Carolyn Dimmick Final PDF.indd - Washington Secretary of State

Judge Betty Howard, seated center on ottoman, at a Christmas party at the Dimmick home in the 1980s with some of the
female lawyers she had befriended and mentored over the years. Carolyn Dimmick is in the back row, fourth from left.
Hughes: Long before Sarah Palin.
Dimmick: And he was the “bull” – Bull Howard – and she was The Barracuda.
Hughes: What did Bull do?
Dimmick: He was a lawyer, and they had practiced law together until she went on the
bench.
Hughes: She must have been one of the state’s first female judges.
Dimmick: Well, Evangeline Star was the first around here, and then Betty.
Hughes: Who was Evangeline Star?
Dimmick: Oh, you should look her up. Evangeline Star was the first woman judge in the
district court, and she kept running for superior court and never made it, although she had
a terrific following among the women. But you were never going to get a man to vote for
a woman for superior court judge. So she was a district court judge and she was noted
for weddings. She would take a recess from the bench and go in her room and perform a
wedding ceremony.
Hughes: Back in law school did it ever enter your mind that the judiciary would be in your
future?
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