Episode Details

It's time to take a look at what's happening around Wyoming, for Monday, May 19th. I'm Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - Brought to you by the Wyoming Community Foundation, who asks you to give back to the place you call home. "5 to thrive" is YOUR opportunity to leave a legacy for generations to come. Support the community nonprofits you care about with a gift through the Wyoming Community Foundation. Visit wycf.org to learn more.

The Powder River Basin's two largest producers continue to be the canary in Wyoming's coal mining industry.

Between them, Peabody Energy and Core Natural Resources (formerly Arch Coal) control a huge slice of Wyoming's coal production, as shown by both companies in their 2025 first quarter earnings reports released last week.

But Cowboy State Daily's Greg Johnson reports that while both companies paint an optimistic picture of increased coal production and projections for the rest of the year, they're only a shadow of what the companies, and the Powder River Basin, used to be.

"Together, they produce about 60% 66% of all the coal that the Powder River Basin produces, which is a huge amount, but it's not, it's not even close to where it was 10 years ago, so or 11 years ago… those two companies still produce, their mines still produced 66% of the coal back in 2014, only back in 2014 they produced something like 250 million tons of coal, whereas… last year, you know, it wasn't even close. In fact, the entire basin last year only produced 185 million tons."

But the executive director of the University of Wyoming School of Energy Resources points out that while there's no denying the decline of coal, it's still Wyoming's dominant industry and isn't close to extinction.

Read the full story HERE.

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The Cokeville Elementary School hostage crisis happened 39 years ago on May 16, 1986, when former town marshal David Young and his wife Doris took some 154 children and adults hostage.

After a three-hour standoff, a gasoline bomb the couple was carrying went off prematurely, injuring Doris while David was out of the room.

But that's just the facts. Cowboy State Daily's Jake Nichols went deeper with his story honoring the anniversary of the dramatic event, in which none of the children were harmed - something described as miraculous by those who were there.

"Anyone I talked to said it was miraculous. What I found interesting is all the side stories that have never been fully fleshed out and told what drives a madman to even do this? How does his wife complicit? How does his teenage daughter, who struggles with he's dad, he's authoritative, but he's doing bad things, and she finally turns at the last second and runs to the cops and says, You gotta intervene. He's at the school now with a bomb. Her story isn't compelling. And then finally, the hardened cop, the lead investigator, who is the last guy who would accept that angels watched over the kids and miracles happen, like he was a grizzled cop and he came to believe there's no other explanation for why that whole school didn't blow up."

A madman tried but failed to shake the tightknit community's bonds and beliefs. David Young is buried in an unmarked grave. But Cokeville was raised from the ashes.

Read th