Creating Fiction From History: 6/1/2022

Andree de Villiers, of Basque ancestry, was a relative newcomer to this strange new world. She had emerged into the old world of the Biscay region of France, to be exact, in the mountain village of Oloron-Sainte-Marie, on September the 13th of the year 1874. Her parents, Eneko and Amala, had passed away, respectively, when Andree was 2 and 5 years of age.

Born Andree Garcia, our heroine was adopted by a fairly wealthy couple living in a quiet little chateau on the outskirts of Paris soon thereafter. The de Villiers adopted this sweet little Basque child soon after her sixth birthday.

When Andree entered her teenage years, she began to develop, as is quite natural, into the young woman that would shape the course of her relatively short life. For reasons that we shall not divulge here, though one might well imagine, events soon transpired that forced her to flee the warmth of her new home and become no more than a vagabond on the mean streets of Paris. As she neared the 17th anniversary of that fateful day when she entered this cold cruel world, yet another such event occurred that forced her to flee yet again. This time, however, she forsook France altogether and after a long, arduous ocean journey, landed in Butte, Montana. It was in this wild western town Andree finally found a reason to stop running. It was here that she took her final stand.

As you may have guessed, our heroine had taken up one of the oldest occupations known to humanity and one of only several available to her in 1800s Butte, America. Like so many women, especially orphans, of the day, Andree did what she had to do to survive. Her life had never been an easy one, but when she met the love of her life in Butte, that fateful day in mid-September 1891, Andree de Villiers felt at Home for the first time since early childhood.

The accompanying photograph is of Andree at age 16 when she finally found her reason for living. Soon after this photograph was taken, she passed from this life, her running finally over!

If you would like to create fiction from history with one of the museum's photos, please contact the Ledger at (406) 287-5301 or email whledger@gmail.com.