Linda Fleming
It’s hard to say what Linda Fleming does best. Can one woman really be in so many places at one time? From writing classes to mineral rights debates, and from agriculture initiatives to appointments and commissions for the state – Fleming can. In fact she does. And speaking with her gives off the sense that she works for all of us. In fact, she’s bold enough to nominate herself as part of a group of Trailblazers – Frances Osborn, Kari Priewe, and Alice Hays – just to illustrate an area of the state where women do well and should be more represented.
While she quips that it might be great that you never have to wait in line for a restroom at the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission, she notes that only a handful of women have officially served in this realm. While she’s always felt like her opinions and those of other women have been respected in Wyoming conversations, she sees room for more balance and sometimes shakes her head a bit at the term equality state. She herself is the first woman to be appointed and then elected Carbon County Commissioner, and one of six women appointed by the Governor to the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission.
Fleming feels that it’s indirectly implied that some of the same traditions that we’re aiming to preserve are keeping women in jobs they have always had. And Fleming holds women accountable for this as well. She commends her fellow female action heroes who acquire the education to fill the higher level positions available, who maintain a real work ethic and who take the initiative to run for boards and get involved in places that build a history forward.
According to the Wyoming Council for Women’s Issues, who honored Fleming as a 2010 Woman of Distinction, she has invaded male dominated fields in the most productive way, promoting math and science for your women and participating in economic and social ventures across the state. Now she serves on the Wyoming Humanities Council board, and who knows what else from science, to church, to state. She’s a woman.
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