Fern Hobbs

Who was Fern Hobbs?

Fern Hobbs was an American attorney in the U.S. state of Oregon, and a 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.