Episode 169: Reba Elliott on the Strategic Power of Older Women in Defense of Public Lands
March 6, 2026
Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed
Subscribe to Rewilding Earth Podcast: Spotify | Amazon Music | iHeartRadio | Email | RSS | More
Reba Elliott, Great Old Broads for Wilderness |Photo by Amanda Maglione Photography
Reba Elliott
Reba Elliott is the Executive Director of Great Old Broads for Wilderness, the only national environmental network for older women. Reba also serves on the Advisory Circle of Daughters for Earth, coordinates the Movement Building Committee of the National Wilderness Coalition, and is a fellow of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. She previously led global strategy and campaigns for Laudato Si’ Movement.
Show Notes
This episode explores Great Old Broads for Wilderness’ nearly 40-year history as the only national environmental organization specifically for older women and examines why public lands are essential to both human survival and ecological health. Great Old Broads has evolved into a powerful grassroots network primarily concentrated in the western U.S., now expanding eastward. Learn about the unique strategic advantages older women bring to conservation — including their status as high-propensity swing voters, their decades of professional expertise, and their remarkable ability to be underestimated by opponents — while highlighting concrete examples of hands-on fieldwork from monitoring bighorn sheep to planting thousands of native trees. A central philosophy of the Broads: Joy, lightness, and fun are not luxuries in conservation work but essential ingredients for building a durable, long-lasting movement.
Photo: Great Old Broads for Wilderness
Highlights
- Great Old Broads for Wilderness is the only national environmental organization for older women
- Founded ~40 years ago with a grassroots membership structure, primarily in the western U.S., focused on wilderness protection through advocacy, education, stewardship, and fun.
- Public lands serve both spiritual and practical functions
- Public lands are spaces we’ve set aside from the “use mentality,” providing crucial ecosystem services like water filtration, oxygen production, climate regulation, and biodiversity protection that are essential for human survival.
- Older women bring unique strategic advantages to conservation
- They are the highest propensity voters, most likely to be swing voters, possess decades of professional skills, and are often underestimated as “harmless,” which they leverage effectively in advocacy.
- Hands-on fieldwork combined with policy advocacy creates powerful impact
- Broads conduct citizen science (examples: monitoring bighorn sheep, tracking wolves, planting 3,000 native trees), which gives them credibility and firsthand knowledge when advocating for land management changes.
- The organization emphasizes fun and community as essential to movement longevity
- One of their four pillars is explicitly “fun” — recognizing that lightness, laughter, and bringing your whole self to conservation work is what creates durability in the movement.
Extra Credit
- Visit the Great Old Broads for Wilderness website and get involved!
- Calendar of events for Spring 2026: includes information on the monthly “Lunch and Learn” event series. This will be updated with links to trainings when ready.
- Learn about “Broadbands.”
- Check out the Broadsides Blog.
Director of Digital Outreach (D.O.D.O.) for The Rewilding Institute
Host and Producer of the Rewilding Earth Podcast
Jack started Rewilding work as Executive Director of Sky Island Alliance in the mid-1990’s, organizing the Sky Island Wildlands Network design, ripping up illegal roads on forest service lands, installing wolf acclimatization pens on Ted Turner’s Ladder Ranch & conducting howling surveys to help make way for the final stage of the Lobo reintroduction program in the Southwest.
Through the years, Jack has worked with Dave Foreman and the Rewilding Gang to further Rewilding initiatives and education.