Western Pioneer, Prospector, Guide, Scout, and Rancher. No family epitomized the essence of Brown's Park more than the Bassetts. In fact, no other family can claim as long an unbroken tenure of land in Northwestern Colorado, spanning more than 110 years. From the time Uncle Sam Bassett first set foot in Brown's Park in the autumn of 1852, down to the time his grandnephew, Emerson Bassett, last owned the ranch site at Joe's Spring in the late 1960's, the Bassetts have held land continuously. It is also proper to say that the Bassetts were the most prominent family in Brown's Park. Sam and Herb Bassett, brothers, came from Jefferson County in the Mohawk Valley of central New York State. Sam, the eldest, left home to join the California a gold rush of 1849, but being none too successful as a prospector and being restless by nature, he wandered the West as a guide and scout. It was during these wanderings that Sam Bassett first visited Brown's Park, which at that time was named Brown's Hole. Herb's wife, Mary Eliza took one look at the beauty of the place and declared that it would be henceforth called Brown's Park and never referred to as a Hole again. Sam Bassett's original holding in Brown's Park was on the first bench above what came to be known as Hoy Meadows, his cabin commanding a magnificent view of the entrance to Lodore Canyon. Later he built a cabin on the west bank of Beaver Creek where that stream emerges from Cold Spring Mountain. Herb and Elizabeth gave birth to Sam's niece, the first white child in Northeastern Colorado, Ann Bassett, "The Queen of Rustlers." He deeded the Beaver Creek property to Josie Bassett, another niece, who lived there in a dirt roofed, dirt floored cabin without water or electricity until her death in 1963 at the age of 89.