Juju’s class project
A fourth grader recently contacted the Herald looking for information about La Plata County for a class project. After finding some US Census information, I couldn’t think of a better way to bore a fourth grader to death than to forward them a spreadsheet, so I set about another data visualization. Click the image below to launch the project comparing La Plata County to Colorado as a whole.
post and dataviz by Josh Stephenson
The 100 inch mark
With snow falling again in Durango, we wanted to take a look at historical snowfall levels in Durango. Most entities keeping records measure snowpack, and normally this is done at weather stations in the high country or the airport, but the Western Regional Climate Center has a fairly extensive data set going back to 1893 (unfortunately ending in 1991). For this data visualization, we stripped out the summer months and go back to 1932 as records before then were quite sporadic. As it turns out, only 3 times in the almost 60 years shown here has Durango topped the 100 inch mark, and with the flakes a flyin’ is poised to do so again. Herald records this year pinned the number at 98.8, a mere 1.2 inches away before this storm moved in. While a bit tight on this real estate, click here or on the image above to view full size and browse month by month.
Morley Cowles Ballantine
When Herald Editor Morley Cowles Ballantine passed away recently at the age of 84, phone calls from former governors started coming in, emphasizing the impact she had not only in Colorado, but nationwide. Photographs of lunch with President John F. Kennedy at The White House emerged and others from around the globe showed another side of the influential woman. Reading published columns and editorials gave us a look into her past, and we wanted to share these things with our readers.
Below, you’ll find a few of those offerings that appeared with various articles on our website. A 360 degree panorama and video place you at the tribute given in Ballantine’s honor at Fort Lewis College. A slideshow compiled from family photo albums takes you through her life in images while audio highlights stories and commentary from those who worked with Ballantine over the years. Finally, a virtual magazine will allow you to flip through and read some of her work published in the pages of The Durango Herald.
In their Statement of new publisher when buying the newspaper in 1952, Arthur and Morley Ballantine wrote “We intend to compete hard for your interest against the many other excellent sources of news available to you, such as radio…”
With more sources of news today than ever before, distributed across more mediums, the Herald continues to compete for your interest. We hope to use all of the tools and technologies available to best present the information you need in the format you desire. To leave feedback for us, enter a comment on this post, use the feedback form on the home page of durangoherald.com, or call me, Josh Stephenson at 375-4565.
Click on above image to view a 360 degree panorama of the Morley Ballantine tribute at the FLC Community Concert Hall
Our Corner
The Durango Herald has launched a series of profiles with the project Our Corner. Take a few minutes to view the first few profiles and suggest someone to be included in future additions.
post and Our Corner project by Josh Stephenson
Timeline – Uranium in Colorado
For a series of articles by reporter Joe Hanel, we produced a time line of key events spanning 130 years.
post and timeline by Josh Stephenson with information from Reporter Joe Hanel
This is not a fun run
Endurance runners register for the Hard Rock 100 in Silverton with a variety of goals in mind, but winning is not usually one of them. One thing that amazed me about the winning woman was the interview after her 3rd place overall finish.
While a number of male competitors had spoken of the importance to stay mentally focused with eyes trained on the obstacles ahead, Diana Finkel conceded she looks around at wild flowers and wildlife to the point that she has become lost after running off the trail.
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post and content by Josh Stephenson
Animas-La Plata over the decades
When the Animas-La Plata project pumps began filling Lake Nighthorse after more than 40 years of legal and political fights, we compiled this timeline of key events in the project’s history as well as offering video with the article and photographs. Click on the dots for expanded information and use the sliders on the sides of the bottom rail to zoom in or out on the timeline.
post and timeline by Josh Stephenson
Snowdown videos, mapped
Snowdown is always filled with crazy competitions and questionable behavior. As best as we can, the Herald staff tries to accurately represent the festivities while not crossing the line into dangerous territory. The video above will give you a short taste of what we covered on the video front, but for a better look, visit the video map from the 2009 In Da Nile Snowdown. Also check out the 2008 Ye Olde Snowdown video map here.
Christmas Light Parade
For an article about this years Christmas Parade of Lights, we compiled a video and panoramas of some of the stunning decorations, including some maps to locate the homes and all the spots featured throughout the city and county. Click here or on the photo to enter the project.
post and project by Josh Stephenson
Durango Public Library opens
A week of special events accompanied the Grand Opening of Durango’s new public library, so along with 360 degree panoramas showing the new building, slideshows and video gave a look at the festivities including poetry classes, art presentations and barbershop quartets, culminating in fireworks above Rim Drive. Deanna Marcum from the Library of Congress even came to celebrate. The library has gone through a number expansion projects since Andrew Carnegie donated $12,500 for the original building over a century ago. The new facility came at a cost of 19 million. Click here or on the image to enter project.
post and project by Josh Stephenson
La Plata County Fair – 2008
What a busy week at the La Plata County Fair. Updated daily, this project ended up with 4 slideshows, 5 videos and 4 panoramas along with a schedule of events. Yodit Gidey and Jack Pincus compiled one slideshow, while the rest was done by yours truly. The demolition derby kicked off with a tribute to State Trooper Mark Dold, who died in a motorcycle crash and had been a staple at the event. The video includes a group building a tribute car to crash in his honor. Other fair staples here include the rodeo, midway and livestock competitions. Click here or on the photo to enter project.
post and most content by Josh Stephenson
2008 Election Map
Markers denote polling places while shaded areas contain results for that precinct.
FLC Spring Commencement
As one of our first attempts at panoramas, we included 2 from the Spring Commencement ceremony at Fort Lewis College, along with a video. While not perfectly aligned and not true 360 degree virtual reality panoramas, we hope this gives readers a better sense of what the event atmosphere was. Click here or on the image to enter project.
post and project by Josh Stephenson
