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Cowboy State Daily is Wyoming’s largest newspaper with Wyoming’s most experienced journalists. 

<title>Daily Darwin: Tuesday, November 15, 2022 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Not betting on a favorable outcome...

Daily Darwin: Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Kolby fedore

Kolby Fedore

Wyoming Life

Around Wyoming

For nearly 60 years, Vern Palmer has been obsessed with Wyoming license plates.

The 90-year-old Big Piney man has spent decades roaming old ranches, forgotten dumping grounds and dusty corners of Sublette County looking for pieces of Wyoming history most people would walk right past.

[{"type":"text","text":"It all started with his oldest son, Jim."}]

Together, the two spent weekends crisscrossing ranches, hunting for rusted treasures hidden beneath the sagebrush. Along the way they uncovered old bottles, antique tools, barbed wire, weathered signs and hundreds of Wyoming license plates.

Today, Palmer's collection includes every Wyoming license plate from 1914 to the present, along with every Sublette County plate issued since county numbers were added in the early 1930s. He's also just four states shy of collecting one plate from all 50.

[{"type":"text","text":"But after six decades of searching, there's one he hasn't yet found."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"The elusive 1913 Wyoming license plate."}]

"I do think that it's around Big Piney somewhere," Palmer said. "I found the 1914 plate pretty close to my home, but I have not found the 1913."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A Family Tradition"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Jim likes to remind people that, technically, he started the collection."}]

As a boy in the late ‘60s, he began picking up old license plates in remote places of the Upper Green River Valley. Before long, his dad was just as hooked.

Summer weekends often meant disappearing into the middle of nowhere with no guarantee they'd find a thing. Palmer rarely bought license plates. Nearly every one in his collection came off the ground.

"He just liked going through old dump grounds looking for old treasures," Jim said. "Old glass ... old artifacts ... tools that you wouldn't find anymore. He just had a passion to find those things."

[{"type":"text","text":"That passion eventually spread to a third generation."}]

His grandson, Joel Florquist, remembers countless summer days wandering through the country with his grandfather.

"A lot of times we didn't find any," Florquist said. "But a lot of times we did."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Before Modern Conveniences"}]

Long before he became Wyoming's unofficial license plate historian, Palmer grew up on a Colorado farm where life looked different.

The family raised cattle, horses, hogs and chickens. They grew vegetables and fruit. His father worked as a carpenter.

[{"type":"text","text":"There was no television, no refrigerator and no indoor plumbing."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"His mother washed clothes in an irrigation ditch using a washboard."}]

When electricity finally reached the farm, the power company installed a single light bulb in the middle of the house and one electrical outlet.

"We didn't have anything to plug into it," Palmer recalled with a laugh. "But it was kind of nice to sit under the globe and do our schoolwork because it was a lot better than the lamp we'd been using."

Florquist said he believes those early years explain why his grandfather never looked at the world quite like everyone else.

"He grew up with not having a lot," Florquist said. "So you took care of what you had so it lasted longer."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"He Valued People"}]

Neighbors knew who to call when a pickup wouldn't start or a car broke down.

After serving in the military and transferring to Big Piney with El Paso Natural Gas in 1960, Palmer built a career as a mechanic before supervising the company's garage.

[{"type":"text","text":"Then he'd go home and fix somebody else's vehicle."}]

"He went out of his way to help people," Jim Palmer said. "He never wanted to do it for credit or recognition. He loved people, and he wanted to make sure they were taken care of."

[{"type":"text","text":"Palmer didn't just see value in old things."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"He saw value in people, too."}]

To him, almost everything deserved another chance — an old license plate, a broken-down car or a neighbor who needed a hand.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"He got joy out of life by being able to help others,\" Jim said."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Every Plate Has A Story"}]

Ask Palmer about license plates and you'll quickly discover they're much more than stamped pieces of metal.

[{"type":"text","text":"They're tiny time capsules."}]

He can explain why Wyoming's 1944 plate was made from fiber instead of steel because of wartime shortages, why early Wyoming plates stretched nearly 16 inches long before they were standardized in 1958, and why every county still carries the same number it was assigned nearly a century ago.

[{"type":"text","text":"He'll also tell you why Sublette County wears the number 23."}]

When Wyoming assigned county numbers in the early 1930s, they weren't random. Counties were ranked by their assessed property valuation at the time, and Sublette landed at No. 23. The rankings stuck, and so did the numbers on the license plates.

[{"type":"text","text":"His collection includes roughly 650 license plates."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"\"When I hold one,\" Palmer said, \"I see the history.\""}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Curious About Everything"}]

Long before Neil Armstrong ever stepped onto the moon, a young Vern Palmer told his teacher that one day people would walk there.

[{"type":"text","text":"In 1969, Armstrong did just that."}]

"He always thought God's creation was amazing," Florquist said. "He wanted to know more."

[{"type":"text","text":"That curiosity never faded."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Jim said his father didn't become an avid reader until he was about 65."}]

Now he reads two or three nonfiction books a week simply because he still wants to learn something new.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"'Throw That Telephone Away'"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"\"Dad hates the dot-com era,\" his daughter, Tammy, said with a laugh."}]

For Palmer, that means more than smartphones or computers. It's the gradual disappearance of face-to-face conversations, handwritten letters and the chance to simply talk to another person.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"Throw that telephone away,\" Palmer said matter-of-factly."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Then, after a beat: \"Throw that computer away.\""}]

His son says Palmer misses the days when paying a bill meant talking to a person instead of navigating an automated phone menu.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"Relationships were valuable to him,\" Jim said."}]

Family members believe Palmer's habit of staying in motion — hiking abandoned dumping grounds, working on cars, gardening and always finding another project — has helped keep him remarkably healthy well into his 90s.

Today, he spends much of his time tending a garden, working with his hands and turning leftover license plates into clocks. 

After oxygen made it difficult to spend long hours in his garage, his daughter built him a small workspace in the living room, where he's made more than 150 clocks for family and friends.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Still Looking"}]

Palmer still believes the missing 1913 Wyoming plate — the state's first official metal license plate — is waiting to be found.

The year before, Wyoming motorists were simply assigned a registration number and expected to make their own marker.

"It was your responsibility to put something on your car with that number," Jim said. "It could have been a piece of painted wood. A lot of people had a leather license plate made, but horses used to gnaw them off of the car, believe it or not."

[{"type":"text","text":"For years, doctors tried reminding Palmer that age catches everyone."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"\"Well, you're getting old,\" one doctor told him."}]

"Dad would just get upset," Jim recalled. "He'd say, 'I'm not getting old.'"

[{"type":"text","text":"His oldest son isn't surprised."}]

"He had too many things that he wanted to do, and not enough time to get them all done," Jim Palmer said. "He just loves life."

Vern Palmer inset 8 1 26

<title>90-Year-Old Big Piney Man Has A Wyoming License Plate From Every Year, Except One | Cowboy State Daily</title>

For nearly 60 years, Vern Palmer has searched Wyoming ranches and forgotten dumps for old Wyoming license plates. At 90, the Big Piney mechanic has a Wyoming license plate from every year, except one. Palmer says he's not giving up his search.

90-Year-Old Big Piney Man Has A Wyoming License Plate From Every Year, Except One

Kerry Drake

CHEYENNE — If you were trapped in the deadliest flood to ever hit a Wyoming city, Judy Brayton was exactly the kind of hero you’d hope would find you.

When she came home to Cheyenne’s eastside Lakeview addition on Aug. 1, 1985, the Wyoming National Guard medic saw the field behind her house had become a river. 

“Six people were floating in water over their heads, grasping at tree limbs and trying to stand up (on) a van that was slowly sinking,” she told reporters the next day.

Brayton and three of her Guard co-workers quickly went into action. A makeshift hospital was soon set up in a neighbor’s garage. 

“I asked for blankets and I bet I got 50 of them,” she recalled.

Brayton said six men who were chained together and tied to a front-end loader swam to rescue victims. 

“People were shining the headlights of four-wheel-drive vehicles on the scene, and another man in a motor boat searched the water for other vehicles,” the medic said.

For two hours, Brayton stood in waist-deep water, talking to and aiding victims. When they were brought into a garage for medical assistance, Brayton said she kept calling out their names, like a roll call, “To give them hope and let them know they’d be OK.”

People mounted rescue efforts in other parts of the city but were having a difficult time reaching those who were trapped in their vehicles in Dry Creek in the northern part of the city, normally a dry drainage basin.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"‘Opened Up a Faucet’"}]

Cheyenne Mayor Don Erickson, who recently turned 89, was in charge when the city experienced the 

 in 1979, and then the 1985 flash flood, which ranks with the blizzard of 1949 as one of the state's greatest disasters.

During a news conference in his office the day after the flood, Erickson came up with a quote that made national news with its metaphor about the freak storm. 

“It was like someone opened up a faucet right above our city and kept it open at ultra-high pressure,” he said of the deluge that dumped more than 6 inches of water in just hours.

Then and now, Erickson also praised Cheyenne’s volunteer spirit. 

“It’s not only volunteers for Frontier Days, which had 3,000 volunteers,” he said. “The entire community was affected. We had neighbors working night and day to get the hail and water out of these basements, especially for our seniors. It was up to the rafters!”

A dozen people, all Cheyenne residents, died in the flood. All but one drowned: Don Shanor, 67, director of the Downtown Development Association and retired educator, had spent the evening trying to bail the water out of his home.

One of the last things he said, according to his family, was to tell his grandson that he felt like he was trying to run uphill with a heavy bucket. After Shanor went to bed, he died of a heart attack.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"About 70 people were hurt."}]

Stalled thunderstorms hovered over the capital city and dropped 6.06 inches of rain between 5 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. That’s half of Cheyenne’s annual rainfall.

Beginning at 1:30 p.m., the National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm watch until 8 p.m., but it was quickly upgraded to a severe thunderstorm warning.

By 6 p.m., hail was falling and getting bigger. 

A half-hour later, tornado spotters were dispatched around Laramie County to watch for funnel clouds. At 7:15 p.m. tornadoes were spotted about 8 miles south of Cheyenne. Within a half-hour, two more were sighted.

On July 15, 1979, a twister tore through Cheyenne, damaging about 400 homes and causing $25 million in damages. A 14-month-old boy died in a trailer park. It’s the most destructive tornado in Wyoming’s history, and part of its path ran along Dry Creek, the site of even more death and destruction six years later.

The Cheyenne flood damaged about 150 homes beyond repair, and 1,600 other houses to a lesser extent. Property damage was estimated at $65 million, affecting homes, businesses and infrastructure.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Warning Sirens Sound"}]

At 7:55 p.m. on the night of the flood, warning sirens — which weren’t available in many locations six years earlier — sounded throughout the city at the same time the National Weather Service issued a severe flash-flood warning. 

The Civil Defense Division of the city and county said some people were confused about whether they should go to their basements to seek protection from tornadoes or seek higher ground.

At 8:30 p.m., a 3-foot wall of water struck downtown Cheyenne, breaking glass doors in the city and county building and shattering storefront windows on nearly every block. 

The emergency operations center in the building’s basement was flooded, temporarily shutting down 911 communications for the city police and fire departments, plus the county sheriff’s department.

Dave Guille, the city’s emergency management director, later observed what went wrong that fateful night. He said it wasn’t lack of preparation or planning, it was the magnitude of the event.

“It was like the world came to an end, as far as [the] coordination we’ve been working on for years,” he said. “It failed because we had a flood through the entire network.”

By 10:30 p.m. a mobile command center was established downtown and emergency communications were back in operation. 

An hour later, Gov. Ed Herschler authorized use of the Wyoming Army and Air National Guard. In parts of the city, Sgt. 1st Class Brayton and other Guard personnel had started their own rescue operations many hours earlier.

Many of those who lost their lives were youngsters. Four were between 3 and 7 years old, and three were teens. A 27-year-old mother, Lynn Williams, drowned with her son John, 5.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Deputy Lost His Life"}]

One of the most tragic events involved Deputy Sheriff Robert Van Alyne Jr., 33, who had already rescued a mother and two children from a van when he went back for 6-year-old Kristy Hernandez, who was trapped by rising floodwaters atop the vehicle.

Van Alyne waded through the swift current to the vehicle, holding a rope he tied to himself that had been attached to a fixed object. 

It somehow became untied and the deputy and the little girl were swept away. Their bodies were found the next day about a mile from the vehicle.

“Some would say he was acting in the line of duty,” The Rev. Robert Ware of First Presbyterian Church said at his services, which drew more than 600 people. “But he was acting out of the kind of man he was. This was his nature, his character, his life.”

Van Alyne was a Vietnam War veteran who worked at the Cheyenne Police Department for eight years before joining the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office in 1984.

The oldest person who died in the flood was Alice Paulson, 73, who lived on West Seventh Avenue in the Capitol Heights neighborhood. The next day, her husband, 75-year-old Herb Paulson, opened his flooded home to Mike Barber of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Bob Storey, a city councilman.

The flood, Paulson told them, left several feet of water in his basement, where he led them. 

“When I looked in here and saw the water level, I knew [Alice] was gone,” he said. “It’s very sad.”

The Paulsons had lived in their home for 50 years. 

He was working at his service station when the flood began, and he couldn’t reach his wife by phone. When he got back to their house, he saw their flooded basement and knew what happened.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"‘Too Many Memories’"}]

“She had heard that tornado warning and got scared,” Paulson told the two men. “Then the flood got her,” along with their two dachshunds. 

In addition to losing his wife, he also had to clean up the damage to their home and wondered aloud to a Denver reporter if he might not be better off selling their home and living in a small place behind his service station. 

He pointed to all of the damage and explained, “Too many memories in there.”

Meteorologists from the National Weather Service explained to residents through local media what had happened. 

“The bowl effect of mountains to the west and Cheyenne Ridge to the east of the city was the perfect trap for the storm cell that spawned what has been labeled a 100-year flood," they said. “Moist unstable air flowing in from the southwest — the norm for the area all summer long — built up over Cheyenne through the afternoon, forming a storm cloud. 

"The top of the cloud was approximately 65,000 feet, as compared to 40,000 to 50,000 feet for a typical thunderstorm.”

As temperatures rose, the NWS reported that the storm broke loose, dumping the tremendous buildup of moisture onto the city.

Light winds kept the thunderstorm stationary long enough for 6 inches of rain to drench the city. Normally, higher winds will move a storm steadily across a much larger area, spreading out the rain evenly and lessening the damage.

But in this case, the thunderstorm kept redeveloping in a pocket right over the same 10- to 12-mile area. Cities and towns surrounding Cheyenne received only a trace of rain.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Culprit Was Topography"}]

Ron Goodman of the NWS explained that for the flash flood that hit Cheyenne, the culprit was the topography: nearby deep canyons and sharp slopes, and a soil base of clay and rock.

“So it really didn’t matter how much rain there was in the last few days,” Goodman noted. 

The combination of swiftly moving water and solids too dense to allow saturation sent most of the stormwater into creeks that overflowed.

“That led to low-level flooding that submerged basements and some first floors in residential areas,” Goodman said. 

In some basements, up to 8 feet of hail poured through broken windows. In the streets, in many places the hailstones made it look like a blizzard, burying cars and trucks.

But many residents’ flood experiences were vastly different compared to the lethal conditions along Dry Creek. While there was certainly danger, in portions of the city people did their best to get to high ground and wait out the storm.

One of those places was the Atlas Theater on west Lincolnway downtown. As with the recent Cheyenne Frontier Days celebration, a melodrama was completing its run.

With the theater’s tin roof being pummeled by rain and hail, Atlas Manager Alma White said the audience of about 200 couldn’t hear the actors and relied on hand gestures to understand what was happening on stage. 

“It sounded like a couple of freight trains in here,” White told the Wyoming State Tribune.

One performer took it upon himself to start singing any weather-related tunes he could think of, like “Swanee River” and “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.” 

“I played anything that I could that would get the audience to sing with me,” the actor said. “I wanted to take their minds off what was going on.”

Over at the Cole Square Cinema off Pershing Boulevard and Converse Avenue east of downtown, Mark Junge, the state’s historic preservation officer and a photojournalist, and his son Dan were watching the latest hit movie from Hollywood — the soon-to-be classic “Back to the Future.”

“You remember the scene where lightning is striking all around, and Christopher Lloyd is scrambling to make the connection so Michael J. Fox can get ‘back home’ to 1985, and there’s lightning popping, and we both heard lightning above us," he said. “We went, ‘Oh, was that realistic!'

“We didn’t know until the usher came down the aisle that we were in trouble,” Junge recalled. “He said there’s this severe storm going on and we’re not to leave. The authorities told them, ‘Don't let your people go out.’ It was dangerous, with flash flooding, and there was water running like a thin sheet over the parking lot. 

"I told Dan we’ve got to get home, and he said, ‘We can’t. We’re not supposed to leave.’ I said we’re gonna leave. We ran to the parking lot to the car, and we made waves pushing through these streams of water until we got to our house in Sun Valley.”

What made him do it? Decades of negatives and photos that were stored in Junge’s basement.

“I was in such a panic, so I asked the neighbor kid if he’d come over and help,” he said. “Finally, we didn’t have to worry.”

The father-and-son team hit the streets the next day to document the damage in much of the city. 

“There were mountains of hail, and you could climb these things like snowdrifts,” Junge said. “It was hot, and steam was rising off the streets.”

The photographer had even more content for his collection the next day. It’s a good bet that they didn’t go into his basement.

Kerry Drake can be reached at: Kerry@CowboyStateDaily.com

Cheyenne 1985 Flood 20260730 093448 8 1 26

<title>Night Of Terror: Wall Of Water Killed 12 In Cheyenne's Deadly August 1, 1985 Flood | Cowboy State Daily</title>

On Aug. 1, 1985, Cheyenne was pummeled by a massive storm that unleashed a wall of water killing 12 people and causing more than $65 million in damage. The 65,000-ft thunderheads stalled over the city unleashing tornadoes, hail and unprecedented flooding.

Night Of Terror: Wall Of Water Killed 12 In Cheyenne's Deadly August 1, 1985 Flood

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Politics

Government & Politics

[{"type":"text","text":"Ann Simpson died early Friday morning in her daughter’s arms."}]

“I lifted up the shade and the moon bathed Mom in the moonlight,” said Ann’s daughter Sue Simpson Gallagher. “I walked over and cuddled up to her and held her, and she died.”

Sue remembers her mother as the most beautiful woman, “inside and out, that ever lived.”

Ann was a mother of three, a wife of 70 years to prominent Wyoming political figure and

Her son Colin Simpson said she was unafraid and even optimistic about dying. She’d been diagnosed with an illness about two months earlier, he said.

“She made us all aware that she did not fear death at all,” said Colin. “She was a Christian and had great faith, and was very at peace with the end of her life.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Her great hope encouraged those grieving around her, he said."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"But the loss is still heartbreaking, the family said."}]

“We lost a person who really understood all of us,” said Sue. “She was on our team.”

Ann’s grandson Nick Simpson interjected that “she was half the damn team.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Sue laughed through tears. "}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Colin said the late couple both had a close connection with the moon."}]

Al Simpson died on the full moon and lunar eclipse of March 14, 2025. Ann died after the buck moon.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Al’s ‘Gorgeous Gal'"}]

Ann Schroll caught Al’s eye her freshman year at the University of Wyoming, said Pete Simpson. His brother Al fell for that “gorgeous gal,” and the pair married in 1954.

She became a mother, a powerful influence on the whole family, and a force even in Washington, D.C., Pete reflected. He said her beauty and “way of treating people” paused the frantic clockwork at the U.S. Capitol, when she crossed a hallway.

She backed her husband and exuded confidence even in the rough-and-tumble world of politics, he said.

“She was a marvelous mom and a marvelous citizen — and a great inspiration for us,” said Pete. “We’re going to miss her like fire.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Pete, who turned 96 Friday, said he misses his brother as well."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"“It’s hard to see both of them gone.”"}]

Alan Simpson was one of Wyoming’s most well-known political figures, having served in the Legislature and Congress. 

A champion of bipartisanship who said a person should “do what’s right … and have thick skin,” he also was awarded the 

For him, Ann was “all the woman that is, and ever was,” said Sue. “And her children and grandchildren and great grandchildren and family would agree.”

[{"type":"text","text":"He was from Cody. She grew up on a small farm in Greybull."}]

Time the pair spent in Germany during Al’s army career led Ann to start the first American Field Service study abroad program in Cody. The program allowed Wyoming youth to travel abroad, while bringing students from around the world to Wyoming.

[{"type":"text","text":"Ann was a mental health advocate, and a champion of the arts"}]

Her twin sister, Nan Fogel Thorne, died last November, with family members by her side, said Colin.

[{"type":"text","text":"“She said, ‘That’s how I want to go,’” he said."}]

U.S. Sen. John Barrasso said in a Friday statement that Wyoming was fortunate to learn from the couple.

“They made a legendary team, always working together to make Wyoming and Washington a better place,” said Barrasso. “We take comfort that she is reunited with her beloved Al once again.”

Ann Simpson, mother of three and wife of 70 years to prominent Wyoming political figure and late U.S. Sen. Al Simpson, died Friday morning in her daughter's arms. “I walked over and cuddled up to her and held her, and she died," Sue Simpson Gallagher said.

Daily Darwin: Tuesday, November 15, 2022

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