Mono County Historical Society 2005 Newsletter The By Day Legacy An early pioneer became a local legend during the Sierra snows of 1859-60, by being the first white man to spend a winter in Big Meadows, later known as the Bridgeport Valley. Caught in a heavy storm, he built a shelter around a large tree and survived the cold by killing wild game and feeding his horse with bark that he stripped from nearby willows. This hardy soul was George Byron Day, known to friends as By Day. He was born in New York on December 22, 1841 and moved with his family to Illinois in 1843, where he was raised and schooled. On April 18, 1859, he borrowed $200.00 and left home on a wagon train en route to the Gold Hill area of Virginia City, Nevada, to make his fortune in the silver mines. By Day fully intended to become a miner, but he quit after working only half a shift underground, saying later that the job had been too hard for him. Soon after that, he decided to try his luck in Big Meadows, which was experiencing mining activity on the claims in nearby Dogtown and Monoville. He made his way with pack animals by crossing over the mountains into the north end of Smith Valley, Nevada. Here he met and stayed with soldiers camping at the hot springs, who were cooking eggs in the hot water. Day followed the East Walker River south on an old Indian trail through the Sweetwater Valley and arrived in Big Meadows in August of 1859. His pack animals died after the first hard storm hit. During his first year in the valley, Day cut wood for the Whitney Lumber Company in Buckeye Canyon, using the whipsawing method, a hard day's work in any weather. The company was owned by brothers G. A. and William Whitney, the first white men to enter the valley on a wagon train and the first established ranchers and hay farmers in the area. Day hauled lumber down to the valley and supplemented his income by building fences for the Whitney's. Day occasionally prospected in the Virginia City area and worked a short time for a livery stable at Genoa, Nevada. He then started his own freight business, making enough money to repay what he had borrowed in Illinois. He never borrowed nor owed money again. In 1862, Day hauled hay and lumber with an ox-team to Aurora, the Mono County seat until an 1863 survey placed it in Nevada Territory. In 1865, he bought 400 acres of land in the northwest part of Bridgeport Valley from G. A. Whitney and began raising sheep and some cattle. This became the Upper Day Ranch and the creek flowing through the property is still called the By Day Creek. He acquired more land in Bridgeport and in Smith Valley, Nevada, and grazed his livestock in both states. The friendly native Piute Indians usually lived at the area hot springs, but they retreated to the mountains because of the large number of game being killed by the settlers with guns. The ranchers wanted peace and sent By Day to negotiate with Captain Jim, the Piute Chief. Day presented the leader with a gun and invited him and his tribe to meet with the whites. During the conference, the Indians suggested that all bows, arrows and guns be placed on the ground and that everyone present race to pick up and keep whatever they wanted. The Piutes won easily and took all of the guns. After smoking a peace pipe, shaking hands, and feasting, the Piutes were taught how to shoot the guns, which established a more trusting relationship. By Day met Harriet Patterson in Bridgeport. She was born in Ohio on August 11, 1844, one of seven children. She left home in 1862 and followed two of her brothers across the plains for a new life in the Eastern Sierra. Shortly after arriving in Aurora, she witnessed the hanging of five convicts, but that did not prevent her from living there for two years. In 1864, Harriet moved to Bridgeport and on October 18, 1868, married eligible bachelor George Byron Day. One day short of their 53rd wedding anniversary on October 19, 1921, Harriet died at the age of 77. Harriet's brothers, Robert & James Patterson, operated the Pioneer Company sawmill near Monoville and James later built another sawmill in the Sweetwater Mountains north of Bridgeport. Robert was serving as the Mono County Sheriff when he died of TB in 1878. During the same year, James and his partner, Anthony Hiatt, developed the Discovery Lode in what became known as the Patterson Mining District, under the highest peak of the Sweetwater Mountains, which also bears Patterson's name. The Upper Day Ranch became "The Old Place" and it was here that son Charlie (Charles Eugene) was born on June 24, 1870, and son Harv (James Harvey) was born on February 24, 1874. Many years later, it became part of the Sweetwater Ranch. The last remaining building was dismantled about 1980 by foreman Benny Romero and the lumber was used to restore the buildings at the old Kirkwood Ranch, now known as the Bridgeport Ranch Barns and Terrace. Charlie and Harv were raised at the "Old Place" until they were ready to attend school in 1883, when their father bought the 160-acre Andrew J. Severe ranch at the west end of town (north of Buster's Market). It was used as the family home until his death and is still referred to as the Day Ranch. The barn that still stands there was built with lumber from a barn in Bodie that Day tore down and hauled to Bridgeport. By Day was a good friend of fellow rancher and pioneer, N. B. Hunewill, whom he affectionately called Napoleon Bonaparte. Day never tired of telling the story of Hunewill coming to town for groceries, visiting one of the bars, having a "nip" and then riding out of town at a full gallop, singing as loud as he could. Day had been fond of wearing buckskin pants, but during one particularly wet season, they became saturated. He decided to dry them next to a hot stove and ended up with a pair of shorts. Day was famous for giving all newlyweds a one hundred pound sack of flour or sugar. He was well-liked, hard-working man with a sense of humor and except for a couple of incidents; his life in the valley was relatively quiet and trouble-free. After moving to the new ranch, Day was forced to shoot a sick horse and did so with a breechloader pistol that blew apart, tearing off a portion of his cheek in the process. In typical fashion, Day calmly rode into town and had the doctor patch him up. After this ordeal, he grew a beard to cover the scars and never shaved it off. In 1891, a Bridgeport Chinese merchant named Ah Quong Tai was charged with the murder and dismemberment of Poker Tom, a local Piute that he played cards with. Tai was arrested and arraigned for the crime, but was released on June 9, 1891, due to insufficient evidence. At the time of the hearing, the upstairs of "The Brick", a saloon now known as Ken's Sporting Goods, served as the Justice Court. Several hundred angry and armed Piutes, threatening to burn the town if anyone interfered, took custody of Tai in front of the saloon. They dragged him to the Day Ranch corral, where By Day was working cattle. Day made the Indians leave the corral, but they killed and dismembered Tai nearby as townspeople watched. His remains were collected under the direction of County Physician T. A. Kables and buried in Sinnamon's Field, east of the Walker River, near where the original crime occurred. About a month after the incident, Day was grinding tools when his dog laid something at his feet. It was Tai's long, braided queue. He threw it over a rafter in his barn for awhile, but later gave the queue to a friend he had known in Bodie, prominent San Francisco lawyer W. H. Metson, who placed it in a small museum on the ground floor of the Fairmont Hotel. It has since disappeared. According to the 1908 Mono County Board of Supervisors report, the Bridgeport Valley contained about 40,000 acres of land, primarily used to graze thousands of horses, cattle and sheep, while some of the land was used to raise large amounts of hay. By Day was described as a horse breeder and as owning 1400 acres of meadow and pasture land and 3000 acres of mountain land, used principally for grazing his 1500 head of sheep and about 1000 head of lambs. Charles Day, also a horse breeder, was noted as owning about 2500 acres of valley and mountain land, used mostly for grazing his 2500 sheep and 2000 lambs, following in his father's footsteps as a respected rancher and land speculator. In 1878, Civil War Veteran and Bodie pioneer, Jack Westwood, homesteaded on land between the lakes and supplied fish to Bridgeport and Bodie. During the 1890's, William Cargill and his wife Dora (Wedertz) staked a claim on the land at the top of Upper Twin Lake and built a cabin, which still stands. By Day and Charlie felt that would be a wise investment. Between 1900 - 1907, they were able to buy all of land from Westwood and the Cargills, and for many years, the Day's grazed cattle there during the summers, and sheep in the early fall. Charlie involved himself in community affairs, including playing a horn in the Bridgeport Brass Band. In 1892, he married Maude Schuman of Bridgeport and a son, Leland Stanford, was born on August 22, 1892. The marriage ended in divorce. Charlie later attended Heald's Business College in San Francisco and graduated in 1901. He was elected as a Mono County Supervisor on November 8, 1908 and served four years. He was a member of the local Masonic & Odd Fellow Lodges and became a director of the Mason Valley Bank in Yerington, Nevada. A ranch at Sulphur Springs, between Smith Valley and Sweetwater, was the base for the Day Family Nevada operations and also served as a daily rest and food station for passing teamsters. About 1900, Charlie was sitting in the kitchen with his mother, cleaning what turned out to be a loaded pistol, which discharged and fired a bullet into his stomach. Charlie was taken to the Bridgeport ranch, but the local doctor was gone at the time. He was able to hold on until a San Francisco doctor and two nurses made the trip by train to Reno and to Bridgeport by wagon. Charlie survived a successful surgery that was performed on the dining room table at the Day Ranch. While working in Nevada, Charlie met Edna Brown Fallon, born January 14, 1878. They were married on March 6, 1906 at her mother's farm in Santa Rosa and their daughter, Alpha, was born on May 1, 1907. Charlie and Edna divided their time between Bridgeport, Sulpher Springs and eventually Smith Valley, where the Day compound is still family owned. They divorced in the 1920's. Edna passed away on Jan. 20, 1962. Charlie's brother Harv, graduated from Heald Business College in 1892, married Deborah McAlpine of Bodie in 1896 and decided to remain in San Francisco. Their two sons were Richard and Harvard. Richard became a San Francisco businessman. Harvard died at age 4. Harv worked 35 years for the California Barrel Company and retired in 1925 as Vice-President, after which Deborah and he moved to the home ranch in Smith Valley to care for his aging and ailing father. George Byron Day died at the age of 85 on February 11, 1927. He was a rugged individual and thrived on outdoor work. He could be seen daily, riding his horse, Geronimo, overseeing his extensive ranch holdings until just a few years before his death. Charlie continued to run the family affairs with the help of his son Leland, and Harv, until August 20, 1936, when he passed away. Leland Day married Helen Rickey of Bishop. Their two sons were Leland (Jr.) George, born in 1917, and Emmett (Charles Emmett), born in 1921. Emmett married Lucile Brown of the Dressler Family in 1945, and they ranched in Smith Valley with their daughters Wilma, Caroline & Marilyn for many years. Emmett died in 2004. Alpha Day, Charlie's daughter, was working at the Valley Co-op Store in Wellington, Nevada, when she met Norman Annett, a young mining engineer born in Goldfield, Nevada on December 22, 1907. They married in 1926 and lived wherever his assignments took him, including several years in Venezuela. At the time of Charlie's death, Norman was working as the mill superintendent at the Silverado Mine at the base of the Sweetwater Mountains. He and Alpha agreed it was a good time to get out of mining and to run the Bridgeport and Sulphur Springs sheep operations. Norman and Alpha had two children, Norma Jean, born in 1937, and Alfred, born in 1942. Norma married Jim Costa and went on to work in the Nevada Legislature. Al and his wife, Josie, own and operate the Napa Auto Parts store in Bridgeport. In 1936, the family leased the land between Twin Lakes to Hal Maltby, who began operating Maltby's Resort, amounting to small campground, two cabins and a boat rental business. He soon discovered that boats could not be launched on the upper lake due to prevailing winds and was granted a request to change the lease to the land at the top of the upper lake. The dirt road to Upper Twin was too narrow to move the cabins on, so Maltby floated the cabins up to the new location. He operated the resort between 1937-1950, and then gave up the lease due to health problems. In 1952, the Annetts decided to get out of the sheep business and devote their time to building a first class vacation spot at Upper Twin. They succeeded. Maltby's Resort was renamed Annett's Mono Village in 1952, when additional cabins, campgrounds, a restaurant, and a store were added. The successful resort is on the edge of the Hoover Wilderness and caters to thousands of visitors each year. It is still owned by the Day Family and is operated by Alpha's grandson, Norm Annett, and his wife Kellie. Alpha is doing very well, still lives alone in her Bridgeport home, and will celebrate her 98th birthday this year. Transcribed by Pat Houser For Inyo County GenWeb, June 23, 2005