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Show Page 4 fascinated by the fair baby with the red glints in her hair, carried Ann back and forth from the cabin of her birth to the wickiup of her foster mother. The cabin where Ann was born was in Brown's Park in northwestern Colorado. Brown's Park is a sheltered valley spreading for about thirty-five miles on either side of the Green River. At first it was called Brown's Hole, named after a French trapper called "Bibleback" Brown, who said it was a good place to "hole up" in. It was a pretty valley surrounded by tall, brooding mountains, with mild weather, large cottonwood trees, lots of green grass, and herds of wild game. Ann's uncle, Samuel Clark Bassett, who had come to the valley in 1852, was one of the area's first settlers. The first white woman, "Snapping" Annie Parsons, arrived with her husband two years later in 1854. Herbert and Elizabeth Bassett, Ann's parents, came in 1877. Upon seeing the beauty of the area, Ann's mother was reminded of a park. Deciding no place so lovely should be called Brown's Hole, she immediately renamed it Brown's Park. The Bassetts were different from most of the valley's settlers. Both were well-educated and cultured. Ann's father was a gentle, kindhearted man with a talent for music. He had been a school teacher in Illinois and a tax collector in Virginia before coming to Colorado. It was in Virginia he met and married Mary Elizabeth Chamberlain in 1868. |