a second attempt at Saddle until the next year…this time heading up from Middle Cottonwood Creek.  There were times the trail became less obvious towards the top and I thought we were again going to be defeated.  Second time around, however, brings a renewed determination and we scrambled our way to the top and felt success.  Second time was a charm.

This year I had Baldy on my list.  Having worked our way from the north end peaks towards the middle I wanted to try from the south.  Knowing if I have eventually done the entire Bridger Run trail in chunks maybe, just maybe, one day I’ll think about entering the race.  After reading a few things online I found there to be some controversy as to what was the true summit of Mt Baldy.  I figured there was no way to really know unless we gave it a try so we headed up from the M Trailhead.  Four and half miles up, thinking we were just about to the peak we saw the true summit in all its bald glory a couple miles ahead of us.  Again, we had begun a hike to a peak only to know we would not be reaching it.  Sadly we were running out of daylight and weren’t equipped to get to the peak and make it down in the dark.  With heavy hearts we turned around.  The mountain wins again.

BUT, I can cross the false summit of Mt. Baldy off my list.

It’s not over.  I will cross Baldy, Bridger and Naya Nuki off my list in the next couple of years.  I will leave Ross Peak for the rock climbers.  Maybe one day I will do the Bridger Ridge in its entirety.  The mountains may win and that is okay.  They have my respect and deserve to win every time.  I just feel fortunate to get to play in them once in awhile.