Passengers entering the Park by way of the West Entrance came north from Ogden, Utah, on the Utah Northern (later the Union Pacific) to Spencer, Idaho, or Monida on the Montana-Idaho border. There they were met by F. J. Haynes' Monida and Yellowstone Stage Line or the Bassett Brothers Company. During the season of 1915 the Haynes firm transported 20,151 tourists through the Park.
In 1903, when the East Gate road was opened, the Holm Transportation Company secured a permit to operate a stage line. The arrival of the Burlington Route to Cody, Wyoming, in 1912, gave great impetus to that business. The West Entrance had benefited by a railroad to its gate since 1907, when the Union Pacific extended the line to West Yellowstone. A branch line was also built to Victor, Idaho, which made Jackson Hole and the South Entrance much more accessible. A table of operators and charges, as of 1914, would represent the stage business in the heyday of its power.[235]
The evolution of permanent camps and hotels was complementary to the development of travel. The first permanent house built was in Clematis Gulch, on the north side of Mammoth Terraces. It was erected in 1871 by James C. McCartney. This "hotel" and C. J. Baronett's bridge and cabin at the forks of the Yellowstone River were the only improvements made before the Dedicatory Act was passed. These gentlemen managed to collect the sum of $9000 for their foresight and property, although they had to wait until March 1, 1899 to get it.
P. W. Norris' _Annual Report_ of 1880 lists the following facilities then in operation: Mammoth, McCartney's house and Matthew McGuirck's baths; Norris, a rude cabin and barn; Riverside, a cabin and barn; Firehole River, near the forks, "a fine shingle roofed mail station and hotel." The latter three stations were built by Marshall and Goff. In the Upper Geyser Basin a small cabin was built by Superintendent Norris in 1879; at the Lake a cabin and boat were operated by Captain E. S. Topping.
[Illustration: Ernest Thompson Seton "Uncle" John F. Yancey.]
Two years later John Yancey secured a mail contract and established a station in Pleasant Valley at the base of Crescent Hill. Here he was familiarly known as "Uncle John." He was an old Kentucky frontiersman stranded in the Park by the flood tide of civilization. He chafed constantly at the uneventful days of the eighties and told his guests thrilling tales of the forties. A pen portrait has been preserved of him: