It was tough for Mormons growing up in the wild, wild west! Butch Cassidy & the Wild Bunch played a role in the murder of Frank LeSueur & Gus Gibbons. Historian Stephen LeSueur details more about the outlaws of Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Check out our conversation...
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Butch Cassidy & Other Outlaws
It was tough for Mormons growing up in the wild, wild west! Butch Cassidy & the Wild Bunch played a role in the murder of Frank LeSueur & Gus Gibbons. Historian Stephen LeSueur details more about the outlaws of Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Check out our conversation...
Interview
GT 00:41 So Frank LeSueur, was he Mormon when he came out here to Arizona? Was he from Mormon pioneer heritage?
Steve 00:49 Oh, yeah, absolutely. I'll back up and talk about a little bit about the family. The Gibbons family were--Bill Gibbons was Gus' father. And Bill was one of many sons of Andrew Smith Gibbons, who was an early explorer and missionary to the Native Americans. Bill Gibbons, Gus' father, was also a missionary, as well. But they moved around a lot and then [they were] called in 1880, to settle in St. John's.
GT 01:32 So, called by Brigham Young, probably?
Steve 01:33 Well, no, because he was dead by that point.
GT 01:35 Okay.
Steve 01:36 And I don't know, specifically, whether it was the prophet, himself, or other Mormon leaders. Anyway, they were called to settle there. And Gus was born in 1874. So, he was just five or six years old when...
GT 01:50 Gus Gibbons?
Steve 01:50 Yeah, Gus Gibbons.
Steve 01:53 And so Gus, he was just a young boy. But this was a stalwart Mormon family, and in fact, his father, Bill Gibbons, was called to be a counselor in the bishopric that was newly formed in 1880. The bishop was David K. Udall of the Udall family. If you're familiar with Stewart Udall, he was Secretary of Interior, and Mo Udall, who was the representative from Arizona for many years, they are grandsons of David Udall, who was the first bishop there, and Bill Gibbons was...
GT 02:31 [Stewart & Mo Udall were] good Democrats, I'll add.
Steve 02:32 Yeah, if there is such a thing as a good Democrat. {both chuckling}
Steve 02:36 And so, Bill Gibbons was a stalwart in both the Church and his community. And, then the LeSueur family, who came from Idaho. There were two LeSueur brothers and two sisters living in Idaho. And they had another sister who was living in Mesa, and she said, "Oh, why don't you come down here?" This was 1878 or ‘79 or so. "We have a good community here." So, they came down to Mesa, the four families. They were all married, and some of them had kids. They came to Mesa. By the time they got there, this sister had died, though she still had a family. So, they stayed in Mesa for about a year. It was too hot for them. So, they decided to move, and they were moving east. And it's a little uncertain exactly where they were heading. But they, at some point, they got called to settle in St. John's, and so they were there in early 1880, as well.
So, four LeSueur families, including John Taylor LeSueur and his wife, Geneva. John Taylor [LeSueur] was known as JT. JT and his wife, Geneva, they settled in St. John's. Their first home was a home, a dirt home [that] they dug out of the side of the hill. It was two rooms [that] they shared with two families. Anyway, Frank LeSueur was born in 1880, shortly after they arrived. So, these two men who are in the book, Gus Gibbons, he was six when the Mormons first settled there, and Frank was just born at that time.
GT 04:17 Okay.
Steve 04:18 And so that was 20 years--they're living there in St. John's, and it was kind of a desolate, out-of-the way place then and it was still kind of that same place in the year 1900.
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