High Country News founder marks 40th year in print with a prediction: ‘God won’t save us now’
By Ray Ring
From the August 20, 2010 issue of High Country News Lander, Wyoming — Ask Tom Bell, the man who founded High Country News 40 years ago, what keeps him going these days, and he rattles off a list of pills for dizziness, blood pressure and cholesterol, plus a diuretic and an antidepressant. “Don’t ever get old,” he says wryly. “It’s terrible, awful.” He’s made it to 86, mostly thanks to the fire in his belly. An eye patch conceals a wound from a World War II bombing mission, where German flak blew out his right eyeball. The dizzy spells — caused by a chronic inner-ear problem — force him to walk extra carefully, and he wears two hearing aids. Yet Bell is pleased to show me some of the places that shaped his Western brand of environmentalism. He puts on a tan cowboy hat and a leather jacket against the chill of the late-spring snowy day. We climb into his car, a 2005 Toyota Prius that he bought used last year. He fumbles a bit with the car’s computer touch-screen and the controls for the heater and windshield-washer. He gets 35 miles per gallon in town and 44 on the open road, but adds, “I’m still trying to learn all the gadgets on the darn thing.” He drives out of town through the roll of sagebrush and pastures where he has deep roots. “All these hills used to be full of grouse,” he says, pointing to the draw where he flushed a great explosion of the birds more than 75 years ago — still a vivid memory. He recalls other childhood encounters with coyotes, foxes, skunks, deer and flocks of geese feeding in the fields. … This story is supposed to be inspirational; after all, we’re celebrating HCN’s 40th anniversary this year. But Tom Bell won’t sugarcoat things. Out of the blue, he volunteers his view of what environmentalists have accomplished — and what the future holds for humanity. “In my mind,” he says, “we’ve cut our own throat.” That’s the message he wants to pass on. … He also takes comfort in his faith. He became a born-again Christian in 1974, when he walked to the front of a Lander church congregation and announced, “I’m turning my life over to Jesus.” His walls are decorated with a stained-glass cross and religious sayings, such as: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change …” Even though God has “gotten us out of many scrapes,” Bell says, “God won’t save us now. I think God is going to let the string run out on us. He’s finally lost his patience.”
