Twelfth Annual Eccles Family Rural West Conference

Zephyr Frank, Bill Lane Center for the American West, Stanford University

Daniel Grant, Ivan Doig Center for the Study of the Lands and Peoples of the North American West,  Montana State University

Jon Bennion, The Washington Companies

Jon Bennion was born and raised in Billings, Montana. He earned his bachelor’s and law degrees from the University of Montana.

In 2004, he authored Big Sky Politics, a book on the history of campaigns and elections in Montana. A revised and updated version will be released in May of this year. Following a clerkship with a state district judge in Billings, Jon worked for seven years as Director of Government Relations for the Montana Chamber of Commerce.

Jon served at the Montana Department of Justice from 2013 to 2020, eventually serving as Chief Deputy Attorney General. He was hired as Director of Government Relations for The Washington Companies at the beginning of 2021, and was named Executive Director of the Dennis and Phyllis Washington Foundation in September of 2024.

Zach Brown, Gallatin County Commission

Zach Brown grew up in Gallatin County, graduating from Bozeman High School in 2009, then completing his undergraduate studies at the University of Montana in 2013. After graduating from college, he spent a year leading a research project at Georgetown University focused on U.S. immigration policy reforms.

From 2014 to 2020, Zach worked as a nonprofit professional in Bozeman in addition to serving three terms representing Gallatin County in the Montana House of Representatives. In 2020, he was elected as a Gallatin County Commissioner. Beyond his public service career, Zach lives a few blocks away from the Courthouse in Bozeman with his two dogs, Beans and Wanda. As a pack, they love to float, fish, hike, and hunt. Zach also loves to officiate high school basketball and actively supports young people and social services across the community.

Rylee Sommers-Flanagan, Upper Seven Law

Before founding Upper Seven Law, Rylee Sommers-Flanagan served as Montana Governor Steve Bullock's deputy chief legal counsel, not only defeating the Trump campaign in election-related litigation but winning two other cases against the administration over the course of a few short months.  Rylee also worked as a fellow for the nationally renowned class action firm Cohen Milstein and as the Supreme Court Assistance Project Fellow for the Public Citizen Litigation Group.  Before that, she clerked for the Honorable Sidney R. Thomas, Chief Judge of the Ninth Circuit, and for Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle and Judge Thomas Hogan of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia.  

Rylee graduated from Stanford Law School, where she served as president of the Stanford student chapter of the American Constitution Society.  She graduated magna cum laude from Emory University.  There, she founded Emory's Day On, a service day in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King.  She also has a creative writing degree from the University of St. Andrews.  Rylee is a fifth generation Montanan who grew up in Missoula and spent summers on the family's working ranch in Absarokee.

Tom Lutey, Montana Free Press 

Tom Lutey has covered politics and investigations for Montana Free Press since 2024. He is also the author of Capitolized, MTFP's political newsletter. Originally from southwest Montana, Tom has written about the West for 30 years, mostly from Montana and Washington. He has covered legislatures, Congress, courts, energy, agriculture and the occasional militia group. He is a collector of documents and a devotee of the long game.

Cora Neumann Montana State Senate 

Dr. Cora Neumann is a Montana State Senator (citizen legislature), public health practitioner, and nonprofit leader with over 25 years of experience advancing health, equity, and economic opportunity across the U.S. and globally. She has worked at the U.S. State Department, RAND Corporation, World Health Organization, Bush Institute, Montana Public Health Institute, and is currently with the Native American Development Corporation, helping improve health outcomes and build Indigenous-led systems of care. Throughout her career, Cora has built cross-sector partnerships with Tribal, local, and national leaders to expand access to care in underserved and rural communities. In 2009, she launched the Global First Ladies Alliance in partnership with First Ladies Laura Bush and Michelle Obama, and to date has worked with more than 100 First Ladies worldwide to deliver critical health, education, and economic services. She serves on the board of Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and is a former regional Vice President of the Montana Public Health Association, and Beth Shalom Congregation. Cora holds a master's in public health from Columbia University and a doctorate in public health and international development from the University of Oxford, UK. Cora grew up and is based in Bozeman, Montana, surrounded by four generations of family, from her grandmother to her two children.

Terry Anderson, Stanford University/Montana State University

Terry L. Anderson is the John and Jean DeNault Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University; past president of the Property and Environment Research Center, Bozeman, MT; and Professor Emeritus at Montana State. Much of his career focused on developing the idea of Free Market Environmentalism, the title of one of his 43 books. More recently he has focused his research on the evolution of Native American property rights institutions. His most recent book with Kathy Ratte is Renewing Indigenous Economies. In addition to a long list of scholarly articles, Anderson has written for popular audiences in publications ranging from the Wall Street Journal to Fly Fisherman, He lives in Montana with his wife, Monica, where they enjoy fishing, hunting, horseback riding, and skiing.

Julia Haggerty, Montana State University

Julia Haggerty is Professor of Geography and Head of the Department of Earth Sciences at Montana State University. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Colorado in history and a B.A. in liberal arts from Colorado College. Dr. Haggerty’s expertise is in community-engaged, place-based research on rural and Tribal economic and community development and related natural resource and energy policy issues. Her research has been supported by grants from the U.S. DOE, National Science Foundation (NSF), the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and others. She received the 2020 Fulbright Global Scholar award and the Professional Geographer Award from the Association of American Geographers in 2019. A University Fellow at Resources for the Future, Haggerty co-leads the Resilient Energy Economies initiative and is active in numerous national and international board and studies.

Isaac Nehring, Stanford University

Isaac Nehring is a fifth-generation Montanan, born and raised in Helena. He grew up hiking, floating, and camping on public lands across his home state and around the West. Isaac is currently a Stanford senior, graduating in June with a B.A. in American Studies, and returning next fall to complete a coterminal M.A. in Environmental Communication. On campus, Isaac leads the Stanford Rural Engagement Network, works at the educational farm, and has been deeply involved with the Bill Lane Center as a student, researcher, and program associate throughout his undergraduate career. Isaac is a 2025 Truman Scholar representing Montana, planning to eventually pursue a J.D. focused on environmental, land use, and estate planning law for application in the conservation industry back home. Previously, Isaac has worked in outreach and development for Prickly Pear Land Trust in Helena and interned for former U.S. Senator Jon Tester in Washington, D.C. He’s also been involved in youth civic engagement efforts, local education initiatives, and United Methodist ministry through a variety of boards and other volunteer leadership roles. His current thesis research follows the legislative and cultural story of voluntary private land conservation in

Zephyr Frank, Bill Lane Center for the American West, Stanford University

Zephyr Frank is the faculty director for the Bill Lane Center for the American West. He is a professor of history, a professor of environmental social sciences, and a senior fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment. He is also the former director of the Program on Urban Studies (2013 - 2019) and the founding director of the Center for Spatial and Textual Analysis (CESTA) 2011-16.  His research interests focus on Brazilian social and cultural history, the study of wealth and inequality, and the digital humanities.

Justin Farrell, Yale University

Justin Farrell is a Professor of Sociology at Yale University whose research examines how landscapes and culture shape American institutions — past and present. He blends ethnographic fieldwork with large-scale computational and network science methods to examine cultural and environmental dynamics, especially in rural lands and communities. Farrell’s work has been published in Science and many other journals, and his books by Princeton University Press, and he regularly presents to policymakers at venues including the U.S. Senate, the White House, the Vatican, and the United Nations. A first-generation college graduate and native of Wyoming, he holds a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Notre Dame and divides his time between Yale and the Mountain West, where he directs a research program on rural communities. His scholarship has been funded by the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Science Foundation.

Shane Doyle, The Nature Conservancy\Yellowstone Peoples

Dr. Shane Doyle (Apsaalooké) is a community and environmental advocate who hails from Crow Agency, MT.  Dr. Doyle currently serves as the North America Indigenous Right Relations Director for The Nature Conservancy, as well as the executive director of Yellowstone Peoples, an Indigenous nonprofit that supports and organizes an annual Intertribal Tipi Village event in Yellowstone Park.  In his role for The Nature Conservancy, Shane works across the U.S. and Canada to support Tribal Bison Restoration on Native lands, as well as the revitalization of Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Land Back to Native communities.  Shane lives in Bozeman with his wife Megkian, and their 5 children; Florence, Ruby, Lilian, Blake and Quanah.  

Andrew Huff, Center for Indian Country Development 

Andrew Huff is the senior policy and legal advisor to Center Indian Country Development (CICD). He is an enrolled member of the Rocky Boy’s Reservation (Chippewa Cree Tribe) of north-central Montana. He graduated from Harvard College in 1991 and the University of Colorado Law School in 1999. Over the course of his legal career, Huff has served in a variety of positions, including as a tribal judge for the Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation; as chief legal counsel to Governor of Montana (2013–2017); and as an assistant attorney general for the Montana Department of Justice (2010–2012).

Cole Mannix, Old Salt Co-op

Cole grew up on a ranch that’s been run by his family since 1882 near Helmville, MT. Today, his parents, aunts & uncles, siblings and cousins run the ranch together. Cole lives about 60 miles east of the ranch in Helena, where he serves as President of Old Salt Co-op (of which his family’s ranch is a founding member). Old Salt is a regenerative marketplace for American Meat, owned and governed by the ranch members that supply it. Cole is married to Eileen Brennan and they have two young sons, Finn and Charlie. He enjoys good food, good company, and live music in small venues.

Megan Torgerson, Reframing Rural

Raised on the windswept Great Plains of Dagmar, MT, Megan Torgerson is a farmer's daughter and the founder of the documentary podcast series, Reframing Rural. Megan holds an MFA in arts leadership from Seattle University and a BA in English with a creative nonfiction emphasis from the University of Montana. For her work on Reframing Rural she has been awarded numerous grants and fellowships including the inaugural Public Humanities Fellowship from Humanities Washington. Since returning to Montana in 2023, Megan has lent her knowledge of agriculture, rural spaces and storytelling to documentary film projects, needs assessments, keynotes and educational courses for organizations including the Red Ants Pants Foundation, Montana Farmers Union and Montana State University Extension. Megan lives in Missoula, MT with her husband Andrew Drinnan and their young son Connor.

Daniel Grant, Ivan Doig Center for the Study of the Lands and Peoples of the North American West,  Montana State University

Daniel Grant is the director of the Ivan Doig Center and teaches history at Montana State University. He is a historian, geographer, writer, and publicly engaged educator focused primarily on the lands and peoples of the North American West. At the Doig Center, he convenes dialogue on pressing issues and across boundaries, facilitates public-facing research, teaching, and creative work, and builds partnerships across MSU, Montana, and the West. He has previously held various teaching, research, and administrative appointments, including at MSU, Harvard University, and Middlebury College. His writing has appeared in a range of scholarly and popular venues, and he is completing his first book, No Man's Land: Unsettled Ground in the American West. Originally from the Pacific Northwest, much of his adult life has been rooted in the Intermountain West and Midwest. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a B.A. from Whitman College. 

Zephyr Frank, Bill Lane Center for the American West, Stanford University

Daniel Grant, Ivan Doig Center for the Study of the Lands and Peoples of the North American West,  Montana State University