There’s something special about a woman who dominates in a man’s world. It takes a certain strength, intelligence, grace, fearlessness, and the nerve to never take no for an answer, and Stephanie Dee Henderson certainly fits that description. Many call her Steph and know her as the girl hay hauler in the big pink truck often pulling triples around Idaho, but I get the distinct honor to call her mom.
In school, I learned that during World War II, women ran America while the men were away fighting. Women built equipment, worked as nurses, fixed airplanes, and most of all, drove trucks. Back in 1898, the first truck was built, and since then, the industry has been dominated by men. Growing up, many women in my life taught me hard work through the trucking industry. My grandmother, Kelley Bohannon, was the very first woman hay hauler in the state of Idaho, and she passed that passion on to her daughter, my mom, Stephanie.
Born in Twin Falls, ID in January of 1982, Stephanie competed in steer shows for 4-H in her younger years, along with helping around the family farm, outside of school. She enjoyed playing basketball and volleyball in school, participating in 4-H camp, and spending time with her friends at the fair. FFA was her forte, and she excelled to be a district officer. After school and on the weekends, Stephanie worked for her Uncle Kyle, raking and swathing hay. While still in diapers, Stephanie started riding in trucks with her mom, and began driving a farm truck at the age of 13.
As Stephanie got older and had her first daughter, Tristan, she showed her a love for riding horses in 4-H and rodeo, soon to pass that on to her second child. When Tristan was little, Stephanie went to cosmetology school and started doing hair in a salon. In October of 2008, Stephanie married a truck driver, Scott Henderson, who has driven trucks almost all his life. After the birth of Stephanie’s second daughter, she took a break from driving and was a stay-at-home mom for several years. As her kids got older, she went back to work. Although she was a hair stylist for many years and then a bank teller at D.L. Evans, along with being a 4-H leader on the side, Stephanie always knew the trucking industry was her real home away from home.
In 2014, Stephanie began working at Standlee Premium Western Forage, driving a Freightliner Cascadia, pulling chassis down to the rail yard in Salt Lake City, Utah. Eventually, she got moved into a green and white Kenworth, and continued to haul containers. In 2016, her Kenworth and the main chassis she pulled got painted a custom “Pepto Pink” for breast cancer awareness. Very shortly after the truck was painted, she was moved to the hay side at Standlee. To haul hay, she needed a set of flatbed hay trailers, so she worked to receive a set of doubles that were painted to match her truck. A couple years later, Stephanie got promoted to a set of triples that were, of course, also painted pink.
Though having a pretty set up is nice, Stephanie’s truck is a working rig, along with the hard work that she puts in. Her job is much more than driving the truck down the road. Stephanie has to drive to the stack yard that she is dispatched to and hauls anything from 3-tie bales of hay, 3 by 4 bales, 4 by 4s, or straw, depending on what the plant needs. Once she’s there, she loads her own trailers with a telehandler or a squeeze, then throws her own straps and tightens them down. Hauling loads throughout the entire Southern Idaho region and down into Utah and Montana, she often hauls multiple loads a day.
In addition to working hard at her job, Stephanie works even harder to look good while doing it. Driving a 2005 Kenworth W900L with a C15 CAT motor and a 13-speed transmission, the “Pepto Pink” and white rig has a classic look, but a custom style. The trailers and the engine block are painted solid pink, and everything is covered with custom purple, white, and light pink pinstripes, which were painted down in Utah.
The stainless steel front bumper, chrome stacks, rear fenders, fuel tanks, and wheels get a mirror polish finish with a buffer, and every other piece of chrome gets hours of hand polish every year to prepare for the Southern Idaho Truck Show, along with a few other events during the season. Behind the truck are three 28-foot hay trailers. On the back of the last trailer, past the 250 something lights, “Wiggle While You Work” was painted by Jeff Devey out of Twin Falls, Idaho. For those who don’t know, “Wiggle While You Work” refers to the way triple trailers wiggle while they drive down the road. In total, the complete combination is 115 feet long, which coincidentally is one inch short of needing a pilot car to run with her.
Unfortunately for Steph, October 2022 was hard on her. One afternoon, while she was getting unloaded at Standlee’s hay plant, she was severely injured. With only a few bales left on her trailers, Stephanie went to jump down off her pup trailer, and when she landed, her left knee went off to the side, right out from under her. She picked herself up but didn’t know what had really happened. When she tried to put weight back on it, it shot out the other way and she hit the gravel again. After a couple hours in the emergency room, some scans, and a few doctor visits, there were no broken bones, but she did tear her ACL, MCL, and meniscus. Stephanie underwent reconstruction surgery and tons of physical therapy, but I am happy to say that she has now fully recovered and is back in the truck again.
From looking pretty, to working as hard or harder than the men she works with, Stephanie Henderson, along with many other dedicated women in the trucking industry, continue to prove that men aren’t the only ones who can do this trucking thing, no matter what they may have been told while growing up. Men might still dominate the industry, but plenty of women are out there getting it done every day, too, and my awesome mom is one of them!
EDITOR’S NOTE: Photo credits for this article go to Amanda Dilworth with Western Edge Photography, Bryan Welsh and Dan Linss of 10-4 Magazine, Colby Williams of Fueled Industries, and Ms. Layton Henderson, herself.
