PROLOUGE
1878 - 1901
The midway point on the stage
route between Salt Lake City and Boise was the Oakley Meadows stage station. The
station was established around 1869 or 1870 by William Oakley. Prior to that
time, thousands of westward bound emigrants passed through the area on the Oregon
and California Trails. The Oregon trail followed the Snake River to the north while
the California Trail cut off at Raft River and went through nearby Almo and the
City of Rocks and on into Nevada. To those pioneers the area was a foreboding area
to be passed through quickly. Two wagon trains had been attacked and massacred in
the vicinity. Only the the numerous jackrabbits contended with the Indians for
possession of the dry sagebrush covered land until the 1870s when a half-dozen
stockmen established themselves in the valley.
Not until 1878 did the Oakley Basin receive serious attention from Mormon pioneers from Grantsville, Utah. In June of that yea, James Dayley and his sons Thomas and Heber rode into the valley scouting for good farmland. They liked what they saw and each staked out a 160 acre homestead. Returning to their homes in Grantsville, they planned to take their families back to the valley. But word came of Indian troubles in the area and remained in Grantsville until the following spring.
In the Spring of 1879, the Dayleys returned with their families and and built cabins on their land. Others hearing their favorable report followed that same year and began farming in the Oakley Basin. The Dayley, Sanford, Cummins, Severe and Martindale families were the first.
Cassia County,
Idaho was created on February 20, 1879, by an act of territorial
legislation. At that time, the county included all of the territory
south of the Snake River between Owhyee County and Oneida County.
The county seat was Albion which had been established just a few years earlier.
James Dayley stakes his claim.
By 1882 there were enough Church members in the valley to form the Cassia Ward of the Box Elder Stake. In November 1887, Apostle John W. Taylor and Elder Seymour B. Young visited the area to organize a new stake and to create new wards from the existing Cassia Ward. The stake boundaries encompassed most of South Central Idaho. Wards were organized in Oakley, Basin, Marion, Albion, Almo, and Elmo.
Charles Wiseman Dayley was only twelve years old when his family homesteaded in Basin. His father, Enoch Rhodes Dayley, was the first bishop of the Basin Ward. Carrie Melissa Sanford was seven when her family settled in Basin. They grew up with Basin and witnessed Oakley become known as the educational and religious center for the Mormon pioneers who settled in the area.
On June 15, 1898, Charles and Carrie were married and began raising their family in Basin. This is the story of their second child, Vyla June Dayley.
Chapter 1