Ed Kemmick

Ed Kemmick has been a newspaper reporter, editor and columnist since 1980. Except for four years in his home state of Minnesota, he has spent his entire journalism career in Montana, working in Missoula, Anaconda, Butte and Billings. "The Big Sky, By and By," a collection of some of his newspaper stories and columns, plus a few essays and one short story, was published in 2011.

Recent Posts

Montana Mint’s pizza contest down to ‘Sweet 16’

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Voting is underway for the Montana Mint Second Annual March Madness Pizza Bracket Contest. Last year, you may recall, the winner was Eugene’s Pizza in Glasgow. The contest, sponsored by Montana Mint, the website whose stated mission is to “bring the best of Montana to the internet,” went live on March 16 this year. It is now down to the “Sweet 16.” Voting has already been so heavy, according to a press release from Montana Mint, that the website crashed and was down for nearly an hour on Friday. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Eugene's Pizza, March Madness Pizza Bracket Contest, Montana Mint

River group’s West End pond will be key trail connector

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Pond

The Yellowstone River Parks Association is the proud owner of a new piece of property—a 12-acre pond in the middle of an 17.6-acre parcel of land just behind the giant Scheels store on Shiloh Road. Darryl Wilson, president of the YRPA, said the land was given to the group in December by developer Joel Long. Now a partner in Shiloh Crossing LLC, Long was the founder of the JTL Group, which was bought out in 1999 by Knife River, a subsidiary of MDU Resources Group. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: News, Darryl Wilson, Joel Long, Scheels, Yellowstone River Parks Association

Prairie Lights: 3 cheers for state’s growing online news

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MFP

Talking to Martin Kidston last week, I almost felt as though I was interviewing myself again. The former Missoulian reporter quit his job at the end of December and launched an online newspaper, Missoula Current, in early January. “I just decided I didn’t want to work for a corporate paper,” he said. “It’s a broken template, really.” (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: Prairie Lights, John Adams, Martin Kidston, Matthew Frank, Missoula Current, Mountain West News, O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West, School of Journalism

Creativity flows at meeting on future of power plant land

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Ali

At a meeting called to envision future use of a 74-acre riverfront site that until recently held a coal-fired power plant, participants were encouraged to use their imaginations. That they did, coming up with activities and attractions for the old J.E. Corette plant site that included sport fields, an amphitheater, disc golf, picnic areas, a museum, restaurants, a brewery, high-density housing and a zip line to the site from the towering Sacrifice Cliffs across the Yellowstone River. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: News, Darryl Wilson, Ed Gulick, Four Dances Natural Area, J.E. Corette plant, Jennifer Merecki, Our Montana, PPL Montana

Atlantic writers visit the Aabergs in Chester

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Hills

Writing on The Altantic magazine’s website, Deborah Fallows pays a fine tribute to composer-pianist Philip Aaberg, and a fine tribute to Chester, the Hi-Line town where Aaberg was born and where he now lives again. The piece is part of American Futures, a project I had not previously heard of. It involves Fallows and her husband, longtime Atlantic contributor James Fallows, flying all over the country in a single-engine plane, sort of a technologically upgraded version of “Travels with Charley.” Here’s a good excerpt from the article, which also has plenty of links to Aaberg’s music:

“Aaberg says, ‘I love this land. There is something about this country that really opens me up.’ Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Chester, Deborah Fallows, James Fallows, Philip Aaberg, The Atlantic

Patient details ‘awful’ time at clinic, hoping to help others

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Clinic bill

On the last day of February, Tahani Nelson needed help, and she thought she knew how to get it. She and her husband had moved back to Billings from Malta last summer and she had not yet found a primary care provider, but all she needed was a new prescription for Zoloft, to deal with the depression she had been diagnosed with at 18. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: News, Billings Clinic, Bob Dalrymple, Carol Christensen, Chad Miller, Dr. Bob Merchant, Jim Duncan, Penny Struckman

Assistant AG says Red Lodge police raid ‘inappropriate’

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Bearcreek

An assistant state attorney general has declined to file charges arising from a drug raid that Red Lodge police officers carried out on a house in Bearcreek. Brant Light, chief of the Prosecution Services Bureau in the AG’s office, also said in a letter to Carbon County Attorney Alex Nixon that he believed the Bearcreek search, conducted by police officers without the prior approval of the Carbon County attorney or sheriff, “was inappropriate.” (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: News, Alex Nixon, Bearcreek, Brant Light, Carbon County, Joel Todd, Josh McQuillan, Montana Attorney General

In search of balance, yoga teacher scales business back

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Kiner

Downtown Billings business owner Sharli Kiner is back to where she started—running her Limber Tree Yoga Studio at 212 N. 29th St. On Monday, she pulled the plug on her second location, at 2710 First Ave. N., just about a year after she opened it. Since announcing the closure, she said, a lot of people have approached her to say how sorry they were to hear the news, more or less offering their condolences. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: News, Bill Honaker, Downtown Billings Alliance, Limber Tree Yoga, Lisa Harmon, Marcia Honaker, Securities Building, Sharli Kiner

In Montana, it’s boom time for beer drinkers, barley growers

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Courtney

In case you hadn’t noticed, Montanans like their beer. Increasingly, they like their craft beer. At last count, there were 60 craft breweries operating in Montana, with five more scheduled to open early this year. More and more often, Montanans order their beer not by the brand, but by the type: India pale ale, Pilsner, Scotch ale, stout, wheat and dozens more. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: Montana, Beavercreek Brewery, Bureau of Business and Economic Research, Jim Devine, Malteurop, Mark Black, Matt Leow, Milo Mattelin

Prairie Lights: On reptiles, patsies and Founding Fathers

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Underwood

In the midst of one of the strangest, most outlandish, stark-ravingly maddest election cycles in the history of the United States, a surprising number of voters have turned to me for guidance. I was tempted to tell them all to take two aspirin and go to bed until the third week of November, but that seemed a trifle irresponsible. So, I will attempt to answer all the questions to the best of my limited abilities. Here goes. (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: Prairie Lights, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Frank Underwood, Hillary Clinton, John Adams, Kevin Spacey, Ted Cruz