Peter Anderson covered mountain town beats for the The Mountain Mail, the Pueblo Chieftain and the Denver Post. After writing several regional histories and a dozen children’s books on natural history and the American West, he taught writing and literature at Salt Lake Community College, Earlham School of Religion, and Adams State University.

His most recent books include Heading Home: Field Notes (Conundrum Press, 2017), a collection of flash prose and prose poems exploring rural life and the modern day eccentricities of the American West which won the 2018 nonfiction award from the Colorado Authors League ; Going Down Grand: Poems from the Canyon (Lithic Press, 2015), an anthology of Grand Canyon poems, which was nominated for a Colorado Book Award; and First Church of the Higher Elevations(Conundrum Press, 2015), a collection of essays on wildness, mountain places, and the life of the spirit. Peter lives with his family on the western slope of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains where he helped launch the Crestone Poetry Festival, an annual gathering of southwestern poets. Visit his website at petehowardanderson.com.

Heather Draper has worked in journalism for most of her career, in both editing and reporting. She started at a small daily newspaper in Iowa, and ended as a reporter at the Denver Business Journal. In between she worked as a business reporter at the Rocky Mountain News, an energy reporter at Dow Jones Newswires in Singapore, and a business editor at the San Antonio Express-News. She discovered Crestone a few years ago during a foray to the Great Sand Dunes. Apparently, the vortex is strong with her, because she and her spouse Amy recently bought a house in Chalet 1. They’ll split their time between Crestone and Lakewood until they can find a way to both work remotely from Crestone.

Gussie Fauntleroy has worked as a writer, editor, and community-focused journalist for more than 30 years in New Mexico and Colorado. She is the author of three books on visual artists and editor on several others. A Crestone/Baca resident since 2009, she has a deep appreciation for the gifts of community and place, having been raised in a US Air Force family and living in multiple states, Canada, France, and Japan. In Crestone she also serves on the board of the nonprofit Informed Final Choices. She has been a contributing feature writer for the Eagle for 10+ years, combining her love of community with a passion for communication that is intelligent yet accessible, meaningful, and clear. Visit her website at gussiefauntleroy.com.

Rick Hart works as a Real Estate Broker in Crestone. He enjoys helping people relocate to this beautiful mountain community, as well as managing all elements of his small business, including sales, marketing, and accounting. Prior to moving here with his wife in 2016, Rick lived in Asia for over a decade.

During this time overseas, Rick first encountered the concept of a news desert. Having had access to a multitude of North American dailies his entire life, he suddenly found himself with almost no English-language news. He eventually discovered a few English-language dailies which, despite limited budgets, persevered in delivering news to an underserved population.

Rick loves this community. By keeping us informed, The Crestone Eagle also keeps us resilient and close-knit, if not always in agreement.

Marge Hoglin worked as a daily newspaper reporter and editor on the Front Range, while earning a master’s degree in journalism at CU Boulder and raising two kids. After 10 years in the magazine publishing business, she owned and operated a retreat center/bed and breakfast just south of Rocky Mountain National Park for 14 years. She sold that business in 2007 and moved to Saguache, intending to get away from the crowds, get involved in a small community and “give back.” As president of the Friends of the Saguache Public Library for three years, she organized and led the successful effort to form the Northern Saguache County Library District. In 2012 she co-founded Saguache Works, a 501(c)3 nonprofit that established the 4th Street Food Store, Blue Earth Thrift, the BEBOP exercise studio and various other programs, and served as its volunteer executive director until “retiring” again and moving to Crestone in 2017. Marge currently manages the Crestone Food Bank and very much enjoys being a part of this community.

I picked up a camera at 17 and started selling photos to the local paper.

In college studying photojournalism I earned a reputation for breaking news and was soon freelancing for the Arizona Republic and Phoenix Gazette.

Out of college, I learned my writing and editing chops under editor Billie Blair at the Taos News as regional editor.

Once in Colorado I was chief photographer and reporter for the Summit Sentinel. I also freelanced for the Denver Post, the Rocky Mountain News, the Fort Collins Coloradan, Associated Press, UPI and Blackstar agency. I became a managing editor for Breckenridge magazine in the early nineties and began working with color desktop publishing in its earliest years. I turned that into a graphic design company.

In 1995, I began teaching film and darkroom classes for Colorado Mountain College including documentary and basic photography. I’ve been teaching ever since and now include basic digital photography and multimedia graphic design classes online. I also taught photojournalism for Community College of Denver. I also created a non-profit art center and served as college vice president of adjunct affairs.

Upon moving to Crestone last year, I began mentoring at the Crestone Charter School and joining the Crestone Eagle non profit board. I’ve been traveling through the San Luis Valley since the mid-eighties and am thrilled to now call this home!

Photo by Carrie Click, CMC

Michael Reid grew up in Nebraska and spent most of his adult life in Denver before moving to Crestone. He graduated from Doane College and attended graduate school at Phillips Universitat in Germany as a Fulbright Scholar and Indiana University as a Ph.d. candidate in history. He has worked in the market research industry since leaving academia and conducted studies for a number of newspapers including The Denver Post, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Boston Globe and The New York Post. He is currently writing a market research textbook.