Elder W. Mark Bassett

General Authority Seventy

Every summer as a little boy, W. Mark Bassett would travel with his family from their home in the Sacramento, California, USA, area to visit his maternal grandmother in Alabama, USA. During their days traveling there, the family would regularly make a point to visit Church historic sites.

Whether it was visiting the historic grounds of Nauvoo, Illinois, or walking through the Sacred Grove in Palmyra, New York, Elder Bassett remembers the powerful feelings he had—even as a young boy—as he visited those sacred places.

“We felt something there,” he says. “That’s how my testimony was formed, through little experiences.”

That testimony gained as a young man has been a source of strength for Elder Bassett throughout his life.

Born on August 14, 1966, to Edwina Acker and William Lynn Bassett, in Carmichael, California, Elder Bassett is the second of five children. Serving in the Church and living the gospel were important priorities in his family.

After serving in the Guatemala Guatemala City Mission from 1985 to 1987, Elder Bassett moved to Provo, Utah, to attend Brigham Young University. He married Angela Brasher in the Salt Lake Temple on December 20, 1989. They are the parents of five children and have two grandchildren.

In 1991, Elder Bassett earned a degree in accounting from BYU and later moved with his family back to the Sacramento area to work in the wholesale auto auction industry. He worked as controller at Brasher’s Sacramento Auto Auction and as the chief financial officer and co-owner of West Coast Auto Auctions, Inc., where he operated automobile auctions throughout the western United States.

Elder Bassett has served in many capacities in the Church, including ward Young Men president, bishop, high councilor, stake president, president of the Arizona Mesa Mission from 2007 to 2010, and Area Seventy.