Equal Rights (English) | ||||||||
| Capital (and largest city) |
Casper | |||||||
| Other Cities | Green River, Laramie, Rock Springs, Sheridan, Cody, Powell | |||||||
| Language | English | |||||||
| Demonym | Wyomingite, Wyomingian | |||||||
| Legislature | Wyoming Legislature | |||||||
| Governor | Edward Buchanan (R) | |||||||
| Lieutenant Governor | Mark Kinner (R) | |||||||
| Area | 73,548 sq mi | |||||||
| Population | 435,179 (2020 Census) | |||||||
| Admission | July 4, 1992 | |||||||
| Currency | Buffalo Dollar | |||||||
| Abbreviations | WY | |||||||
Wyoming is a state in the United States. The majority of the state is dominated by the mountain ranges and range lands of the Rocky Mountain West, while the easternmost section of the state includes part of a high elevation prairie region known as the High Plains. Pre-Doomsday, it was the tenth largest U.S. state by area and the 49th in population, ahead of only Alaska with a population of 471,000 in 1980. The capital and the most populous city of Wyoming was Cheyenne pre-Doomsday.
Today, the capital city of Casper is thriving, its population growing to replace that lost on Doomsday and its aftermath. With the exception of Cheyenne and surrounding Laramie County, the state thrives as an integral part of the United States. The population has risen to around 425,000. Having lost its north-eastern counties to the new state of Absaroka, the modern state of Wyoming encompasses 90,031 square miles.
History[]
Pre-Doomsday[]
A valley in the northeast corner of Pennsylvania was named xwé:wamənk [cway-wa-menk] by the native peoples that lived near there, meaning "at the big river flat." To the European ear, that sounded something like "Wy-wo-mink" or "Wy-oh-ming" -- the latter made it into the English language and the Wyoming Valley became a place name made notorious by a battle there in 1778. A poem written in 1809 set the name in the hearts of America.
Shortly before that poem was written, the territory of the young nation almost doubled when Napoleon sold his holdings (recently acquired from Spain) to assist in his campaign to rule Europe. Over the next half century that land would be carved up in various ways according to the fortunes of the wars with the indigenous tribes that either lived there or were moved there from the states in the east. One of these territories was named "Wyoming" by Representative J. M. Ashley of Ohio. In 1890, after the American Civil War, that territory was made a state.
Sparsely populated, the state proved to be progressive in its politics, being the first to grant women the right to vote (1869). A half century later it would produce the first female governor (1925). With vast areas of wilderness, and the accompanying natural resources, the state was an early battleground for ecological stewardship. For the most part, the environment won that war. One notable exception, at least to environmentalists, was the area around the capital city. Its relative remoteness earned it the right to house hundreds of nuclear missiles.
Doomsday[]
Fields of Minuteman missiles in Wyoming and other parts of the Great Plains
Cheyenne was one of the worst places to be on September 25, 1983. The tri-state area (Wyoming-Nebraska-Colorado) housed over two hundred missile silos, each with a missile tipped with one or more nuclear warheads. Even if all the missiles were fired, the enemy had already targeted these silos for destruction to stop any second battery from being fired.
The only advantage that Wyoming's state government had over other state governments is that they knew to get out of town immediately. As the missiles were flying overhead, Governor Edgar Herschler knew what had to be done. Prearranged routes out of Cheyenne were taken by every officer of the state that was in town (the part-time legislators mostly being home for the weekend). The initial destination was Laramie, 50 miles to the west and shielded by the Laramie Mountains.
Passengers in the motorcade had the eerie experience of seeing many of the missiles as they left their silos, visible to their backs as they climbed into the foothills. Governor Herschler could see the missiles as they disappeared over the eastern horizon, destined for targets in Russia and eastern Europe. He did not give himself time to be afraid, for he knew that the massive fire power that was going to rain down on Cheyenne would be hard to outrun.
About forty minutes outside of town, the governor and his team discerned that no more missiles were coming. The bombs had turned the ground of most of Laramie County into smoldering glass. Anyone deep within the earth, protected by hundreds of yards of rock and re-enforced concrete, would have most certainly been killed by shock waves. If not, all exits were sealed with radioactive molten rock. It would have been better if they had been vaporized.
Because of the blasts being ground level, the radioactive dust clouds proved a threat to everyone downwind. Fortunately for the Wyoming government, the prevailing winds took the clouds down into Nebraska and Kansas. The primary emergency evacuation point in Laramie had survived. By midnight -- five hours after the attack -- all surviving government officials had made it to Laramie. The vehicles they had used had all had shielded electronics, at least in the control modules, to allow them to run even after the electromagnetic pulses (the one from space and the hundred or so from the ground explosions) stopped radios and other electronic devices they may have had. With flashlights aglow, the first session of the emergency session of the Wyoming executive council began. Key legislators would begin arriving as they were able within the next few weeks.
Life would continue, but definitely not as usual.
Organization of the new era[]
Governor Herschler quickly met with the top officials of Albany County, securing their cooperation with the state government. Laramie was the state's third largest city and the home of the University of Wyoming, so it would serve well as a temporary capital.
Herschler decided to first assess the damage done to the state. He ordered exploring parties to survey the most likely targets in Wyoming. Besides assessing the damage to Cheyenne, he also sent parties to Casper, a center of the state's energy industry, and Guernsey, home to an Army National Guard base.
- Cheyenne and almost all of Laramie County was determined to be destroyed with almost nothing salvageable in the near future. Following this report, Governor Herschler declared Laramie County a quarantine zone.
- Casper was also not hit, however in a state of panic as local TV stations had told Casper residents to prepare for a missile impact. Natrona County officials had fled to the small town of Midwest, north of Casper, from which point they planned to return to Casper and restore order.
- Guernsey was found intact, with the National Guard having mobilized to restore order in the town and having branched out into the county seat of Wheatland. The expedition went to Wheatland, where Platte County officials confirmed their cooperation with the State of Wyoming. Nevertheless, the area was flat and exposed to hazardous fallout. Efforts began to evacuate civilians westward to zones around Laramie and Casper.
Within days, rioting and looting broke out in Laramie as well, made worse by the arrival of, initially, several hundred survivors from Cheyenne. The police, former and current military and National Guardsmen, as well as University Police were put to work to restore order.
The expeditions had secured the state's hold on the southeastern counties. Governor Herschler then sent out further expeditions to restore contact with Carbon, Converse, Fremont, and Niobrara Counties, while preparing a force of National Guardsmen to calm the violence and panic in Casper and Laramie. Being a large and sparsely populated state, Wyoming managed to secure nominal emergency control over all of these counties, while recognizing the need for new forms of community aid.
By the end of October the worse of the rioting and looting had ceased, with the state's control of Southeastern and Central Wyoming secure. The State Legislature was reconstituted in Casper, a larger and more centrally-located city than Laramie. It passed a bill authorizing the creation of a Wyoming Defense Force to defend from all armed incursions. Old Fort Caspar was chosen to be its headquarters, with outposts at Fort Fetterman, Fort Washakie, and Fort Fred Steele. The old Fort Laramie was also to be reoccupied to monitor the blast sites and oversee evacuations from Platte and Goshen Counties. Not long after, the governor and emergency administration also relocated to Casper, which became Wyoming's new capital.
In March 1984, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), surviving in a bunker deep below Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado, restored radio communications with key bases in the rest of the country, including Wyoming's capital and the federal government hiding in an arc of bunkers in the Appalachian Mountains. That May, the federal government departed its bunkers to establish three new emergency administrations in different parts of the country. One was set up in Leadville, Colorado, not far from NORAD's headquarters. Vice President Bush briefly ran this administration but left for the Pacific once news arrived of President Reagan's death. The nominal leadership passed to Tip O'Neill of Massachusetts, Speaker of the House of Representatives. O'Neill was in the constitutional line of succession to the presidency and therefore empowered to act in an emergency presidential role. As Wyoming was the only intact state government in the region, he would greatly rely on its support.
The arrival of the emergency administration prompted the Legislature to pass seven new crisis-related bills and resolutions. The first extended the Governor's emergency powers. The second amended the state constitution to create a lieutenant governor position, to be filled at the next elections. The third authorized the state government to exercise all powers that could not be carried out by the federal government for the duration of the crisis. The fourth reaffirmed Wyoming's loyalty to the United States of America and recognized the Leadville administration as its rightful organ of authority. The fifth was a declaration of war on the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and authorized a draft to be used for the Wyoming Defense Force. The sixth gave the governor power to form and assign people to work battalions to maintain critical infrastructure and the food supply. The seventh imposed mandatory food and water rationing.
Herschler quickly used his emergency powers to initiate what he called the Strategic Hamlet Initiative. Essentially, the SHI was a series of walled settlements built to protect the state’s farmers, ranchers, and the food supply from hordes of refugees. The Initiative worked. Wyoming retained the use of the vast majority of its rangeland. Cattle and sheep continued to be supplied to the state’s people. Herschler also decreed that as much land as possible should be given over to wheat, oats, and potatoes. While no one got fat that winter, there were very few deaths from starvation as well.
That fall Herschler made a surprising announcement: the state would hold general elections in November. Herschler explained that the Soviets would have won if America surrendered her democracy. While many in the Legislature grumbled about the waste of holding an election at a time of such extreme crisis, most Wyomingites agreed with the Governor’s sentiment. The election went on as planned, with the state even holding presidential elections, this being a way to continue to demonstrate loyalty to America. Incumbents overwhelmingly were re-elected, with George Bush being unanimously “re-elected” as President.
With the food supply seemingly secured, Herschler next turned to rebuilding Wyoming’s power grid. The spring of 1985 saw the coal mines near Kemmerer and Rock Springs reopened. Besides consolidating the state's at times tenuous hold on its southwest, the coal was needed to begin to restart the state’s power plants. This was the main initiative of 1985: restoring the lights. The state power grid was 37% restored by Christmas. That winter was also remarkable for another reason: only nine deaths from starvation in the entire state that winter. New Year’s Day 1986 brought a great deal of hope: Wyoming was on the path to recovery. However, to the east, trouble was brewing.
Trouble with the neighbors[]
On New Year’s Day 1986, Wyoming wasn’t the only entity in the area on the road to recovery. The Lakota had seized power in the Western Dakotas and had spent most of the last two years consolidating their control. With Western Dakota firmly under Lakota rule, the new republic began debating its course of action. Some preferred to focus on rebuilding what they had. The war parties which had led them to this moment, however, were still firmly expansionist. Their demands were straightforward - the United States had failed them (and billions of others), and they wanted to restore their old lands. Their wish was given a windfall when they received news in February that Governor Herschler had died. With Wyoming’s main unifying force gone, the Lakota and their allies judged that now would be the right time to begin preparing for an invasion. The Lakota began carrying out raids up and down Wyoming’s eastern border, on occasion attempting to get supplies, but primarily to gauge the capabilities of the Wyoming Defense Force.
Meanwhile, in Casper, Mike Sullivan, elected as Wyoming’s first Lieutenant Governor in fall 1984, was sworn in as the new Governor of Wyoming. Sullivan made a speech shortly after, where he committed to continuing Herschler’s work on restoring the state. The raids, however, required that Sullivan begin beefing up Wyoming’s defenses. He ordered iron mines near Atlantic City and Sunrise reopened so that Wyoming would have material to make new weapons. To accomplish this, he used his emergency powers to draft whatever gunsmiths he could find into the Wyoming Defense Force and set them to work making guns and bullets. He also fully renovated Fort Laramie into a proper army headquarters: the zone immediately surrounding the fort and nearby town of Torrington had by chance been spared the worst of the fallout, so it became an important forward base.
The United States Administration– West suffered a blow in November of 1986. Speaker O'Neill was assassinated in Leadville by an embittered survivor of the nuclear attacks on Colorado. The only person who could succeed him as constitutional Acting President was Donald Hodel, Reagan's Secretary of Energy and 15th on the line of succession. Meanwhile NORAD's facilities were beginning to suffer from power failures and shortages of supplies. Hodel saw the futility of his position. He accepted an offer from Governor Sullivan to relocate the entire administration to Wyoming - including the military personnel of NORAD, who moved over the course of the following year.
Hodel accepted that in Wyoming, he was the junior partner. The state government had more capacity to govern than his struggling administration. Federal troops remained nominally distinct but effectively became part of the Wyoming Defense Force. Civil administrators had very little to do; either they took positions within state departments or entered private life. Hodel himself attempted to maintain some degree of independence, first setting up in the town of Rock Springs; but even here he relied on the Wyoming national guard for security. In 1988 he moved to Casper to an office in the state capitol. By now he was acting president in name only. Sullivan assigned him a role overseeing the ongoing restoration of the power grid, something more within his expertise. He served in that capacity for a year before leaving public service. The remnants of the federal administration had gone dormant and were wholly under Wyoming state control.
Still, the federal troops were badly needed. Throughout the remainder of 1986 and continuing through spring 1987, the Lakota raids rocked not only Wyoming but surviving towns in Montana and Nebraska. The raids greatly sapped the state's resources, as Governor Sullivan was forced to spend the vast majority of his time responding to them. Most raids turned out to be minor but threatening enough to force large scale armed deployments by the WDF. Sullivan attempted negotiations with the Lakota, but the Lakota kept demanding the cession of Campbell, Crook, and Weston Counties, demands Sullivan outright refused. By December 1986, it was obvious the Lakota were stalling for time. On Christmas Day, the Lakota staged their most aggressive raid yet. At the height of the chaos, a church in Lusk was set on fire with the congregation inside, killing 79. A telegram arrived later in Casper at precisely noon, signed by the leadership of the Republic of Lakotah. It was a final demand to surrender Campbell, Crook, and Weston Counties and that they be turned over within a month. Sullivan's reply was just three words, but it captured the mindset of all of Wyoming: "Go to Hell."
The Provisional USA[]
The Lakotah War of 1988-1989 was the catalyst for many of the communities of the Great Plains to begin to re-constitute their state governments. They looked to Wyoming for leadership. These efforts grew into a movement to create a new federal government.
The Provisional United States began in 1991 with a convention of delegates from five states: Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, and Kansas. The site of the convention was Torrington, Wyoming, a town that had risen to prominence just before and during the recent war. The area had been found to be safe, and its central location made it a natural regional hub. Torrington remained the capital of the Provisional USA.
Wyoming consented during the early 90s to some cessions of its territory. A small square of Goshen County was separated to create a new federal district, called the District of Kennedy. A large portion of Wyoming's northeast, facing Lakotah, became the State of Absaroka in 1993.
As the Provisional USA continued to grow, Wyoming lost some of the outsized influence that it had enjoyed at the start. But it remained the largest population and economy within the republic for many years.
Geography[]
Adjacent States and Nations[]
- East - Nebraska, District of Kennedy, & Lakotah
- North - Montana
- Northeast - Absaroka
- South - Colorado
- Southwest - Deseret
- West - Idaho
Politics and Government[]
The State of Wyoming functions almost exactly like the pre-Doomsday government, with one exception.
The State of Wyoming has a bicameral Legislature, with a 62 member House of Representatives and a 30 member Senate. Representatives have two-year terms, and Senators have four-year terms, with half the Senate up for reelection every two years. Legislators from districts where most (or all) of the population lived in Laramie County were allowed to keep their seats until they retired, moved to other offices, or died.
Wyoming is headed by a Governor, with a Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of State, Auditor, Treasurer, and a Superintendent of Public Instruction elected on a separate ballot.
Wyoming has a five-member state Supreme Court, with members nominated by the Judicial Nominating Commission, and appointed by the Governor. There are district courts below the Supreme Court, of limited jurisdiction, which handle certain types of cases, such as civil claims with lower dollar amounts, misdemeanor criminal offenses, and felony arraignments. Circuit court judges also commonly hear small claims cases as well. There is no appellate court. One year after appointment, judges are subject to a retention vote by the public.
Wyoming has historically been politically dominated by the Republican Party.
Economy[]
The State of Wyoming is dominated by mining and agriculture. The coal industry is dominant in Wyoming. Wyoming was among the nation's leaders in coal pre-Doomsday, and it provides the vast majority of supplies to the North American Union post-Doomsday. The state government in recent years has made efforts to sell Wyoming's surplus coal across North America, with the California Republic and Jefferson becoming major customers. Wyoming also has a booming oil industry. Although much of it was disabled after Doomsday, the nation's increasing prosperity has led to more demand for fuel and automobiles, leading to a boom in the industry. Wyoming has several oil refineries, making the state a key player in the fuel industry. Wyoming is also a major source of trona, which is used to make sodium carbonate, a material used in a wide variety of areas such as cleaning, food production, and glass making. Iron is present in the Sweetwater Mining District and around Sunrise. While both mines had closed before Doomsday due to a lack of profitability, Governor Sullivan ordered them reopened in the 80s so that Wyoming could produce weapons to defend against the Lakota. The mines remain operational to this day, reviving their areas. In recent years, there has been talk of building steel plants to take advantage of Wyoming’s iron and coal.
The main agricultural commodities produced in Wyoming include livestock (beef), hay, sugar beets, grain (wheat and barley), and wool.
With increasing prosperity and better transportation, the state government has made efforts in recent years to bring back the tourism industry. Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks have reopened for all in recent years, and with an airport in Jackson, the two parks could soon be among North America's leading attractions. Other major attractions include Independence Rock and Fossil Butte National Monument.
Communications and Media[]
There are several newspapers of note in Wyoming. The state's primary newspaper is the Casper Star-Tribune, publishing daily in the capital city of Casper. The paper has statewide readership and influence and serves as the newspaper of record. The Torrington Telegram, publishing in the nation's capital, has refocused its reporting around nationwide political issues and some local news. Filling the role formerly occupied by the destroyed Washington Post, the Telegram has acquired a regional circulation and a reputation as one of North America's leading newspapers. Other major local papers include the Cody Enterprise, Laramie Boomerang, and the Rock Springs Daily Rocket-Miner.
Wyoming is served by two television stations that have translators throughout the state.
KTWO-TV (Channel 2): Out of Casper, KTWO is Wyoming's ABC station. Aside from network programming, it broadcasts pre-Doomsday shows, movies, and cartoons, United States Baseball League games, University of Wyoming sports, and a few post-Doomsday productions syndicated from national studios.
KCWC-TV (Channel 8): Out of Riverton, Wyoming PBS has a more public service-oriented schedule, carrying local, national, and international news, sessions of the state legislature, and limited entertainment, including programs from Vermont, Superior, Kentucky, and Texas.
Colleges and Universities[]
The University of Wyoming continues to be the only institution of four-year learning within the state. The University was crucial to helping maintain Laramie's stability following Doomsday and during the Lakota War. The Agriculture and Natural Resources school was crucial in the first few years, as it was able to provide needed aid for getting as much agricultural production out of the state as possible. Health Sciences rapidly formed a partnership with Laramie hospitals to establish a program for training doctors, with the nursing programs and the pharmacy programs also aiding the recovery of Wyoming. The University has also begun to produce Wyoming's top judges, lawyers, businessmen, and politicians.
The University of Wyoming is supplemented by several community colleges, including Casper College, Northwest College in Powell, Laramie Community College, Central Wyoming College in Riverton, Sheridan College, and Gillette College.
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