Wyoming
Wyoming History: Calamity Jane’s Turbulent Visits To Her Sister’s Homestead
At the mouth of Sinks Canyon near Lander, Wyoming, the tiny community of Borner’s Garden had thrived in the late 1800s.
It consisted of a schoolhouse, post office, and a few homesteading families. One of these families were John and Lena Borner who were raising their six children in this rural community that had been named after John’s fruit trees and large garden.
Their son Frank Edward remembered as a small boy hiding behind his mother’s skirts. His dad was gone and a woman had ridden up to the porch of their cabin. He later learned that she was his Aunt Calamity Jane.
Jan Cerney wrote about the incident in “Calamity Jane and Her Siblings: The Saga of Lena and Elijah Canary.”
“He recalled that his mother Lena asked her what she was doing there and what she wanted,” Cerney wrote. “Lena told Calamity to leave and never come back. Apparently, at that time, Lena had had it with her sister Martha.”
Martha Jane Canary, more widely known as Calamity Jane, was Lena’s big sister and her uncouth ways were not always welcome in Lena’s quiet home.
Another time, Cerney said that Hannah was the child who mimicked Aunt Calamity’s swear words, distressing John Borner to the point that he again told Calamity to never come back.
Future Brother-in-Law
Bill Wilkinson, a great-nephew of Martha Jane said in an interview to author Ellen Crago Mueller that his Aunt Calamity Jane was at the mining camps on South Pass in Wyoming around 1870-71.
It was while here that she first met freighter John G. Borner, her future brother-in-law.
Borner had been badly hurt and broken his leg according to family accounts. He was taken to the rooming house where Martha Jane Canary was working, and the young woman set his leg.
Jean Mathisen, in a December 1996 True West article, “Calamity’s Sister,” said that Canary asked Borner if she could make the trip to Salt Lake for him to check on her brother and sister, Lena and Elijah, known as “Lige.”
“She supposedly made two trips in the next six weeks and brought Borner’s customary load of goods to South Pass,” Mathisen wrote. “After his leg healed, Borner resumed his trips to Salt Lake and made the acquaintance of Lena and Lige Canary.”
John Borner was born in Saxony, Germany, in 1835 and, after immigrating to America, had been injured in the Civil War. Borner later came and joined the Wyoming gold rush at South Pass in 1869.
In 1872, Borner, Ernest Hornecker and Jake Frey moved to an area known as Chief Washakie’s horse pasture, near the mouth of Sinks Canyon at the base of the Wind River Mountains.
The men squatted on what was then Indian land and took up claims. Chief Washakie knew the men according to Mathisen and had encouraged them to settle in the valley to help provide protection for his Eastern Shoshone band from his enemies, the Sioux and Arapahos.
By the next year Borner was building on his own claim in a rich meadowland near the Popo Agie River.
Building A Home
“It was John Borner that brought Lena, Calamity Jane’s sister, to this country to be a companion of the Indian agent on the reservation,” Jack States of Lander told Cowboy State Daily.
States’ father went to school at Borner’s Garden and had shared with States’ the tall tales that swirled around the family of Calamity Jane. States said that at times it is difficult to separate fact from fiction, but it is well known that Martha Canary spent a lot of time at Borner’s Garden and Lander to be near her sister.
Although Borner had originally brought Lena Canary to the area as a companion at Fort Washakie, romance had blossomed between the by-now eighteen-year-old girl and Borner, who was over twenty years her senior, and the job was short-lived. John Borner and Lena Pauline Canary were married in 1875.
Lander Museum Director Randy Wise said Borner’s Garden where Borner brought his young wife was a beautiful area below the canyon proper.
“According to the historic documents, it was one of the few places in the whole state where you could actually grow apples and plums,” Wise said. “They grew currants and gooseberries and things like that up there.”
The Borners became the parents of seven children over the next nine years: May Rebecca, Tobias (Tobe), Frank Edward, Theresa Theodosa, Hannah, Bertha Pauline and William Frederick.
“At its height, there might have been maybe 40 people living in Borner’s Garden,” Wise said. “It was never a formal town and just one of many little communities that dotted the region.”
Aunt Calamity
Accounts differ as to whether Borner and Lena’s infamous sister got along, although a younger brother of Ernest and Mart’s, Albert Hornecker, remembered that Calamity would travel by in a buggy on her way to visit her sister Lena when she knew Borner would be gone.
Tobe Borner related in the September 1941 Basin Republican Rustler that his father had no use for Calamity and felt she was a poor influence on his growing family. However, Tobe also said that Martha Jane was present at his birth in May of 1877, so she continued to visit despite the misgivings of her brother-in-law.
According to Mathisen, old-timers in Lander, the community that grew up on the site of old Camp Brown, stated that Calamity Jane and her sister Lena ran a laundry together in a small log building that sat on Main Street, between Second and Third, in early-day Lander.
“Calamity spent a fair amount of time in Wyoming and this part of Wyoming in particular,” Wise said. “When Calamity was sober, she would help her sister at the laundry in town.”
John Borner’s dislike to Calamity continued to grow, mostly because of her drinking and swearing. Cerney said that Calamity wasn’t afraid of Borner and visited her sister when John Borner wasn’t around. The Hornecker neighbors saw Calamity pass by in a buggy on her way to the Borner place when John Borner was not home. Tom Bell, a local Lander historian, told Cerney that Calamity often stayed at the Borner School when she came to visit her sister since she was not welcome in the Borner home.
A Ghost Community
Tragedy visited the Borner family in October of 1888. Lena Canary Borner, 31, passed away after suffering ill health for two years from injuries she had sustained from being kicked by a cow.
Her obituary in the October 17, 1888, issue of the Fremont Clipper stated, “She was one of the most industrious women in the valley and one whom all her acquaintances held in the highest respect. Her pride was in her children and her home.”
Heartbroken and tired of fighting with his neighbors and former friends over irrigation pipes, John Borner moved his family to Greybull the following spring. He had built a cabin at what would someday be the site of Greybull, Wyoming, and later added corrals and barns.
In 1888 the Wyoming Territorial Legislature authorized a Poor Farm for the soon-to-be state. The trustees bought Borner’s ranch, and in the spring of 1889, Borner loaded up his wagons along with his children and moved to his new land claim. He had 100 head of cattle, a herd of horses, and a herd of mules he had acquired from the government.
A special June 6, 1974, edition of the Greybull Standard stated that Borner was “a prosperous and very intelligent rancher from the Lander County. He picked Greybull as the site of his new home because of his belief that it was an ideal location. Two rivers flowed into the Big Horn within the space of a mile, the Greybull River and Shell Creek. Between the mouths of these two streams, he felt should be an ideal site for a town.”
He never remarried and his children adored him. Aunt Calamity Jane would occasionally visit but had mostly gone on her way to create myths about her life. She passed away in 1903 when she was 51.
At Borner’s Garden, only memories of Calamity Jane and her sister’s family are left. The schoolhouse that Calamity Jane stayed in was moved to the Lander museum and the old homes have fallen down long ago.
“She had quite a lively career when she left this place,” States said. “We have a number of stories from people who knew her when she was here but that part of the history sort of borders on fantasy.”
Contact Jackie Dorothy at jackie@cowboystatedaily.com
Jackie Dorothy can be reached at jackie@cowboystatedaily.com.
Australia-based American Rare Earths, which operates a US subsidiary called Wyoming Rare, has advanced the pilot plant program for its Halleck Creek Project in Wyoming to produce a high-purity separated rare earth oxide.
The company has signed agreements for initial processing to be done in Wyoming through Western Research Institute in Laramie and DISA Technologies in Casper, followed by a final stage of hydrometallurgical processing and oxide separation at the Saskatchewan Research Council (SRC) in Saskatoon, Canada.
The pilot plant program has been structured in three stages. The first two stages, milling and sizing followed by mineral separation and concentration, will take place in Wyoming. SRC will handle leaching, impurity removal and oxide refining in the third stage.
This will allow the front end of the pilot plant processing to stay in Wyoming, as it will process ore that has already been extracted from the American Rare Earths Halleck Creek site and stockpiled in Laramie. It will then leverage the downstream facility at SRC to accelerate production, the company said.
The pilot plant will use DISA’s patented high-pressure slurry ablation (HPSA) technology to handle coarser particle sizes and then use the GradePro reflux classifier and induced roll magnetic separators to perform primary mineral separation and secondary concentration.
The SRC facility has a similar process configuration to the type of downstream processing facility American Rare Earths intends to build in Wyoming. The company will use the data generated during the pilot campaign to further develop its plans for the commercial plant and mine.
“The pilot plant and production of pre-production rare earth oxide were previously expected to take several years. This defined pilot pathway now materially shortens the timeline and positions the Company to deliver outcomes within months,” said Mark Wall, CEO of American Rare Earths.
Source: American Rare Earths
Wyomingites love their guns, and many have no qualms about keeping a firearm by their bedsides, in their vehicles and even on their persons, in case any hooligans want to try starting something.
However, experts warn that this isn’t the Wild West any longer. Even in the most justified cases of shooting in self-defense, the shooter will be investigated. And one wrong move or bad decision can land them in big legal trouble, or possibly prison.
And even if somebody who shot in self-defense is cleared of any criminal wrongdoing, they still might face civil actions that could ruin them financially.
In short, the decision to carry a firearm with the intent that you might someday have to use it to save your life or other innocent lives isn’t something to be taken lightly, Casper attorney Ryan Semerad told Cowboy State Daily.
“It’s going to cause an investigation, and the investigation needs to be completed because it’s a hugely consequential matter,” said Semerad, who has defended civilians and law enforcement officers in use of deadly-force cases. “You might have just killed or nearly killed somebody.”
There are also the psychological effects to consider, he added.
“Taking a life is huge. I’ve never met a person who has taken another person’s life who hasn’t been touched by that experience,” Semerad said.
“If you’re not ready for that, don’t put yourself in that situation,” he added.
When To Open Fire
Statutes governing the use of lethal force can vary by state, but there are overarching criteria that apply across the country, said J James Cullers of Casper, a certified trainer with the U.S. Concealed Carry Association (USCCA) and National Rifle Association (NRA).
“You can’t initiate the scenario, you can’t escalate that scenario,” he told Cowboy State Daily.
USCCA lays out four basic rules for legitimate self-defense in most states:
• A reasonable and immediate fear of death or serious bodily harm to yourself or another person.
• The shooter must be an innocent party.
• No lesser use of force is sufficient or available to stop the threat.
• There is no reasonable means of retreat or escape.
Inside people’s homes, Wyoming’s strong “castle doctrine” standard favors residents claiming self-defense, Semerad said.
Wyoming’s justified use of force statute errs on the side of residents assuming that somebody trying to cross their threshold without their blessing means harm.
“A person who unlawfully and by force enters or attempts to enter another’s home or habitation is presumed to be doing so with the intent to commit an unlawful act involving force or violence,” according to the statute.
Even so, blasting away at somebody who is trying to run out your door with your television set would likely not be regarded as justified, Semerad said.
“You’ve got to let them go,” he said.
Outside of the home, matters get more complicated.
Wyoming statute makes it clear that the person who draws and fires can’t have been the initial aggressor in the situation, was where they had a legal right to be, and wasn’t engaged in illegal activity.
Semerad cited a case of a “weed dealer” who had another person threaten to kill him and fired in what he thought was legitimate self-defense.
However, since the dealer was engaged in illegal activity at the time of the shooting, he ended up going to prison, Semerad said.
Likewise, somebody who was trespassing and got into a deadly confrontation wouldn’t be able to claim legitimate self-defense, because they didn’t have a legal right to be where they were when the confrontation occurred, he added.
Situations To Avoid
One rule of concealed carry is to do everything reasonably possible to avoid sketchy places or situations, Cullers said.
“Don’t go down that dark alley (even when armed). If it takes you a little bit longer to walk around the block to your car, then walk around the block and don’t go down the dark alley,” Cullers said.
People who choose to carry firearms should be alert, he added.
“Don’t be walking down the street with your head in your cellphone,” Cullers said
Semerad said people who have had “even one drink” shouldn’t carry their firearms, because that could lead to poor decisions.
Likewise, firearms shouldn’t be present in emotionally fraught situations, he said.
Most assaults and murders don’t result from random law-abiding citizens being attacked by violent strangers, Semerad said.
Rather, they take place between people who know each other well and get into situations where emotions spiraled out of control, such as quarrels over money or romantic jealousy, he said.
Bringing A Knife To A Gunfight
Another common misconception is that it’s not justified or fair to shoot somebody who has only a knife or a club, or perhaps isn’t even armed, Cullers said.
The legal justification for self-defense shootings often hinges upon a disparity of force, he said.
So, for instance, a petite woman might be justified in using a gun if she’s attacked by a huge, strong man, even if he’s unarmed, Cullers said.
And just because somebody has a knife doesn’t mean that they aren’t a deadly threat to somebody with a gun, he said.
Law enforcement data indicates that somebody 21 feet away, or perhaps even 30 feet away, with a knife can be swift and deadly, Cullers said.
It’s commonly known as the “Tueller Drill,” and is a law enforcement training tool, not a legal rule or absolute law.
“Someone with a knife can cover 21 feet in a second and a half. Most people could not draw a weapon and fire to protect themselves in the time it takes the attacker to cover that 21 feet,” he said.
Get Training, Legal Protection
The Wyoming Legislature this year passed a law allowing 18-year-olds to apply for concealed carry permits.
Cullers said that while he’s glad to see more people getting that right, he also stressed the need for proper knowledge and training.
And that should be two-pronged, he said. First, having a clear knowledge of the legal parameters of the use of deadly force. Second, training how to properly carry, draw and accurately fire a sidearm.
Cullers and Semerad said that a firearm should be a tool of last resort. People who wish to defend themselves should consider “less-lethal” options to use first, such as pepper spray, tasers or guns that shoot pepper balls instead of bullets.
“If you can carry a firearm, you can carry pepper spray. And if pepper spray will do the trick, then carry pepper spray,” Semerad said.
Those who choose to carry a firearm for self-defense should be prepared to have a legal defense, if they ever have to use deadly force, Cullers and Semerad said.
Cullers said that USCCA and other organizations, as well as some private law firms, offer self-defense legal insurance for concealed carry permit holders.
That can be particularly handy for people who are cleared of any criminal law violations in a self-defense shooting, but then get slapped with a civil lawsuit, he said.
Semerad said his clients, civilians and law enforcement officers alike, paid a traditional retainer fee.
“Personally, nobody has ever hired me through an insurance company, I don’t know if I would accept that arrangement,” he said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
Wyoming
Forty-six arrested for immigration violations during ‘Truck Around And Find Out’ detail in Wyoming
The Laramie County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO) arrested dozens of people during an operation targeting commercial vehicle violations.
On April 25, 2026, LCSO shared details on a recent three-day commercial vehicle operation dubbed “Truck Around And Find Out: Operation Spring Break,” which was conducted in partnership with federal authorities.
During the detail, LCSO made 85 criminal arrests, including 46 arrests for immigration violations.
“Many of these folks are operating without commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs),” said Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak. “Unsafe trucks, bald tires, their trucking companies have been revoked or suspended and shouldn’t be operating at all. And so, we’re taking that serious, and we’re trying to help keep our roads safe in this county.”
LCSO said that one of the truck drivers discovered to be present in the U.S. illegally had no CDL and had parked in a spot marked “Absolutely No Truck, Trailer, Or Semi Parking Anytime.”
Kozak said that recent commercial vehicle enforcement operations have lowered the number of fatal crashes in Laramie County. He also said that the county’s violent crime rate is half of the national average.
A previous “Truck Around And Find Out” detail conducted by LCSO in February 2026 resulted in 32 arrests for immigration violations.
Last fall, Kozak and 25 LCSO deputies were sworn in by ICE and authorized to enforce immigration law under Title 8, Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
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