Four years ago, Kalispell resident George Colonius received a call from his credit card company asking if he was traveling in Great Britain and South Africa. He’d never been to either country. But his credit card number had. Turns out, Colonius had spent almost $14,000 there in just a few days. He still doesn’t know […]

MISSOULA – A University of Montana lab technician was injured Thursday in what was described as a small explosion in a chemistry laboratory on the UM campus in Missoula. University spokesman Cary Shimek says an ambulance took the woman to a hospital. Shimek declined to release the woman’s name. He said he was told by […]

BILLINGS – A Montana biologist has withdrawn his claim in a recent study that a rabbit species has disappeared from the Yellowstone area. Joel Berger, a senior scientist with the Wildlife Conservation Society, said Thursday that he has been contacted by at least six biologists and naturalists refuting his conclusions about the white-tailed jack rabbit. […]

A nonprofit crime-solving organization in Philadelphia is looking into the unsolved murder of a television news reporter from Columbia Falls. Jennifer Servo, 22, was beaten and strangled in Texas in 2002. The nationally recognized Vidocq Society has agreed to take on the case, said Servo’s father, Norm Olson. The organization includes forensic professionals and private […]

The Kalispell Police and Flathead County Sheriff’s reports for Wednesday included the following: 8:31 a.m. Someone ran over a bald eagle on U.S. Highway 2. 9:06 a.m. An irate woman went over to her soon-to-be ex-husband’s house, ripped out a metal lawn ornament and keyed his car. She then yelled that she wanted to burn […]

Last summer, Bernadette Larson packed her bags in Minnesota and headed to a new job in the Flathead, arriving with hopes of revitalizing the American Red Cross in Northwest Montana. Fast-forward nine months and Larson is job searching, a casualty of Red Cross’s widespread financial struggles. Larson, the program specialist for Red Cross in Northwest […]

Wow, that was quite a series. Seven long weeks of finger-wagging advice. Now it’s time for a little higher math to bring it all together. Ok, I lied, I’m not going to assault you with higher math, but I do want to make a point about something I spend a good deal of time talking […]

Voters in Bigfork said “no” to an expanded high school, for a second time. The $11.1-million Bigfork High School construction bond was denied with a vote of 1,209 for, and 1,458 against. This was a renewed effort by the Bigfork School Board to pass the high school bond. The first election was for expanding and […]

Good morning and happy Crispus Attucks day. On the Beacon this morning, Bigfork voters once again rejected a bond to expand, renovate and upgrade the high school. The Northwest Montana Red Cross has been closed due to lack of finances, and big questions loom as to whether, and how, the organization can continue to exist […]

Fish Wildlife and Parks is considering cutting back the “no-wake” restrictions on Echo Lake, and extending the zone on Swan Lake. The possible changes at Echo Lake would eliminate the no-wake speed about 0.25 miles southeast of the entrance to Blackies Bay, and the corridor entrance to both Blackies and Causeway bays. FWP received four […]

At the end of April, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne will suggest new rules for carrying loaded guns in national parks that will likely relax the restrictions to bring them more in-line with state laws. In Montana, where gun restrictions are relatively few, carrying loaded weapons could be permitted in Glacier and Yellowstone national parks. Both […]

As four members of the Glacier Nordic Ski Team head to Alaska for the junior national championships, Larry Bruce can’t get enough praise in fast enough. As coaches for the team, he and his wife Molly prepped the kids for this chance. “It’s not a walk-on deal at all,” said Bruce. “You’ve really got to […]

As Whitefish’s own radio station celebrates its first year of broadcasting, The Big Fish adds to its collection of Montana musicians when Rob Quist premieres his Thursday morning musical program this week. “This new collaboration with Rob and WhitefishRadio.com is just a natural,” says owner Ross Strauser. Known across Montana for his singing, songwriting, and […]

If you were expecting a riff from me on the Whitefish doughnut war, sorry, but something else is jammed in my craw: Crummy science and even crummier science journalism. Around Valentines Day, the Associated Press reported on Wildlife Conservation Society scientist and University of Montana professor Joel Berger’s “discovery” that jackrabbits have disappeared from Yellowstone […]

I neither suck down vitamins nor have an ideal diet, but I rarely get laid up. And when I do, it’s only under extreme circumstances. By extreme, I mean it takes more than a fever or runny nose to keep me out of the office. My first sick day in recent memory began at 4 […]