We set off tomorrow for another trip to the Rockies - this time to Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. We're flying to Jackson Hole, then staying in Grand Teton and Yellowstone, before setting off on a mini-road trip through Montana and Idaho. So I've been reading up on our destinations - and here are a few fabulous facts about Wyoming.
Wyoming is famous for: Yellowstone national park, Devil's Tower, rodeos, cowboys
State capital: Cheyenne
Nickname: Equality State
Population: 509,294 (Wyoming is the least populous state in the USA)
State flower: Indian paintbrush
State tree: Plains cottonwood
State grass: Western wheatgrass
State reptile: Horned lizard (not to be confused with the horned toad)
State fish: Cutthroat trout
State mammal: American bison
State bird: Western Meadowlark
State fossil: Knightia (which is apparently an extinct herring. Fascinating)
State dinosaur: Triceratops
State soil (always my favourite category): Forkwood (unofficial)
State gemstone: Jade
State song: 'Wyoming'
State folk dance: Square dance
State motto: "Equal Rights"
Famous Wyomingites: Buffalo Bill Cody, Chris LeDoux, Dick Cheney, Jackson Pollock
Random fact 1: Wyoming was the first state* in which women had the right to vote and hold public office (1869). It had the first female Justice of the Peace (1870), the first all-woman jury (1870) and the first woman governor (elected 1924). Unfortunately little seems to have been accomplished since then: women in Wyoming now earn on average 64% of the salaries their male counterparts doing the same jobs, the worst gender equity pay ratio in the country.
Random fact 2: Wyoming has the higest rate of gasoline consumption per capita in the US at 15.9 barrels per capita (compared to 1.0 for California).
Random fact 3: The town of Kemmerer, Montana is known as the Fossil Fish Capital of the World - it has over 100,000 fish fossils.
(With acknowledgement to www.awesomeamerica.com).
*Unmarried women had been allowed to vote in New Jersey as early as 1776, provided they fulfilled certain property criteria, until an amendment was passed in 1807 limiting suffrage to 'white male' voters, but Wyoming was the first state to enfranchise 'every woman of the age of twenty-one years residing in this territory'.
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