Reviews for The Bassett Women

The average rating for The Bassett Women based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-05-25 00:00:00 Michel Roby A book I've been meaning to read for sometime. Glad I got around to doing it. Drags and hard to follow in places but worth pushing through.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-03-24 00:00:00 David Lainson It's always a pleasure when a book is better than expected, and this one is. I had picked it up after visiting the Josie Bassett Morris cabin in Dinosaur National Monument, struck with both the beauty of Josie's valley and her decidedly unconventional life: fiercely independent, married five times, divorced four, bootlegger during Prohibition, and more. (Giving an insight into her personality, her bootlegging was not limited to ordinary corn liquor; in time, she used her creativity and business sense to expand this "sideline" to include apricot brandy and chokecherry wine.) I expected a straightforward account of her life, which I found, but also countless tales about her family members and other colorful characters who homesteaded or passed through that area in the late 19th-early 20th centuries (including outlaws Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid). I especially liked the quotations from primary sources, such as letters, court documents, and newspaper articles of the period. Any list of books on women of the West should include this, but not just for scholars--read it for entertainment value alone.