1911 - 1920

1911

Seven new counties created by Legislature. Niobrara is formed from Converse; Campbell, from Weston and Crook; Goshen and Platte, from Laramie; Hot Springs, from Fremont, Big Horn, and Park; Washakie from Big Horn; and Lincoln, from Uinta.
Park County, created two years before, is organized.
Wyoming State Game Commission is created.
Pathfinder Dam, the first power, reclamation,and recreation project on the North Platte River, is completed.
Laborers, using hand picks,shovels, and burros, complete Wind River tunnel. It requires one year to progress 18 miles.
On May 25, USS Wyoming is christened .^[1]
First airplane visits Wyoming at Gillette's Fourth of July celebration.
The Plains Hotel in Cheyenne and the Virginian Hotel in Medicine Bow are opened.
Mrs. Susan Wissler of Dayton is the first woman elected to the office of mayor in Wyoming.
Severe winter of 1911-12 causes heavy losses in the sheep industry.

Wyoming Industrial Institute for Boys is established at Worland.
Wyoming Legislature votes to license all motor vehicles through the office of the Secretary of State, the owner is issued a permit and a number he may use on a handmade plate.
In April, Joseph Seng is hanged in the penitentiary at Rawlins on a portable scaffold, similar to the one, if not the same one used to hang Tom Horn.
In October, prisoners mutiny in Rawlins and burn the broom factory.

The State Legislature requires uniform metal plates for all motor vehicles.Undated,these plates bear the state seal and a number.
Wyoming's No. 1 automobile license is issued to J.M. Schwoob of Cody.
The seven counties created in 1911 are organized. They are Campbell, Niobrara, Goshen, Platte, Hot Springs, Washakie, and Lincoln.
Cornerstone is laid for a $100,000 College of Agriculture building at the University of Wyoming.
Wyoming Industrial Institute for Boys is opened at Worland.

Non-partisan Judiciary Law is passed and approved February 24, 1915.^[2]
The Workman's Compensation Law is enacted.^[3]
Automobiles are allowed in Yellowstone Park for the first time.
August 27, Mrs. John J. Pershing (Frances Warren Pershing), daughter of Sen. Francis E. Warren, and her three daughters lose their lives in a fire at the Presidio in San Francisco.

A sugar factory is built at Lovell.
Bill Carlisle robs Union Pacific train.
Sunrise is made model town by Colorado Fuel and Iron Company.
September 28, Wyoming National Guardsmen depart for the Mexican border.
Stock Raising Homestead Act of December 29 opens to entry 640-acre homesteads suitable to stock raising.^[4] Coal and other mineral rights are retained by the government.

The Wyoming State Flag,designed by Vera Keays, is adopted by the Legislature, January 31.
The Indian Paint Brush becomes the State Flower,also,on this date.
Homestead Exemption Act sets veterans' exemptions at $2,000.^[5]
Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, the Liquor Prohibition Amendment,is declared in effect January 16.
State Highway Department is established. ^[6]
Mary G. Bellamy is sent to Washington to represent Wyoming women during the national campaign for the Nineteenth Amendment the nationwide suffrage bill for women.
Buffalo Bill,one of the founders of Cody,Wyoming,dies in Denver and is buried on Lookout Mountain,in Colorado.
Sugar factory is built at Worland.
Jim Baker's cabin is moved from Dixon to Cheyenne.
The East and West wings of the State Capitol Building are completed.
Wyoming male citizens register for World War I draft.
Oil wells are brought in at Lance Creek, in Niobrara County.

Wyoming breweries suspend operations during "national emergency."
First fishing licenses are issued.
The State Historical Board is created.
Royal Valley School, six miles south of Lusk, becomes the first standard school in Wyoming.
July 1st, prohibition goes in to effect.
President Woodrow Wilson stops in Wyoming several times during the year.
Bill Carlisle, train robber, escapes from penitentiary.
Act is passed by the Legislature to promote the public welfare by encouraging the establishment and maintenance of county memorial hospitals. ^[7]
St. John's Hospital, of Laramie County,1901, is incorporated, June 24,1919, as the "Memorial Hospital of Laramie County," having occupied the same site since 1883. It started, unnamed, in a tent in 1867 at the approximate location of the Greyhound Bus Station (now the Depot Plaza at 16th and Capitol Avenue).

Population is 194,402.
The Fifteenth State Legislature meets in special session, January 26,to consider irrigation districts and women's rights. lt ratifies an amendment to the Constitution of the United States,extending the right of suffrage to all women.
Transcontinental mail planes fly over Wyoming.
The Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States is proclaimed, August 26. ^[8]
The White Custer Wolf, said to have killed $25,000 worth of livestock in the Gillette Canyon area over a period of nine years,is finally tracked down and killed by H. P.Williams,under instructions from the U.S. Biological Survey.
Wyoming has 24,000 autos.

1. For an account of the silver service donated by the State of Wyoming, see 1946.

2. Session Laws 1915, ch. 74

3. Session Laws 1915, ch. 124

4. 39 stat. pt. 1, p.862

5. Session Laws 1917, ch. 87

6. Session Laws 1917, ch. 76

7. Session Laws 1919, ch. 7

8. Senate Joint Resolution 1, Session Laws 1920