CHEYENNE —The large crowd that filled the hangar at the Cheyenne airport was growing restive.
The plane carrying President Bill Clinton was late.
I was also restive as a reporter for the Casper Star-Tribune needing a story for next day’s edition
Playing master of ceremonies, Kathy Karpan, a Democrat ending her second term as Secretary of State, was up to the task of keeping the antsy crowd in place.
She sang, she danced, she led them in political chants.
Her energy was amazing.
Her reward came when the presidential plane finally arrived and Clinton stepped out, handsome and cocky as ever, and entered the hangar.
He went up to Karpan immediately and gave her a big bear hug.
At that moment, I could hear all the cameras click.
I remember thinking — this photo will be used by the Republican Party against Karpan during her campaign for governor.
Clinton, it should be pointed out, was not popular among Wyoming voters.
And that’s what happened.
That photo was raw meat for the Republicans. It was used to defeat Karpan in her bid for governor.
Her loss was a total landslide; the Republican general election winner Jim Geringer polled 58 percent to her 40 percent.
A much larger factor in the loss was the Republican wave that swept the nation in the 1994 elections.
It also caught Gov. Mike Sullivan in his race for U.S. Senate, which he lost to Craig Thomas, also by a large margin.
Karpan and Sullivan were the Democratic party’s major stars at that time. They had been big voter magnets according to the polls.
That is why the Republicans went after Karpan in particular with a nasty whispering campaign that she was a closet Lesbian.
This was a common desperation technique used to defeat independent unmarried women who ran for political office and were rising in the polls.
Karpan ran her last campaign in 1996 — for the U.S. Senate but lost to Republican Mike Enzi.
Those events ended her active career as a political candidate.
She went on to hold positions in the federal government.
When the Republicans took over, she returned to Cheyenne and her law practice with law partner Margaret White.
Her initial education was in journalism before she obtained her law degree.
As such she worked for the newspapers in Rawlins, Cody and, I think, Cheyenne.
She told me once about the time she applied for a position at The Denver Post.
She was told that the requirement was that she first spend a year on the Women’s Page desk before she could get any assignments to government or political beats.
That may have helped end her desire to have a career as a journalist.
Back in Cheyenne in her law practice, Karpan lived in my neighborhood.
She showed up one day driving a white BMW convertible.
It fit her extroverted personality.
No matter where she was — in a grocery store or church, she would greet people by name, shake hands and easily chat with them. Just like old times as a campaigner. Always smiling. Always vibrant.
She had an amazing career if you add it all up - director of the mammoth state Department of Health ad Family Services; staff director for the mercurial Congressman Teno Roncalio;
campaign director for Rodger McDaniel’s campaign for U.S. Senate against Malcom Wallop.
A photo of Karpan as a college reporter during John F. Kennedy’s campaign stop in Wyoming is revealing.
A pretty girl with bookish dark frame glasses and a notebook, she stands in front of the other reporters — all guys. She is closest to JFK, the future president.
She looks serious.
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Contact Joan Barron at 307-632-2534 or jmbarron@bresnan.net
