• Season 1 Preview
    Aug 21 2019

    The Modern West is getting a reboot! New host, new theme music, and brand-new stories just for this podcast. Season 1 starts September 17. (more…)

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    4 mins
  • Episode 1: Carpetbagger
    Sep 17 2019

    You ask around, and people can’t agree on a quintessential Wyoming writer. And if you can’t identify the literature of a place, you can’t define the place. Authors including CJ Box and Craig Johnson weigh in. (more…)

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    29 mins
  • Episode 2: Both/Neither
    Sep 24 2019

    The U.S. government only allows Native Americans to register with one tribe. But what happens when two tribes share one reservation for over a century? Two women grapple with how that affected their identity growing up. (more…)

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    18 mins
  • Episode 3: Adult-Onset Hunting
    Oct 1 2019

    The number of Americans hunting and fishing is declining, but women are bucking the trend. Host Melodie Edwards finds a sisterhood at an all-women hunting camp—and catches her first fish with her dad. (more…)

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    22 mins
  • Episode 4: The Midwife
    Oct 9 2019

    Most births are uncomplicated. So in rural areas where hospitals are shutting down, women want to give birth at home. Now, states across the country are legalizing and regulating midwifery so they can. This is the story of one rural state, one midwife, and one brand-new mama. (more…)

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    26 mins
  • Episode 5: Belonging
    Oct 23 2019

    Young people from Gen Z are moving to cities around the West. But in doing so, they’re also out-migrating from rural hometowns in places like Wyoming and New Mexico. Conversations between young people about why they leave and why they stay. (more…)

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    24 mins
  • Episode 6: The Next Yellowstone
    Nov 6 2019

    Imagine Congress agreeing to create national forests and wildlife refuges these days. Probably wouldn’t happen. So when a billionaire realized a large swath of the Great Plains needed special protections he decided to do it himself, without the government’s help. His dream is for a new kind of privately-owned national park–one as expansive as Yellowstone.

    (more…)

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    49 mins
  • Episode 7: Bringing The Buffalo Home
    Nov 13 2019

    It’s been over a century since the U.S. government exterminated bison from the Great Plains as a way to win the war against the Native American tribes there. But now reservations across the West are working to bring them back. (more…)

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    28 mins