Fern Hobbs

Fern Hobbs (May 8, 1883 – April 10, 1964) was an American attorney in the U.S. state of Oregon, and private secretary to Oregon Governor Oswald West. She was noted for her ambition and several accomplishments as a young woman, and became the highest-paid woman in public service in America in her mid-twenties.

Hobbs made international news when Governor West sent her to implement martial law in the small Eastern Oregon town of Copperfield. The event was considered a strategic coup for West, establishing the State's authority over a remote rural community and cementing his reputation as a proponent of prohibition.

Hobbs later worked for the American Red Cross in Europe and at The Oregon Journal newspaper. She died in Portland in 1964.

Early life and career in public service Hobbs was born on May 8, 1883, in Bloomington, Nebraska, to John Alden Hobbs and Cora Bush Hobbs. Her family moved to Salt Lake City, Utah when she was six years old; she lived there for 12 years, finishing high school.

She soon became a private secretary to the president of the Title Guarantee and Trust Company. and was admitted to the Oregon State Bar.

Olcott, who managed Oswald West's successful 1910 campaign to become Governor of Oregon, recommended that West hire Hobbs as his private stenographer. This also made her, at age 27, the highest-paid woman in public service in the United States, earning $3,000 per year. West soon dispatched her to Washington, D.C. to represent the state in various land matters; she was the first woman to represent a governor's interests in Washington, and local coverage in the nation's capital expressed some surprise that a woman would be given an assignment of such gravity. She negotiated successfully with congressional committees and the U.S. Department of the Interior to untangle ownership issues around various parcels of land.

Martial law in Copperfield, Oregon West ordered Hobbs to Copperfield, Oregon to restore law and order on January 2, 1914, along with a group of six militia that included Oregon State Penitentiary warden B.K. Lawson. Some local residents had appealed to the state government for assistance. Governor West responded by ordering county officials to restore order, close the saloons, and force the resignations of the corrupt city leaders by December 25, 1913. Hobbs then ordered Lawson to declare martial law.

Newspaper ad for a theatrical reenactment of the Copperfield affair from the Oregon Journal, January 28, 2014. The actions of the governor were later challenged in court, with Hobbs and West among the defendants. The saloon keepers sought remuneration for liquor they claimed was confiscated during the period of martial law. The Baker County circuit court determined the governor's actions were within his powers, and the Oregon Supreme Court ultimately concurred.

These events made Hobbs the most famous woman in Oregon at that time. Writer Stewart Holbrook reported: In England, the Copperfield story escaped all bounds. One read that Miss Hobbs took off for the hellish place in command of a full battery of field artillery, plus machine gunners, in a special train; that she snapped commands to her troops and had them unlimber and train the heavy pieces on the doomed city.

Despite speculation around the country that Hobbs would run for governor of Oregon, she did not seek the office.

In early 1915, West appointed Hobbs to the Oregon Industrial Accident Commission in January 1915, just prior to the end of his one term as governor. Hobbs' departure from that post later in the year was not without controversy; she offered her resignation to the Oregon State Senate as a bargaining maneuver, in exchange for its support of a contentious workmen's compensation bill. Senators speculated that her letter was presented in coordination with the ex-governor, in an effort to embarrass the Senate. Subsequently, the legislature passed a law permitting appointive heads (such as the governor) to recall officials from appointed positions. Then-governor James Withycombe accepted Hobbs' resignation. At the time, she expressed regret for not completing her term, and announced her intention to return to Portland.

Upon returning to Portland, Hobbs practiced law. Holbrook noted during his interview that "the subject of Copperfield bores her" and concluded his account of her as follows: She had much rather talk of her two years with the Red Cross in World War I, in France, and with the American Army of Occupation in Germany. That, she says, and her eyes light up, was a real adventure. One gathers that she considers the affair at Copperfield to have been a deplorable incident."