The Montana OstlesResearch by Pauline Harkness (England)
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Jonathan Ostle (TABLE I, Generation 5, No. 22) was born on November 15, 1738 at Plasket Lands farm, about two miles south of Newtown. He was the fourth son out of a total of eleven children so there was no future for him there and, as a young man, he moved to Dearham, near Maryport. He worked in a coal mine there and his wife, Mary, gave him nine children – all boys – between 1762 and 1779. Life must have been very hard for the family, Jonathan died when he was forty-seven and the Parish Register for his burial records him as 'a poor collier'. Mary survived him by twenty-five years.
Their third son, John, married Mary Wilson of Aspatria in 1790, they too had a huge family, eight boys and five girls. John was probably also a miner, the family moved from Dearham to Plumbland and then to Greysouthern (pronounced Graysoon). Their eldest son, Henry was born at Dearham in 1791 but was raised in Greysouthern.
Henry was a shoemaker when he married Betty Tolson at Brigham Church on February 20, 1813. Betty was twenty-six and six months pregnant at the time. Henry signed his name in the marriage register, but Betty made a cross, not being able to write her name. They had eight children. Henry became a tailor, John a schoolmaster and Ann a dressmaker. Their second child, and first son, Joseph was born in July 1814 at Greysouthern.
Joseph was a husbandman (farm labourer) when, on February 27, 1838, he married Henrietta Wood Crosthwaite at St Bridget's Church in Brigham; her father, Benjamin was a draper. Joseph and Henrietta had five children: Benjamin (born 1840, died 1850), Henry born in 1842, Joseph in 1843, John in 1846 and Daniel who was born in October 1849. Henrietta died very soon after the Daniel's birth and the baby lived for only seven months. After Henrietta's death, Joseph remarried. His second wife was called Mary and they had four more children.
From Joseph's first brood both Joseph and Henry emigrated to America.
Henry, who was working as a coal miner in Pennsylvania, married Elizabeth Ann Lewis there on May 2, 1876. Elizabeth's parents had emigrated from Wales. Later, Henry and Elizabeth moved to O'Fallon, Illinois.
Elizabeth's aunt, Margaret Davis, had married William D. Nicholas who had come to America in 1848 and moved to Helena, Montana in 1870. In 1872 the Nicholas' settled north of Helena on the Dearborn River which is called the Nicholas Basin. Margaret was the first white woman to live in the area. William had the Rock House built by Masonry in 1876, at a cost $2600, on the north fork of the Dearborn River, approximately six miles (10Km) north of his first home on the Nicholas Basin. The Rock House was built over a spring and they had running water in the house.
The Rock House |
When William died, in 1892, Margaret invited Elizabeth and Henry to join her at her ranch on the Dearborn River north of Helena, Montana. The Ostles lived in the white-framed house between the rock house and the barn.
Henry and Elizabeth had five children.
Henry Ostle's family |
William Nicholas Ostle homesteaded in the Dearborn near the Rock House in 1900. In 1908 Will sold his homestead to his brother Thomas Lewis Ostle and moved to a ranch on Beaver Creek near Winston, Montana by the Missouri River. Will married Marie Catherine Meinz on November 29, 1917 in Helena, Montana. Marie's parents had emigrated from Germany and Nova Scotia.
William and Marie had four children
William Nicholas Ostles Family Sitting: Percy Nicholas Ostle, b May 22, 1925; Marie Meinz Ostle, 1896-1974;
William Nicholas Ostle, 1879-1952; Violet Marie Ostle Lay, b August 10, 1923 |
from the family album . . . | Marion and Mary Ostle Stow, family and friends by the sea side at the Hotel Virginia
in Long Beach, California around 1907. |
Four Generations taken 1928: Mary Ostle Stow (daughter), Elizabeth Lewis Ostle (mother), Alice Stow Ingersoll (grand daughter), and Betty Ingersoll (great grand daughter) |
Picture taken January 1932. Thomas Lewis Ostle sitting with his cows on his ranch on the Dearborn River hand feeding them cattle cubes as candy |
Thrashing wheat at William Nicholas Ostles ranch on Beaver Creek near Winston, Montana around 1943. |
Picture taken of Will and Tom with Sons at William Nicholas Ostles ranch on Beaver Creek near Winston, Montana. Left to Right: Marion William Ostle, Adolf Thomas Ostle, William Nicholas Ostle, Henry John Ostle, Thomas Lewis Ostle. | |
William Nicholas Ostle and Sons had to locate another ranch in 1950 because their ranch was soon to be flooded. The US government built a new dam across the Missouri River and the ranch become the bottom of Canyon Ferry Lake. The Ostles moved about 140 miles north of Helena to their new ranch in the Blackleaf Country 18 miles west of Bynum, Montana along the east slopes of the Rocky Mountains.
This view shows Analope Butte, on the eastern slope of the Rockies, which was the center of the 6,200 acre Ostle Ranch. Altogether the family grazed around 8,000 acres which included some government land. |
William Ostle shows Charlie Hadcock, his neighbour from Beaver Creek, around Ostle Lake on the new Ostle Ranch, west of Bynum. The lake is used for irrigation and water for the cattle |
