Lynne Cheney

In fairness, Lynne Cheney and I have never met in person.

We are both Wyoming women, girls from the sagebrush of the windswept prairie and desert, whose lives have been significantly impacted by the oil and gas industry that competes for attention with the cattle ranchers of the Equality State.

But most importantly, we share a common ancestor, Ebenezer Peck of Rehoboth, Massachusetts, which makes us distant cousins. Our own respective Peck ancestors became Mormon pioneers and crossed the plains. Her favorite to cite is Fannie Peck; mine is Martin Horton Peck, who was part of the Nauvoo Brass Band in the glory days of the Mormon settlement, and later became the first blacksmith in the Salt Lake Valley.

Lynne Ann Vincent Cheney.

Lynne Ann Vincent was born in Casper, Wyoming, and attended college in Colorado. She is an author, historian, and from 1986 to 1993 served as Director of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

She is currently Second Lady of the United States, a position she has held since January 2001, and married to the Vice President of the United States,Vice President of the United States, another Wyoming native, Richard Bruce Cheney.