| Notes |
- From the marriage license of Fred and Leah in Park County, Montana, Fred C. Bassett was residing at Aldridge, Montana, aged 34, born at Red Bluff, California, first marriage. Leah was residing at Aldridge, Montana, aged 21 years, 2 months, 13 days, born in Birmingham, Warwickshire, England, first marriage. The license was issued 20 Nov 1897 and they were married before a Justice of the Peace on 24 Nov 1897 at Horr, Montana.
Fred Bassett, Sr.
History of Park County, Montana 1984
Homesteads could not be filed upon until the land was surveyed by the government, and Cinnabar Basin wasn't surveyed until 1904. So in March of 1905, Joe Stermitz, Sol Heist, and Fred Bassett rode to Livingston together to file on the places on which each was living. They left their horses at Miles Livery, and when they returned, the liveryman offered Fred $50 for his horse. Fred agreed, having been assured that he and his saddle could make it to the station in time to catch the train. When he reached the statioin, he could still see the departing train heading up the valley. He had promised his wife that he'd be home promptly, so he set out walking, and covered the 50 miles to Cinnabar Basin by the next morning. By that time his shoes were worn out and his feet were white with blisters.
In the winter, the men would work at various jobs, such as the Roberts Sawmill up Mill Creek above where Len and Sandy Sargent live today. (This operated about three years.) Fred worked cutting and hauling ice off Aldridge Lake. All the saloons and boarding houses had ice houses, and this was a major chore. Fred was known as a good man at breaking horses, and he certainly spent time in the winter with his stock. He was known for his wiry and spirited saddle horses, and enjoyed a race. Florence remembers the first time they went to Aldridge for Union Day (July 15). They took a buggy and no saddle horses, not knowing that horse racing was one of the major events. When they arrived at the doings, the Aldridge men asked Fred where his racing stock was. Fred left the family and buggy and hurried the nearly five miles back to the Basin to pick up some running horses.
One of the income-producing chores Florence remembers best is making and selling butter. They milked several cows and saved the cream. They churned on Thursdays and Fridays, and hired Grace Bailey to help them. Churning was done in a tub-type churn. Then the butter was worked and washed in a "butter worker". It then went through a printer and was wrapped in one-pound blocks. On Saturdays, the blocks were packed in beer boxes, about 100 to a box, covered with snow-white dish towels. In Aldridge, the butter sold for 25 cents a block. If you bought $1 worth, you got a free gallon of buttermilk.
With his teams, as with his saddle horses, Fred preferred smaller, spirited animals. Even after his brother-in-law, Harry Bray, was killed in a runaway on a hay rake near Absarokee, he enjoyed the thrill of handling a team that trembled with fire and power. For that reason, someone always had to hold the lines if the team wasn't tied. Florence was seven years older than her next sister, and for a number of years, one of her main jobs was to hold the lines when Fred was off the wagon. One runaway he didn't enjoy was when they were hauling water on a stone boat from the spring to the house. After one barrel was filled and Florence and her father were otherwise occupied, the team spooked and took off for the house. As they swept by the front porch, they cut sharply toward the barn, delivering the barrel, upright and with its full load, onto the porch. Their assigned mission accomplished, they proceeded to reduce the stone boat to kindling before settling down.
Fred and Leah Bassett had four children: Florence (born Sept. 22, 1898 in the Aldridge Hospital); Elsie (Simonson) (born May 9, 1905 at home); Winifred (Edleman) (born Nov. 16, 1907 at the ranch house on Bassett Creek); and Fred (born July 16, 1910 at home). His father called young Fred "Johnson" because he was born shortly after the famous heavyweight boxer, Jack Johnson, defeated Jim Jeffries in his comeback bid on July 4, 1910. However, the girls called Fred "Jiggs", after the comic strip character.
Leah passed away May 8, 1943, at the age of 68, and Fred Sr. died April 27, 1947 at the age of 84 at the ranch in Cinnabar.
Bill Bassett
History of Park County, Montana 1984
Hattie and Mrs. Bassett moved up to the Papesh Place with Fred. One winter day they took a team and buggy and went to visit Bill. A big spring at the lower end of the Papesh Place had laid down a sheet of ice across the road. One of the horses slipped and fell, causing the wagon to lurch, throwing Mrs. Bassett on her head on the frozen ground. They righted things, and Mrs. Bassett appeared OK. They continued on to Bassett Creek. Betty prepared tea for them, and Mrs. Bassett proceeded to put spoonful after spoonful of sugar in her tea. That was the first indication that her head had been injured, but from that time on she was never in good mental health. When Hattie married Harry Bray, she moved to the deer Lodge area and took her mother with her. Mrs. Bassett died not long after the move at Warm Springs.
Fred worked at the Goffner Sawmill, above the Taylor Place in Mol Heron Creek, and became acquainted with Cinnabar Basin. He moved to the Basin around 1895, and settled where Al and Judy Jensen now live (on the Sargent Ranch). On Nov. 26, 1897, he married Leah Smith, whose family lived on the place which was later proved up on by the Hesit family. (He was 34 and she was 21.) Their first daughter, Florence, was born Sept. 22, 1898.
So for around ten years, the two Bassett families lived on opposite sides of the Yellowstone River. To visit each other or to trade work, they had to cross the river at a ford just above the present Corwin Bridge. Florence can even remember them hauling a threshing machine across the ford. She also recalls one time when her family went to visit Bill and Betty. They took a team and buggy. One of the horses was a mare which had a foal, which they allowed to tag along, as they were to be gone overnight. The river was high, and when the team plunged into the water at the ford, the colt swam ahead of the team and became lodged between the horses, under the tongue. Fred had to crawl out onto the tongue to push the colt forward and around in front of the team to prevent it from drowning.
Bill and Betty ranched on Bassett Creek for a number of years. Their children were Harvey (Ethel Rigler's father), Lester, Shelby, Nellie (who died when she was 8-12 years old, and is buried in the Gardiner Cemetery), Nora (who married Bill Jones), and Wildie (born about 1905). At a time when buffalo were near extinction, buffalo were a problem on this ranch, especially in the spring. On any given day, a person could round a corner of the barn while doing chores, and run into a cantankerous old bull. The bulls were known to breed their cows, and they had some hybrid calves. So they tried to run the animals off, with varying success.
In 1908, Bill sold the Bassett Creek place to the group which built the Corwin Springs Hotel and Plunge in 1909. The existing Corwin Bridge was built at that time. Subsequently, Betty operated a boarding house on Main Street in Livingston, and Bill set up a blacksmith shop in Fishtail. They are both buried at Fishtail. (After Bill died, in her later years, Betty married S.M. Fitzgerald, the man who originally led the Bassett family to Montana.)
Phillip Bassett
History of Park County, Montana 1984
Phillip Bassett and Mary Berry were married in Connecticut. They moved to California by covered wagon in the early 1860's. They farmed in the Red Bluff area, where he also worked as an architect. They raised seven children: Bill, Wayne, Charlie, George (Gene?), Hattie, Fred, and Abbie (in order). By the time the family was grown, Phillip and Mary had a fine home in Oakland.
In 1880, S.M. Fitzgerald was promoting a horse concession in Yellowstone Park. He made a trip to California to purchase horses. Bill Bassett signed on with him to drive 50 to 75 head back to Yellowstone. When the horses were delivered, Bill found work with the Mulherin family. They lived at the mouth of Mol Heron (Mulherin) Creek (near the current Trestle Ranch buildings, but down on the creek).
Fred came to Montana around 1881 (when he was 18). He built the little stone house at the head of Yankee Jim Canyon that was removed during recent highway construction. Shortly thereafter he settled at the mouth of Bassett Creek and established squatter's rights. In the meantime, Bill had married a Mulherine girl (Betty) and had started a family. So Fred traded his rights on Bassett Creek to his older brother for two saddle horses. When the Valley was surveyed, Bill filed on the homestead. At about this time, Phillip and Mary sold their home and moved to the Bassett Creek place with their daughter Hattie, where they lived with Bill and Betty. The ranch house was the current "Ranch Kitchen" restaurant.
Fred worked at various jobs, including hunting, trapping, breaking horses, and freighting from Horr (Electric) to Aldredige. He took squatter's rights on the Papesh Place.
The Upper Yellowstone country didn't meet Phillip's high expectations. He grew despondent, and committed suicide by taking poison in early May, 1884. He was buried in the cemetery at Mammoth.
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Bassett Family Association Database
1863 - 1947 (~ 84 years)