Bassett Family Association Database

Samuel Clay Bassett

Male 1844 - 1926  (81 years)


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  • Name Samuel Clay Bassett 
    Born 14 Jul 1844  Walton, Delaware County, New York Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    _UID 84D063074AAEA746844D97FCA4148A4891FC 
    Died Mar 1926  Buffalo County, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Notes 
    • Clark Bassett probate records list the following heirs: George Bassett, Campbell; Samuel & James Bassett, Gibbon, Buffalo County, Nebraska; Benjamin Bassett, Erwin; Mary Bassett, Urbana; Lillie Bassett, Campbell; Emma Bassett, Campbell.

      The Lincoln Start
      Monday, March 15, 1926
      S.C. Bassett Is Called By Death
      Prominent Nebraska Agriculturist and Legislator Passes Away
      Member Soldiers' Homestead Colony Established in Early Day
      Kearney, Nebraska - March 15 - Samuel Clay Bassett, 82, Nebraska pioneer and historian, died Sunday at his farm home four miles northeast of Gibbon, after a lingering illness from influenza.
      Depsite his age, Mr. Bassett retained vigorous health until last fall, when he was injured in a fall from a tree while picking apples in his orchard. Although his injuries were superficial, his stamina was broken. Two weeks ago he suffered an attack of influenza, his lungs became infected and since then he sank steadily.
      His widow and two children survive.
      Samuel Clay Bassett was a dominant factor in the rapid development and progess of agriculture in Nebraska. For more than half a century, Mr. Bassett served intermittently on various committees with various farm organizations of the state which had for their purpose the institution of better agricultural methods. As a member of the state legislature in 1885 and again in 1911, first president of the Nebraska Dairyman's association in 1885 of which he served as secretary for twenty-five years, president of the Nebraska State Board of agriculture and as a guiding light on several pioneer state and county farm organizations, he was called by some to be the Nebraska dean of agriculture.
      Mr. Bassett was born in a log cabin at Walton, New York, on July 14, 1844. He attended a rural school and in 1861 was graduated from Corning academy in Corning, New York. In 1861, he enlisted in Company E, 142nd New York infantry in which he served with distinction until the close of the war. In 1871, with his wife and two children, he came to Nebraska, taking a soldier's homestead claim of 160 acres in Buffalo county on which his family has continuously resided. This farm is known as Echo farm. Mr. Bassett was a member of the solder's free homestead colony, organized in 1871, and which was kept alive although Mr. Bassett was the last charter member of the colony.
      Served on State Board
      After serving as a school teacher in Buffalo county for five terms, Mr. Bassett became interested in agricultural development and politics. He was secretary of the first Buffalo county agricultural society, 1875, and through his work became president of the state dairyman's association, and member of the Nebraska state board of agriculture on which he served for fourteen years. He also was a charter member of the Nebraska farmer's congress, 1910, and of the Nebraska Pure Grain and Seed Growers' association, 1912.
      Politically, Mr. Bassett was an ardent republican. He was secretary of the first Buffalo county republican convention in 1871 and won election to the legislature where he introduced important farm measures. In addition, he served as first president of the Nebraska Hall of Agricultural Advancement, 1916, and as vice president of the Nebraska State Historical society, 1909 to 1915. In state and local G.A.R. circles, he also achieved recognition.
      Mrs. Bassett, whom he married in 1867, died on February 9, 1907, leaving him with seven grown children. They are: Mrs. Edward Prouty, Kimball; Mrs. George Prouty, Shelton, Nebraska; Mrs. June Wooley, Slater, Wyoming; Samuel B. of Union, Oregon; and Clark, Alfred B. and Miss Laura of Gibbon, who lived with her father.

      Biographical Souvenir of the Counties of Buffalo, Kearney, Phelps, Harlan and Franklin, Nebraska
      F.A. Battey & Company 1890
      Hon. S.C. Bassett is one of the original members of the Solders' Free Homestead Colony, by which the town of Gibbon, Nebraska, and its vicinity were settled, and is one who has stood steadfastly by the home of his adoption amidst all discouragements and disappointments, and who in so doing has been profited far beyond the average old settler.
      Mr. Bassett is a native of New York, having been born in Delaware county, that state. He was reared partly in Virginia, whither his parents moved when he was young, and partly in Steuben county, New York, whither they returned after a residence of eight years in the South. He entered the Union army in 1863, at the age of nineteen, enlisting in Company E, One Hundred and Forty-second New York infantry, and served till the surrender. His regiment remained on garrison duty about Washington till April, 1863, when it went to the front and participated in the campaign of Gordon's division up to the Peninsula in June, and in the Maryland march, and was then ordered to Morris Island, South Carolina, where it remained till May, 1864. Joining Butler's Army of the James, at that date it began its real service. It participated in nine hotly contested engagements in Virginia and the Carolinas, winding up with Fort Fisher, and lost, out of a total enlistment of one thousand, three hundred and seventy men, five hundred and two in killed and wounded. The subject of this notice was with it during its entire term of service from the date of his enlistment, and so far as fell to him, as a private soldier, helped to win for it its laurels and the distinctive appellation as one of the "Three Hundred Fighting Regiments" of the Union army.
      Returning to New York, he settled down to farming, the pursuit to which he was reared, and followed it till coming to Nebraska in April, 1871. On locating in Buffalo county, he took a homestead in Shelton township, two and a half miles northeast of the town of Gibbon, where he has since resided, having been actively engaged in agriculture and kindred pursuits. Mr. Bassett is one of the prosperous, well-to-do farmers of his community. He has other interests besides farmng, and has held some offices of an official and semi-official nature. He is now, and has been for a number of years, prominently connected with the Nebraska State Dairymen's Association, having been the first president of that association, and is now, and has been for three years past, its secretary. His duties in connection with this association absorb much of his time. He collects a vast amount of material of value to the dairy interests of the state, which he lays before the reading public from time to time, in the shape of printed reports, and also contributes extensively to the journals of the day articles of a practical bearing on the dairy and live stock interests of the state. He is an unfailing attendant at the fairs, conventions and associations of an agricultural nature, and participates in the discussion of topics relating to subjects falling within the line of his endeavor. Mr. Bassett filled acceptably, for one term, the position of representative from Buffalo county to the state legislature, having been elected November, 1884, and served during the session of 1884-1885. In the discharge of his public duties he exhibited he same zeal, energy and sound intelligence that characterize him in private life and in the prosecution of his own affairs, and he quit his office at the expiration of his term, bearing with him the gratitude and highest esteem of the people whom he served, as well as the respect and good will of his associates and co-laborers. For the churches, schools, social and moral interests of his community, he has at all times exerted a favorable influence, and for every interest of this nature, as well as of a material kind, his name stands pledged, and his help is counted on as a foregone conclusion. Mr. Bassett has as much modesty as he has merit, and he shrinks instinctively from public notice. He s a student of books as well as of men, and, while making no pretension as a scholar, he possesses many of the accomplishments of a man of letters, carrying into the practical affairs of life the close, systematic habits of the student, having the student's zeal for research and investigation, and his clear, analytical methods of statement and exposition. He is a pleasant, genial gentleman, whom it is a pleasure to know and whose friendship is of value.

      Illustrated History of Nebraska, Volume II (1906)
      Bassett, Samuel Clay, secretary and treasurer of the Nebraska Dairymen's association, Gibbon, Nebraska, was born in Walton, New York, July 14, 1844, son of Clark and Mary M. (Hanford) Bassett, the former a farmer of prominence and good circumstances in Delaware county, New York. The Bassett family was founded in America, by William Bassett, who came from England on the ship Fortune in 1621, and Samuel C. Bassett is a descendant, seven generations removed, from John and Margery Bassett who settled in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1642, and on his maternal side is of the Hanford family, English people who settled in the "Nutmeg" state many years before the struggle for American independence. Both families were represented in the Continental army during the Revolution. Samuel C. Bassett received his early education in the excellent public schools of his native town, and for two terms attended the Corning, New York, academy. The greater part of his youth was passed on his father's farm. For several years he taught school in his native state, and for a number of terms after he became a resident of Nebraska he engaged in teaching. In 1864 he enlisted in Company E, 142nd New York Infantry, as a private, and served in the Army of the James in front of Richmond, and under Butler in 1865, and under Sherman in North Carolina. He was discharged in June, 1866. In April, 1871, he removed with the Soldiers' Free Homestead colony to Nebraska, and located upon a homestead in sec. 6, tp. 9, r. 13, in Buffalo county, which is now one of the best cultivated farms in that part of the state. It has been steadily improved from the time he settled upon it to the present, and is equipped with model buildings, plenty of forest, fruit and ornamental trees, all of which have been set out and cared for by Mr. Bassett, who has taken a lively interest in horticulture and general tree culture in the western part of the state. Upon his arrival in Buffalo county he took an active interest in educational affairs. He was instrumental in organizing the school district in which he lives, and for twenty-one successive years was an officer in the district. In 1884-1885 he was a member of the Nebraska legislature. In 1885 he was one of the chief promoters of the Nebraska Dairymen's association, was made its first president, and for ten successive terms has been its secretary and treasurer. In 1895 he was elected a member of the state board of agriculture, and served as the president of the same in 1899 and 1900, and as secretary in 1905. He is a charter member of the Buffalo County Agricultural society and for three terms was its secretary. In politics he has always been a republican, but never a seeker after office. He is a member of George K. Warren Post, G.A.R., and Gibbon Lodge A.O.U.W. of Gibbon. He is not affiliated with any church. He was married September 17, 1867 to Miss Lucia W. Baker, who became the mother of seven children: Mary E., Clark S., Samuel B., A. Bronson, June and Laura S. Bassett.

      Samuel Clay Bassett: Farmer, Historian
      By Margaret Ellen Neilsen
      Volume 3, Number 9, Buffalo Tales, October, 1980
      Nebraska historian Addison E. Sheldon described the Soldier's Free Homestead Colony established at Gibbon Siding in 1871 as: "a big, empty, grassy valley, twelve miles from the Platte River north to the loess bluffs, with a slender thread of trees along a stream winding through the vacant prairie; a single railroad track laid on cottonwood ties; a cluster of box cars at a siding and a bend of men, women and children pouring out of the cars, feeling the soil and gazing at the distance."
      It was to this "farthest west farming community in Nebraska" that Samuel Clay Bassett came as a member of the colony to take up a homestead on a quarter section on the Wood River northeast of Gibbon. S.C. Bassett, born July 14, 1844 in Delaware County, New York traveled by wagon to Virginia at an early age. After eight years there, his father, Clark, "an anti-slavery whig and a reader of the New York Tribune", realized Virginia was not the place to raise a family. Returning to New York state, he purchased a farm in Steuben County. Samuel graduated from Corning Academy in 1861 and probably farmed with his father until his enlistment in Company E, 142nd New York Infantry in 1864. Discharged at the end of the Civil War, Bassett was to continue farming in New York until his departure for Nebraska. He married Lucia M. Baker in 1867 and they had two children when their eyes turned westward.
      There is no record of the reaction of Lucia Bassett to the "vacant prairie". She had been raised in a hotel and was a graduate of Cooperstown Seminary in New York. Any dismay she may have felt, she soon overcame. Laura Bassett Kelly of Kearney, her only surviving child, said, "She loved the farm".
      It was the custom of settlers in a new country to locate their homes where the property lines joined in the middle of the section, banding together for protection, water and companionship. Mr. Bassett had moved an old granary to the homestead to serve as their first home. He went to the Wood River for seedlings of cottonwood, ash and elder to plant around the house. As time went by, many other shade and fruit trees were planted. In his poem, "Echo Farm", Bassett wrote:
      "Her orchards and groves do abound,
      They beautify all of the land,
      Their planting a labor of love,
      Each planted by our hand."
      The lane to the house was lined with trees; anyone standing at the end of the lane and shouting toward the house could hear an echo - and thus the farm gained its name.
      Bassett's poem continues:
      "How the house did resound with the noice
      Four girls and three strong hearty boys.
      Mary E., Spencer Clark and Sam B.,
      Bronson, and Martha and June,
      With the Laura the youngest of all,
      Life gave us no greater boon."
      At the Bassett Memorial Hour, held at the College of Agriculture in 1927, E.C. Folsom of Lincoln told of one incident in Mr. Bassett's life as "Homemaker". "Going to town one day Mr. Bassett took Mary... part way to let her run home. A sudden prairie fire swept across the stretch between the town and home. The terrified father searched the wake of the fire as soon as possible to find that an old dugout cellar into which the child had fallen had proved a haven and the little girl was saved from harm."
      Besides battling the other hardships of the homestead: Drought, grasshoppers, lawless men, Mr. Bassett also taught the first term of winter school in the county, and continued teaching another four years. In addition to his activities in the community, his interests soon expanded to the county and state level. He was secretary of the first Republican convention in the county in 1871, and attended the State Republican meeting as a delegate in 1876. He met "many prominent friends" there, among whom was Robert C. Furnas, later Governor of Nebraska. Mr. Furnas gave him several of the rare trees which were planted on Echo Farm.
      In 1875 Mr. Bassett was one of the founders and secretary of the County Agricultural and Mechanical Society, which held the first county fair in rooms offered free of charge by N. Hemiup and E.C. Calkins. His travels all over the state talking to children and their parents at farmers' institutes led one associate to dub him the "agricultural schoolmaster".
      Dr. Charles E. Bessey, in a tribute to Mr. Bassett at an agricultural extension banquet in 1924, told of a meeting "in a little room between Eleventh and Twelfth Streets, where a few men were gathered to talk over a state dairyman's association". Samuel became the first president of the State Dairyman's Association in 1885 and was its secretary until 1899.
      A.E. Sheldon later wrote, "My first recollection of Samuel Clay Bassett goes back to a committee room in the old State Capitol". As secretary of the Dairyman's Association he had appeared with Chancellor McLean of the University to propose that $6,000 be granted by the Legislature for the establishment of a Dairy and Farm School on the Agricultural College Campus. Mr. Sheldon continues, "Some of us had the vision even then of Science in the cornfield pulling History and Literature with her through the corral gate". In 1897, in the midst of a severe depression, most legislators were Populists, who had been elected on a platform of rigid economy. "There was still abiding a strong prejudice against 'Book larnin' on the farm". In spite of much opposition, the money was appropriated and the Dairy and Farm school "became the foundation of the Nebraska School of Agriculture which furnished scientific farm education to 7,500 Nebraska boys and girls from 1897 to 1929, when the school was merged with the College of Agriculture."
      Mr. Bassett was also a member of the State Board of Agriculture and served as president in 1899 and 1900. In 1916, he founded the Nebraska Hall of Agricultural Achievement, made up of selected persons "either actively engaged in farming or in promoting the interests of farming". The achievements of a number of persons were presented at the society meetings and the most outstanding were the honorees whose portraits were hung in the Hall of Fame at the Agricultural College. The four selected at the first meeting were Robert C. Furnas, J. Sterling Morton, Isaac Pollard, and C.E. Bessey.
      Mr. Bassett served in the State Legislature in 1882-1885 and again in 1911, when he landed in the middle of a controversy over the Capital Removal Bill. As a dry, Bassett saw the bill as an attempt by liquor interests in Moaha to defeat county option on prohibition. He believed the bill to move the state capital to another town was a scheme to punish Lincoln, where the open saloon had been abolished.
      Kearney, Grand Island and Columbus were among the towns who believed they had good chance to become the new capital. The "wet element", real estate developers, and "vote traders with other schemes to sell" descended on legislators opposing the bill. Buffalo County supporters went to work on Bassett. On the day the bill came up for final vote, "a large and imposing package" was placed on his desk. Inside was a petition from his home county signed by over one thousand voters, all demanding he vote for the bill. Believing Kearney had little chance of becoming the capital in any event, he voted "no". The bill was defeated 58 to 38.
      The reaction at home was predictable: he was deluged with hundreds of letters, "a few commendatory, a large majority condemnatory". A protest meeting was held in Gibbon, where he tried to defend his position, but the meeting ended with little change of opinion on either side. The County Board of Supervisors, on February 11, 1911, voted unanimously that he had "voted contrary to the sentiment of practically all of the voters in this county...and should resign at once".
      He didn't resign. One accomplishment of his year in office was the passage of his bill introducing the teaching of agriculture into the public schools.
      From the first Mr. Bassett was both a participant in and an observor of the making of history. He had for many years written extensively for various agricultural and historical publications. His activities brought him an appointment to the board of the State Historical Society; a position he held for twenty years, also serving as vice-president from 1909 to 1915.
      In addition to writing of his own experiences, he began, about 1908, to collect information for a comprehensive county history. Besides writing countless letters, he interviewed many pioneers and authorities on local history, and made a number of trips to the courthouse in Kearney to search through records. This information was finally compiled in the two-volume History of Buffalo County and Its People, published in 1916.
      Upon Mr. Bassett's death in 1907, their youngest daughter, Laura Lee, who graduated from Kearney Normal that year, came home to keep house for her father. "He had never been sturdy," Mrs. Kelly said. In his later years he devoted much of his time to his reading and writing. In 1914, he began to write "Echo Farm Musings", a weekly column for the Lincoln State Journal. In addition to comments on new items, a portion of each column was devoted to "My Neighbor". The anonymous "neighbors" described in nine years of writing for the Journal would no doubt read like a roll call of the pioneers of Gibbon and the surrounding area.
      Mr. Bassett took special pride in his Duchess apples, and he delighted in presenting to a frend an "Echo Farm Apple" with his initial standing out in strong relief against the red fruit. This was accomplished by outlining the initial in adhesive tape on the side of the apple before it had ripened. One day, when librarians from Lincoln had come to visit, he had climbed a ladder to reach their "monogrammed" apples, when he fell, severely injuring his spine. Because of this injury he was confined to the farm for the remainder of his life.
      His younger children took charge of the farm and the house, welcoming the many friends from across the state who came to visit. Sheldon wrote, "many of us have sat up past midnight within its enchanted, simple surroundings. It was one of the most inspiring homes in all Nebraska".
      After his death, on March 4, 1926, an S.C. Bassett Memorial Meeting was held at the Agricultural College with Dean A.E. Burnett presiding. Friends described the many facets of his life, such as Homesteader, Legislator, Newspaper Writer, Horticulturist, Dairyman. His portrait, the sixth to be hung in the Agricultural Hall of Fame, was unveiled by his granddaughter, Miss Barbara Prouty of Shelton.
      A.E. Sheldon, with whom Mr. Bassett had been working on A History of Agriculture, said in his tribute to him "As a Historican", that as the first historican in a new society, he "fixed in enduring form the fact and romance of pioneer days", and he "set a luminous example of painstaking care in finding the truth and telling it clearly and attractively".

      1850 Federal Census of Southern Division, Bedford County, Virginia
      C. Basset - 40 - M - New York - Farmer
      Mary M. - 30 - F - New York
      Samuel C. - 6 - M - New York
      Benjamin C. - 4 - M - Virginia
      James - 1 - M - Virginia
      Sally Bill - B - 12 - F - Virginia

      1860 Federal Census of Campbell, Steuben County, New York
      Clark Bassett - 50 - M - New York - Farmer 2500 800
      Mary Ann - 40 - F - New York
      Samuel C. - 15 - M - New York
      Benjamin - 13 - M - New York
      James - 10 - M - New York
      Mary C. - 8 - F - New York
      Matilda E. - 6 - F - New York
      George S. - 4 - M - New York
      Emma N. - 1 - F - New York

      1865 State Census of Campbell, Steuben County, New York
      Clarke Bassett - 55 - M - Delaware
      Mary M. - 45 - F - Delaware
      Samuel C. - 21 - M - Delaware
      Benjamin - 19 - M - Virginia
      James W. - 16 - M - Virginia
      Mary C. - 13 - F - Virginia
      Tillie - 11 - F - Steuben County
      George S. - 9 - M - Steuben County
      Emma - 6 - F - Steuben County

      1880 Federal Census of Gibbon, Buffalo County, Nebraska
      Samuel Bassett - 36 - M - NY-CT-NY - Head - Farmer
      Lucia - 35 -F - WI-CT-CT - Wife - Keep House
      Mary - 12 - F- NY-NY-WI - Daughter - School
      Clark - 10 - M - NY-NY-WI - Son - School
      S.B. - 8 - M - NE-NY-WI - Son - School
      Branson - 6 - M - NE-NY-WI - Son
      Martha - 4 - F - NE-NY-WI - Daughter
      James Basstt - 31 - M - VA-CT-NY- Brother - Farmer
      E.P. McCraney - 65 - F - OH-CT-CT - Mother-in-law

      1900 Federal Census of Shelton Township, Buffalo County, Nebraska (Jun 1900)
      Clark S. Bassett - 29- M - Jun1870 - NY-NY-WI - Head - Farmer
      Katherine - 29 - F - May 1871 - IA-WI-IA - Wife
      Crecy J. - 2 - F - Mar 1898 - NY-NY-IA - Daughter
      (Married 4 years, 1 child, 1 living)
      Living next door
      Samuel C. Bassett - 55 - M - Jul 1844 - NY-CT-NY - Head
      Lucia - 54 - F - Sep 1845 - WI-NY-OH - Wife
      Bronson - 26 - M - Apr 1874 - NE-NY-WI - Son
      Tillie J. - 15 - F - Jun 1884 - NE-NY-WI - Daughter
      Laura L. - 12 - F - Nov 1887 - NE-NY-WI - Daughter
      (Married 32 years, 7 children, 7 living)

      1910 Federal Census of Shelton Township, Buffalo County, Nebraska
      Samuel C. Bassett (Wd) - 66 - M - NY-NY-NY - Head - Farmer Home Farm
      Alfred B. - 36 - M - NE-NY-WI - Son - Farm Hand Home Farm
      June - 25 - F - NE-NY-WI - Daughter - Housekeeper At Home
      Laura L. - 23 - F - NE-NY-WI - Daughter - Housekeeper At Home
      & 1 Boarder
    Person ID I1097  1B John Bassett of Connecticut
    Last Modified 16 Dec 2012 

    Father Clark Bassett,   b. 9 Feb 1810, Dutchess County, New York Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 1883  (Age 72 years) 
    Mother Mary Melvina Hanford,   b. 1820, New York Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 16 Jul 1897  (Age 77 years) 
    Married 1843 
    Family ID F229  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Lucia M. Baker,   b. 17 Sep 1845, Grant County, Wisconsin Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 9 Feb 1907, Buffalo County, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 61 years) 
    Married 1867 
    Children 
    +1. Mary E. Bassett,   b. Jun 1868, New York Find all individuals with events at this location
    +2. Clark S. Bassett,   b. Jun 1870, New York Find all individuals with events at this location
    +3. Samuel Baker Bassett,   b. Mar 1872, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 1936, Union, Oregon Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age ~ 63 years)
     4. Alfred Brunson Bassett,   b. Abt 1874, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location
     5. Martha L. Bassett,   b. Abt 1876, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location
     6. Matilda June Bassett,   b. Jun 1884, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location
     7. Laura Lee Bassett,   b. Nov 1887, Nebraska Find all individuals with events at this location
    Family ID F431  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart