It was the late 1800s and Eugene Amoretti Jr. was sitting in his father’s bank in Lander, Wyoming, when a then unknown outlaw walked into the bank.
“The cashier and I were sitting behind netting in the bank when a man came in,” Amoretti was later reported to say. “He threw a leather belt on the counter and said, ‘Count her out.’ The cashier took the belt and found the bills amounted to $17,500.”
This man was Butch Cassidy who would go on to become a family friend of both Amoretti and his father.
Mary Allison recounted this incident in her book, Dubois Area History and went on to suggest that Banker Eugene Amoretti Sr. made occasional loans to Cassidy.
However, the tale is most likely a legend, or at best inflated. There is no record that such a deposit, worth $400,000 in today’s market, was ever made at the fledging frontier bank. It would have increased Amoretti’s worth instantly by 300 percent since the bank’s reserves were only $5,000 at the time.
“Such accounts must always be considered with great caution,” Historian Mike Bell said. “The take from the Telluride robbery was around $20,000 – so if Cassidy banked $17,500 then his partners in the robbery only got $2,500. That seems highly unlikely.”
It is true however, Bell said, that Cassidy may have banked a small amount of money with Amoretti and did business with the bank in Lander. There is proof that the outlaw drew on this money to pay his legal fees while on trial in 1892 through 1894 for horse theft.
“Amoretti was probably the only banker in the West who could say Butch Cassidy was his friend,” Historian Larry Pointer wrote in his book, In Search of Butch Cassidy. Pointer also pointed out an interesting fact about Amoretti’s bank.
“His bank in Lander was never robbed during the entire outlaw era.”
Who Was This Banker Of An Outlaw?
Born in 1826, Eugene Amoretti Sr. came to America to make his fortune. By the time of his death in 1910, he was a millionaire rancher and banker. He came by this wealth through his entrepreneurship spirit and sometimes questionable partnerships.
Amoretti and his wife Mary were both from Venice, Italy, and immigrated to the United States in the 1840s. According to the Lander newspaper, the Fremont Clipper, Amoretti first went to South and Central America. He eventually drifted up the West Coast to California, where he made considerable money in the gold rush to Colorado of 1848.
The couple left California to return to Italy but then heard rumors of a gold rush at South Pass in the Wyoming Territory. Amoretti decided to try his fortune in the new camp.
He arrived in the remote frontier on July 4, 1868, and immediately purchased mining property and opened his first store. He located his family at South Pass and Mary, in 1871, gave birth to their son Eugene who was the first white child born at the mines.
A Self-Made Wyoming Millionaire
Amoretti entered actively into business of various kinds, and quickly gained the reputation of being an enterprising, far-seeing businessman. He developed mining properties, erected a stamp mill, and engaged in the mercantile business.
At one time, he owned the Star mine, Eldorado, Washington, Tollgate, Hunkadori, and later the Caribou gold mines.
He struggled to make money at his mines and when he was robbed of his gold, he finally gave up the venture.
Amoretti decided to stick to selling shovels and other equipment to the miners instead, which was much more profitable. He quickly expanded his stores and soon opened others at Atlantic City, Miners Delight, and on the North Fork.
When B. F. Lowe secured title to the land on which the original town site of Lander was located, Amoretti was given a considerable portion of the property if he would help build up the fledging town.
Always the businessman, he built a large store at Lander and sold $42,000 in town lots. He helped build a flour mill, brought in an electric company, and established a private bank, which afterwards became the First National Bank of Lander, one of the strongest financial institutions in Wyoming.
As stated before, his bank was never robbed and it was known that it was Butch Cassidy’s bank of choice.
According to Mike Bell in his book, Incidents of Owl Creek, Amoretti also engaged in at least one questionable business venture that helped grow his fortunes. Along with his partners, he short-weighted cattle that they had sold to the Agency at Fort Washakie and were able to pocket a greater profit.
When Lander was incorporated in 1890, Amoretti was its first mayor, and when Wyoming became a state, he was elected a member of the first Legislature.
Not only was Amoretti business minded and a politician but he was also a philanthropist in his hometown. Historian and author Hubert Howe Bancroft wrote that Amoretti gave Fremont County an entire block in Lander for a courthouse and assisted financially to build all the churches in the city.
Amoretti was also largely engaged in the cattle and lumber business, but this was managed by his son Eugene Amoretti Jr.
His Son’s Good Friend, The Outlaw
When he was 19 in 1889, Eugene Amoretti Jr. took over the Amoretti Cattle Company, known as EA because of its cattle brand. He also embarked on several other business ventures.
The local newspaper said, “Gene is a young man of good business qualities and we shall hope to see him prosper.”
Bell noted that the EA ranch on Horse Creek, north of Dubois was located just four miles away from where Butch Cassidy was staying in a cabin owned by Huey Youmans.
It was rumored that Cassidy worked for the Amorettis and Bell said these stories were probably true. It is possible, Bell said, that Cassidy worked for the EA while on Wind River in the fall of 1889 and spring of 1890.
If Cassidy did work for the EA and the Amoretti family, he only helped with the round-up. He did not help drive cattle from the Wind River to the Agency at Fort Washakie and had already drifted up to “greener pastures.”
Amoretti had won the contract to deliver cattle to the reservation, outbidding Captain Robert Torrey of the Embar Ranch. His cattle arrived at the Agency in mid-October 1890, but by that time Cassidy was already in Buffalo. Following the spring roundup in 1890, Cassidy and Al Hainer had left Horse Creek and their young neighbor, Eugene Amoretti Jr., and moved on to Buffalo.
This friendship between the outlaw and businessmen continued over the years. It was one that was mutually beneficial between Cassidy and the Amorettis.
When Butch Cassidy and Al Hainer were accused of stealing horses and brought to court in 1893, a member of the jury was Butch’s friend and banker Eugene Amoretti Jr.
The End Of An Era
In 1909, Sheriff Charles Stough and fellow pioneer and businessman Eugene Amoretti Sr. stood side by side as they broke ground for a new library in Lander.
Stough had been the sheriff that chased Cassidy and other outlaws in Fremont County. The two men would have worked side by side on many projects in Lander and were in the same social circles, although they did not always share the same friends.
The next year, businessman Amoretti, the founder of Lander, banker, real estate tycoon and friend to Butch Cassidy, died with his family by his side.
His legacy can still be found in remnants around Wyoming. In Lander and Thermopolis, where he had established outlaw-proof banks, there are also streets that bear his name.
He may not be as well-known as the more “adventurous” pioneers of Wyoming or captured the imagination as the wild outlaws, but he ultimately had more of an impact than most even know.
Jackie Dorothy can be reached at jackie@cowboystatedaily.com
