Occidental activist, Cheryl Case, dies on hike in Arizona

Sonoma County activist and adventurer Cheryl Case died one week ago in a regional park in Arizona after apparently becoming lost in the rugged, mountainous terrain.

The Occidental resident’s body was found after a multiday search led by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office with hikers, helicopters and trained dogs fanning out in the park west of Phoenix where she had been visiting a close family friend, said her brother Vail Case of Port Angeles, Wash.

Case, 68, was in town visiting her mother’s longtime partner George Powell - who was like a father to her - in Sun City for his 89th birthday, her brother said. She set out the morning of Oct. 27 for a day hike at White Tank Mountain Regional Park but did not return as planned.

Vail Case, who flew to Arizona to join the search, said that searchers found her Oct. 30 in a gully far from a trail.

“It was very rough ground, mountain desert; temperatures the day they found her were 94 degrees,” Vail Case said. “She had hiked there before; she and I have hiked there before.”

Known as “Snake” by friends and “Casey” by co-workers at the Sebastopol Post Office, Case was born May 15, 1946, in Seattle to Earl and Waneta Case. Earl Case was in the Navy, and the family moved frequently, setting down for periods in Pensacola, Fla., San Diego and Albuquerque, N.M. Case started college at 16 in New Mexico and was married at 18. But by 19, she struck out on her own, beginning a series of adventures.

“She’s been a very adventuresome free spirit,” her brother said. “She pushed the envelope.”

Case moved to San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district and in the late 1960s worked for Ramparts, a radical leftist magazine outspoken against the Vietnam War. There, she met fellow wanderer Larry Tomasson, 67, of Santa Rosa.

“One day I said, ‘Hey do you want to go to Alaska? She said sure, which stunned me really. I just wanted to talk to her,” Tomasson said.

They took off on a motorcycle for the Alaska-Canadian Highway, then a dirt road journey through the Yukon. That was one of many motorcycle adventures that led them to back roads and highways across the western United States.

“She was very adventurous all her life,” Tomasson said. “She didn’t care about being safe and comfortable. She’d rather be out there, looking around, meeting people.”

Case took a freighter from New Orleans to Haifa, Israel, and backpacked through Israel, Egypt and Pakistan. She led a trekking expedition in Nepal and hiked the Pacific Crest Trail on her own from Mexico to Canada.

She made west Sonoma County her home around 1980 and became a prominent member of the gay and lesbian community, family and friends said.

“She was a giant in the lesbian community here in Sonoma County,” said Marylou Shira Hadditt, 86, of Sebastopol.

Hadditt met Case in 1981 when she handed over the reins of local feminist newspaper “Women’s Voices” to Case.

“Our first issue we worked on together was on child abuse, before child abuse was on the front pages of the papers,” Hadditt said. “She was a very strong activist. She was involved in things, took leadership, publicly spoke out.”

Case was outspoken, liberal-minded and always offering the use of her pickup.

“She’d say, ‘I heard you were moving and I have that weekend free, I’ll bring my truck,’” her longtime friend Paula Dove of Santa Rosa said.

Case was a well-known fixture behind the counter at the Sebastopol Post Office, where she was known as “Casey,” until retiring about three years ago.

She wrote volumes about her journeys in letters and journals. Vail Case said that his family hopes to compile and publish them someday, something she’d hoped to do herself.

“Her life was pretty much like a novel,” Vail Case said.

A service celebrating Case’s life will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. on Dec. 13 at the Occidental Center for the Arts at 3850 Doris Murphy Court in Occidental.

You can reach Staff ?Writer Julie Johnson at 521-5220 or julie.johnson?@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @jjpressdem.