The Magic City of the Southwest

A People's Press

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 18:54:54 +0000

Print newspapers are becoming increasingly hard to keep alive. But for Maggie McGurie, print media isn't going anywhere in Southeastern Utah.

This story was produced for the Transom Traveling Workshop in Moab. Special thanks to KZMU Moab Community Radio, KDUR Durango, KikiBouba Press, The Moab Sun News, and Transom.

Music:
Martin Landström
Anna Ash

Poem: LOOK AT THE WAY THE MOUNTAINS HOLD THE SKY & THINK ABOUT WHAT IS BURIED IN A LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 21:03:43 +0000

As a prologue for a new season, Kirbie shares his land acknowledgement poem.

Some notes:

The 1890 census is a direct quote from the timeline section compiled by Native Voices, a division of the National Library of Medicine.

Sound design was provided by Epidemic Sound.

An earlier version of this poem was previously published in the Winter 2025 issue of Chapter House Journal.

Season Two: Coming Soon

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Sat, 07 Mar 2026 17:59:26 +0000

In 1881, an artist from New York visited Southwest Colorado when he created a print called "The Magic City of the Southwest." To the artist, 'magic' referred to industry, gold, and the illusion of the western frontier. On season 2 of The Magic City, we redefine 'magic'. We tell stories of the past, present, and future of this place.

We'll see you soon for more stories from The Magic City of the Southwest.

Written by Kirbie Bennett and Jamie Wanzek

Produced by Kirbie Bennett

Music:

Under The Dark Sky by Johan Glössner

The Poppy Garden Red by OTE

Below The Surface

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 06:51:00 +0000

In the 1950's residents living along the Piedra and San Juan Rivers in southern Colorado and northern New Mexico learned that their communities would be condemned and indundated by reservoir water, because a federal water reclamation project would move forward.

This episode tells the story of what happened to Raymond Gallegos' family when they were forced to relocate, and the lives they left behind.

Reporting, production, and musical scoring by Adam Burke for Magic City Studios.

Additional research and reporting by Jamie Wanzek.

The Fruit Wizard of Montezuma County

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 06:12:43 +0000

Today, you can find just a few remnant apple orchards in southwest Colorado. But in the early 1900s, one man envision that Montezuma County, Colorado would become an apple Mecca.

Was Jasper Hall's dream for this arid landscape an historic footnote, or was he a visionary ahead of his time.

This episode tells the story of a man who some people called the Fruit Wizard of Montezuma County.

Reporting, production, and musical scoring by Adam Burke for Magic City Studios.

Hardrock Mining: One Woman's Story

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 06:05:13 +0000

In the 1980's Janice Sanders was one of the few women who worked underground at the Sunnyside Mine, northeast of Silverton, Colorado. She enjoyed her career as a geologist, and she loved working underground. but she had to endure sexism and hateful treatment by some of her male co-workers.

The episode tells the story of one woman's experience working underground in the sunset years of hardrock mining in Colorado.

Reporting, production, and musical scoring by Adam Burke for Magic City Studios.

A Close Encounter With Nearly Forgotten History

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 20:20:13 +0000

History is under our feet and all around us. Old buildings, streets, statues and signs. We drive by remnants of the past every day, without giving them a second thought.

In this episode, the story of one man’s close encounter with a forgotten piece of history.

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Written and produced by Adam Burke and Jamie Wanzek.

Host: Jamie Wanzek

Sound design and musical score: Adam Burke

Additional musical scoring:

First Light, Arend

Moss, by Philip Anderson

Color and Scent, by Mum Child

Ed Singer's oil paintings: reflecting Diné life with beauty and honesty

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 19:21:20 +0000

For more than 50 years, Ed Singer has used oil paints on canvas to depict life in the Navajo Nation. His style mixes realism and expressionism, and he employs techniques drawn from European oil painting masters. Singer is part of a generation of Indigenous artists from the 1960s and 1970s who asserted a visual sovereignty in their paintings, to confront Native American stereotypes, and depict Native American life in a modern context.

In this episode, we meet 73-year-old Ed Singer in his studio in Cortez, CO, and learn a bit about his journey as an artist.

Written and produced by Adam Burke and Kirbie Bennett.

Host: Kirbie Bennett

Musical score: Adam Burke

Additional musical scoring: Lawn Games

A Durango winter festival that got weird and edgy in 1992

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 01 Feb 2024 17:35:25 +0000

In the 1970's, a group of counter-culture denizens in Durango, Colorado, started a festival aimed at curing the winter doldrums. The end of January was a slow, sleepy time of the year back then.

45 years later, Snowdown is an annual event that brings together city boosters, businesses along Main Street, locals, and tourists for a week of costumes, quirky fun and events. Each Snowdown has a theme, and over the years, festival organizers have encouraged participants to get decked out as pirates, disco dancers and ancient Romans.

1992 stands out as maybe the weirdest, edgiest year on record--at least for a small fraction of the people who happened to be in Durango between January 29th and Feburary 2nd of that year.

In this episode of the Magic City of the Southwest, we revisit Clown Around Snowdown.

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Produced by Magic City Studios llc

Written by Kirbie Bennett and Adam Burke

Original Musical Score by Adam Burke

Hosted by Kirbie Bennett

Graphic design by Jamie Wanzek

Durango's Mysterious Origin Story

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Sun, 15 Oct 2023 20:53:59 +0000

Durango loves to promote its western frontier town image. It's easy to envision the bustling boardwalks in the late 1800s and imagine an incorporated town sprouting from the strength and will of those early settlers.

This episode of The Magic City of the Southwest is the real story behind the facade.

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Thanks to historians Robert McDaniel and Thomas Andrews for their help and guidance on this story.

Produced by Magic City Studios llc.

Writing and production by Adam Burke, Kirbie Bennett and Jamie Wanzek.

Hosted by Kirbie Bennett and Adam Burke.

When your mobile home community is a corporate investment

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Mon, 11 Sep 2023 04:37:40 +0000

In 2022, mobile home park residents in Durango, Colorado, fought to keep their community from being purchased by an out-of-state corporate owner. The Westside Mobile Home Park had been Alejandra Chavez's home since she arrived from Mexico at 12 years old. In the fight to help her community, Chavez was caught between an instinct to keep a low profile and the need for her leadership.

In this episode of The Magic City of the Southwest, we tell the story of one immigrant neighborhood's struggle to belong in a city with diminishing housing options for working-class people. Along the way, we go down the rabbit hole of mobile home park investment and explore the psychic landscape of manufactured housing.

Hosted by Kirbie Bennett & Jamie Wanzek

Produced by Magic City Studios (Adam Burke, Kirbie Bennett & Jamie Wanzek)

Original score by Adam Burke

Additional Music:

Chrome and Wax by Ray Catcher

Selena Leica by Sugartree

Wisteria by The Contessa

Tumblehome by Resolute

The Magic City of the Southwest (1st season trailer)

Kirbie Bennett, Jamie Wanzek, Adam Burke — Thu, 22 Jun 2023 03:44:05 +0000

Like many towns in the US, Durango has made a business of nourishing the old West stereotypes, like the narrow gauge railroad, the Native American archeology, the old hard rock mines. Even those of us who live in Durango reinforce this history. But what if we told you that the parks and bike paths along the river were once thriving neighborhoods full of working-class Hispanic and Native American people?