Candle light vigil at the Jr. High, watching my son and a hundred of his teenage classmates be forced to grow up way faster than they should have to. Kids are connected to so many via school, family, & friend networks, that when one is lost the reverberations are broad & deep. Tragedy upon tragedy.

Gun control, now please. Actually, yesterday, please. Another gun fatality in Orem today, & this one much closer to home. Why do we live in a world where now BOTH of my teenage children personally know a kid whose life was ended this way. Curses upon our society for everyday we look the other way.

Dear Apple Cider and Apple Cider-flavored treats, Many other have abandoned you for Pumpkin Spice, but know that I never will. I remain true to you, my original PacNW autumnal flavor love. Eternally yours, Me

Trying to scroll less. Social media algorithms feed content to create outrage (they've learned outrage = more consistent engagement). Also, sm is a HORRIBLE source for news/info. Scroll less. Use intentional processes to get news/info from trusted sources. www.nationalgeographic.com/health/artic...

Just when you think we were already in the dumbest timeline, a certain someone goes and opens their mouth and…

Not to be missed! Now, someone do a comparative project with the US-Canada border too!

My teenage (drummer) son is developing his own musical tastes. Currently, Dr. Dog's "Fate" is his top LP (proud dad moment!). The upcoming LP by French band Totorro (who he LOVES playing along to) will be my 1st time watching him geek out over new tunes. I can't wait! www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXzp...

Need a new word for the hypocrisy in US politics of politicians 100% lying or applying shamelessly flagrant double standards (even though we can expose hypocrisy via video, audio, docs, social posts, etc.!) because monied power structures protect them, they’ve done it before without consequence…1/2

What a team! Congrats to CSU & all involved. Our scholarly community will all benefit from your hard work. And a million thanks to Anne F. Hyde and everyone at Oklahoma who did such good work with the Western Historical Quarterly over the past decade! #AmWest 🗃️ #WHA2025 (Screenshot from WHA FB Page)

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In addition to being my guest on @writingwestward.bsky.social, @adamsowards.net interviewed me for Taking Bearings. Access to the full interview requires a (very reasonably priced) subscription. Come for the history talk, stay for the embarrassing 1994 photo. www.adamsowards.net/developing-e...

TFW you spend years making a scholarly intervention from various angles & continue seeing works make the same omissions & exhibit the same blind spots you were trying to point out. Yes, I'm being obnoxiously vague. Just let me vent. Sometimes the void have been screaming into was, indeed, a void.

Looked at my data collections for state-backed activity. If the report were a picture:

I learned so much by spending some time reading over Adam's last decade of public writing. This is a conversation (and a body of work) I can't recommend strongly enough to all of my academic friends.

Today I may break my record for the number of social media posts typed out, left un-posted for a bit, and then deleted.

I, for one, am a fan of the constitution. Others disagree. Schmecks and Schmalances, apparently.

I didn't have "@themountaingoats.bsky.social featuring Lin-Manuel Miranda on an advanced single from an upcoming concept album about shipwrecked fishermen and presented as a very orchestral musical soundtrack" on my bingo card for today, but I'm here for it! www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqMW...

Remember people assuring us that we were overreacting and that he would rise to the dignity of the office or that the office would somehow smooth over his baser tendencies?

Normally I would be down in Flagstaff to introduce this keynote (like I did in previous years with Terry Tempest Williams and Stephen Pyne), but my schedule wouldn't allow it this year. :( Thankfully, everyone can live stream the event!

Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia: doi.org/10.5281/zeno... We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity. 1/n

Making mischief in the Great Salt Lake with the Utah Historical Society this morning. I’ve done many a hammock #MountainOffice, #DesertOffice, and one #LakeOffice (on a boat in Utah Lake), but I’ve never done a #LakeOffice literally sitting in a lake. 🤣

Never let anyone tell you that satire has lost its edge or utility these days. www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/oth...

This is opposite of what celebrating America's 250th should look like. I would have been shocked if AI hadn't created fake quotes. 🤦 gizmodo.com/trumps-new-h...

Despite having taught at BYU for 10 years & at 4 other universities in the 8 years prior, the night-before-the-first-day-of-classes stress dreams hit hard around 4:00 AM. Flat Vespa tires, unlocatable classrooms, incomplete syllabi, missing article clothing…got a bit of everything last night. 😵‍💫🤣

Fascinating! Maybe I should have been a food historian. (Actually, I do have a food history project on a back burner that I'll get around to someday...) slate.com/life/2025/09...

Finally summited Mt. Timpanogos via the seldom-visited southern ridgeline. 17 miles (5 of which was no-trail shwhack and rough ridgeline scrambling) with over 7,000 ft vert. Gorgeous. Now I can look up from my yard & say, “I’ve done that entire ridgeline” (I did the northern section previously). 😍

15ish years ago I discovered Nick Drake's album Five Leaves Left & was mad that no one had tipped me off earlier. This week I feel similarly betrayed RE Joe Cocker's 1969 debut LP "With a Little Help from My Friends." I knew "of" him but hadn't really listened before. www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIIz...

🫩 It’s truly exhausting 🫩

Most excellent news! #utpol apnews.com/article/utah...

Environmental Historians! What are your favorite digitized archival collections or resources for undergraduates to use? I'm directing a senior capstone seminar on (North American Environmental History theme). I know that new primary sources are digitally released daily. What are your favorites?

Agree with Nebraska state Senator Megan Hunt. Don’t sully the Cornhusker name. www.facebook.com/share/p/1Egr...

Unexpected surprise seeing my hometown featured in the Journal of the West. Look out Bellingham, you’ve made it to the big time now!

However bad you were taught that slavery was, I guarantee that it was incomprehensibly worst. The teaching the messiness of history is not anti-American. It’s takes strength to acknowledge dark pasts & doing so speaks to a nation’s strength. Whitewashing history is the cowards way out.

Pair this with Wendy Warren's Pulitzer Prize finalist book, "New England Bound: Slavery and Colonization in Early America." amzn.to/4mLE7Cd

Unbelievable...except given his track record it's 100% believable. 😖

The Western History Association conf. program looks great. #WHA2025 will be my 20th in a row. Keeping the streak alive & looking forward to seeing w/ old friends, making new ones, recruiting authors for my @unmpress.bsky.social "The West in Context Series," etc. www.westernhistory.org/2025/program

You almost never see/hear/read a person-on-the-street quote in which that person is saying "Yeah, immigrants are great." If it hates it rates just like if it bleeds it leads, and we get a disproportionate number of right-wingers sharing their hate and disinformation about immigration from msm.

I've been saying this for years. A "patriotism" that can't wrestle with messy history reveals weakness, not strength. It lacks belief that one's nation has the capability to do better. That ain't me. "Are we such weak, fragile people that we can’t view the full length and breadth of our history?"

Just saw a dude eat two raw salmon filets while walking around the grocery store. He straight up grabbed a shrink-wrapped package, opened it, held the filet skin side down, gnawed all the flesh off, and then picked up the 2nd one and did the same thing. Normal looking dude, but clearly not normal. 🤯

I’ve worried about this broadly for years - what will the devolution of public discourse do to my kids’ generation. The cruelty, indifference, mocking suffering, etc. of this “Sadopopulism” is terrifying. We need leaders who challenge us to be our best and better, not indulge our worst.

Although I am still taller than my (almost 15 year old) son, his legs are already longer than mine & he’ll probably pass me up in height by year’s end. Awesome. But here’s what I’m not sure how to feel about: I just got hand-me-down pants from him—ones we bought him but he outgrew before wearing. 🤷‍♂️🤣

A bit later in the month than I like, but it's been a crazy August so far. This conversation and Sullivan's book was really fascinating.

A roving band of archivists (whose jobs were recently defunded and cut) threatened to paper-cut me with stacks of NARA call slips, forced me to transcribe low-quality microfilm images of 19th century Dept. of Interior correspondence, and then mocked my paleography skills.

Today was a good day

"this product is good because it's like having a pocket full of PhDs" just suggests to me you've never actually been in a room with a bunch of experts on a topic. You think you're going to come away with a quick, simple, easy-to-digest summary of their expertise? Think again.

I fundamentally disagree with the foundational premises of this report. What the committee takes as settled, I very much do not.

Successfully guided my parents through transferring everything to new phones and getting those all set up...remotely from 950 miles away. I feel like there should be a formal award for this that I could put on my CV.

If the Pres. can declare things he doesn’t like “fake news,” then I can too, right? I desperately want another couple weeks of July, so I’m declaring the calendar is fake. It’s not August 1st because I don’t want that to be true.

With news that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is shutting down due to Trump’s meddling, it’s worth watching Mr. Rogers testifying to the Senate about the real value of what we’ve all lost.