Belle S. Isom

  General Notes:

Research of Belinda Pierce on Rootsweb: (cherokeebabe@comcast.net)
Belle (Isom) Jackson states the following;
" I came to Montana Territory on October 18, 1885 in the cabin on the banks of Rosebud Creek.
My folks had a place above the Freeman Philbrick place just below the George Snider place. They migrated from Burr Oak, Kansas, by wagon train arriving in the fall of 1882. They stayed the winter at the Graham Ranch later known as the McDonald place on the Rosebud.
The next spring my Dad built a cabin on his place and lived there until 1891 when he sold out to Freeman Philbrick and moved to Ash Creek on what is now the Cheyenne Reservation. We lived there until 1903 when the government finally got around to paying us for our buildings.
We then moved to Big Horn, Wyoming, where the folks built a home on the edge of the Big Horn River where Dad also had a lime kiln. I attended high school there.
My two older brothers established a place on Greenleaf Creek in Montana where my two younger sisters and brother and I came back to live. My older sister, Martha, had married Thomas Wood and lived on Ash Creek.
We had happy times while living on Ash Creek except for the Indian scares. The folks had built a dugout under one room of the house and when the Indians proved unfriendly they always put us children there. You could hear a pin drop as we scarcely breathed at these times.
In 1892 two young Indians killed a fellow by the name of Hugh Boyles and buried him in a shallow grave. The soldiers from Camp Merriott at Lame Deer finally ran them off the point of a hill facing West near the town of Lame Dee. "Little Mule" one of the braves "ran the gauntlet" down the hill with those soldiers shooting at him. He was riddled, and the Indians put a pebble on each drop of blood they found.
The other Indian scare was in 1897 when James Yellowhair and Spotted Hawk killed Hoover, a sheepherder who worked for John and Fred Baringer. The people all flocked together, moving at night, to the Snider place. The Indians were just as frightened and ran just as fast the other way.
Also, while we lived on Ash Creek my baby sister died from Mountain Fever and Pneumonia. She was buried beside my grandmother on Cherry Creek. My brother Ralph, drowned in the Tongue River near the Baringer place in 1902. In 1905 my brother Charlie, was killed by a bucking horse. The horse fell giving my brother a bad concussion after which he lived eight day. Again, we had to call on our friends, the Baringers, who kept him at their place until his death because he couldn't be moved. Ralph and Charlie died in the month of July on the Tongue River. They are buried beside my little sister and Grandma.
In the fall of 1905 I spent some time in Miles City to learn the photography trade from a cousin. She sort of fell down on her part of the bargain so my brother thought I had better come home.
I married George Jackson on November 15, 1907 in Douglas, Wyoming and we settled in Manville, Wyoming. George worked for Ad Spaugh who knew both the cattle and sheep business and had built himself quite a livestock empire near Manville. Our son Floyd, was born there in 1908.
George's folks wanted us to come back and file on a homestead along with his brother Al and his sister and husband, the Jim Saffells. George's folks had come to the Rosebud in 1897.
On February 3, 1910, we arrived at our new home on Sweeney Creek in 20-below-zero weather with lots of snow on the ground. When the snow melted you couldn't step anywhere without stepping on a cactus bed! George had built his cabin in the winter.
We ran horses and cattle and in later years had mostly cattle. George started shearing sheep when he was nineteen years old so he supplemented our income by this means each year. He sheared with blades and went to Wyoming in early April or May and returned in June and sheared for people around home. In 1935 he became ill from carbon monoxide gas from a shearing machine used in an unventilated shearing shed. He was ill twenty-three days before the doctor finally found out the cause of his illness. George never fully recovered from this illness. He died August 1959.
In 1903 a community church building was started but it took time and money. Sunday School was held at the Lincoln School which was most centrally located for the people who came. But in the winter Sunday School was held in the homes because they were easier to heat.
For entertainment we had dances at the Ash Creek schoolhouse. Box socials were held to furnish hot lunches for the school children. We had very happy times at those dances where we danced from dusk to dawn, so we could see to get home. Each one helped furnish the lunch and paid a dollar a ticket to pay the fiddler and his helper.
Once at Ash Creek someone forgot to take a Montgomery Ward catalog out of the boiler before putting the coffee in. George skimmed the pages off as they came to the top, saying nothing about it as there was no more water. Everyone drank that good coffee to the last drop!
We had another son and daughter who attended school at Ash Creek. Our neighborhood was a good one and everyone helped one another. Some got a little carried away during prohibition and did a little bootlegging but nothing compared to other places.
Sometimes there was a little trouble in keeping livestock from wandering from home; in some instances purposely, but on the whole those who minded their own business were not intimidated by this kind of loss of livestock."

Social Security Death Index;
Belle JACKSON
Birth Date: 18 Oct 1885
Death Date: Sep 1981
Social Security Number: 516-44-1398
State or Territory Where Number Was Issued: Montana
Death Residence Localities
ZIP Code: 59347
Localities: Rosebud, Rosebud, Montana

Note that the following states her father to be a JACKSON;
MONTANA DEATH INDEX;
JACKSON , BELLE S
FATHER: JACKSON
MOTHER:
DEATH: 11 09 1981
AGE AT DEATH: 95
CO. & STATE OF DEATH: CUSTER CO., MONTANA
WIDOWED
FILE # 4513
NOTE: On the 1920 Sweeney, Rosebud Co., Montana Census, I do find the following from Iowa which Belle may be a BOTT and not ISOM;
John E. Bott age 53 Massachusetts England England
Lilie M. age 47 spouse Iowa Indiana Ohio
Robert O. age 26 Iowa Mass Iowa
John E. age 21 Iowa Mass Iowa
Doris C. age 18 Iowa Mass Iowa
Thomas E. age 9 South Dakota Mass Iowa

Belle married George Robert Jackson, son of Robinson Jackson and Charity Percilla Kellum, on 15 Nov 1907 in Douglas, Converse Co., Wyoming. (George Robert Jackson was born on 7 Nov 1883 in Stewart, Smith County, Kansas, died on 29 Aug 1959 in Forsyth, Rosebud County, Montana, United States of America and was buried in Forsyth Cemetery - Rosebud County, Montana.)