Diffey. She was of American Indian heritage, being a descendant of Pocahantas' sister. Her ancestors include Chief Powhatan of the Pamunkey Tribe, Chief Long Knife of the Mohawks, Chief Mattabesetts of the Montauketts, and Chief Tatobem of the Pequots. She also descends from the Croatan, Creek, and Catawba tribes. Earl and Nadine met in Mississippi while he was cowboying and rodeoing there. They were married in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the Salt Lake LDS Temple, and raised five children. Nadine Bascom was an artist of floral arrangement, painting and sculpture, creating many bas-relief sculptures. Besides being a professional rodeo contestant, Bascom tried his hand as a rodeo clown and rodeo bullfighter during his rodeo career. Just after his 89th birthday, Earl was honored as the oldest living rodeo clown in the world. At the age of 88, Bascom helped roundup longhorn steers on the Shahan Ranch in west Texas and received honors for his art during the 1994 Texas Longhorn Quincentennial Cattle Drive and Celebration. Bascom's bronze sculpture The American Longhorn, 1494–1994 was declared the most authentic example of a classical Texas longhorn steer. In 2014, Bascom was honored posthumously during the tenth anniversary celebration of the National Day of the Cowboy, for his international contributions to cowboy culture and the cowboy way of life. Artist Influences While working for the Nilsson Rafter-E-N Ranch, Bascom happened to read a story in a western magazine about Native American Jim Thorpe, who had excelled in sports and became an Olympic champion. Thorpe's life touched Bascom: "I felt like I had walked in his boots," Earl said. "Like Jim Thorpe, cowboy life was the only life that I knew. But what about my art, what about art school?" Wanting to be an artist since childhood, Bascom filled the pages of his school books in the one-room school house he attended with cowboy scenes. His desire to be a cowboy artist was greatly enhanced after seeing art works of the two great icons of Old West art, Charles M. Russell and Frederic S. Remington - both cousins to his father, John W. Bascom (Remington and Russell were both related to Bascom through their mothers, Clarissa "Clara" Bascom Sackrider Remington and Mary Elizabeth Mead Russell, respectively). Both Remington and Russell were artists that spent time in Canada producing art. In the late 1920s, Earl worked on a ranch south of the Sweetgrass Hills in