Randy Olson, Melissa Farlow Photography

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  • Small towns struggle in the region, where the Ogallala aquifer is pumped for irrigation.<br />
<br />
Business is slow midday in downtown Muleshoe, Texas. A community founded in 1913 northwest of Lubbock, the name traces back to a ranch by that name in the late 1800s. Muleshoe expanded with the coming of the railroad and grew to a town of 5,000 residents in 1970. But small towns struggle in the region, and population declined. The once lively Main Street is quiet with abandoned buildings. <br />
<br />
Economic stress is intensified as the community’s water source, the Ogallala aquifer, is pumped for irrigation. Muleshoe can be described as a dying town that can’t keep its grain elevator full. Although to outsiders it looks bleak, the town claims the smallest TV station and the owners are truly kind.
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  • Towns are built in the flat valleys between the mountains of the Alps.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114518.jpg
  • Small towns struggle in the region, where the Ogallala aquifer is pumped for irrigation. Businesses close their doors reflecting the downtown grain elevator.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8429_2481067.TIF
  • Muleshoe, Texas is only one of the small towns that struggle in rural Texas where the water has been mined out by irrigation. All you have to do is look at Google Earth and you see the swath of brown earth where Muleshoe is on the map.
    MM8429_20151025_23547.tif
  • Lightning strikes above the town of Dodge City, Kansas.<br />
<br />
A lightening bolt cuts through the steel gray sky behind a grain elevator, a symbol of high plains rural America, that has lost more than 12 million people since 2000. Just 16 percent of the nation’s population lives in rural areas – the lowest in recorded history and down from 72 percent a century ago. <br />
<br />
Dodge City, like all towns on the high plains, have been seriously diminished by the rush to the cities. After the Dust Bowl and the family farm crisis and the domination of BIG AG that requires fewer people to produce more crops, communities face another crisis. <br />
<br />
With a dwindling supply of water, farmers unable to fill their grain elevators threatens communities further and grain will come in on the rails from other areas. Even with the water they have now, small, dusty towns are getting smaller and dustier.
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  • A ghost town east of Iqueque has remnants of the nitrate heyday when saltpeter was mined in the late 19th and early 20th century. Now deserted, Humberstone, was once a model company mining town offered tennis and basketball courts, a swimming pool and theater. The remains are preserved in the dry Atacama desert of Chile.
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  • Women with young children walk through the streets of a gold mining town in northeastern Congo.
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  • Pople walk by homes that line the unpaved road in a gold mining town in northeastern Congo.
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  • The remote town of Oktyabrsky.<br />
is small town built on the fish industry on the west coast of Kamchatka or the mouth of the Bolshaya River in the Ust Bolsheretsk district. The Russian community was founded solely because of fishing, and the population of a little over 2,000 doubles in the summer.
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  • Storm clouds build above the grain elevator and the town of Portales, New Mexico, a community without well water. Drought is taking its toll putting pressure on the aquifer shared by agriculture.
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  • Elevated view of this small Vermont town’s midway taken during its annual county fair.
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  • An evening view of the snow-covered resort town of Sestriere, Italy. Olympic alpine skiing competition was held on the slopes in the Alps during the 2006 competition and now draws tourists to the quiet mountain region.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024034.jpg
  • A statue of Lenin in the main square of the remote town of Oktyabrski.
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  • The remote fishing town of Khailino.<br />
An aerial photograph of Khailino from a MI-8 helicopter between Tilichiki and Khailino, shows the Vyvenka River linking these two communities.  Flying north in Kamchatka, there are miles and miles of untouched tundra, streams, wetland, and rivers like this meandering, unconstrained river that is a perfect environment for salmon spawning.
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  • The new town of Karang Pani which supports the nearby gold mining.
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  • View of the town of Sinop.
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  • Women attending a wedding ceremony in old Harappa town.
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  • A wedding ceremony in old Harappa town.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071268.JPG
  • Mendicants or beggar pilgrims at a town fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071255.TIF
  • Wide empty streets in the town of Portales, New Mexico, a community that is buying agricultural wells to supply residents homes and businesses. The city has conservation efforts in effect to reduce consumption.<br />
<br />
Water levels in the Ogallala aquifer below Clovis, Portales, and surrounding communities have declined in excess of 100 feet in the past decades. In addition to the decline in water level (as much as 2 feet per year in some places), there is evidence of deteriorating water quality.<br />
<br />
The long term water supply appears more promising because of a pipeline that may bring supplies from the Ute reservoir to help.
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  • An aerial photo after sunset with lights glowing on homes, businesses and empty streets in the town of Valentine, Nebraska.
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  • Rear view mirror inside a car driving down a street in the remote town of Oktyabrsky.
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  • The new town of Karang Pani which supports the nearby gold mining.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7339_1223004.TIF
  • Evening bright lights illuminate the town of Martigny, winter home of  St. Bernard dogs of Alps fame. Nestled between the snow-capped mountains in the Alps, it is a junction of roads that join Switzerland with Italy and France.
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  • Rainbow over a western Australian town after a rain.
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  • Rainbow after a rainstorm over a western Australian town.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_763220.JPG
  • Mendicants or beggar pilgrims at a town fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071274.JPG
  • Mendicants or beggar pilgrims at a town fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071272.JPG
  • Mendicants or beggar pilgrims at a town fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071258.JPG
  • A wedding ceremony in old Harappa town.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071254.JPG
  • Mendicants or beggar pilgrims at a town fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071249.JPG
  • Laborers gather for a wedding in Harappa town. These laborers work in the archeological area and often drums are used as they dig the pits by hand.
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  • Elevated view of this small Vermont town taken during its annual county fair.
    RANDY OLSON_06414_131227.TIF
  • In spite of the 200 inches of rain the area receives every year, nearly a million cruise ship passengers visit Alaska, sometimes doubling a town’s population on a summer day. As many as six cruise ships make daily stops - and as many as 500 a year - bringing tourists on the Inside Passage, the route through a network of passages between islands along the coast of Alaska, British Columbia and Washington state. Tourism is Southeast Alaska’s fastest growing industry.<br />
One of the stops in Alaska’s Panhandle is the former logging town of Ketchikan. Travelers can shop for Native art and souvenirs or diamonds in one of many jewelry stores along what was a former red-light district during the Gold Rush.
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  • A cruise ship docks at Ketchikan's harbor bringing a city full of tourists for shopping and sightseeing. The once logging town is dependent on the growing tourism industry. Nearly a million cruise ship passengers visit Alaska, sometimes doubling a town’s population on a summer day. <br />
The ships travel the Inside Passage, a network of waterways between islands along the coast of Alaska, British Columbia and Washington state. <br />
Travelers can shop for native art and souvenirs or diamonds in one of many jewelry stores along what was a former red-light district during the Gold Rush. The Misty Fjords National Monument is one of the area’s major attractions.
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  • Cruise ships dock at Ketchikan's harbor, while another waits its' turn. In spite of the 200 inches of rain the region receives every year, nearly a million cruise ship passengers visit Alaska, sometimes doubling a town’s population on a summer day. As many as six cruise ships make daily stops and as many as 500 a year. The Inside Passage is a network of channels between islands along the coast of Alaska, British Columbia and Washington state. Tourism is Southeast Alaska’s fastest growing industry.<br />
The former logging town of Ketchikan, now relies on tourism. Travelers can shop for native art and souvenirs or diamonds in one of many jewelry stores along what was a former red-light district during the Gold Rush.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1073531.TIF
  • Flashing lights of a railroad crossing light the night sky in front of the water tower on central village square in Riverside, Illinois. Riverside is the first planned community in the United States, and was commissioned for a design by well-known landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and his partner Calvert Vaux. An affluent suburban community nine miles west of Chicago, Riverside maintains the original aesthetic charm that was planned to appeal to people desiring a “rural” location.<br />
<br />
The town might not have ever been popular had it not been for the disastrous Chicago fire of 1871 which served as an impetus for people to move away from the crowded, urban setting.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6560_956182.jpg
  • Store window reflections mirror cruise ships arriving to unload shoppers and sightseers in the former logging town of Ketchikan located in Alaska’s Panhandle. Travelers can shop for Native art and souvenirs or diamonds in one of many jewelry stores along what was a former red-light district during the Gold Rush.
    MM7258_20050905_12198.tif
  • A few cars make a traffic jam on a rainy afternoon at the main intersection in Coffman, Cove, Alaska, population 200.<br />
What began as a logging town on Prince of Wales Island is mostly made up of people who stayed on when the industry declined. Boats and off road vehicles are plentiful and a road connects the community to other parts of the island.
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  • Twilight falls on the snow-covered village of Castelrotto which is also known as Kastelruth in German. The tower of a cathedral lights up the northern Italian resort town that serves as a winter destination in the Dolomites. Large distinctive mountains loom over the communities attracting tourists in all seasons.
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  • An aerial view of lighted docks in Vestmannaeyjar Harbor which hosts large boats and trawlers for the fishing industry in Iceland.
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  • Chairs outside Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional airport with a choice of colors to wait.
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  • Houses built above Ketchikan Harbor where many cruise ships dock.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114677.jpg
  • Aerial of Revillagigedo Island.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114606.jpg
  • An overlook of Telfs which is located west of Innsbruck.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114484.jpg
  • Koryaksky Volcano looms above Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional capital of Kamchatka in Russia. <br />
<br />
Entrepreneurs and bureaucrats execute plans for pipelines, roads and mines-developments that build wealth but endanger salmon runs. Half  (pop.195,000) of all Kamchatkans live in Petropavlovsk, most in former Soviet “block style” housing.
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  • Most of Sudan's wealth flows to Khartoum, into the hands of a privileged few who have imposed strict Islam on the country and are exploiting southern resources.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6998_718232-5.jpg
  • Most of Sudan's wealth flows to Khartoum, into the hands of a privileged few who have imposed strict Islam on the country and are exploiting southern resources.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6998_714569.jpg
  • Islam and Arab culture came to Sudan through trading centers like the ruined Red Sea and ancient port of Suakin. Sudan has long been ruled by a small circle of wealthy northerners, who, because of their Muslim faith and Arabized culture, consider themselves Arab instead of African. Islam and Arab culture came to Sudan through trading centers like the port of Suakin. Suakin was ottoman built but was possibly chipped into this perfectly round circle by the Romans.  Suakin was the main port from the 14th century until World War I and has never been excavated.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6998_714566.jpg
  • A street in Zhapo is reflected in a  restaurant fish tank that attracts people to select a fresh fish for dinner. <br />
Overfishing stresses aquatic populations of reef fish.
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  • Markets line the streets of the Senegal fishing village of Saint Louis on the edge of the Pacific Ocean.
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  • Street scene of a child in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky near the regional airport.
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  • A photographer poses with an imitation polar bear.
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  • Houses line Ketchikan Harbor and fishing boats in marina.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114674.jpg
  • Cruise ship docked at Ketchikan Harbor dwarfs houses on hillside.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114613.jpg
  • Maretesch or Mareccio Castle surrounded by vineyards.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114598.jpg
  • Parade of children carry lanterns in an Easter passion play.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114596.jpg
  • Lit banners in Mendrisio telling the story of Jesus.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114529.jpg
  • Sestriere, site of the men's downhill skiing during 2006 Olympics.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114506.jpg
  • An overlook of Telfs which is located west of Innsbruck.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114483.jpg
  • Scenic view of the picturesque Ladin village of LaVa in the Italian Dolomite mountains. Perched on the lush green, hillside is 15th century Gothic style Christian Church of Santa Barbara. <br />
The Alps arose as a result of the collision of the African and European tectonic plates, in which the western part of the Tethys Ocean, that was formerly in between the continents, disappeared millions of years ago.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024119.jpg
  • Twilight falls on the quiet, Ladin village of LaVal in the Dolomites where the church stands high on the hillside. The picturesque community in the Alps depends on agriculture and crafts.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024087.jpg
  • An elevated view from a tower over the city of Turin, capital city of Piedmont in northern Italy. It is  that is known for its refined architecture and cuisine the in southern Alps. Stately baroque buildings and old cafes line Turin's boulevards and grand squares such as Piazza Castello and Piazza San Carlo. Nearby is the soaring spire of the Mole Antonelliana, a 19th-century tower housing the interactive National Cinema Museum. <br />
The first capital of united Italy in 1861, Turin went on to become one of the main economic and industrial cities in the country in the 20th century thanks to its car industry. The city is the home to Fiat, which also owns Lancia and Alfa Romeo, and Iveco trucks.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024035.jpg
  • A double rainbow over Sylvester after a summer rain.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023739.jpg
  • A coal mine above Mc Roberts causes flooding and water problems for the residents that live in the shadow of this valley fill from a mountaintop removal mine.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023677.jpg
  • Shrouded in a light, misty snow, Chapin Parkway is one of seven tree-lined boulevards planned for the Buffalo, New York park system. Although other cities have implemented this kind of plan, it was in 1868 that Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux tried to integrate a system of parks and parkways for the first time.<br />
<br />
Olmsted designed the parkways so that within steps of each resident’s door was the entrance to a park-like setting. The parkways in Olmsted’s day were smoothly paved and intended solely for use of private carriages. Featuring 200-foot rights of way and flanked by several rows of trees, they were designed to provide open space for the neighborhoods through which they passed.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6560_956194.jpg
  • An overlook viewing modern downtown Santiago, Chile's capital city. Approximately three decades of uninterrupted economic growth have transformed Santiago into one of Latin America's most sophisticated metropolitan areas, with extensive suburban development, dozens of shopping malls, and impressive high-rise architecture.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187653.jpg
  • A smokestack from a textile mill.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8515_2702864.JPG
  • A smokestack from a textile mill.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8515_2702861.JPG
  • Aerial photo shows Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional capital and the surrounding icy waters in Kamchatka.
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  • A young woman in a resettlement village.
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  • Surface mining and blasting destroyed a store.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7339_1222967.TIF
  • Surface mining blasting destroyed many homes in Sanso.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7339_1222966.TIF
  • Downtown Robanda with locals.
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  • Bantu tribespeople living a more urban existence in permanently build homes decorated with more modern items and wear western-style clothing.
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  • Taillights blur as a bus squeezes through building on the narrow streets of the Swiss village of Santa Maria. The charm of the mountain communities draws tourists, but the streets were built long before gas-powered transportation.
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  • Twilight falls on the Ladin village of LaVal in the snow-covered Dolomites. Perched on the lush green, mountain hillside is 15th century Gothic style Christian Church of Santa Barbara.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7139_1024130.JPG
  • A veil of vehicle exhaust fogs a valley in Passiria which is an increasing problem in villages between the mountains. The air is trapped under clouds in the Alps producing pollution in this idyllic scene.
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  • Elevated view of the main street in Eureka Springs.
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  • Ferndale's Greek Investment Company, a cafe, exterior view.
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  • Ski lessons in town of Maloja near St. Moritz.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114588.jpg
  • An aerial view of a meteor impact crater near the town of Halls Creek.
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  • Father and son cross the Mexican border to celebrate a 21st birthday at a bar in a border town to Laredo, Texas.  The two laughed and sang with the Mariachi band with an accordion in the atmosphere among other tourists among the pinatas.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052-1.JPG
  • A worker sets fire to a home that is demolished to rubble as a result of mine expansion. As mountaintop removal mine permits allow the surface mines to expand, they often displace residents in their way.  Dingess-Rum Coal Company served notice to Dehue residents renting old coal company houses, giving them 30 days to move. <br />
Dehue, like dozens of other mining towns, was once a busy center of activity with a grocery, post office, theater, barbershop, pool hall, school payroll office, and Civic Club. These communities become ghost towns and over time are dismantled. Day lilies and fruit trees often mark the spot of leveled homes lining a road.<br />
Dehue was located off Route 10 on Rum Creek south of Logan. It began in 1916 as a coal company town owned by Youngstown Mines Corporation. It existed as late as the 1970s, but the homes were never sold to private residents. Most houses were cleared and burned in 2000 and 2001.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_996260-1.JPG
  • A worker sets fire to a home that is demolished to rubble as a result of mine expansion. As mountaintop removal mine permits allow the surface mines to expand, they often displace residents in their way.  Dingess-Rum Coal Company served notice to Dehue residents renting old coal company houses, giving them 30 days to move. <br />
Dehue, like dozens of other mining towns, was once a busy center of activity with a grocery, post office, theater, barbershop, pool hall, school payroll office, and Civic Club. These communities become ghost towns and over time are dismantled. Day lilies and fruit trees often mark the spot of leveled homes lining a road.<br />
Dehue was located off Route 10 on Rum Creek south of Logan. It began in 1916 as a coal company town owned by Youngstown Mines Corporation. It existed as late as the 1970s, but the homes were never sold to private residents. Most houses were cleared and burned in 2000 and 2001.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_996260.jpg
  • Fishing off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057893.JPG
  • A mining employee works around a large piece digging equipment used at Black Thunder, a coal surface mine. Located in Wyoming's Powder River Basin, the dragline bucket used at the mine holds 170 cubic yards of coal that is extracted, processed, then loaded onto trains. Almost 100 million tons of low sulpher coal is shipped from this surface mine to power plants.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705777.jpg
  • Students work on clients hair and makeup to learn skills at Princess de Gales, a beauty school in Quito.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512706.jpg
  • A nun makes wafers for communion at Convento de Carmen Alto, a cloistered convent in the Colonial historic district of Quito.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512702.jpg
  • Cloistered Catholic nuns ride in a modern glass elevator added to the 16th century Convento de Carmen Alto. The Carmelite order was forced to settle in Quito after destruction of their monastery in a 1698 earthquake. Older nuns appreciate the convenience to climbing stairs to attend prayer in the chapel.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512699.jpg
  • An oil drilling platform off of Newfoundland.
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  • Billboards advertising gold jewelry.
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  • Eucalyptus tree at twilight.
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  • Ocean spray on a fishing boar off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
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  • A fish tangled in a net on board a fishing vessel off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
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  • The sea captain and workers fish off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands in Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057892.JPG
  • Houses and boats in harbor of fishing village on Baranof Island.
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  • Boat leaves harbor on Baranof Island in Sitka.
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  • U.S. Border patrol officers take a break at the Montana/Canadian border after riding their trained mustangs in the rough backcountry.
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  • Mustangs wade through thick brush carrying U.S. Border patrol officers who make their way through rugged backcountry. The riders find the former wild horses sure-footed and sturdy in the mountainous region.
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