McElfresh, Beth Ann

1888-1982

Sheridan County

Biographical and Professional Information

Elisabeth Ann Mary Cockelreas Ash McElfresh could break horses, brand and trail cattle with the best of them. Known as "Mrs. Scout" by the cowboys and "Jack" by her husband, the 97 pound beauty worked alongside her husband for Wyoming Governor Bob Carey as well as other cattle and sheep outfits. Born in Chehalis, Washington, in 1888, she was the only child of John Cockelreas, a race horse breeder, who died when she was five. Her mother remarried and she was raised by her stepfather, Frank Ash, a sheep foreman in northern Montana. She married Waitman Wiley "Scout" McElfresh in 1905, and served as a chuckwagon cook for cattle and sheep herds in Wyoming, Montana, and the Dakotas. When her husband died in 1948, she moved to her mother's home in Sheridan, Wyoming, where she published countless autobiographical articles as well as her Chuckwagon Cookbook, although legally blind in her 80s. Her subsequent fan mail came from various countries around the world. Source: Westerners by Jean Henry-Mead