Lander, Wyoming is not an easy place to get to. I got there in February by flying from Washington to Denver and then sitting around the Denver airport for hours, while the local commuter airline that flies to the airport nearest Lander tried to get its small planes refueled in 15-degrees-below-zero weather. While waiting, I was informed that the flight schedule of this particular airline, which will remain nameless, is more subjunctive than indicative.
Yet the wait, the aggravation, and the bitter cold were worth it, for they were part of getting introduced to a new venture in Catholic higher education that’s unfolding in Lander: Wyoming Catholic College, where students read Thomas Aquinas in the original Latin, take a mandatory freshman course in horsemanship, and go on a three-week, survival-skills trek through the Rockies before they crack a book. Oh yes: At Wyoming Catholic, students are not allowed to have cell phones, but the college provides a gun room for their rifles. A visitor from the Ivy League found this combination disconcerting. I found it charming.
