Les Averill had a simple business strategy: Do whatever it takes to succeed.

Bigfork loses one-of-a-kind booster

Averill, who died Monday at age 85, left a lasting legacy on the shore of Flathead Lake.

He was the founder of Flathead Lake Lodge - a resort that Averill and his family have built up over more than 60 years into a facility known around the world for its Western hospitality.

While his imprint on the Bigfork area looms large because of the lodge, Averill had many other accomplishments: He was a commercial airline pilot at age 20, a military pilot, a pioneering wilderness outfitter, a wildlife cinematographer, a Christmas tree farmer and even a dedicated volunteer who helped shape the community of Bigfork.

We are glad to have called him neighbor.

Sometimes the selective nature of the enlightened environmentalist mind is too much to comprehend.

The Center for Biological Diversity in Tucson, Ariz., for example, announced Tuesday its "concerns about the environmental impacts of the Bush administration's plan to deploy 12,000 additional troops and agents to the U.S.-Mexico border."

It seems those boots on the ground might kick a cactus or two while hunting down illegal immigrants. Perhaps the Center for Biological Diversity will even be demanding an environmental impact statement to assess the federal government's actions.

We just have to wonder the obvious: Where's the concern about millions of illegal immigrants trampling delicate desert flora and spooking, if not eating, precious wildlife every year? Where's the environmental impact statement? Where's the outrage?

Memo to folks at the Center for Biological Diversity: The Border Patrol and the National Guard are the cure for their worries, not the cause.

A graphic depiction of Lewis and Clark's epic journey through Montana is taking shape in Kalispell.

Kalispell Art Casting has the job of pouring liquid bronze to create a 16 1/2-foot-long, 8-foot-tall bas-relief sculpture that eventually will hang in the Senate chambers at the Montana Capitol.

Noted California sculptor Eugene Daub created the historical piece that is being cast here.

The finished artwork will in one scene sum up the Corps of Discovery. It will include the main characters - Meriwether Lewis, William Clark and Sacagawea - plus as many as 20 members of the expedition manhandling pirogues and canoes out of the Missouri River.

It promises to be an impressive addition to Montana history at the Capitol and give the Senate something to rival the House's signature artwork - Charlie Russell's famous wall mural of Lewis and Clark meeting Indians.