Tag: 2

While the word glamping sounds like a mistake, many Oklahomans might argue with that assessment. A portmanteau from “glamorous camping,” this luxurious form of getting into nature is an amped-up version of tents and sleeping bags. Many glamping destinations, from France to Colombia, promote beautiful sunsets and lakes in exotic locations … while not really roughing it at all. If you...

El Reno native Harvey Pratt, honored by his tribe and law-enforcement agencies across the country, didn’t think his work as a display and forensic artist was worthy of something as hallowed as the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian. Cheyenne and Arapaho artist Harvey Pratt's law enforcement career spans over five decades. A top U.S. forensic artist, he...

All signs point to vacations closer to home this summer. Oklahoma and its neighboring states offer scenic beauty, culture, history and even some quirky attractions just a few mini-van hours away. We explore some high points in Arkansas, Missouri, Texas and Kansas, as well as gems along Route 66 and some tourist spots to hit right here at home....

An increase in the prevalence of bugs during the spring and summer is a reality in Oklahoma. While encounters with insects and arachnids are usually harmless, one sting or bite can bring pain or long-term health problems to some. Wasps, bees, mosquitoes, spiders and ticks are the most common bugs Oklahomans encounter. The mosquito is perhaps the most irritating of...

Three Oklahoma submariners, who died with their shipmates during World War II, have been formally recognized for their ultimate sacrifices. The full honors and memorial came after their submarine, the USS Grayback, was finally found last year off the coast of Okinawa, where it sank in the East China Sea after being struck by a Japanese plane and several ships...

From Nofire to Nowhere, Oklahoma-born Wes Studi has a career that is anything but inconsequential. Studi, who received a Governors Award in October for lifetime achievement in film, is the first Native American actor to win an Academy Award. For more than three decades, he has portrayed strong, complex characters and helped break stereotypes common in the days when anglos...

Arnell Dean made his career choice as a teenager, thanks to Emergency, which ran on NBC for six seasons in the 1970s. The show’s paramedics, Roy DeSoto and Johnny Gage with Los Angeles County’s fictonalized Squad 51, were Dean’s heroes. “I watched it religiously,” says Dean, a 40-year emergency medical technician with EMSA in Oklahoma City. “Every episode, they saved...

Oklahoma on Film If there’s one popular concept that people from other states have learned about Oklahoma, it’s that the wind comes sweeping down our plains. Even though the cinematic version of Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein’s musical Oklahoma! was filmed in Arizona, the movies that are shot entirely or primarily here often reinforce a wide-open image of Oklahoma, where...

Quito, Ecuador, is an ideal base for cultural and ecological day trips around the country. The charming boutique hotel Portal del Cantuña is 50 feet from a prime area, Plaza de San Francisco. Once a 19th-century Franciscan convent, the hotel retains its original columns, relics and chapel. The colonial furniture, stained glass and greenhouse lobby exude Ecuadorean style, and the...

Outdoor cooking isn’t alone in appealing to aficionados. Ernest Hemingway, after all, writes in his 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises that those with passion and knowledge about any activity share common traits; he equates the matador of a bullfight with the conductor of a classic symphony. Given the popularity of grilling, smoking and barbecuing in Oklahoma, it’s easy to find...