BASSETT, George W.

KASSON

Posted By: Debbie Clough Gerischer
Date: 11/17/2002 at 23:02:48

GEORGE W. BASSETT was born in Canada in 1827. He received his education in
Wabash College, Indiana, and the Cincinnati Law School. He came to Iowa in
1856, studying law with John A. Kasson in Des Moines. He located at Fort
Dodge in 1858 where he practiced his profession. In 1861 he was a lieutenant
in a company of cavalry raised at Fort Dodge which was attached to the Army
of the Potomac. He was disabled by wounds in battles and had to resign in
consequence. Upon his return to Fort Dodge in 1863 Lieutenant Bassett was
elected to the State senate for the northwestern district consisting of
twenty-eight counties and represented more than one-third of the territory of
the State in the Tenth and Eleventh General Assemblies. For nearly twenty
years Mr. Bassett was the general agent for the leasing and sale of the lands
embraced in the Agricultural College grant, disposing of nearly 200,000 acres
of lands. He died in California on the 6th of February, 1896.