Cooking in the West

Another one of my teaching colleagues, Alice Bassett, has passed on to that big school in the sky where there is eternal duty free lunch. Alice's husband, Charlie Bassett, was my teaching partner for 23 years, and I taught with Alice until she retired. Alice was an amazing kindergarten teacher who suffered from very severe arthritis, which forced her to take early retirement. Although she lived with daily pain, she had an indomitable spirit.

Before she came to Big Timber to teach and eventually marry Charlie, she had been a Catholic nun. Perhaps it was the faith of her convictions, but she had...