Joshua Heston

Old and worn highway winds next to the creek, a creek now obscured by green leaves and the falling dark. Frogs peep. The old town’s yellow street lamps cast globes of light in the creekside forest, illuminating clouds of flimsy Mayflies. The darkness is close, the water down below running over limestone. Springtime in the Ozarks is here.   Heavy traffic whines on the big six lanes. Not long ago, the anachronists of the Ozarks would have stumbled over the idea of big road and big city and yet...

I’m flipping through the magazine, looking at pictures of a traveling circus, documented as it wound its way through the Upper American South sometime in the late 1960s. The photos are in color and a little grainy. The performers magnificent, but a bit worn. The photojournalist had been embedded, traveling with the troupe as they left their warm Florida winter quarters and made another arduous journey north in the spring, battling rain and storms and winding, rocky, mountainous terrain to...

“These are the classic monster movies, like ‘Frankenstein,’ ” Dustin is saying, pointing to several shelves full of DVDs. “Over there, the formation of Western civilization. Here, action films. There, horror. Here, documentaries.”   Associate editor Dustin Burkett is giving me a tour of his film room. In the new StateoftheOzarks Magazine, film and book recommendations are a regular segment. Film is now part of my job description. I glance up. On top of the bookshelves are displayed classic...