Frank Gossett

Birth: He was born in 1877 at Indiana.  

Family Information: He'd married Almira "Mae" Gossett in 1900 at Nebraska.

He was the father of Edith "May" Gossett plus several other children (Frank, Jay, Juanita, Olive and Harold) who never lived in the colony.  

Description: His WWI Draft Registration Card dated September 12, 1918 described him as being of medium height and build with brown eyes and dark hair.  

Pre-Colony History: In 1900 he and Mae were living in Nebraska where he worked as a farmer. In 1910 the couple and four of their children lived in Oregon where he worked as a laborer in a hop yard.

In 1920 and 1930 they lived in Montana with some of their children and he worked again as a farmer.  

Home in Colony: According to the 1940 census -- in 1935 he had been living in the colony and Mae was reported to have been living in Crowley, Louisiana, although later that same year, both he and his wife were present in the colony.

In 1937 the Gossett family occupied an apartment in the so-called "old tourist camp."  

Job in Colony: In December 1932 those living at the Isle of Cuba Plantation (near Thibodeaux, LA) included: Sam Hall, Harry Morgan, Henry and Bennie Frahm, Beldon Lewis, F. Gossett, John Horney, Roy McLean, Mrs. Swilley and Mr. and Mrs. Perkins with their four children.

By the end of the month, the group had added Mrs. Gossett, Mr. and Mrs. Bill Shipman, Albert Wicks, Dolly McCullough, Jim Nash, Earl Swenson and Ranny Wells.

In 1933, he and Lee Fread took a load of lumber and pigs to the Rice Ranch and brought back a load of rice straw.

In 1934 he was running the cut-off saw at the sawmill.

In February 1934 he was a member of the Sunday Volunteer Gang including: Bill Heath, Charles Brown, Rob Roe, Walter Gaulke, Dad Thomas, Ernest Prodon, Bert Busick, Roscoe Busick, Gossett, Jack Carnahan, Ed Hiatt John Calgarry, Tom Cunningham, Phillips, Real Baril, Nick Lentz, Ed Mansfield, Septer Baldwin, F.W. Fay and F.S. Hammond. They spent the day cutting some eight hundred feet of cypress lumber into two-inch planks, twenty inches wide and as clear as a hound's tooth to be used for shingles.

In 1935 he attended to the meat cutting. The cooler weather had enabled the smoking of meat to begin and Frank promptly got the pork that was in pickle, washed and hung it in the smoke house, and got his hickory fire started in the furnace outside. He kept the fire going during the day and at night the man on duty at the ice plant watched over it.

In 1937 he and Fred Busick kept a couple of shovels busy spreading gravel at the crossing in the colony.  

Other Info: One newspaper account, in January 1935, reports that he returned to the colony, via sidedoor pullman, from Shreveport accompanied by Mr. Keeble, an erstwhile broommaker from the commonwealth of Kansas.

In September 1935, he was reported to be "looking pale but smiling and happy, getting around now pretty lively." Mrs. G-- also reported to be rapidly on the mend and able to turn her hand to doing her own housework.

In 1936 he donated a book, "The Empty Heart" written by Marion Harland, to the colony library.  

Post-Colony History: In 1940 he and Mae were living in a home in the unincorporated New Llano, Louisiana (site of the old colony) while he worked as a laborer doing road construction.  

Death: He died in 1963 in Vernon Parish, Louisiana and was buried at O'Banion Cemetery at New Llano.  

Sources: US Census: 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940; Nebraska Marriage Records; WWI Draft Registration Card; "Llano Colonist": December 10, 1932, December 24, 1932, December 2, 1933, February 3, 1934, September 8, 1934, January 12, 1935, September 7, 1935, November 23, 1935, March 28, 1936, February 13, 1937; FindAGrave.com