Linda Anne Arms White

Linda was born in Berea, Kentucky to Henry Windle Arms and Miriam Crow Arms, but she grew up in Wyoming and Colorado. Her love of the West and of Colorado’s mountains, streams, wildlife, and history became the compass that steered her life and subsequently those of her husband and children.

Her father Windle was a geologist who worked for an oil company. When he was transferred from Colorado to Lafayette, Louisiana in 1965, Linda and her sister Sharon were uprooted from the mountains her senior year in high school. She left friends and the landscape she loved to find herself in an alien, flat land with soaking humidity. At a high school party, however, a friend shoved her literally into the lap of a boy, Trigg White, who soon became a boyfriend, then a fiancé, and in 1969 her husband.

Linda and Trigg were separated for two years when she entered college at the University of Southwestern Louisiana (now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette) and he went away to college at Baylor University. But they were reunited when she transferred to Baylor her junior year, and they were married during spring break of that year. In college, Linda wanted badly to study interior design, but her father insisted on something practical, and she instead graduated with a BA in Speech-Language Pathology. She would maintain her love for design throughout her life, however, carefully appointing her homes with antiques and beautiful textiles. She made curtains for every new home, every home of her adult children, and even for Trigg’s fishing camper. Like the phone calls she would make before a heavy snow, making those curtains assured her that everyone was warm and cared for.

When they both graduated in 1970, Trigg entered the U.S. Air Force. Linda became Mrs. Lieutenant and took on the role of military wife—almost a career of its own. Linda’s mountain compass was sidelined for six years by the Air Force’s compass, which directed them to Biloxi, Mississippi, then to the storybook land of Germany. Linda always had an interest in architecture, and she was enchanted with the centuries-old handcrafted homes, the history, and the art of Europe. Linda and Trigg traveled to explore, visiting castles, rivers, and walled cities. The Air Force’s compass then pointed to Omaha, Nebraska where, among other things, they weathered the “Blizzard of ’75.” During the six Air Force years she also became the mother of sons Brad and Ryan and daughter Robin, and daughter Kate was added shortly thereafter.

Trigg and Linda left the Air Force in 1976 and moved their family to the Dallas, Texas area. But the mountain compass was never stilled. They viewed this move as a bridge between military and civilian life and were able to move to Loveland, Colorado in 1983 when Trigg took a job with Hewlett-Packard Company. Not quite in the mountains, but close.

When her youngest daughter Kate entered kindergarten, Linda decided to write a children’s book. Her first effort didn’t sell, but the second, Too Many Pumpkins, was bought and published by a New York publishing house. The book was inspired by the difficulties of her father’s Tennessee farm family during the Great Depression. It has sold more than 200,000 copies and can still be found in bookstores each fall. She ultimately published 10 books including her picture book I Could Do That: Esther Morris Gets Women the Vote for which Linda earned a Christopher Award for works that “affirm the highest values of the human spirit.” As an author, Linda became a popular speaker at schools. And with a partner, she spent 10 years holding weekend writing “bootcamps” across the country for aspiring children’s book writers.

While Linda was busy with family and writing, though, the compass pointed still higher and farther west. Linda and Trigg bought property near Allenspark, Colorado—in the mountains and by a stream. Linda designed a house to capture the feeling, if not the scale, of her favorite building, Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Inn, and construction began. In 2002, Trigg accepted an offer of early retirement from Hewlett-Packard. They took the deal, sold the Loveland house, moved into the almost-but-not-quite-completed Allenspark house and spent the next year hammering the final nails and laying the last tiles.

During her 23 years in Allenspark, Linda volunteered at the newly formed Allenspark Community Cupboard food bank and served as its director for five years including through the COVID-19 pandemic. Her service there earned her and Trigg the Dan Crane Award for distinguished service to the community. Linda enjoyed camping, gardening, painting, rustic architecture, and especially being with family, which came to include daughter-in-law Sandra Bray White and five grandchildren: Rowan and Dory White, Zane and Kaden Edwards, and Sylvia White.

Linda lived a most happily contented life. She died following a brief illness surrounded by her family close to the mountains she loved. Her last morning brought fresh snow, and a moose was seen browsing near the house.

A memorial reception will be held May 19th, 2025 at 2:00 P.M. at The Old Gallery in Allenspark. In lieu of flowers, the family suggest donations to the Allenspark Community Cupboard food bank at theoldgallery.org/donate. (Note Linda White Memorial Fund in the dedication.)