Last Best News (https://montana-mint.com/lastbestnews/author/edkemmick/page/56/)
Tucked into a corner just inside the front door of the Western Art Forum, a new gallery in downtown Billings, is an elegant blue easy chair. Gallery owner Kira Fercho, an artist known for her vibrant oil paintings, designed the chair and said it represents the kind of art—slightly Western but also mid-century modern—she wants to display and sell at the gallery. (more…) Continue Reading →
A variety of back-roads history tours and talks on historic preservation are on tap this week in Red Lodge, which is hosting the third Montana Preservation Road Show. Organized by the Montana Preservation Alliance and numerous other partners, the road show debuted in Dillon in 2012 and continued in Lewistown in 2014. This year, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the Red Lodge road show is expanding from three days to four to accommodate more speakers and day tours. (more…) Continue Reading →
I told myself I wouldn’t write about Donald Trump again. But if I may quote the late Jim Harrison, writing in another context entirely, “it was like trying not to think of a white horse.” Trump is lodged so firmly in my mind, and in the minds of millions of my fellow Americans, that love him or hate him it is hard not to think about him. (more…) Continue Reading →
I’m not sure what I was expecting when I went to the Donald J. Trump rally Thursday afternoon, but I wasn’t expecting anything quite so low key. There were probably 6,000 or 7,000 people on hand, and while they waved signs and cheered loudly enough, it seemed to me that they were mostly excited about the fact that they were finally able to attend a Trump rally, rather than passionate about Trump himself. What was even more surprising was that Trump seemed so much less menacing in person. All the comparisons with Hitler seemed ludicrous. He’s no Hitler and he’s no Mussolini. Continue Reading →
Skylar Petrik has some misgivings about Donald Trump, but he can’t wait to cast his first vote in a presidential election for the billionaire developer. Petrik, an 18-year-old from Sidney, flew his Cessna-172 to Billings for the Trump rally in the MetraPark arena Thursday afternoon, and he brought two friends with him. (more…) Continue Reading →
Starting at 9 a.m. six days a week, the donations start flowing into the Montana Rescue Mission Bargain Center at 1233 S. 24th St. W.
There is clothing, great heaps and mountains of clothes for men, women and children for every season of the year. There are dishes and appliances and housewares of all kinds, rivers of fabrics and linens, back-breaking numbers of books and record albums, exercise equipment, luggage, Christmas decorations, lighting fixtures and a million and one of the gewgaws with which people decorate their homes. (more…) Continue Reading →
Some of the biggest names behind the biggest names in Nashville will be performing in Red Lodge next month. The occasion is the first Red Lodge Songwriter Festival, set for Thursday-Saturday, June 23-25, and it will feature songwriters who have penned hits for Blake Shelton, Miley Cyrus, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakam, Rascal Flatts, George Strait, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Randy Travis, Patty Loveless and Alison Krauss, among others. (more…) Continue Reading →
Sacred Harp singers who gather one Sunday a month at St. Andrew Presbyterian Church in Billings are resolutely informal. “No auditions required,” says a flier inviting all comers to the gatherings. “No musical experience required. No rehearsals or performances required. Continue Reading →
When I got to the third paragraph of a new book from the Montana Historical Society Press, I was hooked. “Beyond Schoolmarms and Madams: Montana Women’s Stories” is a collection of 98 short pieces about notable women or topics germane to the history of women in Montana. The first piece is titled “Nineteenth-Century Indigenous Women Warriors,” and here’s that third paragraph: (more…) Continue Reading →
Well, this is pretty cool. Local Kitchen and Bar, which we profiled when it opened and where we have eaten many times since, was selected by Travel and Leisure as the best farm-to-table restaurant in Montana. The short article doesn’t say whether Lynn Donaldson-Vermillion helped Travel and Leisure make the selection, but it does quote her extensively. If you haven’t checked out Lynn’s elegant, mouth-watering Last Best Plates website (great name, too!), here’s your chance. Local Kitchen chef Travis Stimpson worked at some great downtown Billings restaurants—Walkers Grill, Cafe Italia and Lilac—before deciding to bring a bit of the downtown to the West End, just off Shiloh Road and Grand Avenue at 1430 Country Manor Blvd., to be exact. Continue Reading →
