09 - Summer 1995 - Watermark

the OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL
SUMMER 1995
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Queen Ann & ?
In This Issue:
Brown's Park Mystery
Woman
Indian Slave Girl
Book Cliff Women
$5.00
Published By The Outlaw Trail History Association
Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

328 East 200 South, Vernal, Utah 84078
www.westernheritagemuseum-uc-ut.org
THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL
Managing Editor: Joy T. Horton
Associate Editor: Doris K. Burton
OUTLAW TRAlL HISTORY ASSOCIATION
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Richard Wm. Horton. Chairman
William Webb. Vice-Chairman
Doris K. Burton, Secretary
Joy Horton. Treasurer
John D. Barton
ADVlSORY BOARD
Edward M. Kirby
Kenneth Jessen
Gail Olson
Jim Beckstead
Roy P. O'dell
Jesse Cole Kenworth
H. Bert Jenson
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The OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL is supplied to all members of the

OuLlaw Trail Hislory Association. and is also available through
purchase. Membership in the association is open to anyone
interested in lhe history and culture of the West. Applications for
membership should be sent to Doris Burton. Uintah County
Library. OuUaw Trail History Association and Center. 155 East
Main Street, Vernal, Utah 84078. Annual Dues are $15.00.
Members receive the JOURNAL. newsletters. and reduced rates
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Publication of the OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL is made possible

through grants and assistance from:
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Uintah County
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The Outlaw Trail History Association

~OUTLAW
JOURHJl.L
Summer 1995
Contents
Who Was Jennie Brown?
Women of the Bookcliffs in the 30's
Navajo Slave Girl Marries
Mormon Polygamist
By Frances Williams-Reu t
By Marie Kaczmarek
By Doris Karren Burton 13
Pioneer Postmaster of Linwood, Ut
27
FOLKTALES from the Outlaw Trail History Center
32
WESTERN POETRy........................
41
BOOK REVIEWS.................................................................................
44
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.............................
46
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COVER PHOTO: "Queen Ann" Bassett with mystel),
See article, "Who was Jennie Brown 7 "
WOli/ell
"The Outlaw Trail Journal" is a journal of history published semi-annually hy the Oul/a. ) Trail
History Association. It is a journal dedicated to the preservation and research of tlie !listory of tlu'
Outlaw Trail, the greater Uintah Basin region and the Intermountain West. Historic inlerprelatioll
of articles are the authors' and do nol necessarily reflect those of the Olltlaw Trail History
Association. Manuscripts for journal articles or Folktales are welcome. Article manllscripts should
be submit/ed in dt/plicate, double-spaced, with footnotes following the Turabiall style of anllolali I.
Folktale manuscripts need not be annotated. If possible, please inch/de a copy of the l1lol/uscript 011
a disk if typed on WordPerfect. Please send all manuscripts for considemtioll of publicatioll to till'
Managing Editor, The Outlaw Trail History Center, 155 East Main Street, emal, Ut M078
Manuscripts will not be rett/rned unless a self addressed, stamped cnVf ope is Illcluded.
Copyright 1995
The Outlaw Trail History Association

WHO WAS JENNIE BROWN?

"Brown's Park is a small valley only thirty-five miles long and some six
miles wide, surrounded by rugged mountains".1 Brown's Park was afavorite
stopping placefor outlaws on the run and part ofthefamous outlaw trail with
access into the valley from two other western states; Wyoming and Utah.
The Bassetts came to Brown's Park when the area was called "Brown's
Hole". George, Josie, Anna, Eb and Samuel were children ofHerb and Mary
Eliza Chamberlain Bassett. The women of the family were the predominant
players in the Bassett family saga. Elizabeth Bassett was known as "head of
the Bassett gang; oldest daughter Josie was kind, generous, much married and
divorced; and the youngest daughter Anna became known as "Queen of the
Cattle Rustlers." The men; Herb, Sam, George and Eb played supporting
roles to the women's strong wills. The Bassetts have had many stores written
and many tales told about them. Some stories were true, 1 am sure, and . ..
many were not.
While reading Volume 11 of Val Fitzpatrick's book, 'The Last Frontier"
on page eighty-eight concerning the Indian War of 1898, he says that,
"Ann Bassett and Jennie Brown rode to
tell the Indians the game wardens were
coming and to get rid of the meat they had.
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1/
I wondered about Jennie Brown as 1 read this. Who was she? Why had
I not heard anything about her in all the reading I had done to this point? I
pu t her on a shelf to be researched later when I had the time. Little did 1 know
that the time would come sooner than I thought.
In early 1993 William P. Haworth gave the 1useum of Northwest
Colorado bl.my family items. 2 WiJliam P. Ha\A rth is the son of Edna
Basse t Haworth and Paul Haworth. Edn was the daughter of
George (brother of Anna Bassett) and Alma Ruby McClure Bassett.
This wonderful collection cons i ted 0 fold p hotographs and memo
rabilia of th Bassett/McClure families. ThilE cataloging the acces
sion, th "famous" Josie and i\nna ph to graph came to my attention.
Thi the photograph that is in all the books and articles as the photo
of the Bassett Sisters, Josie and Anna Bassett. Prior to this time we
knew of only one copy in existe ce in the archives of the Sweetwater
Counly Historical Museum in Green River, Wyoming.
On the reverse of the newly acquir d photo are two names, Anna

THE GUTLA W TRAIL}l' 1l.(l\'AI
WHEN COMPA ~ING FACES, IT'S EVIDENT THAT THE
", 1MAN 'EHIND ANNA BASSETT IS NOT
JOSI.~ fASSEl T AS HISTORY BOOKS INDICATE
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In history books, the women in the "famous photo" (left) were identified as Anna and Josie
Bassett. However, a newly acquired copy of the same photo identified the woman behind
Anna Bassett as Jennie Brown. Another photo (right), pictures Anna Bassett and an
"unknown woman" (to the left) who appeared to be possibly the same person. (Photos
courtesy William P. Haworth)
Jennie Brown Law (left) seemed to resemble the woman behind Anna Bassett in the famous
photo. However, a relative claimed the woman was Jennie's sister, Suzanne Brown
Timberiake (right) instead. In comparing Suzanne with the unknown woman in the famous
photo (top left), the women appear to be the same person. (Photo of Suzanne courtesy
Richard Hughes)

TN E OUTLA W Tl AlL IOU RNAL
Bassett and ... JENNIE BROWN! Why would the "famous" photo of
Josie and Anna have a name written on it of someone that was
virtually unknown? Somewhere in my mind a tiny bell rang. Where
had I heard the name Jennie Brown before? Thus began the search .
. . WHO WAS JENNIE BROWN?
I have discovered that photos of the Bassett clan ar few. To my
know ledge, pictures of Elizabeth are irtually non- xistent. Ther are
only a few photos of Josie. More phot graph have surfaced of Anna
than all the rest of the family. The first step was to retr"e e a photo of
Josie Bassett from our Museum files. Much to my consternation, we
did not have a photo of Josie. I decid d to try and make a comparison
of Josie from the photo in the book "The Bassett Women"3 with the
picture from the Haworth Acc ssion. When J compar d the two
photos, at first glance it was readily apparent that the young woman
behind Anna in the "famous" photo, wa" not Josie at all.
In my fifteen years as a portrait artist I have gained a know1 dge
of human form and facial structure. Unless traumatized in ome way,
bone structure does not change with the coming of a e; the skull and
cranial structure in this instance, unlike the flesh tha t does change as
one ages. The flesh sags and loses it elasticity. In comparing the two
women's photos, the space between their eyes is different. Josie's is
more narrow. There is a definite difference b lwe n the bridg of
Josie's nose and in the woman's seated behind Anna in the "famous"
photo. Their eyebrow lines are much different. Th left yebrow of
the woman seated behind Anna ha a much more pronounced line
than the left eyebrow of Josie in the wedding photo. The young
woman behind Anna has a very strong square chin and Josie' chin in
more pointed and narrow. Becau e of the e differ nces in facial
structure, the "famous" photo is not really the "Bassett sister '," rather
it is a picture of Anna Bassett and an unknown y ung woman.
Possibly, because of the writte information on th back of the
Museum photograph, JENNIE BROWN! JUST WHO WAS JENNIE
BROWN?
In the Haworth accession was another photograph of "Anna
Bassett and an unidentified young woman". There wa a similarity
between the "unidentified young woman" in this picture and the
young woman seated behind Anna in the "Bassett Sisters" photo.
They appeared to me to be possibly the same pefS n. Because of these
two conflicting photographs I decided to search for the identity of the
woman in the" famous photo" and the iden ti ty of the unknown young
woman in the photo at left.
In the Civil Works Administration Historical Report for Colorado/
under miscellaneous:
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THE OUTLAW TRAIl IOU
AL
"May21,1891 OnMay6that the residence ofMr. J. C. Allen,

Miss Jennie Brown wa united in marriage to Mr. Geo. Law
(Meeker Bank Robber) The ceremony was performed at
ight a clock by Justice Allen, after which a delicious repast
wa serv d. Dancing occupied the rest of the nigh t and the
silvery arrow of the da wn came over the moun tain's crests
as the gl ests departed."
A short comm ntary on the statement that names Geo. Law,
Jennie's husband, was on of the Meeker Bank robbers. The Meeker
Bank robber identified as Ge . Law is not a true statement. One of the
bank robber was not Jennie's husband, George Law. All three
Meeker bank r bbers were killed at the time of the robbery in October
1896. Many new paper accounts after October 1896 place Geo. and
Jennie Law in Brown's Park for several years. The tax rolls in Utah list
Law and Jarvie in both 1897 and 189 . The census record for nineteen
hundred shows that George Law with wife Jennie and son John G. and
Douglas S. were living in Uintah County, Utah. This is probably the
most certain proof of all that the George Law of the Meeker Bank
robbery was not Jennie's husband. In our museum files now is the
death certificate of Geor e Law, Jr. George Law died at the age of 64
years, 10 months, 3 days on August 15, 1916 after a 15 month illness.
He was buried in Hot Sulfur Springs, Colorado on August 17, 1916.
Prior to his death he lived in Granbyl, Colorado and was a merchant
there. s And... through the research for this story we have unearthed
the true identity of the Law that was one of the Meeker Bank robbers
but that is a st ry for another time.
In the Routt County marriage index is a listing for a license issued
to Geo Law and Jennie Brown on May 4th, 1891.
George Law's (Jennie's husband) father's name was also George
Law. In the book "Flaming Gorge Country" by Dick and Vivian
Dunham they say that:
"In the late sixtie an English Mormon convert, George
Law, coming down Bitter Creek, saw an opportunity in the
coal deposits there and settled for a time with his son
George and three comely daughters. Tittsworth's eye lighted
favorably on the oldest daughter, Jean. Before Law moved
his family to the Cache Valley, Billy and Jean were married.
She oon found h.ers If up to her ears in cooking and
wash.ing for the sizeable crew Billy had asembled at Salt
Wells, so she invited her sisters, Mary and Elizabeth, to visit
her."
The book goes on to tell us later that Mary Law married Charley
Crouse and Elizabeth Law married Charles Allen. George returned
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THE OUTLA W TRAIL JOURNAL
to the Park and worked for Jim Warren and Park Livestock and hauled
freight sometimes for John Jarvie and had some land near Adea Hoy's
ranch. Since one of George's sisters had married a Crouse, and since
the Crouse family was prominent in Brown's Park history, our
museum files contained the obituary of Stanley Crouse, Jr. In the
obituary were some living Crouse family members. A call was placed
to them. I explained my problem. In their family photos they had an
old photograph of a young woman. On the back of this photograph
were written the words "Jennie Law." They were kind enough to send
the photograph to the museum.
In comparing the photos at the museum and the new arrival, I was
elated. The facial resemblance was amazing and I was pretty sure at
this point that the young woman in the "famous" photo of Anna and
"Josie" was Anna Bassett and Jennie Brown Law.
The photograph is of an older woman but she has much the same
eyebrows and a quite similar square jaw. I sure thought I had hit the
mark. Another point is that all photos were taken at Thayer Studio in
Rock Springs, Wyoming. I really felt at this point that it was Jennie
Brown in the "famous" photo.
George Law married Jennie Brown on May 4, 1891. 6 They were
married by Justice of the Peace, J. C. Allen at Lodore in Routt County .
in Colorado.? 8 Douglas, another son, was born in May of 1893 in
Utah. 9 (Douglas was actually born in May of 1897. 10 The date of 1893
in the 1900 census is wrong. l1 ) Douglas died in Alpine, California on
30 May 1974. 12 At the time of this writing, Ihavevery little information
on what happened to John Law. In the obituary for his father, George
Law, he was living in Wyoming.
Jennie and George Law remained married until the decree of
divorce on August 12, 1905. On this date they were granted a divorce
in Sweetwater county, at Green River, WyomingY
A marriage license was issued to a Mr. Jesse James of Rock Springs
and a Mrs. Jennie Law of Rock Springs, Sweetwater County, Wyo
ming on June 16, 1906. 14 15 According to the Census Jessie and jennie
were living in Wyoming in 1920. 16 Gordon Timberlake, age 16 and
Douglas Law, Jennie's son, age 22, lived with themY
Jennie Brown had two sisters and one brother,I8 Suzanne (Susie)
and Elizabeth (Lizzie) and George, the brother. Jennie was born in
1872;19 George was born in 1875;2 Suzanne was born in 1876;21 22 and
Elizabeth was born in 1879. 23
At the death of Douglas Law, Jennie and George's youngest son,
the obituary 24 25 stated that he was survived by his niece, Ann Hughes
of Camarillo, California. Several Hughes were still residents of
Camarillo. A few phone calls later, Richard Hughes was located. He
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is the son of Anne Timberlake Hughes.

Anne Timberlake Hughes was the daughter of Suzanne Brown
and E. A. Timberlake. Anne was two years old when her mother,
Suzanne, died on October 14, 1908. Jennie Brown Law James "took
care of her and her brother Gordon at first and wanted to rear them but
her husband objected."26
Richard Hughes, grandson of Suzanne Brown Timberlake, had in
his possession one of the "famous" photographs of the "Bassett
Sisters" except that he believes that the young woman on the left and
behind Anna is his grandmother Suzanne Brown Timberlake. He sent
a photocopy of the "famous" pictures and also a photocopy of a
photograph of his grandmother, Suzanne Brown Timberlake. He
stated, "Written on the back of the photo and identified to me by my
mother (Anne) as my mother's mother, Suzanne Brown Timberlake."
Also he said in the phone conversation27 that, "his mother told him
that it was her mother in the "famous" photo and then as stated above
it was written on the photograph in his possession as well.
I compared the photo of Jennie Law and the photocopy of Suzanne
Brown Timberlake Mr. Hughes had sent. The similarity between the
two sisters was very remarkable. The one noticeable difference
between the two was that Suzanne's jaw was even more square tha
Jennie's. In comparing Suzanne with the woman behind Anna Bassett
in that photo, it was immediately evident that it was more likely the
woman was Suzanne than Jennie, and because of the information
from a direct descendant, I feel certain that the "famous" photo is of
Anna Bassett and her friend Suzanne Brown.
If one compares the photograph of Suzanne Brown Timberlake
and Anna Bassett and the Wlknown woman, you can readily see that
the two women are most probably the same person.
This has been quit an experience for me. If our team had stopped
the hunt with the discovery of the photograph of Jennie Law, we
would never have discove "ed the true identity of the young woman
wi th Anna Bassett in the" famous" photo. I learned that for every fact
that one finds to propel the story, one must find the fact to back up the
fact just found. We must approach a mystery, not trying to prove our
idea of truth, but to hunt for evidence with an open mind for the truth,
and what may be written on the back of old photographs is not always
the truth.
Jennie Brown Law James died in the state of California, San Diego
County, San Diego, at the age of 54 years 10 months 20 days.28 She died
at home of cancer on August 7, 1927. 29
I have been intrigued by Jennie Brownsince my first acquaintance
reading Val Fitzpa trick's book and am no less fascinated with her now
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than when this story began. She opened up the world of the Brown
and Law familie to me and gave me added insights into the pioneer
life and times at the turn-of-the-century people.
NOTES
I. McClure, Grace, The Bassett Women, Swallow Press, Introduction, page xiii.
2. Hmvorth, William P., Museum of Northwest Colorado, Accession #93-21 .
.1. McClIII"t', Grace, The Rassett WQmen, Swallow Press, phQtographic sectiQnfQIIQwing
page /18
4. ranby infmrnution came from an interview with Esther Campbeli conducted by Dick
and Daun DcJourncllC.
1
1
5.Death Certiji ate; Bureau of Vital Statistics, State of CQloradQ, CQunty of Grand,
GmlldhY, Colorado, Registration District #94.
6.Law, CeOtRe alld Jellnie Browll, RQutt County marriage Index, colQradQ, Box B, page
52.
7Lwv, JOhll, IfJOO Census, Utah, VQI20, ED 151.
trNoek Sprints Miner, Rock Springs, Wyoming, Wednesday, Febmary 24, 1892.
() Lmv, Doug las, I YOU Census, Utah, Vol 10, ED 15/.
IOu/II', f)oug/as, Newspaper; Vernal Express. May 6, /897
11.192 Cen.llls, Utah, Vol 8, ED 86, Sheet 12, Line 98.
/2.L(/\\', Douglas, California Death Index, San DiegQ CQunty, Registrar Number #8637,
Stute File #1208/3.

/ j Civil File Numher #406, State of Wyoming, District CQurt.
J.+.AppLication for License to Marry, No. 3081, Weber CQunty, Utah.
15. V m(/I Express, June 30, 1906
16.1920 Census, Wyoming, Vol 8, ED 86, Sheet 12, Line 98.
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17.Ibil1
18. Brown, George, Obituary; Rock Springs Rocket, Tuesday, August I, 1932.
/9/900 Census, Utah, VQI 10, ED 151, Sheet II, Line II.
20.BI'(Jl\,/!, Georgi', Obitllary; Rock Springs Rocket, RQck Springs, Wyoming, Tuesday,
ALigusf I, /932.
210bituary; Rock Springs rQcket, RQck Springs, WYQming, Friday, October 16, 1908.
22.Marriage license to E. A. Timberlake and Suzanne Brown, Sweetwater County; RQck
Springs, Wyomin;?, December 29, /902.
23.1900 Census, WYQl/1.inJ?, Vol 4, ED 55, Sheet 7, Line 62.
2..f..Lwv, Douglas. Obituary; Carlsbad JQurnal, October 3, 1974.
25L(lll'. DOLlglllS, Ohituary; Blade-Tribune, Carlsbad, CalifQrnia, September 26, 1974,
Oceansidp, California.
26.Letlerfrolll Richard Hughes, grandson Qf Suzanne Timberlake ne' Brown,
Co 1/1 a rilla, California, dated November 8, 1993.
27 Conversation hetween Dan Davidson, Director, Museum Qf NQrthwest ColQradQ and
1<ichard Hughes, grandsQn of Suzanne Timberlake ne' Brown, Camarillo,
California.
n.James, Jennie, Death Cc.rtificate, San Diego CQunty, San Diego, CalifQrnia, #27
041771.
29.Ibid
(c) Museum of Northwest Colorado, 590 Yampa Avenue, Craig, Colorado 81625,
Telephone (303)824-6360 Written by: Frances William-Reust, Curator
Researched by: Dan Davidson, Director

WOMEN
OF THE BOOKCLIFFS
IN THE 1930s
By Marie Kaczmarek
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North from the Bookcliff mountains in northeastern Utah run the

canyons of Bitter Creek and Evacuation Creek to eventually empty
into the White River.
This vast empty area is clothed in aspens and pine in the high
country; in the lower elevations the almost black of the pinons and
junipers and the monochromatic grey-brown of the sagebrush, grease
wood and shadscale is only broken by the vivid blue of the occasional
bluebird.
Scattered across this isolated country in the years of the depression
were two tiny towns along the Uintah Railway, two mining camps
and a few hardy ranching families.
The women who lived there made homes for their men and
families under difficult conditions. They wore the "uniform of the
day", cotton housedresses and aprons that they had stitched together
on their treadle sewing machines, ordered their necessities from Sears
or Montgomery Ward, and got together when they could for an
afternoon. Sometimes they played cards, a game called "five hun
dred", or exchanged recipes, books or worked someone's quilt.
The women in Dragon had running water, the others carried wa ter
from an outside pump or barrel under the eaves. Water was a scarce
commodity - the joke about how many times a dishpan full of water
was used before being thrown out could have had its origin here.
When the rare opportunity came to go up in the mountains or to
Vernal, the startling green of the cottonwoods at White River or the
paler green of the aspen on the mountain were welcome sights to eyes

10
only adjusted go grey-brown.

Hard-living, but live there they did. On an isolated ranch in the
Park Canyon country Daisy Kirk kept house for her brother Doc, one
of the early cowboys in that area. Daisy was a meticulous house
keeper; infrequent young visits were initiated into the niceties of
washing and drying dishes as well as the exact placement of silver
ware on the dinner table. In the parlance of the day, Daisy was an "old
maid".
Undaunted by the lack of water, she spent many hot summer days
hauling oddly shaped rocks in the truck of her 1930's coupe and
arranging them in the front yard. She had her garden even though it
was made of rock. Mail was picked up infrequently; Daisy had only
her wind-up phonograph and beautiful record music for company.
During the winter the Hills also lived in Park Canyon. In the
spring they moved to the house on upper Bitter Creek where they
summered their cattle. Julia, a former school teacher at Watson was
as adept with a meat saw in cutting steaks to feed a crowd as at
patrolling the raspberry bushes at night with a flashlight and .22 to
keep the porcupines away. She could change her dinner plans from
serving four or five to 20 in half hour's notice. For her it was Simply
cutting more meat and peeling more potatoes.
A motley crew sometimes graced her dinner table - a Ute Indian or
two, several cowboys, visitors from town as well as her own family,
her husband and two boys.
Julia spent many years moving her household spring and fall as
the cattle were moved from winter range to summer range, then
moving to town when the boys were old enough for school. She could
make a house into a home wherever she might be.
One summer on Bitter Creek a magpie started hanging around
whenever she was outside. It became very goo at copying her voice
and could call the chickens or Harry, sometimes when she didn't want
either! One of the earlier cabins at the Bitter Creek place was backed
up against the side of a hill Its combined living 'oom and kitchen had
the walls papered with covers from the old Col 'er's magazines where
a couple of chimpanzee cartoon characters were featured week after
week - great entertainment for the children who had to be quiet at the
dinner table.
She is in her 90s now, living in Arizona an ~ joying a well earned
rest.
Mildred Finnicum Jensen was raised in Nebraska and taught
school in Kansas before joining her parents in Dragon where her
father Jim Barr was the freight agent for the Uintah Railway. It was
there she met her first husband, Dorr, where he and his father, George
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THE OUTLAW TRAIL
J'
IR".'AI
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11
Cabin built in 19G8 by Frank A. Brewer and brother-in-law W. C. Havens. Left

to right are: Edith Brewer holding infant Allan Brewer on her lap, Frank A.
Brewer and Etherl Brewer, age four, holding doll. Picture taken December
25, 1910. "My First Christmas", Allen Brewer 1995.
Finnicum owned and operated the Dragon Mercantile. The store also
contained the post office and was the center of activity in the town.
The mail in earlier years came in every other day and then as the
railroad lowly cut back came less often. Mildred worked in the store
with Dorr, kept the books, and raised one son, Jim.
Universally well liked, Mildred helped out many "down on their
luck". There wasn't a lot of "cash" money floating around in those
days; the "books" must have shown many names which had been put
there with no chanc of being paid. Indian and white man alike, she
helped them out when she could.
The store and the house shared a building and children of the town
(there wer n't very many) had wonderful times in Mildred's living
room pumping the player piano until their legs gave out.
Mildred is in her 90s and lives with her son in Grand Junction. She
is still her same warm, lovely self.
Just northwest from the store close under the cliffs of Dragon
Canyon lived the Engberson family. They raised sheep which caused
some division among the children at the school. This was before the
Taylor Grazing Act and bad feelings ran between sheep and cattlemen

12
).
about grazing rights on the open land. Matriarch of the clan was the
mother, Pearl. she was the source of much interest because she had a
wooden leg. She had been known to pull up her dress no matter where
she was and hammer her stocking on more securely, or chase one or
more of her sops down the road, waving her crutch in the air and
screeching.
And then there was Dolly. Her husband had one of the smaller
gilsonite companies. She came and went via the Uintah Railway
always with an impressive number of trunks. She dressed flamboy
antly by Dragon standards and worse, dyed her hair! Rumors
abounded about her; she had been an opera singer or an actress, she
had been a prostitute. Whatever the rumors, she was a very kind
person, very good to people. She drank. (This was in the years of the
prohibition, but as everyone knew, there was a bootlegger up Davis
Canyon.) And when she drank, she wandered. Her husband and
another man went looking for her one day. They found her sound
asleep on a blanket under a pinon tree. She resisted being taken back
to her home, finally had to be lifted into the truck and held on the
gentleman's lap while her husband drove. She wet the gentleman's
trousers.
The old ones tell of a day when she was going to leave her husband
and set off afoot. Behind her she dragged her fur coat to erase her
tracks in the dirt because she had heard the coyotes would track her
and get her!
There were differences in personality, of course, but one thing
these women had in common. They could live and make a home in
an isolated area away from family and friends, shopping facilities, or
amusements.
There are far fewer people living in those hills and canyons today
than during the depression years. People are now drawn to that
country by the romantic aura of the old ghost towns and times past.
There are few remaining places in the world where one can stand
quietly and revel in that immense stillness.
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13
(Editor's note: This article was published in Doris' book, Blue Mountain Folks, Their
Lives & Legends, published in /987(now out of print,) The cover of the Winter/Spring
/992 Outlaw Trail Journal, carried the photo of Rose Daniels, however some of the
description of Rose inadvertently described another Indian woman,
NAVAJO SLAVE GIRL
MARRIES MO MON POLYGAMIST
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By Doris Karren Burton
When the little Navajo Indian girl, Rose, drove her family's tiny
sheep herd into the hills, little did she know she would be taken
captive by Ute Indians and four days later would be living her life in
the Colorado/Utah area. She would never have dreamed she would
grow up to marry a Mormon polygamist and settle on a beautiful
ranch east of the Dinosaur National Monument Quarry on the Green
River. The ranch first inhabited by Indians would again have an
Indian occupant, this time the beautiful Rose.
In 1880-1881 after white settlers arrived, the former Indian settle
ment became a horse ranch for two families, the Jed Snyders and the
Henry Chatwins. 1 The ranch was next inhabited by three generations
of the Daniels family; Aaron Daniels, a polygamist and "squaw man,"
his son Eugene Aaron "Gene," and his grandson, Benjamin "Ben."
This prosperous ranch now belongs to the Douglas Chew family.
Aaron Daniels was born in 1822 in Dryden, New York. Hisparents
were converts to the church ofJesusChrist of Latter Day Saints. Aaron
was baptized as a member of the church in 1830. The Daniels followed
the migrations of the saints to Kirtland, Ohio, and then to Nauvoo,
Illinois.
It was there Aaron met and married his first wife Caroline Rogers.
The Daniels family arrived in Utah in 1847 with the first pioneers.
Aaron and Caroline were called by the church to settle in Fort Utah,
now Provo, in 1852. Eleven children were born to this marriage, the

14
fourth being "Gene." In 1856, Aaron took a second wife, Harriet

Nixon, in polygamy. Shortly after this second marriage, he was called
to settle Fort Supply about eleven miles southwest of Fort Bridger,
Wyoming. Eight children were born to this marriage. Aaron stated in
his journal:
I trapped and explored the valley in the winter. At one time I discovered a
Spanish Mine near the summit of the ridge of Daniels Canyon, but actually
found this shaft in the spring. In April 1859, I returned to Fort Supply.
Aaron later had some trouble with Jim Bridger, so he moved
Harriet to Utah Valley to live with his other wife, Carol" e, and her
family for awhile. One of his daughters had by this time grown up and
married a soldier and remained at Fort Bridger.
Aaron Daniels spent time freighting, trapping, and prospecting.
Then Aaron carne into Heber Valley with a herd of cattle. Both Daniels
Creek and Daniels Canyon are named after him. During this time, an
old prospector, Thomas Rhoades, and his son were bringing out gold
from the famous Brigham Young Mine in the Uinta Mountains. 2
Aaron got"gold fever" and spent much time prospecting.
The little Indian girl, Rose was taken to Fort Bridger to be sold by
the Indians and was purchased by army officer, Bryon Lan. Lane was'
the husband of Leonora Ida, daughter of Aaron and Caroline, who
had remained in Fort Bridger. Bryon Lane having inherited money
could afford to purchase the Indian girl as a slave in his horne, but he
had a drinking problem which resulted in the separation from his
wife. She took Rose and her children to Wanship, Utah, to live with her
mother, Caroline. 3 Rose was later sent to live with the other polyga
mist wife, Harriet, in Wanship who was expecting a child. 4
In 1874, Aaron's son, Gene who had been prosp cting with his
father married Martha Melissa Bullock in Provo. A son, Ben, was born
to them in Provo in 1875. In 1876, Gene carne across the mountains
from Provo to Ashley ValleyS in the winter on skis. He looked over the
valley and decided that he would corne back and homestead where
the Ashley Creek enters the Green River. 6
Aaron had a falling out with the Church and apostatized sometime
after 1878, and his second wife, Harriet, left him. Th Indian girl was
sent to Provo to live with Caroline's family.? Then in the early 1880s,
Caroline also divorced Aaron.
While Aaron was prospecting in the mountains, he be arne ill and
sent for Rose who carne and nursed him back to health. Then he told
her to go back horne, but she didn' twant to leave. He told her to go and
find some young man to marry, but Rose said she wouldn't marry an
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Rose Daniels on a white horse. (Photo courtesy of the Uintah County Library
Regional History Collection)
Indian and no white man would marry her. s Rose continued to live
with Aaron, and the couple came to Ashley Valley where they settled
on the Daniels' ranch and were married on Blue Mountain by Captain
Pardon Dodds, acting Indian Agent, in 1885. 9
I touched on the subject of the play, The Squaw Man, with a
background of life on the Utah-Colorado line in the history of the
Royal Ranch. Aaron Daniels and his Indian wife, Rose, and their son,
Hal Albert, were supposedly the fictitious characters upon which the
second part of the play was based. The play was later published as a
book and also put on the screen. In the plot, the cowboy assumed the
crime his brother had committed and fled to the west where he starts
life over again on a cattle ranch. He takes a indian wife, and they have
a son, Hal. His innocence is later established, and his former sweet
heart locates him. He is torn between his love for her and his loyalty
to his son and Indian wife. At the climax of the play, the Indian girl
commits suicide.
In real life, the "indian wife" outlived her husband by over forty
years, living to be 99 years old. lO At this time, she was a typical Indian

16
woman in appearance, but when she spoke, her mind and her
thoughts were those of a white woman. Her life is the story of one
brutality after another; yet, she tells about it without bitterness and
witharealcharm thatanywomanmightenvy.ll RoyalandFabersham
may have done better to write her real story. Following is her story in
her own words as told in 1934 to Jay Monaghan:
1
1
I am not an Indian. I am a Navajo. I do not know how old I am, but I know
I am past ninety, and I can still ride a horse with the best of them. Grandpa
Dan'els always called me "a little bit ofa chick."
I would like to go back someday to the place where I was captured. I can
see it so plainly, I would recognize it. There was a big gulch that came out of
the mountains and a littleprongfrom the east that joined that gulch. I know
it pointed to the east because the sun came out of the head of that little prong
every morning. My father and mother and another family camped where the
little prong joined the main gulch. Down the big gulch, just a little way where
itwent out ofthe mountain, my gran'motherandgran'jather had a littlefarm.
They raised corn and beans and melons. We camped above, so we could graze
the sheep. There were no white men in the country, or no other Navajos that
I know about. I was only a little girl, I think about seven. (An article by Ann
Curtis in the Daughters of Utah Pioneer's Lesson Book for 1983 states this
was south of Lee's Ferry, near Glen Canyon Dam in Arizona.)
We lived in an open country with cedars on top of rock gulches. One
morning my father went up on the bluff above camp to get a dead cedar for
,firewood. He would throw the wood over the bluff into camp.
I and another little girl my age that belonged to the other family, started
offwith the sheep. We got to the bend ofthe canyon where we were out ofsight
of my mother's camp and not quite in sight ofgran 'mother's when we heard
afunny noise. It was a lot of yipping, just like aflock of wild geese. I often
think about that, how it sounded like aflock ofwild geese. We should have run
and hid, but we just stood there. We did not know what it was. In a minute,
we saw twelve Indians coming with their horses on a big run. The Indians
didn't have on no clothes, just moccasins and britch-clout. Their bodies were
painted black and yellow. They were swinging war clubs. We just stood there
and looked at them. They had strings around their heads to keep their hair
back. They stopped in a circle around us, tied us up, and rode away yipping
like wild geese. The sun was one hand high in the east when they rode away,
and it was one hand high in the west when they came back. They had another
Navajo girl and two little boys with them, and lots of blankets, horses, sheep
and scalps. They put me and the other little girl on a horse, but they kept us
tied, We went down past gran 'mother's farm and saw her and gran'jather
lying there with arrows sticking out of them. It must have been in the fall of
the year because gran'jather was lying in the watermelon patch, and the
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Rose Daniels at U.B.l.C (Uintah Basin Industrial Convention) standing by
vegetables and canned goods. (Photo courtesy of the Uintah County Library
Regional History Collection)
watermelons was rip. Them Indians took us up on the hill eas t ofgran'mother's
farm and built a fire in the cedars. Then they killed some of our sheep, just
enough for supper, and threw big hunks ofmeat on the coals. They ate some
of this, ashes and all, like they was hungry. Then we started offin the night.
We traveled north four nights and four days. At night we didn't travel
as fast as we did in daytime, but we kept going. Sometimes, when the grass
was good, we would stop for a little while to let the sheep and horses eat. The

18
?
?
Indians would cook some meat and rest, but they never made camp or went
to sleep. We traveled out of the low country up into high country and then
back into low country again. We crossed two big rivers. I remember that the
water come to my armpits. The Indians crowded the sheep into the water, but
they kept swimming back to the same side, so they let them go.
Finally, we came to the Ute camp. I think that it was on White River, but
I don't know for sure. I know that they were White River Utes. When the
squaws saw us coming, they started to wail and cry. I guess they thought
some of their braves were dead. When they found out that none of them were
dead, they were happy and got ready for a big dance. I remember that dance.
The men took colored dirt and mixed it with grease and rubbed their
bodies. The women put the scalps on the ends ofsticks. There was a drum and
some singing. The squaws all stood in line and danced back and forth waving
the scalps in the air. The men jumped around in a bunch at one side waving
their war clubs.
War clubs ain't just the right name. They were like slingshots witha loop
around their wrists and the shot was a big rock, or something that they never
threw, just used it to hit people as they rode past them. I never liked these
Indians. They was always moving. They would have a dance and move. Then
they would have another dance. Pretty soon, they would have a dance and
move again. They didn't have nothing to eat but meat, and they cooked it on
coals or sometimes they would build a rack ofsticks and broil it that way. They
did not have no pots, or kettles or anything.
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Th Indians ate lots of grasshoppers, fresh in the summer and

dried in the winter and Rose said that she couldn't eat them-they
stuck in her throat-so she was always hungry. When they sent her
out to gather wood, she would hunt for green things or roots to eat. 12
Rose tells more about her captors:
The White River Utes didn't even have beads in them days. Their tepees
were of buffalo skin with the hair scraped off. If the1J wore any clothes at all,
it was buckslcm. Their sun mer moccasins were m de of buckskin, and in
winter they made moccasins out of buffalo hide with wool on the inside.
I hated the White Rivers and ran away every chance I got. I wasn't afraid
to be out all night among the wolves and the bears. I'm not afraid now, either.
There was no place to run except out in the hills, and they always found me
and brought me back, but I made them so much t bie that they sold me to
Tab y. :ie was chiefofthe l intahs. We still moved around and danced just
the same as before.
The first white men I ever saw were trappers who came to Tabby's camp.
They had long hair down their backs and beards. They dressed in buckskin and
fur caps in winter. In summer, they wore caps the squaws made for them out

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of willows. Sometime. they wore a handkerchi~f around their heads in

summer like II ins do nL 7U. I remember two ofthem came to camp and stayed
at Tabby/step ". ',~hey haa ,1 council, I just a little girl, and their names meant
nothin' to me. S .l.:e then, 1 have often wondered who they were. I have heard
Kit Carson was Ll this country, and I wonder if I ever saw him.
The Utes was always afraid ofthe Sioux, I remember how they used to talk
about the Sioux. They went into Sioux country after buffalo sometimes, but
they kept a sharp lookout.
Life was better with Tabby than with the White Rivers. We still ate mostly
meat but once we moved west of the mountains to the Mormon settlements
we got wheat, not corn, wheat! The Indians were crazy about that wheat. The
squaws used to put it in their open-top baskets with live coals. Then they
would shake the baskets, so the coals would not burn the willow. They would
shake the baskets until the wheat popped. Then they would eat it. After that
first taste, they would give the Mormons anything for wheat. They used to
beg for it...(She tells many more Indians customs of burial, Sun Dance, etc.)
I used to run awayfrom the Uintahs, same as I did from the White Rivers.
I guess that is why Tabby sold me. Two of us girls was sold at Fort Bridger
that time. The other girl was Red Jacket Jane. Both her mother and father had
died, so the Indians sold her. She used to run away from the whites at Fort
Bridger. The Indians would get paid for bringing her back. They would get
a sack offlour for returning her...Finally the whites got tired ofit and told the
Indians they could keep her.
After that l the Uintahs sold her to the White Rivers. Fort Bridger is where
she learned to talk English and how to act in ahouse. When Meeker was made
Agent at White River, his wife hired her to help in the Kitchen. When Meeker
got to quarreling with the Indians, she overheard the family say that the
soldiers were coming to kill the Utes because they hadn't done what Meeker
wanted. That made them mad and caused all the trouble.
When I was sold to the white peoplel I never did run away to the Indians,
not me? Tabby sold me at Fort Bridger to a rebel soldier named Bynum
Lane...(Author's note: A. Bryon Lane was listed on the Fort Bridger census
in 1860.) Bynum Lane was a tie cutter. Then he got cattle. As soon as he got
cattle, he got to drinkin' and his wife quit him. She took her kids and went
to her motherls ranch in Weber Canyon. Gran/pa Dan'els was herfather. He
was a Mormon. His other wife lived at Wanshipl Utah and I was sent over
there. That is where Ifirst saw Granlpa Danlels l and he called me!'a little bit
ofa chick.!'
Granlpa Dan'els found some coal in the mountains while he was riding
for cattle and he started to dig it. Brigham Young heard about it and sen t him
a threatening letter. He said Gran Ipa Dan /els was desecrating church
property. I was afraid that they would send over a destroying angel. Gran'pa
DanIels split from the church after that.
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I remember how he used to laugh and say, "I don't put much stock in a
God that won't let a man dig a hole in the ground." Both his wives quit him
on account of this.
Another story by Ann Curtis stated that Aaron found a gold mine
in the mountains. When he was told that he should give ten percent
of it to the LDS church, he refused and apostatized. 13 Rose told of
coming to Blue Mountain in her interview:
The church won and Gran'pa Dan'els moved down to where Heber City
is now and took up a place at the mouth of Dan'els Canyon. He toughed it
out there for two years fighting what he called the "Grasshopper War." Then
he gave up and went to Tintic, Utah and worked in the mines. That was in
1871. We stayed there three years. Then he wrote to one ofhis sons in Nevada
to come join him, and we all moved to a ranch at Provo. It had changed a lot
since I was there with the Uintahs. Gran'pa Dan'els left us there while he
went to hunt gold in the Black Hills, but he didn't find any. We stayed at
Provo until after Brigham Young died. (Brigham Young died in 1877.)
Gran'pa Dan'els had a lot ofgrowing bays. He wanted to leave them all
a "stare' so when Ashley Valley openedfor settlement in 188L he said, "Let's
leave this ranch for Dave and go to Ashley and build up a place for Gene and
Ben. "
So we moved over there, and by the time Gene was big enough to take over
the Ashley Ranch, Gran'pa Dan'els had spotted a likely location for a new
ranch east ofGreen River on Cub Creek. He had used up his "rights" by now,
so he took a "squatter's claim" in the desert under Blue Mountain. Our cattle
summered on the mountain in Colorado. The first snowstorm would bring
them down Cub Creek to the winter range. Gran'pa Dan'els used to say, "It's
only a step from the summer to the winter range."
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Mountain sheep, bears and deer were the animals Rose remem
bered seeing at the Blue Mountain Ranch. She marveled at the way the
sheep jumped from rock to rock on the high cliffs. 14 The early
expeditions through the area also commented on the many mountain
sheep. A petroglyph on a rock near the Daniels' Ranch depicts such
a mountain sheep. Rose continues:
Our nearest neighbors were the Royle Cattle Company with headquarters
twelve miles away. The Royle boys were New York City fellas, so we had the
whole country to ourselves.
Gran'pa Dan'els built our house under some big cottonwoods. Then he
took water out of the creek above the house and planted lucerne. He laid out
a mile racetrack around the farm and planted rows of poplar trees from the

21
house to the racetrack, like the spokes ofwheel. No matter how hot the desert
was, it was always cool under them trees, and you could hear water runnin'.
It was a awful purty place. My boy Al was born there.
On the Indian records at the Ute Indian Agency in Fort Duchesne,
this boy's name is listed as Hal Albert Daniels. This is Royal's Hal in
"Squaw Man."ls Rose told her grandson, Albert Daniels, that when
Walter, the youngest, was small, a mountain lion followed him home
to the Ranch. Rose was so frightened that from then on, she wanted
to move. Rose Daniels' story continues:
We lived there three years. One day after my Walter was born, Gran'pa
Dan'els said, "Little Chick, the Utes killed your father and mother. The
government is providing for the Utes. They should provide for you. "Then
he saddled his horse and rode over to see the agent.
When he came back, he said, "Little Chick, Uncle Sam will give you forty
acres and a red wagon. Ain't that great? Now we can let Ben have this place,
and he will be provided for."
We loaded our things in awagon and went to the Uintah Reservation. We
got an allotment where White Rocks Creek joins the Uintah. It was in the
brush. We couldn't see the mountains, but the grass was good. Gran'pa
Dan'els liked it, so I was happy. That was in 1889. My two girls, Ethel and
Mentora, were born there.
Gran'pa Dan'els died in 1896. He hadn't been gone long before Superin
tendent Tidwell called me to the Agency. I saddled my horse and went. One
Hairwas in the office, and Tidwell said, "One-Hair is chiefofthe Uintahs. He
wants to get married, so I have sent for you."
I looked at One-Hair and said, "You black scoundrel." Then I walked out
of the office.
Tidwell called after me, "Look here, little lady, you're only an Indian who
can't read or write. You might do worse."
"You may be right, I replied, "but 1'm no fool. I never liked Tidwell
from that day to this.
A lot ofthem wanted to marry me in the next few years. There was Provo
and Mack and even Tabbywhit's father. I told 'em all, "I don't want another
man.
I will neverfind anather man as good as Gran'Pa Dan'eIs! ...Last summer,
I was in the Indian Parade at the U.B.I.C. (Uintah Basin Industrial
Convention). I put little bells and ribbons on my horse, and he looked real nice.
When I rode up to take my place, there was that old One-Hair. He said,
"Huh! Navajo!! What you doin' in this parade? You white man.
I told him a thing or two. I can still talk pretty good Ute when I get right
madfl6
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II
II
II
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Rose's grandson, Albert, told me that after they moved to the

Reservation and the boys were nearly grown, the flu epidemic carne.
Many Indians were dying. They believed if you jumped in the river
you wouldn't get the flu. It was very cold, not the time to be jumping
in a river, but many of them did and drowned. One of Rose's boys was
sitting in a cabin with some bodies that had been pulled out of the
river. He was alone, and as the bodies began to thaw, one of them
moved. It scared the Daniels boy half to death, and he took off.
Rose said that they gave the first ranch to his son, Gene, and the
other to Grandson, Ben. Then Shirley Daniels' history states that his
father, Gene, left the ranch to his son Ben. I think they are probably
both right. Aaron had used up his rights and squatted in the Cub
Creek area, but Gene was also married, and he had filed on the Stewart
property in Jensen. Then, as Joe Haslem told me, Gene purchased
Snyder's relinquishment up at Cub Creek. Another of Aaron's sons,
Lehi "Lee," joined the family. Shirley said:
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My father filed on the property where Ashley Creek entered the Green
River. He had scouted the area up the riverfurther and decided the area where
Cub Creek entered the Green would make a very good ranch, with Cub Creek
to furnish irrigation water. He put us some cabins and had his brother Lee
ocwpy the cabins the first yearY
Gene's son, Shirley was born in Jensen in 1892. He relates some of
his memories and stories told him by his father about the Cub Creek
Ranch:
Father and his brother Lee built a large two-room log cabin with afireplace
in the center of it. Then they constructed three more log cabins. One was a
fireplace in the center ofit. Then they constructed three more log cabins. One
was for Uncle Lee and his new bride, Adelia. The other cabins were used as
bunkhouses.
Father intended to put his ranch house up where the Indians had their
town or village two hundred years before. In plowing the area, his plow turned
up large chunks ofbrick houses that the Indians had built and were destroyed
by attacking tribesmen who were taking captives for trade to the Spanish in
Mexico. The Indians had built into the clay hill up about twenty or thirtyfeet.
Their storehouses, where they stored their corn, squash and seed, contained
baskets made of tanned hides. I chased a little cottontail rabbit, that ran up
the face of the hill and into a hole. I noticed some old logs in the hill. Father
said it was probably an old Indian storehouse. Later, he opened the entrance
and removed the old baskets and other artifacts. They were given to the

23
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Rose Daniels
Aaron Daniels
Rose Daniels
Rose Daniels
(Photos courtesy of Doris K. Burton)

24
Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D. C.

Father started his adobe ranch house, and I can remember walking and
playing bare-footed on the green drying adobe and being whisked away by my
mother. Several of the bricks had my two-year old barefoot mark on them. I
can remember the horse pulling the mixer around. Skippsy Johnson was the
mason who quarried and laid offthe rockfoundation. (Skippsy is the one who
bought the Burton Ferry.) The Libbert boys helped in laying the dobbies up
about 1894-95. At one time Father had it plastered with white lime plaster.
It sure showed up when the sun hit it.
As the cattle herd grew, he built a cabin up on the main springs of Cub
Creek. In the early 1900's, Josie Bassett McKnight with her two boys squatted
in one ofthe cabins myfather had built at the mouth ofthe canyon that we had
named "The Penitentiary. Josie tried to take the water from the north fork
ofCub Creek, but Father had his earlyfiling, so she was restrained from using
it. When Ben sent the boys to clean out the springs, Josie came out with her
gun and ordered them of! They came down to the ranch, no one disobeyed
Josie as her reputation was well established by then. A fence across the mouth
of the canyon kept saddle horses overnight, also a deer corral for me. As a boy
I would go up there with my bow and arrow and shoot a nice deer in order to
have venison at the ranch. Mother moved up there in the summer at the ranch
site on Cub Creek.
A dry year caused my father to build a reservoir up where the south fork
ofCub Creek comes in. That reservoir would fill up and was a great place to
hunt duck and geese when spring and fall migrations were on. We planted
cutthroat trout in the reservoir, and they did very well. After afew years, we
were getting three and four pound trout.
Father filed on the springs on Blue Mountain and built cabins there, so
the cowboys always had a home to come to when they were taking care of the
range cattle. Father always had two men on each section, as the cattle rustlers
didn't like to take on two men. Those early days the herds had to be guarded
by good men. The Brown's Park boys and their numerous friends made it
necessary to be very watchful. Our cowboys were the best; Bill Gwithers, Bill
Moore, Green, the greatest balladeer ever to cross the Pecos, Short Isobel, who
said he was the last of the feuding family from Texas. (As a cowman he was
good, but as agunman none could match him!), Will Johnson, Al Blood, who
later took up with the National Forest, Hiatt and Wilson.
It was an interesting time at roundup. The A. H. Popper, Two Bar, K,
my father and others would gather as many as 7,000 head and separate them
to their various owners. I doubt that the early land deals show in the abstract
all the changes. However, father claimed the spread and ran his cattle on Blue
Mountain.
'
In the late 1880s,jather had the land all cleaned off, leveled and seeded into
alfalfa. About 1891, the ranch was producing hundreds of tons ofhay. The
If
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cattle herd had grown so that three hundred head ofsteers were marketed each
year. Father and H. S. Royal went into partnership to raise thoroughbred
racing stock. They bought fine thoroughbred stallions in Kentucky and
started the business. Dad built acircular mile racetrack. Grandfather planted
poplar trees all around it on the inside of the track.
The Indians have always loved horse racing. They entered in the
races at the Daniels' Ranch and all other races held in Ashley Valley.
The Indians called Old Aaron Daniels, "Running Pants," because he
raced horses. 18 Shirley Daniels' remarks continue:
Royal's brother came out to have summer vacation. He ran around and
obtained local color and wrote the "Squaw Man."
Some ofthe notables who stayed at the Ranch to race were: Captain Drew,
Captain Merrywether, Captain Dodds, Pardon Dodds' father, Captain
Whitlock, Charley Crouse, George Wilson, Arnolds and Ruples. Indians were
numerous there. Racing time was usually the 4th and 24th of July. At
Thanksgiving time, there were many local people and outsiders who would
come to the ranch for horse racing. The men came to race and hunt and enjoy
life. The ladies would knit or make quilts. We kids would go horseback riding
over the hills, exploring to find Indian artifacts, taking pictures of Indian
petroglyphs and boating on the river.
Dad named his race horses. The racers were Thoroughbred Red Boy and
best known mare, the "Cricket. // His pacers and trotters were bought in the
east. Doc Rowen was known as the parcel post colt. Dad bought the fertility
rights on the colt and had him shipped by express from Massachusetts. Sam
Carey, Jr., Vernal Girl, George Wilson and many more took awards and won
races all over the country. (Author's note: Douglas Chew said that the
outlaws liked to purchase horsesfrom these men as they were so fast they could
outrun posses.) Workmen on the ranch property, besides the cowboys were:
Haslem boys, Riley Murray, Bill Oakley, greatest hay pitching boy Jensen
every produced, Arnold boys, Libbert boys and others. Mother had a girl to
cook and help. The girl finally married Arthur Johnson, a New York
millionaire and left. Johnson was out here on a Wild-west hunt in the 1890s.
The Daniels family took up the ranch and developed it. When father
decided to leave the ranch, he made a gift of one hundred fifty range cattle,
about fifty head offine horses, and the land to my brother Eugene Benjamin
Daniels. This removalfrom the ranch and its livestock was agift to him when
he married.
Dad had a ranch in Big Piney, Wyoming, where we used to drive the two
year-old steers to fatten on the summer grass and sell in the fall. We usually
would start to drive in thefirst week ofJune and arrive about thefourth ofJuly
in Big Piney. I usually was the boy to look after the cavvy. Usually, Dad,
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George Wilson, Bill Moore, Hiatt, Jim Wilson and Warren Kempton went.
We only had one night stampede and we only lost three head that time.
Crossing the steers was quite a sight. The river then was usually running
high, but we had a lead cow we used to start the swim. The others would
follow. The cowboys usually swam their horses to keep the steers headed across
the river.
In 1900, Father bought a home in Vernal, so I could go to school. In 1917,
Ben sold the ranch to Charles A. and Nathan Hardy.
Ed Lewis purchased the ranch in 1920 and sold it in 1941 to
Douglas Chew. This included 1100 acres will all grazing rights on
Blue Mountain. 19
Aaron Daniels preceded his wife in death in 1896. Rose Daniels
who was much younger than her husband died forty-seven years later
in the Fort Duchesne Hospital in 1947 at about the age of 100.
ENDNOTES
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1. Cowan, Ila W. A HistoO' of Jensen, Utah. 1979,

2. "History of Aaron Daniels 1822-1895 "furnished by Albert Daniels, Fort Duchesne.
3. Mrs. Phillips, Mrs. Cohler, and Miss Goodloe. Interview with Rose Daniels, "The
Story of Grandma Daniels' life," July 30, 1942. Submitted to author by Rose
Daniels' grandson, Albert Daniels.
4. The 1870 census places Rose with Harriet Daniels.
5.Ashley Valley is the valley where Vernal, Utah, is located. Namedfor William
Ashley, early fur trader who left his name painted on a ledge as he floated down the
Green River. Ashley Creek which runs through Vernal and Jensen into the Green
River was also named after William Ashley.
6. Daniels, Shirley, Letter to June Stewart of Jensen, Utah,
7.The 1880 census places her in Provo, Utah at Caroline's home.
8.Knutson, Phyllis Emma Rupplinger, Manuscript written from story told her by Hazel
Daniels, daughter of Will Daniels.

9. "History of Aaron Daniels 1822-1895," furnished by Albert Daniels of Fort
Duchesne, Utah.
10. Obituary for Rose Daniels published in the Vernal Express, July 14, 1943.
11.lnterview with Rose Daniels by Jim "Jay" Monaghanfor Colorado Historical
Society.
12.Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, Lesson Bookfor October, 1983.
13.lbid
14. Mrs. Phillips, Mrs. Cohler, and Miss Goodloe, Interview with Rose Daniels, "The
Story of Grandma Daniels' Life," July 30, 1942. Submitted to author by Rose
Daniel's grandson, Albert Daniels.
15.Records searched by Max and Joyce Rasmussen of Vernal, Utah.
16.Rose Daniels Interview with Jim "Jay" Monaghan for Colorado Historical
Magazine.
17.Shirley Daniel's 'letter to June Stewart of Jensen, Utah.
18. "History of Aaron Daniels 1822-1895" furnished by Albert Daniels of Fort
Duchesne, Utah.
19. Vernal Express microfilm, Uintah County Library Regional Room.

27
Minnie, tell me a story.

Tell me about the boarding house
near the Bucket-of-Blood saloon,
or about Butch Cassidy and the Bassetts
carving legends in the heart of Brown's Park.
Tell me about the tiny beaded moccasins,
A gift for you from a starving squaw.
Tell me stories of homesteading at the Gap
and the white-haired Scotsman who shared his books.
Tell me of the dry, Linwood day
when you arched our pride and dropped the match,
leaving your home in ashes flung to the wind.
Minnie, tell me a story
Now, that you're home to stay.
By Carol Lynn (Jarvie) Gardner
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
PIONEER POSTMASTER
OF LINW OD, UTAH
Minnie Crouse Rasmussen was born June 5,1882 near Bridgeport,

in Brown's Park, Utah but her story actually began with her father,
Charley Crouse. Born in 1851 in Virginia, Cbarle' Crouse was a Civil
War veteran and was one of the first permanent s ttlers of Brown's
Park. On May 15, 1879 he married a pretty Scots lady named Mary
Law. Charley died in 1908 and Mary preceded him in death.
Most stories of Charley Crous tell abo t his temper and bad
disposition. Whatever he was, he was tough. He had to be to survive
this new land with all its raw elements. From him Minnie inherited
her ability to survive. Minnie survived the ext erne changes of several
generations. When Minnie was born the horse or mule was the main
means for transportation. The last time she left Utah to go home she
flew in a plane and love every minut of it. Minn'e survived a harsh,
demanding life and through it a 1 remained an egant, charming

28
Minnie Crouse holding gun which she has used to shoot large eagle. Lady on
the right is Mrs. Charlie Crouse, Minnie's mother. (Photo: Outlaw Trail
History Center)
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
lady. Those qualities she inherited from her mother. Ann Bassett once
said of Mary Law Crouse that she was " . ..a gracious and beautiful
lady."
Although Charley Crouse's reputation probably surpassed him,
he has been credited for being instrumental in building schools and
bringing teachers into the Park. He als brought tutors in from Vernal
for his own children. Then in 1891, when Minni was only nine years
old, he sent her to Iowa to go to school. She always said how mad it
made her that she had to leave her mother, her horses and her home
to go to school. She remained in Iowa attending a Catholic boarding
school until she was 18.
Minnie became an avid reader, possibly fulfilling a dream of her
rough and uneducated father. Even in her late 90s, until her eyeSight
left her, she enjoyed reading anything and everything. She particu
larly liked reading such publications as Newsweek and Time; she
like<;i keeping up on current events.
Her love for books brought her lose to John Jarvie, Sr. She would
ride to his store in the Park and exchange books with him, spend the
nlght and return to her home the next day. They would compare notes
at the end of chapters and on the margins of the pages. She was
visiting him the day her mother died.
Charley Crouse was well-known for breeding exc ptional horses

29
Minnie's Gap focated jus I norlh of Dutch John, Ulah is /lamed for Minnie
Crouse Rasmussen. (Phow: OUiLaw Trail History COller)
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
and mules. His animals were so fine that he even warranted an

extremely rare compliment from Ann Bassett. And, partly because he
owned such fine horses and partly because he loved races, he was
constantly arranging horse races. Minnie once stated that the first
time she ever remembered seeing Butch Cassidy he was riding in one
of those h rse races--possibly on one of her father's horses.
Another story Minnie like to tell about Butch Cassidy happened
when she was eight. At that time her family apparently was living in
Vernal, Utah. Minnie said that he was playing with her hoop behind
the jail one day. A man from behind the bars began call d to her,
"Minnie, come here." Minnie said she got a box and crawled up to the
window. It was Butch Cassidy. He asked her to go get her father for
him and she did.
Usually Minnie had good t ings to say about Butch, unless you
mentioned her being his girlfriend. Then she would come up on the
fight. She always 'narted with indignation and disgust at the mention
of it. Butch Cassidy, born April 13, 1866, was 16 years old when
Minnie was born. When he entered the Wyoming penitentiary in 1894
at the age of 27, Minnie was only 12. And what's more, during the
prime of the outlaw era Minni was in Iowa going to school.
Usually wh n Minnie spoke of any of the outlaws it pertained to
them working on her father's ranch or waking up one morning and

30
finding a strange horse in their corral and one of their's missing. And
she almost always made ita point to say something good or kind about
them. Of course that was th general attitude of the outlaws in the
Park at that time.
Minnie was a part of Brown's Park when it was a land of legend.
People who are a fascina 'on to us today were acquaintances and
friends of hers then. One such friend was th famous Matt Warner.
She knew him as an outlaw and sh orresponded with him up until
the time of his death.
In 1900, finish d with chool, Minnie r turned to Linwood, Utah.
There she went to work in a boarding house. She said she didn't know
how to cook but she soon learned. Meals were 35 cents and beds with
a cotton blanket were 50 cents a night.
One year, right befor a big holiday like Thanksgiving or Christ
mas, a small boy came begging at her door. Instead of a handout, she
gave him a job. He ran errands for her in exchange for his meals. That
year she cooked her firt turkey or the big dinner. Somehow, during
the course of the meal, a fa d fight got started. Soon food was being
thrown all over the kitchen and Minnie was caught up in the middle
of it. She was a mess with food in her long, red hair falling down
around her shoulders. Everyone was having a glorious time except
for the small boy. He was fr n 'c, running around trying to save
Minnie.
Another time Minnie told he tory about the chicken pie. Some
times she like to eat while lying down. Evidently she liked to rest
while she ate. One day, after baking a chicken pie, she took it in and
sat in on her three/ quarter bed. She went back to the kitchen to get a
cup of tea. She carne back to the bedroom an sat down on the bed and
was eager to eat, except her pie was gone. She looked all over for a
minute then realized that she was sitting on it. She said she probably
just went to sleep to drown her sorrows.
While working for Mrs. Larsen at the boarding house she met Mrs.
Larsen's nephew, Knudt Ronholt. Knudtwas a carpenter working on
the famous octagon dance hall. She arried him, possibly in Idaho
Falls, and they had one daughter, Mary L uise, born in 1915. But by
1919 Minnie had divorc dR nholtand wasbackin Linwood working
at the boarding house. Shortly thereafter Knudt Ronholt died.
In 1913 Minnie was working at the boarding house where Emerson
Wells died, supposedly of poisoning. Minnie firmly believed he was
poisoned and always told the story in careful detail.
In 1917 Minnie became the postmaster of Linwood and held that
position until 1952. In 1924 she married George Rasmussen, owner
and operator of the Linwood Merc (originally the Smith Larsen
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

31
Mercantile). He died October 13, 1962.

Minnie lived in Linwood until 1963 when the dusty, docile town
was cleared for the already rising Flaming Gorge Lake.
On the afternoon of July 26, 1963 the clearing contractor and
government inspector stopped to visit Minnie. They told her they
couldn't wait any longer, the next day they would have to start
moving her home to higher ground. She invited them in, offered them
tea and seemed agreeable to what they were saying.
As the workers were driving up the Larsen Dugway on their way
home that night they looked back and saw black smoke boiling into
the sky. They turned around and headed back, but they didn't hurry.
They pretty well knew what had happened and they were right.
After the two of them had left that afternoon, Minnie threw a
bucket of gas on the front of her house and threw a match to it. Minnie
couldn't stop the government with its progress and prosperity but she
could deny them the satisfaction of moving her out of the way. No one
drove her from her home of 39 years, she arched her pride and walked
away by herself.
At that point Minnie moved to Arizona to live with her daughter
and granddaughter. She returned for visits but never lived in Utah
again. She was on one such visit when the special plaque for Linwood
was dedicated by the Daggett County Historical Society. Erected on
a hillside overlooking the waters of Flaming Gorge, the plaque was a
memorial to "Linwood, The Town that Drowned." And, by chance
she was home when the highway was dedicated at Minnie's Gap. It
is so named because she homesteaded there alone in the early 1900s.
She often said she didn't like the name because "gap" didn't sound
very pretty. And now, in a quiet sense, she is home for the dedication
of her own plaque.
This history on Minnie is vague and brief. It seems that when
everyone was interviewing and recording her it was always about
someone else. Everyone wanted to know about the Bassetts, Butch
Cassidy, Matt Warner, etc. But no one thought to interview her about
her until it was too late. She died in Prescott, Arizona November 18,
1981 at the age of99. Her ashes were brought north and scattered over
the hills of Brown's Park.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
EDITOR'S NOTE - The above information is taken from the historical files at the
Outlaw Trail History Center. The Winter 1993 issue of the OUTLA W TRAIL
JOURNAL featured a story on Charlie Crouse, father of Minnie.

32
FOLKTALES FR M
THE
0'0 LAW TRAIL
Editor's Note - For those ofyou who are new members, we would like to take this opportunity
to tell you about the FOL TALES FROM THE OUTU W TRAIL portion ofour journal.
It is a section devoted to stories that have been handed down, but are not documented as
are the stories in the first part of the journal. In previous journals we have attempted to tell
the stories of Butch Cassidy being seen after the "shoot out in South America, " as well as
other claims of outlaw heritage. We hope to continue to do this along with other stories.
Following is one of those stories, a Iwe slory written by Dick De Journette. Dick and his
wife, Daun a."e in the process of writing a history of Diamond Mountain and the people who
lived there. This story depicts just how wild and rugged this outlaw trail country is even
today. Hope you enjoy il.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
TO HELLS CANYON AND BACK
by Richard Ford De Journette
It was a cold, snowy day just aft r New Years. We were stoking
up the old wood stove in the sheep wagon to keep warm. It was mid
afternoon, suddenly the dogs started barking. Moke swallowed his

last drop of black coffee and reached for his hat and rifle. He said, "It
can't be a lion in the sheep, because its coming from the wrong
direction. "
In the summer time and autumn as you cast your eyes toward Blue
Mountain, it is almost a misty blue with pine trees sprinkled here and
there. The sage, with its lasting aroma after a quiet rain grows with
much vigor over the rolling hills. The Green River runs along the
northwest side of Blue Mount in and the Yampa River on the north
east side. Black Mountain, with its rugged splendor, stands on the
other side of Green River, making a definite contrast.
Blue Mountain is a long mountain with rolling hills with an
atmosphere of unique beauty in its setting, almost an innocent look.
As you go on north toward the Yampa, you come into some very
primitive country. Harper's Corner and the Echo Park Lookout are

33
northwest of Blue Mountain. This scenic view draws people from all
over the world.
As winter moves into this area, the innocent look fades quickly,
especially down through Hells Canyon and the primitive part of what
is now a part of the Dinosaur National Monument. It is rugged with
deep canyons, and when it is covered with snow, it has a treacherous
affect on one traveling through. This was the setting that Toby and
Sharis Fields from Lima, Ohio, found when they were taking their
belated honeymoon in January of 1963.
Before I go on with this story, I must tell you how I happened to be
on Blue Mountain in the winter of 1963. I was born in Vernal, Utah and
I had been raised herding sheep and trapping coyotes. I had spent my
life on Diamond Mountain, across the Green River to the northwest of
Blue Mountain. In 1960, I helped Vic Karren lamb his sheep on Blue
Mountain. Vic is the father of Doris Karren Burton (another author
included in this journal). I herded one bunch of Vic's sheep the
summer of 1961. The coyotes were bad and Vic asked me to stay and
trap that winter, as I had been having good luck trapping them. He
offered me a good deal and furnished me with a good little jeep
pickup that I used for moving the sheep camp.
Vic hired Morse (Moke) Lee to herd the sheep. Moke didn't like
horses, so, he herded the sheep on foot. He was a good walker. He had
to be because Vic had bought some new sheep and put them in the
herd, and they were hard to handle. Things went along nice and
smooth all fall, and then in December it started snowing and became
very cold.
I stayed on the ranch at Wolf Creek and fed the cattle and horses.
I had one trap line to the south of the ranch, and one towards Moke's
camp. I moved Moke's camp for him and took groceries and supplies
to him. Vic was paying him extra for cutting cedar posts, so I helped
him haul out his posts and pile them in one location. I remember the
weather had turned off really cold, about twenty below zero or colder.
I went to Moke's camp that day. It was Christmas time, and I had
dinner with Moke. We were good old buddies.
He had the sheep in Bear Valley and decided, due to the cold
weather, that we should move the sheep to Cactus Flat. This was
lower country that lies on the rim of the Yampa River, and also it is in
the Dinosaur National Monument wilderness country. I had never
trapped down there because it was on the Monument and against
regulations to trap there. I had been told it was a'rugged area, hot in
the summer and extremely cold in the winter, a good place to stay
away from
There was one thing for certain, Moke and I were the only two
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

34
Canyon Country traveled by Toby and Sharis Fields. (Photo: Uintah County
Library Historical Collection)
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
damn fools on that entire mountain. The closest ranch had cattle on .
Blue Mountain in the summer, but wintered them at the Three Springs
Ranch, close to U. S. highway 40. I stayed at the WolfCreek Ranch and
Moke at the sheep camp, and were about twenty miles apart. Vic
Karren would come to the ranch about every week or ten days.
Sometimes he would stay overnight, other times just brought sup
plies. Then he would go back home if everything was going all right.
T e day that we moved the camp was January 4, 1963. We had
moved the camp to the top of the hill from Cactus Flat, because the
roads were so steep down in that neck of the woods. I knew that the
y it was storming we might get snowed in, if we tried to go down
in too far with the camp. It was getting close to dusk, we had just
starte to get dinner, we heard the dogs bark. We looked out and saw
this man staggering up the hill towards us. He looked like he was just
abo t done for. I went out and helped him into the camp, and offered
him some hot coffee, (the old boil-over coffee that Moke made would
make your hair stand on end) but he was so overcome and irrational
that he was beside himself. I almost had to shake him to calm him
down, so he could tell us what was the matter and what he was doing
in this rugged country in January. After he stopped trembling and
shaking some, he told us that his car was stranded back in the
wilderness area. He had been walking all day long. He had left his
wife in the car where they had spent the night.

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOUR AL
35
We tried to get some food down him, but al he could think of was
getting back to his wife. We scrambled some eggs and had some cold
sourdough biscuits. We put some ofMoke's strong coffee in a fruit jar.
I didn't have much gas in the jeep. We had three gallons of white gas
for the lantern that we took with us just in case we needed it. We
loaded him up in the bitter cold weather, expecti g to find the worst,
but hoping and praying silently a the best. As I looked at this man,
a pain touch my chest and a lump came in my th oat; "Just what would
we find?"
On the way, he explained that he that he and his wife had been on
a trip to Idaho to spend Christmas w'thfriends and were headed back
to Lima, Ohio. When they arrived in Vernal, they had stopped at the
Dinosaur Field House for literature and then went on to the Dinosaur
Quarry. When they came to the Monument headquarters, the other
side of Artesia (Dinosaur), Colorado no one had warned them not to
get off the main road. They turned off and headed for Harper's
Corner. When they got there, they were still on paved road, but not
knowing where they were going and that primitive wilderness lay
ahead, they turned off and started down a steep dugway. They were
in a 1962 Thunderbird conv rtible. Well, there was no turning back
after they started down into the 'teep, sharp curve of the Echo Park
road. They kept on going lmtil the convertibl got stuck. Imagine, a
convertible car and hardly any warm uothes, nothing to eat or drink
and very little gas. They were just about twenty miles from our camp.
When we finally got to the car, ther was no sign of life and a
queasy feeling hit the pit of my stomach. Then I stuck my head in the
window and his wife was curled up in the back seat. There is no doubt
about it, she would have froz n to death that night -- twenty below
weather in a convertible. I huddered, then I hollered, "Happy New
Year!" and she came to life. I think I gave her quite a ~tart, as I had
about a six inch beard, and I didn't exactly look like I'd be too afe to
be around. He grabbed her and they held onto each other, tears were
flowing, and my eyes were damp, and not from the cold, nowy night.
Make handed her the cold, crambled eggs and biscuits and the
strong, black, cold coffee. Later she said, "That was th best New
Year's dinner I ever had./I
I dug out some extra car chains and put them on his car. Then we
put some of the lantern gas in his car. With the jeep, we pushed and
pulled until finally we pulled them up out of that cold, desolate place
andgotthem pan the hill by Make's camp. WeleftMokeat 'scamp
and they followed me to the ranch. When we got there it was just
twenty-five below zero. I got them some gas from Vic's gas pump.
They tried to pay me with all the money and equipment they 1 ad. I
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

36
Looking out over the Canyon Country described in this story. (Photo: Uintah
COl/lit)' Library Historical Collection)
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
told them all I wanted was money for the gas because it didn't belong
to me. I tried to get them to stay at the ranch that night but they were
anxiou' to get out of there and on their way. I am sure they had
en ugh cold, hunger and wilderness area to last them for quite a
while. So I head th m out on their way to Craig, Colorado.
I gue s the Lord was looking after them. I am sure that it was an
act of God that we moved the camp where we did that day. If we
hadn't of been where we were, when we were, Toby Fields would
have died along the way. His wife, Sharis would have frozen to death
that night, curled up in the back seat of their convertible.
Time slips away and the years go by quickly. I have never
forgotten this ordeal, nor have I been forgotten by this couple. My
wife, Daun and I were talking one day and she said, IIYou know, we
probably won't ever get to go to Ohio to see them, but I would
certainly like a picture of them. So we called and asked them to send
us a picture, and they not only sent pictures, but Toby sent the story
of the ordea I they went through.
II
TOBY FJELD'S STORY

The day after Christmas in 1962( Sharis and I left on our trip from
Lima,Ohi , to vi it Andy and Connie Wilson, who ived in Idaho
Falls, Idaho. We went to pend New Year's Eve with them.

37
Since we had taken U. S. Route 30 out of Idaho, we wanted to take

a difference route home. We chose to come b ck on U. S. Route 40, so
that we could go through Logan, Utah, and Salt Lake city to see more
of the country and vi it the Mormon Tabernacle.
We proceeded on to Vernal, Utah, on Wednesday January I, 1963
where we spent the night at the DinaVille Motel. The next morning
we ran across the Dina aur National Monument tourist centeI'. There
were men on scaffolds utting these huge skeleton bones out of the
side of this mountain and inside of the building. There was a la'rge
map on the wall with a list of points of interest. Beside the list was a
row of buttons. When you pushe a button, th corresponding light
would corne on, showing the location on the map of that particular
place of interest. We hadn't seen much wildlife and th ught that a trip
to on of these places would be fun. Andy had warned us not to get
off the main highway, but we wanted the adventure. The name must
have sounded intriguing. Apparently the tourist center was just being
built, and the area had not been developed at alL We did manage to
get to Harpers Corner, but all we fou d wa a ign with a name~ The
stone road turned over the ridge and we decided to go further.
The snow had melt d comple ed on one ide of the canyon, but
was six inches to a fa t de p on the oth r side. Once we dropped over
the ridge it was too late tCl turn back--we thought. There was no room
to turn around and it was too ste p to back up. There was a couple of
construction type trailers just abandoned off the side of the road. ow
we rationalized that the road went down to the bottom of the canyon
and crossed over to the dry side and out. At the bottom of the canyon
there was a fork in the road. It appear d tha t the left road went t a
ranch which looked pretty far away and that there had not been any
trav Ion that road. There didn't seem to be any activity at the ranch,
so we took the right fork. Not a very smart decision a . it tun1ed out,
but we hadn't been very smart up to then anyway. It was around
noon, and we th ught there would be plenty of time. Well, the road
didn't cross over. We kept proceedin and after we tarted up from.
the bottom of the canyon the road became narrower and narrower; it
looked like a catH trail. Th further we got the worse it b came. We
didn't have any fa d and just wanted to pu h on and get back to the
highway. Then the trail turned even worse with st ep hills, drop-offs
and curves. OUf car was a 1962 Thunderbird convertible and was not
your norma14-wheel drive, all-terrain vehicle. The hills were so steep
the car had to be pushed to get up them. I tried pu hing and Sharis
drove. Well, that didn't work; so I dr ve and Sharis pushed. With the
tires spinning and heating up; the snow melted. When Sharis had
enough mud splattered on her, we gave up. Now it was starting to get
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

38
THE
UTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL
dark, the car kept overh ating, and was nearly out of gas. We put
snow in the radiator to ke pi ful. Soon it was completely dark. We
decided to see if we could raise sorneone/s attention. I had a .22 rifle
and pistol with me becau e Andy and other friends back in Ohio, used
to go to dumps and hoot rats. Tough sport, hugh? Andy and I had
planned to d a little target shooting. We got out of the car and while
Sharis gathered wood to start a fire, I frantically started shooting the
guns. We built a good-sized fire to no a ail. Dick, you told me later
that even if som one ad heard the hots they likely would have had
no concern because th y would be assumed to have come from
hunters, who weren't thought too highly of.
lt was getting late, and we were cold and tired. We decided to get
int he back seat of the car and leep until morning and then I would
walk for help. We didn't get mud sleep and couldn't find a way to
get warm. We got clothe from the trunk to cover up with and tried
every imaginable position to ke p warm. We ended up sitting up
facing each other with our Ie sand fe t tog ther.'
Morning came and w woke up. Frost had accumulated on the inside
of the window so that you couldn't see out and the windows
wouldn't go down. Icicles were hanging inside from the roof. We
cracked open the door and it was snowing. Later y u said it was not
uncommon to snow thr feet or more atone time, which would have
stranded us, and we would not hav been found until spring.
I decided that I had to start walking for help. Sharis agreed to stay
in the car and if she started it to get warm, she would only let it run for
fifteen minutes within an hour. She never started the car. I left at 7:00
or 8:00 a.m. and left the rifle with her. Aft r about two hours, I ran
across a sheepher er's trail r The door was open and there was
coffee and some food there-l think. it was clean and neat. I thought
I should go back and get Sharis and brin her there, but I went on.
(By the time Toby Field g tto thatpointhe had to be hallucinating
because there was no camp or anything similar to that in that area.)
At one point, T:,hot the pistol; ome coyotes started barking which
could have been w Ives,as far as I knew; and Iwas scared. Therewere
these red patches of cloth on the side of the canyon ina couple of places
that I swore were moving. As the trail would turn, they seemed to
have moved. You thought they must have been surveyor flags. I
prayed and sang, a d I don't sing. My feet were soaking wet from the
snow melting througl my boot. Now, dusk was corning and I hadn't
seen anyone or any sign of encouragement for help. I came to the
bottom of thi really teep hill and though, there must be someone
near, as the trail looked m re used. Getting close to the top, I came
around the bend and there was a jeep. Man, I was happy. Then there
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

39
was a trailer Iwagon. I went up to the door and knocked. Inside were
our saviours, you and Make Lee. How could we ever forget you. You
told me to corne in, but the steps were so high, and I was so tired you
had to pull me up and in. For quite awhile you didn't beli ve me or
my situation. I'd say, it seemed to take forty-five minutes to an hour
to convince you tha t my wife was down in the canyon. Ioffer d to give
you my pistol and money if you would help us. Once you were
convinced that I had a problem, you didn't want anything from me.
You just wanted to get started to find Sharis. You gave me coffee and
offered me eggs, but I couldn't eat anything. Then you fixed coffee
and scrambled eggs with curdled milk a some kind of biscuits and th
three of us started for the car. You kept saying, how far is it, with a
renewed doubt. As the saying goes--"just around the nest corner." As
it turned out, you said it was eighteen miles.
Finally we did find the last corner and there was the car and Sharis.
Everyone was elated. The white snow on the side of the hill wad
decorated with at least a large box of bright, purple Clones. It looked
like a spring flower garden. After the hugging and crying, y u and
Make put chains on my tires and we started out. All I could thing
about was getting out, so I went as fast as I though I could, narrowly
missing going off the side of the trail a couple of times. The car ran out
of gas. You had some in the jeep and we made it to Make's wagon. You
went to the ranch house'and got some more gas that got us to Craig,
Colorado, where we spent Friday night. You told us that after you and
Make had eaten; you were going to leave to do something with fence
posts and ten minutes later, I would have missed you. If I'd have gone
a little farther, the tracks in the snow would have misled me. Those
tracks were your trapping trails and the most traveled tracks w uld
not have led me out.
You offered to open the ranch house for us to stay the nigh t, but as
truly thankful as we were, we just wanted to get horne. I hav often
wondered what that ranch house was like and regretted not staying
there.
The next morning when we got ready to leave the motel, I noticed
the tread was worn off the back tires--gone, and you could see the steel
wires in the tire. We had to replace the tires before we left for
Steamboa Springs on Saturday January 5, 1963.
Dick, we will never forget you. In fact, we think of you as part of
our family. Sharis and I were married September 24,1960 and had not
had any children. At the time of this trip, we had started the adoption
process. We think that because of this experience our love matured,
and for whatever reason, barriers were overcome. You see Dick you
are not only responsible for saving our lives, but also for us haVing a
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

40
family. We have four wonderful children.

Dick, if you hadn't been where you were then, none of this could
have happened. We have a very special love for you. We believe we
have a very special family and hope that they all can experience a very
special friendship--like ours.
EPILOGUE
Since that time, January of 1963, every year I get a package and a
letter at Christmas from the Fields. Over the years every time there
was a new baby or any family event, they would let me know. They
came to Vernal one time to see me. I was at Slater, Colorado. They
hired a car from Showalter Ford Motor Co. in Vernal drive up to Slater
to see me.
Toby and Sharis have four children, and I feel like they are my
family. Occasionally, when I call the Field's residence, if one of the
kids answer the phone and I tell them my name, they always say, "Oh,
we know who you are." Toby and Sharisalwayssay, "Wehaven'tand
we never will forget you." Well, that is true. They never have forgot
the old trapper who saved their lives west of Cactus Flat.
Property of the
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History Center
AND NOW FOR THE REST OF THE STORY
After Toby and Sharis Fields left Blue Mountain, the weather just
kept getting worse and it snowed until it was three feet deep. The
sheep had to be moved to the lower country to be fed. So Vic Karren
had been busy getting them taken care of, and hadn't seen him for
about two weeks. The snow was deep enough that I could run the
coyotes down on my horse. I had been running coyotes all day when
I got to the ranch, I could see that Vic had been there with the cat and
cleared the road. I put my horse in the barn and went to lift a sack of
pellets to feed the other stock when a terrible pain hit me in my right
side. I finally managed to get in the camp but by two in the morning
I was so sick, I knew I had better try and get help of some kind. I
managed to start the jeep and made it to the sheep camp. I got Vic out
of bed and we left for Vernal in his pickup and by ten that morning,
I had my appendix out. There are two things I am most thankful for:
1. This didn't happen when Sharis and Toby Field needed my help.
2. I am so grateful to the man upstairs that I didn't have the attack
before Vic got the snow plowed out. Because if Vic hadn't of cleared
the path, I am sure this old trapper would have been a goner. Yes, I
saved a life and mine was saved in return.

41
HAS CHANGED
Property
of the
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History Center
HOW THIS OLD WEST
By F. Allan Brewer
Well I grew up on Bitter Creek while I was just a kid,
We pioneered that native land much like my Grandpa did.
May Dad was raising cattle on a rugged, untamed land,
And we were poor as church mice, as you will understand.
Hard winters wolves and lion and rustlers took their toll,
And every fall with shipping done, we came out in the hole.
My mother died and left my Dad with five little doggie kids,
I don't see how the hell he made it, but omehow he did.
My oldest sister was fourteen, my youngest brother, four,
I guess it was a blessing there wasn't any more.
And by gum, I say my father must have had a lot of sand,
To keep the wheels a rolling in such a harsh damn land.
We three boys, we growed up fast to tak the place of men,
Frances, she could wash the dishes and feed the settin' hen.
All we knew was cows and hor es, all we had to know was work,
And somehow among the bunch of us, we made the old ranch perk.

42
We got a little schooling in the mining town of Dragon
Fifteen miles away by horseback and eighteen miles by wagon.
My youngest sister, Frances, was shipped out to the coast,
To stay with our grandparents, she went to school the most.
Now she is my ghost writer, she punctuates these lines,
She corrects all my spelling and sees each sentence rhymes.
She was sure enough a cowgirl and she loved that rugged land.
And I would have never wrote a line without her helping hand.
I proved up on a homestead and built myself a herd,
And merged it with my fathrs ranch, a partnership is the word.
We put up lots of stacks of hay to see the cattle thru the snow,
And bought out other ranches and watched the cattle grow.
Then Dad grew old and we sold out and take this little hint,
He bought land in California and turned it into a mint.
He took his fortune to Missouri, that good 01 "Show Me" state,
And he died there in its glory when he was eighty eight.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
And I am just a Mossie horn, I figure not worth shootin',
Just living out a pleasant life, I keep my horn a tootin'.
I think of all them good ol'boys with whom I used to ride,
I am older than most of them were when they crossed the Great
Divide.
And all them carefree cowboys, my gosh how things did change.
All that's left is down on paper, all the men who knew have died,
An I hope they all have found a range just like the one we used to ride.
Editor's Note: Allan was born in 1910 and grew up in the Bookcliffs. The
Bookcliffs are mostly in Uintah and Grand counties in Utah with some
properties in western Colorado. Allan's "story telling" poems are unique in
that it was he who lived them first and then wrote about them.

HER PORCH OF SCREEN

She was so small, barely five foot two,
With eyes of hazel instead of blue
That danced with love as her small feet flew
from room to room--with the cloth and broom.
The old house shone with a polished glow
And every day, with it tidied so,
She had her favorite place to go
with her hook and thread-Or a book half read.
She sought the porch with its walls of screen
And the sweeping view of her favored scene...
White barked trees with the silver sheen
on the shimmering lea es - Such restless leaves.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
It was her haven in summer time,
With scent of wild rose and columbine

And the breath of aspen all intertwined
on the fragrant breeze--as it teased the trees.
She loved that porch and her rocking chair.

Each afternoon he could find here there,
Sunbeams streaking the soft brown hair
on her tilted head - bend to hook and thread.
To and fro went the rocker's tread.

In and out went the hook and thread
While silence lay like a golden spread
as the steel hook flew - And the lace work grew.
Then she lay aside the thread and hook
To plan his favorite dish to cook
On the big black range with the polished look.
And the pots and pans - for her busy hands.

43
44
THE OUTLAW TRAiL JOURNAL
She sang at work and it seemed like play,

For she loved each moment of every day ...
And she never knew that she could not stay
with her porch of screen - in the restless green.
But she was as fragile as the lace
That trims the edge of the satin case
Where darkness cradles her sleeping face
and her hands are still - But forever still.
By Frances Brewer Steiner
Frances Steiner is a sister to F. Allan Brewer and

both are cousins of Marie Kaczmarek's.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
BOOK REVIEWS
Stephen Goldman, Wanted Dead or Alive, True Life

Accounts of the Desperados of the Wild West from the
Actual Newspaper Reports of the Times, Historical Briefs,
Inc., 200 pages.
This book was just received as we are going to press with this journal.
I want d to let everyone know how much I njoyed looking through
the old actual newspaper accounts all collected together in one book.
If you haven't seen it yet, you have a treat in stor . The Editor.

45
Book Review by Roy P. O'Dell
Trouble in New Mexico; The Outlaws, Gunmen,
Desperadoes, Murderers & Lawmen for Fifty Thrbulent
Years. Volume 1,
The A's & B's
By William D. Reynolds. Self-published and available from author at

2312 Oakwood Drive, Bakersfield, California, 93304-5438, U.s.A.
298 Page, 8-1/2 x 11 inches in size. Spiral bound $16.50 + pp.
Bill Reynolds has set himself the difficult task of listing as many
New Mexico characters he has access too, in a series of volumes
startin with the A' & B's. Bill has been collecting material on the Old
West f r many years.
This book is encyclopedic in design. Each entry ranges from a few
lines to several pages. Many of the characters were also active in other
sta tes, many of them in neighboring Arizona. Bill has concentrated on
th ir New Mexico activities.
It is most interesting and easy to read, a book that is helpful t the
reader / researcher giving information on many characters that nor
mally get little or no mention of all anywhere else.
I was impressed by the sources which come from his many books,
do uments, copied newspaper articles and other assorted records,
listed after each entry. A series of ten books are scheduled which will
cover A-Z. Volume 2, th C's will be out within two or three months
time.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
Other books received at the Outlaw Trail History Center are:
THE LOST GOLD OF THE UINTAH'S, THE REST OF

THE STORY, By Gale R. Rhoades, published Benzoil Inc.,
Duchesne, Utah, 199 pages in addition to 164 pages of maps.
Before Rhoades died in September of 1988, he was collaborating on
the new publication with Steve Malnar. Almost seven year later,
Malnar has published the book, which became available to the public
tw weeks ago.

46
Other books receive at the Outlaw Trail History Center are:
GUIDE TO THE LOST RHOADES GOLD MINES, by A.

C. Wilkerson.
Mr. Wilkerson said he began writing his book 13 years ago, but let his
friends talk him out of publishing it sooner. With his 80th birthday
approaching, Wilkerson says its now or never.
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF WESTERN LAWMEN &

OUTLAWS by Jay Robert Nash, published by Da Capo
Press, New York.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
OUTLAWS IN PETTICOATS, AND OTHER

NOTORIOUS TEXAS WOMEN (Women of the West
Series) by Gail Drago & Ann Ruff, Wordware Publishing
Inc. 1506 Capital Avenue, Plano, Texas 75074, 172 pages.
This book was sent to us by OTHA member Gail Drago.
LETTERS TO THE ED TOR

Dear Joy & Doris:
The Winter 1994 issue of the Outlaw Trail Journal sparked my

memory a little. In the summer of 1932, the first year that we lived on
Willow Creek, south of Ouray, I was approaching 6, having been born
September 17, 1926.
After the summer roundup on the Book Cliffs that year, Charlie
Glass came to the creek with my uncle, Louis Thorne, and helped with
the haying for several days. On a day that they were stacking hay at
the corrals near my grandparents house, I was riding back and forth
to the fields on Dad's wagon and generally being underfoot as 51/2

47
year old boys tend to be.

They had just finished unloading Dad's wagon when a whirlwind
came by and dumped a big tumble weed on top of the unattended
team, who being a little spooky anyway, took off as if the hounds of
hell were after them. Charlie, who saw that I was directly in the path
of the runaway and unaware of it, dashed out in front of the team,
snatched me up by the scruff of the neck and seat of the pants and
threw me up on the roof of an adjacent shed, undoubtedly saving me
from serious injury or death but at considerable risk to himself. It was
an experience that I have never forgotten, nor the man who did it.
In Dr. Walker's article, "Ft. Duchesne's Buffalo Soldiers" he quotes
the fear and concern expressed by Chief Sour of the Uintah Utes over
the coming of the Ninth Cavalry. I imagine that the reputation for
bravery and determination in enforcing regulations that the Ninth
and Tenth Cavalry had earned on the southern plains, and in Texas,
New Mexico and Arizona from 1867 when they were first deployed
until this incident in 1886 had certainly reached the Chief via word of
mouth.
I was not aware of the contacts between the Ute's and the Black
troopers until I read \J\Tilliam H. Leckie's book, "The Buffalo Soldier".
The following information is from that book.
The Southern Utes were the first to encounter the Ninth Cavalry,
when in March 1878, Agent F. H. White of the Los Pinos Agency in
Saguache County, Colorado requested assistance from the military to
calm the tension between the tribe and the white settlers and miners
who were encroaching on designated Indian lands. Lieutenant Valois
with a detachment of troopers from "D" Company of the Ninth were
the first to arrive at Los Pinos, followed a month later by Major
Morrow with G, I, K, and M Companies and the balance of D
Company. They were soon joined by General Hatch from the Head
quarters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, who arranged a council with
Ignacio, the Southern Utah Chief, and a number of his warriors, all of
whom were sullen and insolent. General Hatch did not dally, he told
Ignacio that the troopers had come in peace to protect the Indians as
well as the whites, but if the Utes wanted war it might as well begin
immediately, there would be no gifts except bullets from gun muzzles
if necessary.
The Southern Utes remained at peace after this contact with the
Ninth, but the White River Utes, due to the ineptitude and narrow
mindedness of Agent N. C. meeker, revolted in September of 1879.
Agent Meeker requested troops from Fort Frederick Steele in Wyo
ming and also sent a request to Captain Dodge who was encamped
along the Grand River with liD" Company of the Ninth Cavalry.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center

48
The story of Major 1. 1. Thornburgh's relief column, consisting of

three companies of cavalry, one company of infantry and a supply
train of 25 wa ons, and their ambush at the Milk River by the Utes on
September 29, is well known. Of far lesser renown is the fact that
Captain Dodge, Lieut. M. B. Hughes and 35 troopers made a hard ride
from Grand River, arriving at the Yampa River before dawn on
October 2, where after a brief rest and issue of extra rations and
ammunition, they proceeded to the ambush site on Milk River and
bef re daylight br ke through the Ute lines to aid the embattled
troops from Ft. Steel .
For the next two days of the battle, veteran Buffalo Soldier Sgt.
henry Jacks n mad regular rounds of the entrenchments to encour
age the d fenders and made trips under fire to the river to obtain
water for the troops. For these actions he became another in the
growing list of Ninth Cavalry tro pers to receive the Medal of Honor.
I have read a good deal about the Meeker incident, but in Leckie's
book was the first reference I hav s en of the part played by troopers
from the Ninth Cavalry prior to their being stationed at Ft. Duchesne.
I was also interested in the article by Bert Jenson about Lieut.
Charles Young and the reference to America's first black general,
Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. Three years ago here at Ft. Bayard where
various d tachments of the Ninth were stationed from 1876 to 1880
there was a sta rue to the Buffalo Soldier dedicated, at which time I had
the plea ure f meeting the principal speaker, retired Gen. Benjamin
O. Davis, Jr.
Enough of my ramblings. Just want to say that I think you are
doing a gre t j b with the Journal, always have interesting appropri
ate articles. Keep up the good work. Best wi hes to you both.
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
. Neil Th rne
Silver City, New Mexico

Outlaw Trail History Center
Research Centerfor Outlaws & Lawmen

Featuring History of the Wild Bunch
Housed in the Regional Room at
Uintah County Library
155 East Main
Vernal, Utah 84078
1-801-789-0091
Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center
There have been eight issues of the Outlaw Trail Journal

published previously and we still have a limited number of
back issues available for purchase.

Property of the
Outlaw Trail
History Center


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the OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

Indian Slave Girl

Book Cliff Women

Published By The Outlaw Trail History Association

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

Managing Editor: Joy T. Horton

Associate Editor: Doris K. Burton

OUTLAW TRAlL HISTORY ASSOCIATION

Richard Wm. Horton. Chairman

William Webb. Vice-Chairman

Doris K. Burton, Secretary

Joy Horton. Treasurer

Jesse Cole Kenworth

The OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL is supplied to all members of the

Publication of the OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL is made possible

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

By Doris Karren Burton 13

Pioneer Postmaster of Linwood, Ut

FOLKTALES from the Outlaw Trail History Center

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.............................

The Outlaw Trail History Association

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

WHO WAS JENNIE BROWN?

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE GUTLA W TRAIL}l' 1l.(l\'AI

WHEN COMPA ~ING FACES, IT'S EVIDENT THAT THE

", 1MAN 'EHIND ANNA BASSETT IS NOT

JOSI.~ fASSEl T AS HISTORY BOOKS INDICATE

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

TN E OUTLA W Tl AlL IOU RNAL

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIl IOU

"May21,1891 OnMay6that the residence ofMr. J. C. Allen,

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLA W TRAIL JOURNAL

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

is the son of Anne Timberlake Hughes.

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

and Daun DcJourncllC.

() Lmv, Doug las, I YOU Census, Utah, Vol 10, ED 15/.

IOu/II', f)oug/as, Newspaper; Vernal Express. May 6, /897

11.192 Cen.llls, Utah, Vol 8, ED 86, Sheet 12, Line 98.

Stute File #1208/3.

16.1920 Census, Wyoming, Vol 8, ED 86, Sheet 12, Line 98.

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLA W TRAIL JOURNAL

North from the Bookcliff mountains in northeastern Utah run the

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLA W TRAIL JOURNAL

only adjusted go grey-brown.

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL

Cabin built in 19G8 by Frank A. Brewer and brother-in-law W. C. Havens. Left

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum

THE OUTLAW TRAIL JOURNAL

NAVAJO SLAVE GIRL

MARRIES MO MON POLYGAMIST

Uintah County Western Heritage Museum