Title: Women Homesteading the West, from her book Staking Her Claim
Biography: A graduate of the University of Tulsa (B.A. 1964; M.A. 1966), Hensley taught English and Western American Literature at Western Wyoming Community College, where she directed the Western American Studies program. She is the recipient of the Wyoming Arts Council’s Neltje Blanchan award for writing inspired by nature. Her essays have been published in numerous anthologies, Wyofile, and the syndicated column “Writers on the Range.” In 1909, her non-fiction book, Staking Her Claim, Women Homesteading the West, won awards from the Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Association as well as from Women Writing the West, Wyoming Writers, Wyoming Historical Society, and ForeWord Magazine. After 30 years in rural Wyoming, Marcia now lives in Laramie, Wyoming, where she wrote her memoir, published in 2024, Away from It All: A Wyoming Love Story, and served on the Albany County Historical Society Board of Directors.
Presentation Summary: Finding Their Place in the Equality State - Although about 12% of Wyoming homesteaders in the early 1900s were single women, their significance has often been overlooked. This presentation will discuss what made homesteading feasible for single women during this time, what motivated them to homestead, what their stories reveal about life in the early days of statehood, and how they shaped attitudes about women’s equality.
This project is funded in part by the Wyoming Semiquincentennial grant from the Wyoming State Parks and Cultural Resources office.