Joel Rhymer

Bird Skins. Portal, AZ.

Icteridae. Portal, AZ. The tag on the top bird reads "Icterus parisorum. April 7, 1885 near Fort Lowell. Arizona. Dr. E.A. Mearns." Known generally as Scott's Oriole, it was originally named in honor of General Winfield Scott, Commanding General of the US Army from 1841-1861. Scott is remembered for the forced removal of the Cherokee Nation and the capture of Mexico City in 1847.

Picidae. Portal, AZ. At top is a specimen of Melanerpes torquatus, or Lewis's Woodpecker. This particular bird was collected in central Arizona in the 1980's. The species, however, was first named in 1811 by the famous ornithologist Alexander Wilson in honor of Meriwether Lewis, who "discovered" the bird in 1805 on his exploration of the American West with William Clark. Lewis's original specimen, which he shot himself and carried in his backpack, still exists and is part of the collection of the Harvard Museum of Natural History. 

Piranga. Portal, AZ. 

Hepatic Tanager (Piranga flava). Portal, AZ.

Parulidae. Portal, AZ.

Cardinalidae 1. Portal, AZ.

Trogonidae. Portal, AZ.

Female Elegant Trogon (Trogon elegans). Portal, AZ.

Trochilidae. Portal, AZ.

Female Black-chinned Hummingbird (Archilocus alexanderi). Portal, AZ. This tiny bird is resting after having been trapped and then receiving a numbered metal band on her leg so that she can always be identified as an individual by modern scientists. The band is so small that she must be recaptured and magnification used in order to read the numbers. 

Sedona 11. Sedona, AZ. Dense smoke from a nearby wildfire blankets the Verde Valley as hot air balloons rise in the morning air. In our balloon above it all, our pilot, who has been flying over Sedona for 45 years, says he has never seen it like this.

Sedona 13. Sedona, AZ. Wildfire smoke over Sedona. 

Sedona 14. Sedona, AZ. More wildfire smoke over Sedona. Sedona is a bustling center of New Age tourism and pseudo-science, flavored with Native American spirituality, built around the belief that there are several "vortexes" where healing energy emanates from the spectacular rock formations around the town. Sedona is named after Sedona Schnebly, a farmer's wife who moved to the area around 1900 and served as the first Sunday School teacher there. According to US Census data, the population is less than 1% Native, and the median age, the per capita income, and home values are well above the state and national norms.

Marfa, TX.

Marathon, TX.

Kelso 10. Mojave National Preserve, CA.

Badlands National Park, SD.

Dragonfly. Arenas Valley, NM.

Hoover Dam, AZ. Other than the 19th century railroads and the 20th century interstate highways, there is likely no construction project that is responsible for opening up the American West for development more than Hoover Dam. And, there is no other public works project anywhere that commemorates itself more as an engineering marvel and also as a work of art. 

On the Arizona side of the dam, sculptor and artist Oskar J. W. Hansen created a panel of bas-reliefs to honor Native inhabitants of the West. This photo is a detail of the much larger sculpture, and the full inscription from the 1930's reads, "Since primordial times, American Indian tribes and nations lifted their hands to the great spirit from these ranges and plains. We now, with them in peace, buildeth again a nation."

(Note the almost Biblical language used here. By the 1930's, the continued development of the West was dependent upon the view that Native Americans had been subjugated and "civilized," thanks in large part to science and technology, and that they were now accepting and supportive of white settlers). 

Hoover Dam is named after Herbert Hoover, a mining engineer who in 1929 became the first US President born west of the Mississippi River. To alleviate unemployment during the Depression, his administration forcibly deported over one million Mexican Americans, the majority of whom were birthright citizens of the United States. (The mass deportations continued under FDR, and again in the 1950's under Eisenhower).

Abandoned Brothel. Crystal, NV.

9/11 Memorial. Bisbee, AZ.

Mexico City.

Swainson's Hawk (Buteo swainsoni). Val Marie, SK. Napoleon's nephew, Charles Lucien Bonaparte, identified this North American hawk as a unique species in 1832.

Doorman. El Paso, TX. The doorman at a historic downtown theater waits for the end of the night's performance - a poetry reading to raise funds for "El Paso Strong," the organization formed in response to the hate crime where a gunman killed 23 and wounded 22 on August 3 of 2019. Most of the victims were Mexican Americans or Mexicans who had crossed the border for shopping that day.

“The disappointing thing is that El Paso has always been the safest city in the US. Since that shit at the Walmart, whenever anyone thinks of us, it's something different."

" I grew up in LA," he continued. "There, everyone is always rushing to get to where they're going. Here, it's not like that. People still say, 'Yes, Ma'am' and 'No, Sir' and they'll hold the door for you." 

Ajo, AZ.

Engelmann's Prickly Pear (Opuntia engelmannii). Big Bend National Park, TX. Named after German botanist George Engelmann who traveled widely in the North American West in the 19th century.

Panamint Rattlesnake. Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, NV.  There are 32 species of rattlesnakes in the US. Crotalus stephensi is named in honor of the naturalist and explorer Frank Stephens who was the first director of the San Diego Museum of Natural History, although the Panamint people (now known as the Timbisha Shoshone) have lived in the Death Valley region for over 1000 years.

Iinnii. Paahtómahksikimi. 

Columbian Black-tailed Deer, Olympic National Park, WA. Common in coastal regions of the western US, Odocoileus hemionus columbianus was named in 1829 to honor Christopher Columbus.

Estes Park, CO.

Morning on the Border 1. Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, AZ. The national monument sits within the traditional homelands of the Tohono O'odham Nation, where many extended families live on both sides of the international border.

Morning on the Border 2. Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, AZ.

Death Valley National Park, CA.

Border Road. Potrillo, NM.

Creation. (Head of Chihuahuan Raven - Corvus cryptoleucus). Chiricahua Wilderness, AZ. 

Moonset. Death Valley National Park, CA.

Dome Fire 1. Mojave National Preserve, CA. Site of the ecologically destructive Cima Dome Fire which burned for 10 days in the northern part of the Mojave National Preserve in August, 2020. The fire, which was allowed to burn because firefighting resources were needed elsewhere in the state, covered over 43,000 acres and damaged an estimated 1.3 million trees in one of the largest Joshua tree forests in the world.

Dome Fire 2. Mojave National Preserve, CA.

Apache, AZ.

Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range, WY. The wild horse range is located within Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area, which in turn sits inside the reservation of the Crow (Apsaalooke) Nation. The horses are believed to be descendants of Spanish animals brought to North America perhaps as early as the 1400's. 

Feral Burros. Beatty, NV. Beatty is named after "Old Man" Beatty who was a rancher who lived on the north side of the town. Among its claims to fame is that Beatty used to be the site of annual Wild Burro Races that attracted participants from around the world. In 1972, an article in Playboy magazine generated so much adverse publicity that the races were discontinued. Today, local residents caution visitors to keep their car windows rolled up when they are approached by burros, who are known to stick their heads inside and eat everything they can grab. 

Trona, CA. In the film Will & Harper, Harper reveals that she once bought a house in the mining town of Trona, believing that it is the most isolated community she could ever find where she can live unbothered by others. Grass doesn't grow in Trona. The high school football team plays on a field of dirt. 

Palm Springs, CA.

Los Angeles, CA. I typically avoid photographs of street people because such photos can be exploitative and aggressive without adding anything productive to the ongoing discussion about health care, poverty, and inequality in the US. With that in mind, I've always been hesitant to share this photograph, and I've never put it on social media.

This was taken in July 2021 on the Red Line going from Hollywood to downtown Los Angeles. It was a hot and sticky afternoon. After the nightmarish first wave of 2020 and the initial round of vaccinations, COVID-19 was again making a nationwide surge. The mayor of LA had just issued a mask mandate that morning, and I was acutely aware of how crowded, dirty, and oppressively stuffy this train car was.

As I stood distanced as I could be from other passengers, this man got on board and alarmingly threw his bag from the door to the back wall. He collapsed into the corner with a loud and painful moan. For the remainder of my ride, he never moved his hand from his face. The scene...the composition, the subject, the timing...was impossible not to bear witness to.

Street people are unavoidable nearly everywhere, and I have noticed big changes in their numbers and visibility over time. This photograph breaks my heart in many ways. The world suffers on.

Hollywood, CA.

Morning Star. Elbow, SK (2023).

Bratt's Lake, SK. Smoke from wildfires over 600 miles away filters the sky.

Hartley Bay, BC.  Hartley Bay is the center of the Gitga'at First Nation on the North Coast of British Columbia. It is accessible only by boat or seaplane.

Hartley Bay, BC.

West Yellowstone, WY.

Dust Storm Over the Chisos. Big Bend National Park, TX.

Los Angeles, CA. A custodian washes spray paint from the gilded doors of a bank on Hollywood Boulevard.

Approaching Storm 2. Marfa, TX.

Mama Bear. Big Bend National Park, TX. Ursus americanus eremicus. The East Mexican Black Bear is one of 16 subspecies of North American Black Bear. Its range straddles the Rio Grande. It is considered to be critically endangered, especially in areas south of the border. Here, a young mama bear is keeping watch over her two cubs nearby in a trash-strewn gully.

Spirit Bear. Great Bear Rainforest, BC. Ursus americanus kermodei. Kermode Bears are another subspecies of Black Bear. They are found in a small isolated population in coastal British Columbia. About 1 in 10 of them exhibit a recessive gene for white fur, and they are known popularly as "Spirit Bears." Access to their territory is controlled by a coalition of First Nations people. The Kermode Bear was named in the early 1900's to honor Frank Kermode, the director of the Royal British Columbia Museum.

Dust Storm Over the Chisos 2. Big Bend National Park, TX.

Gila Bend, AZ.

Colorado Springs, CO.

Terlingua, TX.

Tucson, AZ.

Bagdad, CA.

Cook Bank Building. Rhyolite, NV. 

Jackson Street. Tucson, AZ. Jackson Street in downtown Tucson is named after rancher John A. Jackson who was killed by Apaches in 1870. 

Approaching Storm 1. Marfa, TX. They own the color of the sky. One of the largest multinational conglomerates based in the US has trademarked the paint color "Approaching Storm." They describe it as "a deep, mysterious purple. More than just dark, it's exciting and invigorating in its sense of drama."  

Hachita, NM. 

Pahrump, NV. The name "Pahrump" is believed to be derived from the Southern Paiute word Pah-rimpi which means "water rock." The word refers to the once-abundant groundwater sources that used to exist near the surface which supported livestock and agriculture when the area was first developed in the 1800's. Now the water sources have dried up and agriculture no longer exists in the area. The city, however, about an hour away from Las Vegas, is one of the fastest growing bedroom communities in the US.

Livingston, MT.

Langdon, ND. In the park between the elementary school and the day care center.

Abandoned House. Joder, NE.

Inside the Copper Queen. Bisbee, AZ. The Copper Queen Mine was the site of a contentious miners' strike in 1917, when profits were at an all-time high due to American involvement in World War I. A vigilante force of over 2,000 "deputies" rounded up the approximately 1,300 striking miners at gunpoint, loaded them onto railroad cars, drove them over 200 miles out into the desert, and abandoned them without food or water. Most of the strikers were of Italian or German descent. The incident is now known infamously as the "Bisbee Deportation." 

Bisbee, AZ.

Piranga 2. Portal, AZ.

Passeriformes. Portal, AZ.

Cardinalidae 2. Portal, AZ.

Kent, TX.

Marfa, TX.

Climate Protest. Fort Worth, TX. 

Ajo, AZ.

Great Sand Dunes National Park, CO.

A Marfa Light. Marfa, TX.

Bisbee, AZ.

Hemingford, NE. Inside an abandoned meeting hall on the prairie, a broken piano sits covered in droppings from the barn swallows that nest in the rafters above.

Big Bend National Park, TX.

Weyburn, SK.

Joder, NE.

Scenic, SD.

Roadside Cross. Emory Pass, NM (2024). Emory Pass is named for Major General William H. Emory who led an US Army expedition through here on the way to "liberate" California from Spain in 1846. Emory was a noted surveyor and naturalist, and the map he created from the campaign was later used by 49ers who overran California during the Gold Rush. Congressional interest in Emory's map of territories along the Rio Grande is believed to have led in part to the Mexican-American War, and Emory is remembered for his detailed maps of both the Canadian and Mexican borders which delineate the US. In addition to Emory Pass, his name is affixed to Emory Peak in Big Bend National Park and he is memorialized in the scientific names of at least two reptiles and several plant species of the southwest. There is even a crater on the Moon with his name.

Death Valley National Park, CA.

Garlock, CA.

Kenow Fire Scar. Waterton Lakes National Park, AB.

Bisbee, AZ.

Yellowhead Highway, BC.

Rodeo, NM.

Badlands National Park, SD.

Marathon, TX.

Lida, NV.

Crystal, NV.

Hachita, NM.

Whiskered Screech-Owl. Portal, AZ. Although it is fairly common throughout the Sierra Madre, there are only a few remote mountain canyons in southwest New Mexico and southeastern Arizona where the Whiskered Screech-Owl is found in the US. It is only one of countless plant and animal species not restricted by human geographical borders.

Pahrump, NV.

Just Another Good Vibration. Santa Monica, CA.

Bisbee, AZ. "Raining a river of color, and it's flowing Bisbee Blue." Calexico, "Bisbee Blue."

Burrowing Owl. Pine Ridge, SD.

Mescalero, NM. This place sits by the roadside within the Mescalero Apache reservation in southern New Mexico. According to many sources, it's where, in 1878, Buckshot Roberts made his last stand in a wild west gunfight commonly called the "Battle of Blazer's Mill." It involved Roberts, Billy the Kid, and The Regulators. 

Roberts, who apparently was in town on peaceful business but was targeted as a member of a rival gang, killed the leader of The Regulators, Dick Brewer, and wounded many others before being shot himself. Roberts held off perhaps as many as a dozen men after he holed up in the house. 

It was all part of what was known as the Lincoln County War, and Billy the Kid supposedly said of Roberts, “Yes sir, he licked our crowd to a finish.” In the 1988 movie Young Guns, Charlie Sheen played Dick Brewer, Emilio Estevez was Billy the Kid, and Brian Keith portrayed the mule-riding Buckshot Roberts who yells, "Let's Dance!" before opening fire. Roberts died the next day and was buried in the same coffin as Brewer on a nearby hillside which, like the house, is now covered in trash. 

Kenmare, ND.

Cottonwood, ID.

Tonasket, WA.

Bill, WY.  “East from Bill, north of Bill, the dirt roads north and east of Bill - whatever exactly it is, it is potent up there: unadorned curve of the earth.” - Merrill Gilfillan, Magpie Rising. (1988).

Glentworth, SK.

Wounded Knee, SD.