American biography and genealogy

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AMERICAN

Biography and Genealogy

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CALIFORNIA EDITION

ROBERT J. BURDETTE, D. D.
EDITOR

VOLUME

ILLUSTRATED

THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY

CHICAGO, NEW YORK

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: LIBRARY

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND
GENEALOGY

EDITORIAL FOREWORD

A DOWER OF WONDERS — THE EARLY DAWN — SPANISH SAINTS AND
^ AMERICAN DEVILS — OUR FIRST CALLERS — THE PADRES AND THE
PURITANS — THE MISSIONS — THE MEXICANS — ROBBING THEIR
CHURCH — A PROCESSION OF GOVERNORS — ENTER THE BEAR— THE
EAGLE — ADMISSION DAY — BIRTH OF Los ANGELES — DEMOCRATIC
BEGINNINGS — THE LIVE OAK SPROUTS — GOING TO SCHOOL — OUR
WELCOME STEP CHILDREN — How BOTH HALVES LIVE — -THE FRUIT
OF THE VINE — THE CITRUS ORCHARDS — SPIRITUAL GROWTH AND
PROSPERITY — A LAND OF HOMES — MORE THAN THEY CAN SPEND —
COMFORTABLE PIONEERING — THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY — THE Los
ANGELES HARBOR — ELECTRIC POWER — THE Los ANGELES AQUEDUCT
—THE MEN BEHIND THE WORK — Los ANGELES, IMPERIAL, FRESNO,
KERN, SAN Luis OBISPO, INYO, SAN JOAOUIN, KINGS, ORANGE, RIVER-
SIDE, TUI.ARE, VENTURA, SANTA BARBARA, SAN BERNARDINO AND SAN
DIEGO COUNTIES.

By Robert J. Burdcttc.

You sit on the western piazza and watch the sun go down. You linger
long, held by the after-glow that tints the heavens like the heart of a shell.
A crescent of silver gleams in the purpling skies. A star shines out below
the young moon. In orderly splendor the glittering constellations flame
out in their march across the fields of night. Shadows of pine and palm
whisper softly under the kisses of the fragrant winds. Incense of rose
and heliotrope mingle with the odor of the orange trees. The silence and
star-shine and perfume is prayer and praise. Your soul worships at the
shrine of perfect nature. An unseen chalice of melody is tilted some-
where in the upper darkness — a ripple of music, clear and sweet, spilled

1

•2 A.MKRICAX 1IU >< ,U A 1'HY AXD GENEALOGY

from its heart of rapture, runs down through the shadows and fragrance
— a mocking bird is singing his hymn to the night. Your soul overflows
with a sense of beauty and joy and peace. It is not a ".Midsummer Night's
Dream." Such a scene could not be presented "In a wood near Athens."
It is a Midwinter Night in Southern Galifornia. An ordinary, common-
place calendar night, one of many such that "quickly dream away the
time." With such a winter season, and a summer time that fits it per-
fectly, small wonder it is that every land under the sun sends its worship-
ing pilgrims hither. The wonder is that so many men stay away.

"Climate'' is California's natural asset. Our eastern friends tell u>
the state deserves no credit for that. No. Nor does New Orleans de-
serve the credit of creating the Gulf of Mexico. Nor did St. Louis in-
vent the Mississippi river. Chicago did not dam up Lake Michigan ; she
only built the drainage canal, which is different. There is even an old
tradition that the famous Harbor was there before Boston was located,
which is impossible. All these great natural advantages antedated by
many ages the great cities which have grown up because of them, despite
the shrewd observation of the thoughtful man who had been impressed
by the fact that Providence had wisely ordained that all the great rivers
should flow past the large cities. We reluctantly admit that neither the
'49ers nor the Native Sons made the "glorious climate of California."
Men didn't make the climate. But they made the State. Men make cities,
not because of natural advantages, but in spite of natural disadvantages.
Else had the east wind prevented any. Boston; the swamp had vetoed
Chicago : the morass had prohibited New Orleans, and the grim specter
of the "Great American Desert" had forever isolated California.

It was destined to be a land wherein fact should read like romance,
and all the fiction born of California genius should read tamely, beside
the quiet wonders of its history. Its very name sprang from romantic
dreams, for "it is taken from an old Spanish romance, called Sergas de
Esplandian (Exploits of Esplandian), by Ordonez de Montalvo, trans-
lator of Amadis de Gaul, printed about 1510. California was a mythical
island on ''the right hand of the Indies, very near the Terrestrial par-
adise, peopled with Amazons and Griffins." God was very good to Cal-
ifornia, then, at her christening, giving to her a name that was character-
istically descriptive, especially as to geographical location, before some
closet geographer should name it "North" Something, because there was
a portion of the earth to the south of it, or "New" Something, because
there was already in existence a country so utterly unlike it that the most
distorted imagination could detect no suggestion of similarity between
them. "A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches."

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 3

A DOWER OF WONDERS

Happy California ! That the day of her christening should have
come in the time of originality in nomenclature, before the growing world
had fallen upon the evil days of naming towns and states by the simple,
time-saving and brain-sparing use of carbon sheets and multiple copying
presses. Christened at the fount of romance, Cold Fact smiled at the
appositeness of name and description, and adopted the dream-child for
his own. So he gave to her a dower of valleys in which never a flake
of snow flutters down from the highest clouds, and looking down upon
them, mountains that wear white crowns of winter all the months through
all the summer years. Deserts lower than the sea, and a mountain higher
than the clouds; Death Valley, the lowest depression, and Mt. Whitney,
the highest elevation in the United States. He clothed his daughter of
Romance with nothing but truthful superlatives. He gave her the scant-
iest, sourest, most unpalatable wild fruits of her own, and made her the
most bountiful step-mother of all the fruits the earth can bear, lie fam-
ished her with deserts, barren and desolate, and said to her. "I lore, not in
the mines of gold, is your wealth."

And in one year the harvest of her gold mines was a paltry $16,989,-
044, while the golden harvest of her farms and gardens was $131,690,606,
more than seven times as much as all her gold that year could buy. He
taught her how to waste her rivers from their torrent beds, and scatter
them over the land in irrigating ditches, so that the shallow river a child
could ford became a stream of fertility, an oasis of blossom and fruit and
shrub twenty miles wide.

On every page of her unfolding history and growing greatness, he
wrote down paradoxes that her writers of fiction hesitated to use, so that
the guileless tenderfoot believed in "Colonel Jack Hazard,'' and ''Truth-
ful James," and "Bill Nye," in refined and rigidly moral gamblers, in
pure-minded harlots and generous stage robbers with university degrees,
but shook their heads and said, "Oh, California stories !" with pitying
toleration, such as one uses when speaking of the heathen in his blindness,
when told of the "Big Trees" and the Yo Semite, and eight crops of peas
or alfalfa in one year from the same field.

Even the meditative and unromantic cow, contemplatively chewing
her cud of alfalfa under the great branches of the live oak, looked down
with placid contempt on the strenuous efforts of the gold mines to pro-
duce sixteen millions of dollars, while in the same period, in her quiet
simple life in'the meadows she added twelve million dollars to the wealth
of her state in milk, butter and cheese, a rivalry which is enough to make
the old "49ers" turn over in their graves. The gold is only useful to buy

4 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

more cows, and improved agricultural machinery. Los Angeles county is
not famous for its gold mines — although one ma}- stand on the street and
buy mines as they come along, for she owns mines in nearly every district
in California, Nevada, Arizona and Mexico — but it has more than eight
thousand farms, and the transmutation of farm products into minted gold
is just as sure as the mining process, and requires far less blue print and
promoter's eloquence.

THE EARLY DAWN

Hut the climate doesn't deserve exclusive credit for all this. The
climate was here in all its perfection of beauty and gentleness in 1542.
And that was about the only good thing that was here. For the aboriginal
Indians of California, all the early explorers are agreed, were, of all
creatures in human form, the most ignorant, brutish, and degraded, "living
naked and swinishly," said Cabrillo ; lazy, half-starved, even in the richest
land on earth, eating anything they could catch with the least exertion ;
lizards, worms and carrion. They had no religion, fewer morals, and
still less clothes — a most discouraging problem for any sort of civilization.
The taming and cultivation of these creatures by the Padres was a miracle
like unto that of Gadara, for they brought them to the foot of the cross,
clothed, and in their right minds.

Civilization was on its way. In June, 1542. Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo.
a Portuguese navigator in the service of Cortes, under the Spanish crown,
sailed from Navidad, and. following the indentations of this western coast
discovered California, and entered the bay of San Diego, which he named
San Miguel. A short week he tarried in that port, then continued his way
northward, still closely scribing the coast line. He anchored off San
Pedro ; he discerned the islands of San Clemente and Santa Catalina, of
Santa Barbara, he found the isles of Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, and San
Miguel. Every where he landed he planted the Spanish flag. His ships
encountered fierce weather off Point Concepcion, but he sailed on into the
Bay of Monterey. Driven back by storms to winter in the roadstead of
Santa Barbara, he was injured by a falling mast, and arriving at the
island of San Miguel, died and was buried there, on the third of January,
i 543, well nigh forgotten in this day of its greatness and prosperity, by the
land he had discovered.

SPANISH SAINTS AND AMERICAN DEVILS

Blessings on the memory of our discoverer if for no other thing than
this, he even anticipated the holy padres in consecrating this beautiful land

\MKRICAX lUOGRAl'llV AND GENEALOGY 7,

in the names of the Saints. Far as the shadow of the banner of Arragon
fell upon this land destined to be an earthly paradise, it calendared the
names of the blessed ones. And this was well, and is well. Not one of
these names should be changed.

For by and by there came into power in California its present proud
possessors. And the American seems to have delighted in making the
land of beauty a monument to the name of his Satanic majesty. What-
ever was especially grand, whatever was sublimest in nature, whatever was
strikingly picturesque the American discoverer used to perpetuate the
glory of the devil. This was "The Devil's Gate — and this "The Devil's
Slide" — here a glory of crag and shadow was the Devil's Canon ; this
heaven kissing peak was "The Devil's Tower," The Devil's Stairway,
The Devil's Pulpit, Devil's Glen. Had these men found it first they would
have named one of the most impressively beautiful things in all the west-
ern land, "The Devil's Cross." As it was, devout Catholics baptized the
Mountain of the Holy Cross with a Christian name before impious and
poverty stricken intellectuality could pollute it with a diabolical name.
( hie cannot journey across this continent without being unpleasantly im-
pressed with the great number of beautiful and romantic features of the
natural landscape made over by their sponsors to the fame of the Evil
One. Let us be grateful, then, to the early Spaniards who preserved so
many places to the glory of the Saints, and rejoice that the beautiful
harbor praises the name of St. Francis, instead of being called "The
Devil's Punch I'.owl," by some later Gringo discoverer.

Or'R FIRST CALLERS

Cabrillo discovered California only half a century after Columbus dis-
covered the "West Indies. Thirty-seven years after the Portuguese, came
the 'English sailor, Sir Francis Drake, a gentleman pirate, looking for
Spanish galleons — and finding them too, woe to Spain ! He anchored in
Sir Francis Drake Bay, in June 17. 1579, refitted and supplied his ships,
and went ashore to hold religious services before a large audience of the
native Indians. He planted no mission however, and baptized no converts,
although it must have been that the spectacle of Sir Francis Drake paus-
ing between the looting and sinking of Spanish merchantmen to say his
prayers must have been very edifying. It would have been, had they
known Sir Francis as well as we do. Having said his prayers, he
claimed everything in sight and all lands adjacent thereto for the English
crown, and sailed away, leaving California Spanish as he had found it.
It remained Spanish through vicissitudes of changing government and
flags, and unto this day Spanish names are among the proudest and great-

(3 AMERICAN moGKAPHY AXD GEXEAU .)( A

est in the rolls of citizenship and old Spanish families are influential in all
great movements of the new days, as they were in the days of old.

Sebastian Vizcaino, under the authority of King Philip III of Spain,
came to California in 1602 with a fleet of four ships. 1 le touched at San
Diego and at Santa Catalina, and finally entered the Bay of Monterey,
naming it in honor of the Mexican Viceroy, lie held the first Roman
Catholic service in the California ; sailed north, passed the great Bay of
San Francisco without seeing it : came back and missed it again, leaving
it to be discovered a hundred and fifty years later by a foot soldier,
hunting for something else, and yet called himself a sailor and explorer.
One wonders how many whalers wandered past the Xorth Pole before
the Peary-Cook debating society was organized.

TlIK PADKKS AND THE PuKITAXS

Seeking a land where they might worship God in the freedom of their
own consciences, the Pilgrim Fathers found and possessed the land which
one of the earlier discoverers had merely located. Xot to him who finds
but to him who occupies shall be given every foot of ground whereon the
foot shall tread. On a winter day, on a desolate coast, in the face of the
bleakest climate in this United States, the Puritans landed at Plymouth
Rock. John Cabot "discovered'' Massachussets in 1497. — one hundred
and forty-five years before Cabrillo discovered California. But one hun-
dred and twenty-three years after Cabot discovered it, Governor John
Carver and Ruling Elder Brewster and Captain Miles Standish found it.
and took possession of it under God's foothold charter, and began the
making of it and of the great Republic.

And on the western coast, in the fairest land on the western continent,
in a perfect climate where summer only changed to give place to spring
and there was never any winter, on a summer day, July ist, 17^9. Gov-
ernor Don Caspar de Portola and Padre Junipero Serra came to San
Diego. The Pilgrim Fathers had organized their government ami de-
clared the purpose of their coming in the one phrase, "for the glory of
God and the advancement of the Christian faith." And Father Junipero
might have used the Puritan declaration of faith and purpose. For first
and last his great soul burned with the desire for souls, for the conversion
of the Indians. To plant the cross of Christ in this new land, and to
bring all its native peoples to a knowledge of its saving grace and truth,
for this he ventured and endured, for this daily and nightly he prayed ;
in the hope of this he lived and wrought, and in this work and faith he
died. East and west, on the Atlantic coast and the Pacific shores, by
Puritan minister and Catholic priest the great Republic was founded, not

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 7

by gold seeking adventurers, but by humble and consecrated servants of
Christ. From the sunrise to the sunset, its foundations were laid in the
eternal principles of the righteousness of Christianity. What the Puritans
were to New England, the Padres were to California. But for the Father
Junipero's sublime faith in God and his appointed ministry, his insistent
declaration that he would remain alone in California to prosecute his work
of soul-saving, and his mighty prayer that moved God and men, the ex-
pedition would have been abandoned, and the doughty Governor Portola
had returned with soldiers, sailors and padres to Mexico.

THE MISSIONS

So the missions were founded in faith and established with prayer.
A golden chain of Christian civilization they mark the day's journey along
the Highway of the King — San Diego, established 1769; San Luis Rey,
1798: San Juan Capistrano, 1776; San Gabriel Arkangel, 1771 ; San Fer-
nando, 1771 ; San Buena Ventura, 1782; Santa Barbara. 1786; Santa Ynez,
1802; La Purissima Concepcion, 1787; San Luis Obispo, 1/72; San
Miguel, 1797; San Antonio de Padua, 1771 ; La Soledad, 1791, in honor
of "Our Lady of Solitude," San Carlos del Carmel, at Monterey, 1770;
San Juan Bautista, for St. John the Baptist, 1797; Santa Cruz, in honor
of the Holy Cross at the site of the present city of that name, 1791 : Santa
Clara, 1777; San Jose de Guadalupe. 1797. also in the beautiful Santa
Clara Valley; San Francisco de Assisi, 1776; San Rafael Arkangel, 1817;
San Francisco Solano. 1823. Twenty-one stations of civilization, making
a highway 700 miles long, from San Diego in the south to Sonoma in the
north.

This is "El Camino Real." "The King's Highway." now in process of
restoration and improvement, in the "good roads" work carried on by the
state and by the liberality of public spirited citizens. The long trail made
sacred by the patient feet of the padres, walking from mission to mission,
to and fro, on their journeys of Christian service, is marked by miniature
mission bells swung from iron mile posts at the roadside. The narrow
trail is a broad highway for automobiles covering in hours the distances
which the Fathers measured by weary days and weeks. A sentimental
and a patriotic spirit unites men and women of many creeds and one
faith in the restoration of this historic pathway.

Sings of this storied and hallowed way California's poet of sweetness
and strength, John S. McGroarty—

"Green is the way to Monterey,
And once upon a wandering day.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY '.»

With breath of mist and flash of sky,
My feet were where the green ways lie —
My soul unleashed, my heart at play.
Upon the road to Monterey.

"All in the morning's golden rluw

I came by holy Carmelu.

Where whispers still its silvery stream

Like voices from an ancient dream,

And through the haunted silence beat

The long-hushed tread of sandalled feet.

i
"Dream-wrapped in memory's mystic spell,

I rang the rusted Mission bell,

And called to hill and vale and sea

To give again their dead to me —

The brown-robed priests, the altar lights,

The hosts of dark eyed neophytes.

I called the dead years forth to free
Their dust-thralled feet to trudge with me.
So, fared as comrades with me, then,
Fair women and brave riding men —
By wood and dune, that dream-kissed day,
They passed with me to Monterey.

Blithe were the green ways then that told
The gladness of the days of old ;
From chaparral, with flocks athrong,
I heard the Indian herder's song.
And ringing scythes, with laughter blent.
From fields where dusky toilers bent.

Madre de Dios ! Keep for me

My dream of hill and sky and sea —

The green wiy< where my path was set,

The gay guitar and castinet,

The stars that hailed, at close of day.

The sunset roofs of Monterey.

LIGHT HOUSES OF CIVILIZATION

Around these missions centers of light, the Padres with the most un-
promising material on this continent began the construction and develop-
ment of a Christian civilization. They taught the wretched Diggers that
they had souls, and made men and women of them by convincing them
that their souls were worth the sacrifices Christian teachers were making
for them, and were worth saving. They clothed these savages. They
taught them the arts of agriculture, horticulture, stock breeding, archi-

10 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

tecture; they taught them music, and gave them Spanish speech; they
taught them manufactures ; they developed in their bodies, soul and
brains, they taught them cleanliness, decency, chastity. They made
Christians of them. Fifty trades and crafts they taught these people,
who had not one before their teachers came. The padres transformed
the deserts into pastures, and the pastures into farms. Around the nine
missions established by Father Junipero in his life time were gathered a
prosperous population of nearly six thousand Christian Indians, skilled
in the trades and industries of civilization.

Padre Junipero Serra died on the 28th of August, 1784, at the Mis-
sion of San Carlos in Carmelo Valley, by himself the best beloved of all
his mission within three months of his seventy-first birthday. Thirty-
five years of the fifty-four of his life as a priest, he had been a mission-
ary. And he did for California what the Jesuit missionaries did for
Canada. He made its Indians Catholic unto this day.

THE MEXICANS

The policy of Spain of "milking" her colonies, a policy which eventu-
ally resulted in evicting the Spanish flag from every foot of ground in
the new hemisphere which she discovered and vainly endeavored to ex-
ploit, began in California as soon as the Missions began to be worth
plundering. The Spanish Cortes passed the decree "secularizing" the
Missions in 1813. Trouble always comes to the church when it begins to
get too prosperous in worldly possessions. "The meek shall inherit the
earth," but they mustn't monopolize their inheritance. Long before 1813,
the Puritans on the Atlantic coast had made the mistake of thinking they
owned the colony of Massachussets. They had pilloried the Quakers,
whipped the Baptists and nailed up the doors of their meeting houses,
the result being that the Quakers and Baptists multiplied and mightily pre-
vailed and in course of time an Irish Catholic was triumphantly elected
Mayor of Boston and then elected again to succeed himself. The sole
kingdom of the church is spiritual.

ROBBING THEIR CHURCH

When the Missions became wealthy, their own government, needing
the money began the work of legalized plunder. The prospect was very
tempting. The Missions owned by the right of occupation and virtue of usu-
fruct, had by this time a land monopoly that would make the Standard

011 hide its diminished head when the subject of monopolies was intro-
duced. From San Francisco to San Diego they held about all the land

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY II

that was worth holding, and no settler could obtain a grant of land for
his homestead, save with the consent of the nearest padres. The ranches
owned by the Mission San Gabriel contained about 1,500,000 acres. And
this immense tract of land, it is said, never supported a population of more
than i, 800 neophytes. Naturally, people on the outside clamored for a new
division of the earth. And the Spanish crown, unspeakably mean, de-
cided to rob its own church, and satisfy this popular clamor by sub-
dividing the immense property at its own profit. Before this paternal
plan could be fully carried out however, Manana dawned and the Mex-
ican days of good times, high living, perpetual holiday, unbounded
hospitality, eat-drink-and-be-merry-for-there-is-no-tomorrow, filled all
the land with music and laughter, romance and love, and made all days
seem alike and each one made for play, with a little time in between for
rest. If that sort of thing could only be kept up forever, there had been
never a snake in Eden. But alas, after every dance, the fiddler waits with
extended hand for his pay. After Louis XVI, Robespierre; after George
IV, George Washington ; after laughing, singing, love-making Today
dressed in spangles and power, grim visaged Tomorrow, with an item-
ized account and a constable's warrant. After the happy Mexican, count-
ing naught but the sunny hours, the matter-of-fact Gringo, dancing very
clumsily and singing out of tune, but playing poker with an eye single to
the stakes.

ADIOS !

Spain was not able to carry out its plans for the sequestration of the
Missions. Mexico had long been restless under the rule of the Spaniard,
and one day in 1822, the ship San Carlos sailed into the harbor of Mont-
erey, and the Canon Augustin Fernandez de San Vincente came ashore,
hauled down the Spanish flag from gubernatorial palace, replacing it
with the green, white and red of Mexico, and Spanish dominion in Cal-
ifornia ceased forever with its last governor, Don Pablo Vicente de Sola,
and Luis Antonio Arguello became the first Mexican governor of Cali-
fornia.

The Mexican administration of California was too joyous to be stren-
uous. It consisted in the first place of decreeing, in 1833, the complete
secularization of the Missions, and year by year the granting of immense
tracts of lands to favored citizens, in all nearly nine millions of acres.
The Mission estates were divided into smaller ranches and gradually
passed into the hands of actual settlers. The country prospered com-
mercially during the quarter of a century that it was a Mexican province.
Its prosperity was its downfall, because this attracted the eyes of other
nations to this favored land. There was less or more restlessness in the

\-2 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

country. Americans began to come in, and fmm the first they were looked
upon \\ith popular suspicion, although Governor Arguello was friendly
to American traders. In 1824 William A. Gale, an American and Wil-
liam E. P. Hartnell, an Englishman, established the first mercantile houses
in California, locating in Monterey. ISut as a rule, the Americans were
unwelcome settlers, and their coming was not at all encouraged.

A PROCESSION" OF GOVERNORS

With occasional unsuccessful uprisings that did not attain to the
dignity of revolutions the history of Mexican occupation of California
drifted through the 25 uneventful, but prosperous years and is written
mostly in the list of names indicating the ten governors who ruled during
that period — Luis Antonio Arguello, Jose Maria Echeandia, Manuel Vic-
toria, Pio Pico, 1832, Jose Figueroa, Jose Castro, Nicolas Gutierrez,
Mariano Chico, Juan Bautista Alvarado, Manuel Micheltorena, and once
more Pio Pico, for hi< second term — the last Mexican governor of
California.

ENTER THE BEAR

For all the half formed suspicions and fears of American invasion
were realized when on the 1 4th of June, 1846, William B. Ide, an Ohio
man, living in Sonoma, issued a proclamation calling upon all "peaceable
and good citizens of California to repair to the camp at Sonoma and
assist in establishing and perpetuating a republican government."

THE EAGLE

The beginning of the end was winding itself up. The man with the
writ of eviction had arrived and he spoke United States. William 1.
Todd painted a grizzly bear and a solitary star on the new flag which
Freedom unfurled to the glorious air of California and the Bear Republic
was born. It lived twenty-six days and did not die then, but was quietly
merged into the older and greater republic, unresisting and unsurprised.
The fact that Captain John C. Fremont, "The Pathfinder" was at that
time in camp on the American river, undoubtedly facilitated the blending
of the two republics. In his camp which was a miniature melting pot,
were already gathered all the elements for an American commonwealth —
a nucleus of Americans with the proper quantities of English, Swis>.
French, German, Russian, Greek, and a few Indians. The pot began to
simmer. July 4th a mass meeting was held at Sonoma at which a Declar-
ation of Independence was promulgated, and Fremont made Commander

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 18

of the forces of the Bear Republic. July gth, Commodore Sloat, in com-
mand of a United States squadron consisting of his flagship, the
Savannah, the Cyane, and the Levant, anchored in the Bay of Monterey,
landed a force of two hundred and fifty marines, hauled down the flag
of red, white and green and ran up the red, white and blue above the
custom house and the Mexican rule in California was ended. July iQth,
Fremont, arriving at Sutter's Fort, Sacramento, hauled down the Bear
Flag and unfurled the stars and stripes at the garrison flag staff, and the
thirty stars on the blue field rearranged themselves to make room, with-
out crowding, for the thirty-first star, for there's luck in odd numbers.

ADMISSION DAY

A little war followed in which several battles were fought in Cali-
fornia, the casualties on both sides aggregating about seventy killed and
wounded. The treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, on the 2d of February,
1848, ended the Mexican war and ceded California to the United States.
Colonel Richard B. Mason was the first civil Governor, succeeded in April,
1848 by General Bennet Riley. A convention of men from all parts of the
unorganized province — it never was a territory — and California was
organized as a free state, with a provision in its constitution prohibiting
slavery. A general election on November I3th ratified the constitution.
Peter H. Burnett was elected governor, John McDougall lieutenant
governor, Edward Gilbert and George W. Wright, members of Congress.
The legislature met December 15, at San Jose, the new capital, and elected
John C. Fremont and William M. Gwin, United States Senators. The
state capital was removed to Vallejo in two years, remaining there until
TS53, when it was changed to Benicia, for one year, and in 1854 it found
a permanent location at Sacramento. In 1849 Major Robert Selden Far-
nett, of the United States army designed the great seal of the state of
California. The state records thus explain the symbolism of the seal.

"Around the bend on the ring are represented thirty-one stars, being
the number of states of which the Union will consist upon the admission
of California. The foreground figure represents the goddess Minerva,
having sprung full grown from the brain of Jupiter. She is introduced
as a type of the political birth of the State of California, without having
gone through the probation of a territory. At her feet crouches a grizzly
bear feeding upon the clusters from a grape vine, emblematic of the
peculiar characteristics of the country. A miner is engaged with his
rocker and bowl at his side, illustrating the golden wealth of the Sacra-
mento, upon whose waters are seen shipping, typical of commercial great-
ness ; and the snow clad peaks of the Sierra Nevada make up the back

14 AMKR1CAX IS1OGRAPHY AND GEXEALOGY

ground, while above is the Greek motto 'Eureka' (I have found itj.
applying either to the principle involved in the admission of the state, or
the success of the miner at work."

Four years of delay followed the application of the California for
statehood. There was much opposition from the Southern senators. But
at length, on the ninth of September, 1850, the door was opened and
California joined the sisterhood of states.

BIRTH OF Los ANGELES

The metropolis of the Southland was born under the Spanish flag,
Felipe de Neve being governor, and the Mission San Gabriel sponsor.
It has been claimed that if this pleasant summerland of the Pacific
region of North America had been discovered first, the rugged Xew Eng-
land coast had never been settled. Well, yes, maybe. But after all, men,
not climate, make a country. Eden was such a pleasant country that
Adam and Eve had to be driven out and kept out that the rest of the
world might be populated, and Greenland's icy mountains have a place on
the map as well as Ceylon's isle with its spicy breezes, pleasant prospects
and vile inhabitants. As a matter of fact nearly a hundred years —
ninety-eight, to be exact — before the Pilgrims settled Plymouth, Cabrillo
sailed into San Diego Bay. And in the fulness of time, when New Eng-
land had a little leisure, it crossed the continent and occupied California,
which had been found some time before. The Gringo found as much
desert here as the Indians had. There wasn't an orange tree in the state.
Part of it was a sheep corral, the rest of it was a cattle range and a great
deal of it was desert. Most of it was climate. And doubtless the cattle
enjoyed it. For the population of California then consisted of the two
classes into which the discerning cow-boy still divides the denizens of the
earth — "cows and humans," putting the cows first, of course, as the more
valuable and more intelligent. All California was a great pasture, and
the horned herds that roamed over it would have hard work to secure
"honorable mention" and useful death in the "scalawag" class in any
reputable stock yards of today — long bodied, longer legged, and still
longer horned ; Meet of foot and scant of beef — the lean and milkless kine
of Pharaoh. The only product of any value they yielded was their hide
and tallow. When that was taken off, and out, there was nothing left.

The people lived the simple life. The "first families" of Los Angeles.
the founders to whose illustrious memory we have neglected to rear a
lofty monument, are not represented by their descendants among the
aristocratic loungers in the California Club, nor are they corralling the
passing lion in the Friday Morning, or studying civic righteousness in

A.MKKICAN 15IOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY ir,

Ebell. "Our Glorious Founders" were a polyglot lot, which Mr. Venus
would have classified as "human warious."

DEMOCRATIC BEGINNINGS

There were eleven families. Not a man of them could read or write.
Two Spaniards there were, and these had Indian wives. And one of the
proud Castilians, Jose de Lara, of aristocratic name, was very shortly
deported from the colony for general uselessness to himself and the com-
munity. The historians tell us, however, that Jose's Castilian stock was
somewhat adulterated. But Antonio Felix Villavalencio was warranted
"absolutely pure." He had an Indian helpmeet. Jose Navarro and
Basilic Rosas, an Indian, had mulatto wives ; so had Manuel Camaro and
Jose Moreno, themselves mulattos, also Luis Ouintero, a negro ; Jose
Vanegas, Alejandro Rosas, and Pablo Rodriguez, were Indians, with
Indian wives. Thus laden with humble souls and aristocratic names our
Mayflower came into port September 4, 1781, and with religious ceremo-
nies, consisting of a mass and a salvo of musketry, our step-fathers form-
ally founded the Pueblo de Nuestra Sefiora La Reina de Los Angeles, on
the banks of the Rio de Porciuncula, which changed its name to Los
Angeles when it went dry. The city never having passed through that
process of regeneration retains its original name unto this day. It takes
an earthquake of the century class to convert a California city of the first
class to prohibition, and Los Angeles is not in the earthquake belt.

Our forefathers possessed the true Los Angelan spirit. They built
first an irrigating ditch and then they laid out town lots and acreage
property, deported three of their number, one white man and two negroes,
for congenital worthlessness, wisely and thriftily confiscating their prop-
erty for the common good. The remaining colonists — twenty-eight all
told, including the children — went to work, erected public buildings and
a church, and began to do business.

THE LIVE OAK SPROUTS

All of Los Angeles was in that little acorn. They weren't a people to
worry — that folly comes with the higher civilization — and they watched
themselves grow. In nine years the population had increased to 141 :
multiplied itself by five in nine years — a record-breaking challenge for
succeeding generations. The city thus early established the habit of grow-
ing; which is to this day emphasized by prophetic and optimistic real
estate "pobladores." The padres were teaching the Mission Indians the
arts of agriculture and architecture, and the useful trades. Los Angeles

Hi A.MKRICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

emerged from its pole huts and erected palatial structures of adobe, one
story high and absolutely fire-proof. In 1800 the population was 315,
the herds of horses and cattle numbered 12,500 head; wheat was $1.66
per bushel and the crop was over 8,000 bushels. "Dollar wheat" didn't
get into politics that year. They paid their taxes in grain. They had a
mail from Mexico once a month, but as not more than half a dozen of the
citizens could read or write, there was no complaint when one or two
mails missed.

In 1818 two Americans became citizens of Los Angeles,. Joseph Chap-
man of Massachusetts, and a negro named Fisher. Things moved with
symptoms of "hustle." Chapman built the first mill in southern Cal-
ifornia, and the gods of things that are to be began to grind their grist.
Los Angeles was an agricultural community. Its manufactories at this
time consisted almost exclusively of distilleries and wineries. These were
very successful, as an election in 1826 was declared void by the governor
on the ground .that "the candidates were vagabonds, drunkards, and
worse.'' Graft is not a modern disease in the body politic. Our fathers
also ate wild grapes.

GOING TO SCHOOL

If ignorance is bliss, the people were happy in their childhood. But
they were not unmindful of the blessings of education. In 1817 an old
soldier, Maximo Pina, opened a school and taught the children enough in
two years to last them through the next decade. Two years of school
would not make scholars of a community. Indeed, it would barely qual-
ify them for writing dialect stories and "best selling books." They felt
that, and in 1827 Luciano Valdez was employed at a salary of $15 per
month, to teach the young idea how and whom to shoot. He struck for
$30 in his second year and resigned. Fifteen dollars was the value placed
upon a schoolmaster until after the American "assimilation," even in the
flush times of '49. In 1850 the salary was suddenly increased to $60 per
month and house rent, and the schoolmaster took his place among the
plutocrats.

But during all the dearth of public schools it must be remembered that
the padres were teachers at the Missions. They taught along polytechnic
lines and largely on the Dotheboys hall system. When the neophyte
learned to spell hide, he was sent out to tan one. And at irregular but
appropriate intervals his own was properly tanned by the good padres
on general principles. He, and the public school teacher as well, were in-
structors after the fashion of Saxe's "Pedagogue" — "ye youngster's pate
to stimulate, he beat ve other end." The teachers in the public schools.

AMERICAN I'.K.MikAl'lIV AND ( IK \KAI.OGY 17

up to 1850, were, as a rule, old soldiers, selected because of their physical
strength and good fighting qualities.

Yet at that very day there were far worse schools and far more brutal
teachers — it not being conceded that the padres were more brutal— in
England than in California. And in Illinois I myself attended school
where I tasted the lash if I missed my lessons or joined the insurgents.

At 4 o'clock on the afternoon of August 13, 1846, "manifest destiny"
knocked at the gates of Los Angeles. Fremont and Stockton entered the
city with 500 real soldiers and no proclamation, California was benevo-
lently assimilated, and Joshua had added to his rightful inheritance by the
simple act of "putting down his foot." Los Angeles belonged to "us,"
and the first "native son" in a land older than the pyramids got himself
ready to be born and organize a "parlor." The men who were to make
California, however, had got born some time before, and were on their
way to introduce the strenuous life.

At the time of the capture of Los Angeles the white population of
California was about 5,000, of whom less than 500 were Americans. Two
years later a man found a grain of gold in the mud of a tail-race, and
within a year thereafter that tiny magnet had drawn 42,000 people from
the eastern states and all over the world to the new gold field, and Cali-
fornia was "discovered." In ten years the population had grown to
nearly 100,000. In 1860 it was 379,994. Today, it is more than one and
one-half millions, and in rank of population is the twelfth state in the
Union. The greater part of the increase has been in the south. Los
Angeles, which came into the Union in 1851 with a population of 1,610.
is now the i 7th city in the United States, numbering 370.000 souls.

OUR WELCOME STEP CHILDREN

The family kept on growing. In the I3th U. S. census, the figures
for the foreign-born population in California show that the number of
white foreign-born in the State has increased in the last ten years from
316,505 to 517,355. or 63 per cent., as against an increase of 60 per cent,
in the total population.

The largest aggregate increase of any nationality is the Italian born,
of whom there were -22,774 in California in 1900, and 63,549 in 1910..

The German born lead in numbers, with 76,208.

There are in the State 48,606 English-born.

The aggregate number in California born as British subjects — in Eng-
land, Ireland, Scotland. \Yales and Canada, excluding French-Canadians
— is 158,441. or over one-fourth of the total foreign-born in the State.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY HJ

France has 17,361 ; Switzerland, 14,300 ; Sweden, 26,395, and Austria,
17,330 representatives in this State.

High ratios of increase are shown in other nationalities. The Spanish-
born have increased in California in ten years from 893 to 4,201, the
Roumanians from 73 to 1,119, the Greeks from 370 to 7,916, the Hungar-
ians from 799 to 3,126, the Turks from 645 to 4,542 and the Portuguese
from 12,042 to 22,574.

The total number of foreign-born whites in California is but 21.3 per
cent, of the entire population, according to the census of 1910, or less
than one-quarter.

THE LUMP OF YANKEE LEAVEN

Some time in 1820 Los Angeles was discovered by Boston, and a
thriving trade in hide and tallow was established, the Boston ships
bringing out assorted cargoes. The blessings of Boston baked beans
did not reach the land until later, for the canning industry still slum-
bered in the brain of inventive man. But the Los Angelans had a
base-born sable-hued bean of their own, upon which, knowing nothing
superior, they thrived happily. The American invasion continued. About
1829 the precursor of all the signs that dot the landscape and hide the
vacant lots and crown the cornices of the highest buildings, appeared
— "Rice and Temple." And they were New England Yankees. Los
Angeles was marching on the way of its destiny, and new comers
were already dropping the "Pueblo de Nuestra Senora La Reina de"
from their letterheads. Temple & Rice introduced three or four new
and distinct pronunciations of the rest of the name, which are still most
successfully imitated, with intricate variations, by their 370,000 succes-
sors. The area of the "pueblo" has grown to be double that of Paris,
and with an eye to the annexation of the entire country with its popula-
tion of 575,000.

How BOTH HALVES LIVE

If the newcomer has a taste for forestry, and does not know any too
much about it, there is temptation of eucalyptus culture awaiting him,
with its promise of profits. The area of the eucalyptus groves of the
state were increased over 7,000 acres in the spring of 1909. One com-
pany planted 2,250,000 young trees upon its lands, and other concerns
had at that time 200,000, 400,000, 500,000 and one million trees in
nursery stock, and the demand far exceeds the supply. There are twenty-
five eucalyptus companies in the state at this time. The largest single

^<i A.MKRICAX lUOGRArilY AND GKXEALOGY

plantation in the spring uf 1909 \vas that of the Santa l;e Railway Com-
pany, which had planted between 7,000 and 8,000 acres. An acre of
commercial eucalyptus, rightly located and handled, at ten years of
age should produce 100,000 feet of lumber, board measure. The stump-
age value should be $2,500 per thousand feet, for this age. And the cost
to the grower about $2.50 per thousand.

Southern California offers unusual inducement to the small rancher
— the "truck farmer." The lure of the hen is as attractive as a gold
mine, and results, while never so dazzling in the blue print and pros-
pectus, are more certain. Indeed, the small producers, as a rule, are
more prosperous, proportionately, than are the great investors. The
poultry ranches range from a "coop" in a back lot of a city home, to
the big corral with a thousand or thousands of busy hens, announcing
their diurnal output after the manner of their kind. The largest pigeon
ranche in the world, containing about 100.000 birds, is located in Los
Angeles — the ranch covering eight acres of gravelly ground in the bed
of the Los Angeles River. These are common pigeons. About 300 squabs
per day are killed, selling at $2.50 and $3.00 per dozen. All the fancy
varieties of pigeons do well in California. Poultry raising in the state
is an established business, all the way from the little brown hen to the
gigantic ostrich, the hen being a more profitable investment than her
gigantic sister — and more easily managed. In n/oK, the revenue from
the poultry yards of the state was $12,650,000. results which justify a
great deal of cackling both from the producers and owners.

THE FRUIT OK THE VINE

And the vineyards call to the immigrant with a very pleasant voice.
The man who is rich in children and poor in purse may capitalize the
labor of his family in this industry. A fifty-acre vineyard has been
known to yield a profit of $3,000 a season. Grapes raised for raisins
alone have yielded a return of $60 an acre. There are three classes of
grapes grown. The vines for the wine grapes are easiest of culture. No
irrigation is demanded, and far less care in picking is required. Muscats
are the raisin variety, growing quickly and fruiting abundantly, with
certain profits. Table grapes — Malagas and Tokays — are the most profit-
able, the returns sometimes running as high as $T.OOO per acre. The
eastern varieties. Concord, Isabella. Delaware and Catawba. are also
grown in California. The new vineyard begins bearing in three years.
More than $100,000,000 is invested in the wineries of California, about
$40,000,000 of this being represented in Southern California, which con-
tains about sixty wineries, and produces the bulk of the sweet wines.

AA1KRICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY -1\

There is one vineyard at Cucumonga which alone produces 20,000 tons
of grapes. Altogether there are 100,000,000 vines in the state, three times
more than are grown in New York, and nearly ten times more than in
Ohio. The raisin crop, cured, is over 60,000 tons. Of dry wines, the
products is about 3,000.000 gallons ; sweet wines about one-half that
amount, and brandy, in some years, about 4,500.000 gallons. The sec-
ond largest vineyard in the world, being surpassed in acreage only
by one in Italy, lies but 43 miles out of Los Angeles. Eleven years ago
it was a desert. It is cultivated without irrigation, and it raises annually
30,000 tons of grapes, and produces 3,000,000 gallons of wine. There
are 4,000 acres in the tract and 600 people are employed in the vineyard.
The prune product of the state is about 100,000 tons. From the en-
tire output of natural resources, California derived a revenue in 1908
of more than $405,000,000. Of this amount $300,000,000 came from the
soil. The florists raised $600,000 worth of flowers and the bees extracted
$825.000 worth of honey and wax from all the blossoms in the state.

THE CITRUS ORCHARDS

In Southern California about 12,000 orchardists are engaged in the
cultivation of oranges and lemons, the principal counties being Riverside,
Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Tulare, Orange, Ventura and Santa Bar-
bara. This industry supports about 150,000 persons, including laborers
and their families. During the past eleven years the citrus orchards of
California have produced 90,089,300 boxes of oranges and 9,780,500
boxes of lemons. The amount received by the citrus growers from the
year of the first shipments is over $250,000,000. In 1908 Southern Cali-
fornia placed on the market 600,000 gallons of select olives, and more
than 200,000 gallons of oil.

The \Yashington navel orange was introduced into California in 1873.
In 1911, 27,000 car loads of this orange, each car containing 376 boxes in
the aggregate, 1,000,600,000 oranges, were shipped from the state. 500.-
000,000 Yalencias, 750,000,000 lemons, with the addition of great quan-
tities of grape fruits made a total of 3,200,000,000 citrus fruits shipped
from California in 1911 to the rest of the world. The citrus farmers of
the state employ 25,000 laborers. About 170,000 acres are added to the
citrus orchards annually, the plantations ranging from five acres in
several hundred.

It is the greatest barley growing state in the Union. The output of
1910 was conservatively estimated at 971,900 tons, which was 221,900
more than was produced in 1909. The value of the crop was $19.000,000.
which far exceeded the value of anv other cereal grown in the state.

22 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Colusa county leads. Out of a total of 585,789 assessed acres, there
were 180,000 acres in barley; 180,803 tons °f grain were produced, with
a value of $2,776,000. Contra Costa county comes next with 50,000 acres
of barley, a yield of 3,000,000 bushels of grain, worth $1,500,000. This
is not to mention 200,000 tons of hay, worth $2,500,000, of which barley
hay constituted the greater part. Close to Contra Costa county is Mon-
terey county, which reported 127,000 acres of barley, a yield of 2,320,416
bushels, worth $1,002,419.

The total value of the pear crop harvested in 1909 in the United States
was $7,911,000, of which $1,661,000 is credited to California. The next
highest state in the list of production is New York, with nearly twice as
many trees, but with a yield valued at $1,480,000. Michigan is third and
Oregon fourth. California has 98 per cent of all the almond trees in
the United States.

SPIRITUAL GROWTH AND PROSPERITY

Ecclesiastical Los Angeles stands among the elect. She has set bounds
around the saloon which it may not pass. Two hundred saloons must
suffice for the city, no matter what its growth may be, and these, as
well as the wholesale liquor houses, are segregated within borders which
they must not pass, so that the resident portion of the city is kept clear of
this evil. But there are more than two hundred churches in Los Angeles,
and no limit to as many more as may come. There are 170 houses of
worship worthy of mention — some of them beautiful examples of archi-
tecture— one of them a classical structure costing $250,000. The Young
Men's Christian Association building and the Young Women's Christian
Association building are among the costliest and most complete in all
their appointments in the United States, which is to say, in the world.
Los Angeles is a church-going city — the same may be truthfully said of
every city in Southern California. The churches of Los Angeles are bound
together in the strong brotherhood of the "Church Federation." Church
unity is a practical fact, not a theory. There is no spirit of controversy
among the denominations. Jewish and Baptist congregations have wor-
shipped together at the Passover season, both rabbi and minister tak-
ing part in the service before the united congregations. That is the spirit
— not of religious tolerance, but of brotherhood and friendship. The
Protestant church membership of the city is nearly 60,000 ; the
Catholic communion about the same, though, of course, the church at-
tendance is much larger than the total memberships. The feeling of all
the churches is well expressed by the Right Reverend Thomas J. Conaty,
Bishop of the Roman Catholic diocese of Monterey and Los Angeles:

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 23

"The earnest desire of the Catholic people, composed as they are of so
many and varied nationalities, is to unite with the other citizens of Los An-
geles to make our city a home to be proud of, and a community in which
it is a privilege to dwell." Pasadena is the episcopal residence of the
Right Reverend Joseph Johnson, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of
Southern California.

THE SCHOOLS OF TODAY

With the churches stand the public schools, which begin their work
of education with the tiny children. The kindergarten system of Los
Angeles is expensive to the city, because it is the very best, but it is the
cheapest to the patron, who secures the best returns for the outlay. The
Los Angeles child may begin its education when it is four and a half years
old. The kindergartens are so distributed that they are for the benefit of
the children of the "plain people" — the people whose the public schools
are. They are not confined to "the best localities." The sessions are
for half days only — the best for teacher and pupil ; and the classes are
never large — the average being thirty-six pupils. In the primary schools,
into which the kindergartner is graduated, the average number of pupils
to the class is about thirty-six. In his way through the public schools,
the pupil is not only taught the indispensable "three R's," but construc-
tive work in paper folding, basketry, and weaving ; cardboard construc-
tion, and for the boys two years in wood sloyd with some, mechanical
drawing, while the girls spend the last two years of the elementary
course in learning the elements of cooking. All pupils have instruction
in free-hand drawing, the beginnings of designing, and from the day they
enter the schools until they leave them daily instruction in music — an
education for the sons and daughters of the people. In 1908 the draw-
ing exhibit of the Los Angeles schools was given the place of honor at
Edinburgh. Great attention is paid to manual training. It is taken for
granted that boys and girls educated in the public schools are not only
going to know something, but also to do something. The city looks after
the health of the pupil's body as well as the education of his mind.
There is a thorough health inspection of all the children in public schools
— the inspection being directed to five points — condition of eyesight, hear-
ing, breathing, heart action, and the teeth. A compulsory education
law is strictly enforced. The city keeps her children of school age off
the streets and out of the factories and in the schools. Idleness is
looked upon as a crime. The high standards which the city has set, and
which it maintains, for the qualifications of the teacher, secure for
the schools a most superior body of instructors. No one may teach in

24

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

u

fft

in

o

<

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :>:>

the grammar schools who has not received an education equivalent to
graduation from a high school and a normal school.

On a par with the city schools are the county schools. The child on
the ranch is not sent to the city to attend high school. Of the twenty-
six high schools in Los Angeles county, eighteen are in the country dis-
tricts. The buildings are usually of the mission style of architecture ;
they are all handsome, splendidly adapted to their purpose ; modern to the
day of their erection ; surrounded by beautifully kept grounds — educa-
tional palaces, each in its own park. All the county schools are orna-
ments to the country in appearance, as they are immeasurable benefits.
More than 20,000 school children reside in the country ; ninety per cent
of them live within easy distance of steam or electric railways and from
fifteen minutes to one hour distant from the center of Los Angeles.
Whittier has a union high school which serves seven districts. The
Citrus union high school at Azusa is a beautiful picture in the heart of
the orange groves. The finest building picture in the heart of the orange
groves. The finest building in South Pasadena is its high school. San
Gabriel, El Monte, Monrovia, Sierra Madre and many other of the towns
deserve high praise for their school houses.

A LAND OF HOMES

Probably in no other state of its population in America do so many
people own their homes as in California. And in no land is there dis-
played a greater desire for home adornment. The bungalow has become
a feature of city and country residence architecture. It has followed the
old mission style, which, in this land of Spanish traditions, must always
be popular. Less stately and dignified, the bungalow preserves, with the
mission home, the spirit of the out-of-doors which belongs to this land.
It is capable of an almost endless variety of architectural treatment. Its
beauty, lightness, artistic airiness of construction, combined with durabil-
ity, its easy adaptation to the personal taste and whim of the owner and
builder — in short, its charming individuality endears it to the home
builder, and bids fair to make of Southern California the typical bunga-
low-land of the world. It is equally appropriate and graceful in the city.
the villa and on the ranch and the mountain slope. In the city of Los
Angeles alone, in 1908, homes to the value of $6,000,000 were erected.
One can build a home for $300. Beyond that, the limit is his purse. One
can buy a lot with his money. He can't get a thousand-dollar lot for
three hundred dollars. Not in California. But he can get an excellent
three hundred dollar lot for that amount. And he may live in the city.
nr he may live ten or twelve miles out. and be just about as near to his

26 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

business in town, on the line of an electric railway that has never been
snow-bound since frost was invented. And if the newcomer cannot
afford marble, or concrete, or brick or lumber for a home, very well —
he can live out of doors. He can do that part of the time, in the severe
eastern climates. You may live out of doors in Southern California all
the year round, if you so desire. And hundreds of people, in good health,
with never a touch of any kind of sickness, and of ample means, who live
in costly homes, build the out-of-door sleeping room, because they prefer
to sleep out of doors. The "sleeping porch" is never forgotten in the
plans of the modern California house. Tent houses, consisting a good
floor, a good roof, frames for doors and windows, and canvas sides —
and sometimes the canvas roof as well — cost from $25 "up" to $200 or
$300. according to the means and taste of the owner. Canvas partitions
gives the dweller the requisite number of rooms. Sometimes you will
see little colonies of these tent houses. One by one they disappear. A
handsome and durable bungalow or more conventional residence stands
in its place. The tent house has been moved "back." And in many
instances some member of the family still resides therein from prefer-
ence. The tent house is a rent saver. It goes on the $100 or $500 lot
with the first payment, and some of the happiest hours of the home life
are lived in its canvas walls. And all around it the roses and lilies, car-
nations and violets, geraniums and lantanas glorify the little home with
the same wealth of color and fragrance and they yield to the lawns and
gardens of the millionaire. A twelve hundred dollar bungalow, cov-
ered to the window casings and chimney tops with roses and bougain-
villea, may be constructed of marble, for aught the eye can declare.

MORE TIIAX THEY CAX SPKND

The bank clearances of Los Angeles exceed those of any city west
of the Rocky Mountains, San Francisco alone excepted. Half a cen-
tury ago, Los Angeles county was a ranch — hardly that — a wild of
grazing lands, for the assessed value of all the real estate in the then
enormous county was but $748,696 in 1852, and the value of improve-
ments but $301,947. In 1911, seventy-one towns and cities dot the area
of the smaller county, and 40 banks in the city house deposits of $138,-
218,417.86. April, 1912, brought Los Angeles to the front in the state,
with the issuance of the building permits of -the value of $2,639,673, or
nearly $900,000 more than in April, 1911.

If one knows just where to look for it, there is in Los Angeles an
adobe house, there may be one or two or several others — crumbling land-
marks of adobe days and adobe men. They were good houses and good

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY i>7

men in their day. They were the best of their time and place. All honor
to their memory. It should be kept green by the preservation of at
least one adobe house. But the great sky-scrapers of steel and terra cotta
and reinforced concrete easily crush the sun-dried walls which sheltered
the simple life. The intellectual poverty of the tenderfoot, who, unable
to pronounce "El Camino," insists on changing the name of the street
on which he lives to the name of a way-back street on which he used to
live in a way-back town, is like unto the class of people who date their
letters "Troy'' because they cannot spell "Skaneateles." The antiquity
of a city 131 years old is not that of Baalbec, nor is it "one with Nineveh
and Tyre," but it is sufficiently venerable to demand the reverence of these
days of gallop and gulp. Any destruction or mutilation of the old names,
memorials of the people who laid the foundations for, all our present day
prosperity and glory, is a profanation, like the erasure of an honored
name from a tombstone. There is enough of pathos in the fact that the
race which christened the city should have been so utterly dispossessed
of their inheritance. It adds tragedy to the pathos when we obliterate
even the names of their fathers. Despite the movement to make spelling
easy for lazy illiterates, let California's native and adopted sons alike con-
tinue to "spell hickory with a j," and grant the transplanted tenderfoot
dispensation to "pronounce her as she is spelled," until he learns to "say
her as she is spoke."

Now, all this marvel of development was not wrought by climate
alone. This required men. And the men of California, like its fruits
and flowers, are largely adopted children. There is only one genera-
tion to the manner born. The speech of the Californian betrayeth him
not, for every dialect of civilization is here. A little pure Spanish and
much patois of Mexican-Indian-Spanish whisper into the Babel of today
the echoes of a romantic yesterday. Aspirations and exaspirations from
the tight little island have a right to be called native Californian so
long as we sing the charms of the English rose, of which we have adopted
every thing save the English perfume. The "Sunny land of France"
speaks the language of the boulevards in her own Los Angeles colony
and journal. The Basque shepherd cares for his snowy fleeces on the
sheep ranges. The New England twang blends with the soft south-
ern accent, and a broad touch of Pennsylvania Dutch establishes the
Dunkard's right to the privilege of the native born. The right amalgam
is stronger than the virgin metal ; pure gold is either too good or not
good enough for money; and every state in the Union has poured its
right and due proportion into the blend that we call California. Russia
sent her children here — or rather they came without being sent — runaway
children, very much against the paternal will, and they brought the

i',s AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXU GENEALOGY

strength and hope and liberty-loving spirit that the mother country now
so sorely needs, and which the kinder step-mother so gladly accepts as
her own. Xot only the Orient but the Occident — the nations who dwell
where the East and West join — China and Japan, are among us if not
of us. Travelers tell us of the vivid panorama of varied humanity that
streams past "Shephard's" in Cairo. You will touch elbows with a
greater variety of men in the streets of Los Angeles. Only, the pic-
turesqueness is lacking. The people have become amalgamated. They
dress like Christians. At least, they dress like the rest of us.

COMFORTABLE PIONEERING

The immigrants who have made modern California were so unlike
the ordinary conception of immigrants that a new name had to be ap-
plied to them, and they are called "tourists." Not theirs the toilsome
journey across the continent or around the storm-washed Horn. Not for
them the daily trek and the nightly camp in the midst of alarms and
cactus, Indians, grizzlies, and rattlers ; not theirs the weary pilgrimage
through the alkali lakes and the desert dust, with the complaining wheels
shrieking their anguish to the sun-burned and wind-dried axle ; not for
them the dying cattle, the long and repeated hours and the days of despair
and fear. About 8,000 came to Los Angeles in that manner in the decade
of 1850 and 1860. The rest of them waited for the completion of the
transcontinental railways and came with no one to molest them save the
train-robber and no one to make them afraid but the porter. In the
ten years following the breaking out of the Civil war. 4,000 came. Be-
tween 1870 and 1880, 10,000 home-seekers came by the easy way of the
rail. The ten years following saw 70,000 added to the city's population,
and the same number in the next decade, and more are coming all the
time.

Our immigrants came not to hew down the forests or dike out the
sea. They came prepared to buy their homes ; they came from homes of
comfort to make new homes still more comfortable. They were not
flying from persecution or tyranny in the eastern states ; they were not.
as a rule, driven here by stress and pinch of poverty. They did not have
to come. They wanted to. True, some of them came with a diminished
capitalization of health, but even then they came because they wanted to.
increase their vital holdings. Men came here not to be made by the
country, but to help make-the city, county and state. The East sent to
California her best, and California made them better. The work of bet-
terment was mutual. Southern California was moulded by these immi-
grants of education, thrift, and morality. It was never the California of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY -2V>

Bret Harte, of refined stage robbers, chaste and sensitive women of
the street and camp, and high-minded and honest blacklegs. The new-
comers builded churches, public schools, libraries, jails and other con-
comitants of a high and progressive civilization. It was not a drunken,
riotous California. Prohibition became popular. One of the largest and
most beautiful cities in the Los Angeles county, the most prosperous out-
side of the great county capital. Pasadena was founded as a temperance
town, and has not had a saloon within its limits during the past 27 years.
It has a population of 34,000: fifty-six churches, twenty-five public
schools; eleven banks whose total deposits July i, last, were $11,375,641.
The assessed valuation of the city is $47,920,900 : it is on the line of three
transcontinental railroads; has a public library with 32,000 books and is
connected with 1,000 miles of electrical interurban railroads. Its in-
crease in population in the decade of 1900-1910 was 232, 2 per cent —
the fourth largest in the Union. Now, suppose Pasadena had fifty-five
saloons and no church, one might make a wild guess at what's its increase
would not have been in that period. There are now more than half a
score of prohibition towns in the county. The city of Los Angeles re-
stricting the number of saloons to 200, has fewer of them in proportion
to its population than any other city of its size in the United States. Xot
"wide-openness." but temperance, morality and industry, with an un-
measured faith in the country itself, have been the great elements in
the prosperity of Los Angeles county.

THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY

At midnight, on the first of October, 1910, the civilized world was
horrified by the perpetration of one of the most appalling crimes in the
records of human brutality. While the night force of editors, pressmen,
reporters and compositors were at work getting out the paper, the build-
ing and plant of The Las Angeles Times was destroyed by a murderous
explosion of dynamite. Twenty-one of its employes were killed at their
posts of duty, and the shattered building burned to the ground. After
months of searching the detectives under \Ym. |. Burns arrested two
brothers, John and James McXamara, of Indianapolis, one of them the
secretary-treasurer of the Structural Iron Workers Union, and charged
them with the crime. The prisoners were brought to Los Angeles and
placed on trial. They were defended with all the energy and ability of
desperation, but before a jury was fully chosen, the}- broke down and
confessed their crimes. They were sentenced to confinement in the San
Ouentin penitentiary, one for life, and the other for a term of fourteen
years.

30 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

The Times by the aid of its surviving employes and the use of its
auxiliary printing plant, brought out its daily issue, never missing a
number. Its new building, larger, finer, and in every way complete and
better than the old one, is nearing completion on the site of its disaster,
and will be dedicated and occupied in October, 1912, two years from the
day of the destruction of the old edifice.

THE Los ANGELES HARBOR

Founded as an inland Pueblo, the city of Los Angeles now looks out
across the Pacific Ocean from its own frontage, and the great railroad
center is a busy seaport. The dream of the consolidation of Los Angeles
city and county, with the borough system of government, took tangible
form in the preliminary report of a consolidation commission in 1906,
which had for its object the effective control of harbors and the assur-
ance of free wharfage ; co-operation and participation in the benefits of
the Owens river water supply ; regulation of terminal rates for harbor
towns, and economy and increased efficiency of city and county govern-
ment. Since that day of visions Mahomet has gone to the mountain ; Los
Angeles, finding that the Pacific Ocean, which was here first, and abode
upon its right of priority, would not come across the meadows and up the
grades to the city, has gone to the ocean, by the simple process of annex-
ing the intervening territory, which was all too glad to be annexed, and
Los Angeles is one of the important seaports of the Pacific coast. And
not the least important.

Alrmg in the nineteen hundreds the city began to grow by leaps and
bounds. It stretched itself like an awaking giant, and added to area and
numbers by the wholesale methods of annexation, always with the glad
consent of the annexed. It reached down to the sea and made the great
harbor at San Pedro the harbor of Los Angeles, by making a part of
itself all that portion of the Pacific Ocean and the towns adjacent. A
number of municipalities-became part of the wealth and strength of Los
Angeles. And having reached its three mile limit of jurisdiction in the
Pacific Ocean, the city is now looking fondly toward even greater con-
quests nearer the mountains. And when it reaches from the desert to
the sea, it will extend north and south.

In August, 1909, there was a government breakwater in course of con-
struction at San Pedro and a good place for a harbor. With the union
of the cities of Wilmington, San Pedro and Los Angeles, the greater city
pledged itself to expend ten millions of dollars in harbor improvements
and the work was begun at once, the city voting $3,000,000 in February.
1910. The breakwater, two and one half miles long, is completed, at a

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :;i

•

cost of $3,500,000. The inner harbor channels are dredged and wharves
are under construction; cost, $3,000,000. .Municipal wharfage covering a
frontage of twenty-one and one-half miles is planned, to cost $10,000,000.
A harbor boulevard and highway from the harbor to the city is projected,
a distance of twenty-two miles, to cost $700,000. Also a municipal rail-
way between the city and the sea, to cost $2,000,000. The outer harbor
will have a depth of 35 feet; the inner, 30 feet.

The "inner harbor" consists of nearly three miles of wharfage along
the channel opening to Wilmington lagoon, where additional shipping and
industrial facilities are to be developed as the increasing commerce
demands, many times greater than in use at present. And the "outer
harbor" is the great anchorage which the United States government has
protected by its immense breakwater. The protected area will be 35 feet
in depth, with a channel from 500 to 900 feet in width, and a turning
basin 1,600 feet wide. The Inner Harbor will have a larger area than
the great Liverpool docks, which handle an annual tonnage of nearly
twenty millions. In the great breakwater, the weight of each wall stone,
on the harbor side, is not less than 6,000 pounds. On the ocean side, the
weight of each stone is at least 16,000 pounds. The breakwater stands
14 feet above low water; 20 feet wide at the top; 38 feet wide at the
water line. The width of the base, at the 52 feet depth, is nearly 200
feet.

Should the necessity ever be felt, this great sea wall can be extended
an additional 20,000 feet, to the easterly edge of Long Beach, thus increas-
ing tenfold the deep water anchorage. At the present time vessels draw-
ing twenty-five feet of water can take on and discharge their cargoes in
the inner harbor. And within a very short time, as the entrance to this
portion of the harbor is deepened, the slip can be used by ships drawing
thirty feet. Plans approved by the war department provide for the im-
provement of 60,000 feet of water front in the east and west basins in the
inner harbor. The importance of this great free harbor is not alone for
the city of Los Angeles, but for all of Southern California. During the
year 1907, 956 steamers, 281 schooners and 79 other vessels, coming
from the mills in California. Oregon, \\~ashington, British Columbia and
Japan, discharged at San Pedro harbor cargoes consisting of 484,879,000
feet of lumber, 170.284,000 shingles, 1,348,000 shakes, 36,006,000 lath,
275,689 railroad ties, 12,052 piles for wharfs. 18,230 telegraph and tele-
phone poles, 37,854 posts of various kinds. 789 tons of staves and 2.206
tons of shocks. And the receipt of other classes of freight from domestic
and foreign ships that make San Pedro, now the greatest lumber port in
the world, a port of call, is steadily increasing. Vastly increased traffic
will follow the opening of the Panama Canal : all Southern California

',',-2 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

will rejoice in the consequent tides of prosperity, and the generation of
public-spirited citizens who have labored for the possession of this great
free harbor will be remembered with blessings by a grateful posterity.

ELKCTUIC POWKK

In proportion to population, more electric current is consumed in Los
Angeles than in any other city in America. The cheapness of electricity
makes it popular. Only one great city in the United States enjoys such
cheap electric rates as Los Angeles — that is Buffalo, within eighteen miles
of the greatest electric power source in the world — Niagara Falls. Three
power and light companies in Los Angeles have a total investment of
$16,441,092.29. They furnish 60,000 horsepower for railways, manufact-
uring and elevator service. The aggregate output of these companies for
light and power, in 1908 was 141,877,145 kilowatt hours.

Los Angeles is also the greatest interurban railway center in the
United States. The nine cities of Indianapolis. Fort Wayne. Springfield,
III.. Detroit. Cleveland, Toledo, Columbus, Dayton and Chicago, with an
aggregate population of nearly four millions, operate 1,228 trains per day.
One electric railway in Los Angeles alone operates 1,800 trains per day.
The three interurban companies operate 1,000 miles of track.

Among other uses to which the rich county puts its great wealth is
the construction of good roads. A few years ago the people voted bonds
to the amount of $3.500,000 for the construction of a system of solid,
smooth macadamized roads, radiating from Los Angeles city throughout
the county, and the practical work on these highways was begun in 1009.
This work is now completed, and the state has commenced the construc-
tion of a system of improved highways extending its entire length, north
and south. The sum of $18.000,000 was voted for this work, and when
it is finished California will stand first among the states for good roads.

THE Los AXGELES AQUEDUCT

This is the greatest of all Los Angeles great undertakings — an enter-
prise that stands great among colossal achievements, the Los Angeles
Owens River aqueduct. It never was a "dream.'' It was born a plan,
conceived in the brain of a citizen of Los Angeles.

It was never discussed as a possibility, but always as a reasonable
and positive undertaking. It was proposed as a necessity for the city and
its environs, that the municipality bring from the High Sierras. 250 miles
distant, a flood of clear, sweet snow water — 29,000,000 gallons daily — to
the homes of its citizens. That means a supply of water for domestic

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 33

purposes for a population of 2,000,000 people and the irrigation of about
75,000 acres of land, now unproductive, adjacent to the city, and the de-
velopment of 75,000 horsepower of electrical energy. The water will be
carried through 240 miles of canals, lined with concrete and covered with
concrete slabs, tunnels, steel siphons and tubes and flumes, with a system
of impounding, clarifying and regulating reservoirs. It was an immense
undertaking. But when the election was held in 1907 the people showed
their quality of municipal faith and patriotism by voting 14 to i for the
issue of bonds to the amount of $23,000,000 for the work. It was looked
upon as a matter of course. And this faith was builded largely upon the
character of the men who said it could be done. If they would undertake
the work, the people would gladly furnish the means. Honesty and effi-
ciency conducted the work. The very day laborers were sifted down to
the best. American labor was employed. The city constructed one sec-
tion of the aqueduct at a cost of less than one-half the lowest bid sub-
mitted by a contractor. All the work, with the exception of ten miles,
was done by the city, under direction of the board of public works and
the aqueduct engineers. The authority of the city to perform its own
work was contested in the courts. The city won out, and then proved
how well it could do its own work, how much better the "boss" could
work than the "hired man," by constructing one section of the aqueduct
— the Jawbone — at a cost of less than one-half of the lowest bid sub-
mitted by a contractor. During one month the working force on this
section was over 1,200 men. One of the wisest investments of the city
was the construction of a cement plant at a cost of $400,000, with a
capacity of 1,200 barrels of Portland cement per day. Surrounding the
plant, the city owned immense supplies of limestone and clay, and a nar-
row-gauge railway, seven miles long.

THE MEN BEHIND THE WORK

The character of the men who conceived the plan and wrought the
work, created and justified the faith of the city. Nearly 20 years ago
Fred Eaton, one time city engineer and again mayor of Los Angeles, had
been a resident of Inyo county. And even then, looking far into the
future, with a Californian's faith in the growing greatness of his state,
he foresaw the day when Los Angeles would thirst for the waters of
Owens river. He went to a man who could understand, and who had a
prophetic vision far-seeing as his own, William Mulholland. Mulholland
was an Irishman who was a citizen of the world. He circumnavigated
the world as an uncommon common sailor. He came to Los Angeles in
his twentieth year. He was made the zanjero of the town, superintending

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 35

its water ditches. God had given him a mind and he cared for it like a
garden. He made the most and best of his manhood. He became super-
intendent of the city waterworks. And when his fellow citizens had
known him for more than a quarter of a century, they knew they had in
him an engineer of one of the greatest problems of construction in his
century, and a man to whose flawless honor could be entrusted the ex-
penditure of the twenty-three millions of dollars for the construction of
the longest aqueduct in the world.

With these men wrought the city waterboard, men of the highest char-
acter, ability and public spirit — John J. Fay, Jr., J. M. Elliott, Fred L.
Baker, William Mead and M. H. Sherman. There was determined oppo-
sition to the great project from many sources, but the vote on the bonds
in Los Angeles — 21,918 for and 2,128 against, showed a united city back
of the project and the work went on. The placing of Lieutenant General
Adna R. Chaffee, so recently commanding general of the United States
army, to which high honor he had been raised from the ranks by succes-
sive promotions for merit and gallant conduct, again strengthened the
confidence of the people, and Chief Engineer Mulholland took the field,
ably seconded by the Assistant Chief Engineer, Mr. J. B. Lippincott of
the United States reclamation service. Preparations were carefully made.
Foundation plans were laid broad and deep. One million tons of material
and 6,000 men would be required to complete the work in the time speci-
fied. A construction railway 120 miles long must be builded from Mojave
to Owens Lake. Water must be found in the mountains and piped to the
line of construction for the great army of workmen. Roads and trails
must be made to all parts of the work. The commissariat and quarter-
masters department must be organized and herein was shown the wisdom
of securing the services and broad experiences of General Chaffee. For
fourteen months the preliminary work went on. Then in October, 1908,
dirt of the aqueduct began to fly. Ten days after the city began work
on the Jawbone Section, the most difficult division of the work, Chief
Engineer Mulholland has 400 men at work. Forty-five days later, 700
was the muster, and a little later, the working force numbered 1,278 men.

When work was started on the Elizabeth tunnel, the United States
thirty-day record for boring in hard rock was 449 feet. Before this
tunnel was finished, the record was repeatedly broken and in April, 1910,
the figures advanced to 604 feet, the honor falling to Aston's men. In
instances of high footage, each man on a crew earned in addition to his
daily wage as high as $50 a month as a bonus, which represented his
participation in the city's profits by having the work done at the earliest
possible moment. And as an aid, the city furnished the most modern
machinery. The long chamber was brilliantly lighted and ventilated with

36 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

electricity which also furnished the motive power for the trolley system
of railways that transported the debris to the surface and the men to and
from their work at the tunnel faces.

The Los Angeles aqueduct will carry ten times as much water as all
the famous aqueducts of Rome combined.

The estimated cost of construction, including the purchase of all water-
bearing lands, water rights, rights of way, and preliminary engineering is
$24.500,000. The work will be finished within this estimate.

It is designed to deliver a minimum of 258,000,000 gallons daily into
the San Fernando reservoir, twenty-hve miles northwest of Los Angeles
City Hall.

The system throughout is gravity. There are no pumping stations.

The completion of the work, beginning with the breaking of ground
at the south portal of Elizabeth Tunnel, September 20, 1907, was
promised for the summer of 1913. In January, 1912, 75 per cent of the
work was finished — in point of hardship, 85 per cent. The work will be
completed inside the computed time.

It is constructed entirely of steel and concrete. About one-fifth of
its tunnels. The one beneath the Sierra Madres, 26,870 feet in length,
is the second longest water tunnel in the United States.

The aqueduct is carried across canons and deep valleys by inverted
steel siphons, 9 to n feet in diameter, weighing, in the aggregate, more
than 14,000 tons.

In addition to insuring a domestic water supply for one million people,
the city will be able to provide a surplus of wrater sufficient for the irriga-
tion of 135,000 acres of land contiguous to it an area of more than 200
square miles, capable of supporting a dense suburban population.

By the installation of power plants, plans for which the city has already
entered upon, it will be able to develop 120,000 horsepower of electrical
energy. It is estimated that the accumulated earnings from the sales of
power will at the end of 25 years, be sufficient to pay for the total cost of
the aqueduct.

Los ANGELES COUNTY

In 1850 Los Angeles county included the present counties of San
Bernardino, Orange and about half of Kern, and the officially recorded
population was 3,530. In the rush of '49, Los Angeles county profited
a little with the rest of the territory, but the development of the mines
in the scfuth, with other developments, followed that date. In 1911 the
value of "the gold that grows on trees" in Southern California citrus
groves, represented an investment of $175,000,000. Hides, once the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 37

great staple of the country, Southern California, added but a paltry to her
wealth. The value of the steer saves his hide in these days of prosperity,
while "humans" pay more for a pair of boots or a suitcase than the whole
hide is worth. Such is the difference between hide and leather.

Of the six: coast counties of Southern California, Los Angeles lies
about central between San Diego county on the south, and San Luis Ob-
ispo county on the north. She has a stretch of eighty-five miles of coast
line and reaches back to the Sierras, which form a wall separating this
section from the north. Within the confines of the county one finds, there-
fore, an unusual diversity of climate and conditions. One may live at
sea level, on the slope of the foothills, or 6,000 feet above the sea on
mountain heights, as his taste dictates. Beautiful valleys — the San Gab-
riel, Pomona, Cahuenga, Los Nietos and San Fernando — lie between the
folded hills that stretch back from the sea to the Sierras. The county is
literally gridironed with steam and electric railways, and great ships sail-
ing from every port the world around land their cargoes at her seaports —
San Pedro, Redondo and Port Los Angeles. The county is about the size
of the State of Connecticut, covering an area of 4,000 square miles.

Los Angeles county is officially declared to be the richest county in the
west, including Cook county, Illinois, which contains the city of Chicago.
The State Controller's Department at Sacramento, showing the values of
property and indebtedness of each county in California for the year 1911
show that Los Angeles county is more than $62,000,000 richer in property
values than San Francisco county, which stands second on the list. Ac-
cording to these figures, which are official and absolutely reliable, Los
Angeles county is almost ten times more valuable than Fresno county, the
fifth of the state. The real estate values in Los Angeles county are
given as a little more than $318.000,000, and the total value of property
as returned by the auditors $597,452,518. Added to that is $9,000,000
railroad assessment.

The county's total indebtedness is only $2,625,000, and the state and
county rate of taxation on each $100 valuation is 65 cents and $1.25.
There is no other county in the state that has such a low rate of taxation
according to the official statement, with the exception of Mariposa and
Plumas counties, neither of which has a state tax and the county tax, in
both instances, is but a few cents lower than the combined state and
county tax in Los Angeles county.

IMPERIAL COUNTY

Imperial county is the twin of Los Angeles county in regard to size
and it is the youngest in the group, having been formed from the eastern

38 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

half of San Diego county only a few years ago. Imperial Valley is just
now in the midst of a wonderfully healthy growth. The government has
undertaken control of the Colorado River and capital has poured into the
county. Its population has increased rapidly within the past few months
on account of the development of one of the richest cotton belts in the
United States, of its vast field for stock raising, its great grain and corn
fields.

FRESNO COUNTY

Fresno county lies in the center of the San Joaquin Valley and its
name is synonymous with the great raisin-growing section of the world.
It covers 6,000 square miles and has a population of 75,000. The long, dry
summers, free from rain, and the generally dry atmosphere make Fresno
county climate perfect for raisin culture and it is the acknowledged leader
of the world in this respect. Its average crop of raisins is double that
of Spain, which for centuries held the lead.

KERN COUNTY

Oil and gold are the magic words in Kern county. It is the home of
the famous Yellow Aster gold mine and her oil wells yield more than
one-half of the total output of all districts in California. Kern county is
recognized indeed as one of the great oil producing regions of the United
States.

SAN Luis OBISPO COUNTY

You could set Rhode Island down three times in this county and then
have a nice fringe around the edge. It is the northernmost coast county
of the southern group and, like Los Angeles county, has eighty-five miles
of seacoast and here are located some of the greatest oil ports in the
world.

INYO COUNTY

Inyo county is the second in size in the group and is famous as the
home of the Owens River, from which Los Angeles will draw her future
water supply. Inyo county deals in superlatives for she has the distinction
of claiming the loftiest mountain peak and the lowest valley in the entire
United States. Death Valley is 400 feet below the sea and Mt. Whitney
is 14.500 feet above. Here is found also the finest apple growing section
in the United States, the famous Owens Valley apples commanding an
exclusive price of their own.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 39

IN THE SAN JOAQUIN

San Joaquin county has about 40,000 acres in grapes. A little more
than half the vineyard area of this section, both table and wine grapes, is
included in the district known as the Lodi region, in the northern part of
the county, but extensive plantings are being made in the sandy districts
in the southern part of the county in the neighborhood of Manteca,
Escalon and Ripon. There are five large wineries in the county. In addi-
tion there are some forty small wineries operated by the owners, who are
principally Italians, making clarets for home consumption.

KINGS COUNTY

Kings county lies in the semi-tropic San Joaquin Valley and her farm
products, ranging from raisins to eggs, shipped out of the county last
year approximated $6,000,000 — a gain of more than $885,000 over last
years.

ORANGE COUNTY

Crops, poultry, oil, oranges, nuts and dairy products, unite to yield
abundant harvests and line the pockets of the farmer with gold. Orange
county in the smallest in the state, and yet it is an empire in itself. Its
residents are fond of saying with pride that they could build an impassable
wall around their little domain of 780 square miles, and live on the
products within their borders.

RIVERSIDE COUNTY

Riverside county is an illustration, the like of which cannot be found
the world around, of the power of water applied to land. The desert of
twenty-five years ago, covered with cacti and sagebrush, is now the home
of the most famous orange orchards on the face of the globe — with an
annual output of over 2,000.000 boxes of the choicest citrus fruit.

TULARE COUNTY

Tulare has the greatest watershed of any county in the San Joaquin
Valley. Pumping plants dot the landscape and the erstwhile waving grain
fields are giving way to orange orchards and citrus fruits. Tulare is
the center of one of the richest dairying districts of the State, her numer-
ous creameries distributing more than $80,000 per month among the pros-
perous farmers of that region. Tulare enjoys the distinction of being
the banner wheat county of California.

40 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

VENTURA COUNTY

It is the great bean field of the world, having but a single competitor
in the civilized world — the far-away island of Madagascar, off the South
African coast. Yentura county alone produces nearly three-fourths of
the lima bean output of the world. There are 60,000 acres of bean lands
in the county and no fertilizing or irrigation is required, as the ocean fogs
and fresh salt breezes are the breath of life to the bean.

SANTA BARBARA COUNTY

Santa Barbara county is the playground of Southern California. The
city of Santa Barbara with the outlying Montecito is famous the world
over as a resort of tourists. Her climate is perfection, sheltered by the
Santa Ynez Mountains on the one side and the Channel Islands on the
other she gets the ideal combination of moisture and dryness that go to
make a perfect clime.

SAX BERNARDINO COUNTY

San Bernardino county is the biggest county in the bunch, covering
an area of more than 20,000 square miles — almost as much as the com-
bined territory Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire. How-
ever, only about one-third of this vast tract is arable, the balance being
mountains or desert land. Lying as it does contiguous to the Colorado
Desert, San Bernardino county leads the van in irrigation development
and has three of the largest systems in the state. As a consequence of
the abundant water supply the people of that county enjoy an annual in-
come of $9,000,000 from their citrus crop alone, while the products of
her rich mines, her deciduous fruits, grain and dairies swell the grand
total to $20,000,000 — which is exactly 1000 times her total area in square
miles. The peach orchards of Ontario, the orange groves of Redlands
and Rialto and the sugar beets of Chino are famous for the annual large
crops.

SAN DIEGO COUNTY

San Diego county enjoys the distinction of being the nearest to the
Panama Canal of any county in Southern California. Consider that in
connection with her famous and world-renowned bay and one gets a
glimpse of her future prospects. The county is about the size of Los
Angeles county, measuring 4,209 square miles, which slopes back from the
seacoast in a series of tablelands. Within the past year the population
of San Diego county has jumped from 61,000 to 75,000 and her tax

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 41

assessment has increased more than $15,000,000. Eastern capital and
colonists have so poured into the county that it is estimated that of the
$5,000,000 spent for buildings alone, two-thirds was brought by people
from the North and East who have established homes for themselves in
the county.

The wealth of San Diego city and county in 1910 was increased by
millions. Of the $5,000.000 spent for buildings two-thirds was brought
into the county by those of the North and East who came here and estab-
lished homes, hence San Diego's bank clearings showed larger gains in
percentage than any other city in the state.

San Diego's city population in 1910 was 39,575; 1911, 50.000; county
population in 1910 was 61,000; 1911, 75,000. The county tax assessment
in 1910 was $41,815,697; 1911, $57,000,000. San Diego's city tax assess-
ment in 1910 was $43,299,019; 1911, $50,000,000. San Diego's banks in
1911 cleared $100,000,000. an increase of more than 40 per cent. The
bank deposits in 1910 were $11,000,000: in 1911, $14,000,000. The post-
office receipts in 1910 were $146,000; in 1911, $165,000; exports of the
local customhouse in 1910 were $1,051,588; in 1911, $1,080,000; imports
in 1910, $865,784; 1911, $900.000. The customs collections in 1910 were
$I43-385 : in 1911, $150,000. In 1910 the lumber shipments to San Diego
were 60,000,000 feet; in 1911 the shipments received were more than
90,000,000 feet. These figures- are from the books of the steamship
companies, by which transportation all the lumber used in this county is
received. The number of vessels entering and leaving this harbor in
1911 was 50 per cent, greater than last year.

42

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Jb*

CHRONICLE BUILDING

SAN FRANCISCO

THE FACE TURNED TOWARD ASIA — DISTINCTIVE ATMOSPHERE — SPANISH
MISSIONS — INFLUX OF GOLD SEEKERS — HAMLET BECOMES A CITY IN
A DAY — RAILROADS COME — CIVIL WAR TIMES — DESTRUCTION AND
REPLACEMENT OF THE CITY — PANAMA-PACIFIC INTERNATIONAL EX-
POSITION— THE CITY OF TODAY — PECULIAR CLIMATE — GOLDEN GATE
PARK AND THE PRESIDIO — CHINATOWN — BERKELEY AND OTHER SUB-
URBS.

By Rufiis Steele

One of the things the homeseeker has to do when he comes to Cali-
fornia is to unlearn about all he has ever been taught about soil, climate,
seasons, the habits of plants and the treatment of the farm and garden.
The brilliantly illustrated "annuals" issued by the great florists and seed
houses of the East are joke books in California, where things grow thir-
teen months in the year, rather than six. When the hour is dull one can
read the chapter on "Garden Work in November" and laugh the tedious
moments away. "What to Plant After Gathering the Peas" pleases the
Whittier farmer, gathering his seventh crop for the cannery that year.
One of the duties of the Christian parent in California is to explain to
the wondering child the snow-drifted, ice-bound, frost-spangled Christ-
mas cards issued by the Boston publishing houses and sent to this land
where Christmas and Fourth of July are born under the sign of Gemini.
Easter Sunday is no more beautiful and glorious with its symbols of the
resurrection, than is any Sunday in December. How can the emblems
of the resurrection be very impressive in a land where nature has no
symbols of death, but where month answers month,' all through the year,
in every flower-blossoming cemetery, shaded by fadeless palms and pines,
crying, "Life — everlasting life !" Our children cannot understand Thom-
son's "Seasons." The pathos of the Christmas story of the ragged little
waifs freezing to death in their wretched hovel on Christmas eve is largely
lost. ''Why did not the children go out of doors and get warm?" This
is a land of life.

With a population of 420,000, San Francisco is the eleventh city of
the United States, coming between Buffalo and Milwaukee, and the

43

44 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

metropolis of the Pacific Coast. It covers solidly the point of the penin-
sula that separates San Franciso Bay from the Pacific Ocean. Having
been almost completely destroyed by fire in 1906 and rebuilt in the record-
breaking four years that followed, San Francisco enjoys the unique dis-
tinction of being a brand new city throughout, structurally the most
modern city of the world.

The story of San Francisco's destruction and replacement would be
sufficient to center interest upon the city for all time, and yet that tale
of demolition and rehabilitation is but one chapter in a history that from
the very beginning is extraordinarily engrossing. Verily there is no com-
mon scale of cities by which this one may be measured in any of its dom-
inant aspects. From the days when Saxon hands relieved the Castilians
in the founding of a permanent settlement the place has been different.
As it passed to the Americans it became and has ever remained the center
and culminating point of a vast material wealth, a wealth yielded by
natural resources under the manipulation of courageous and never tiring
hands. The pioneers who trekked across a continent or sailed around it
to reach golden California built up the city not only with the riches which
they gathered from the fructifying land, but with their lives and their
dauntless spirits as well. In the great rush when news of the discovery
of gold flew around the world the weaklings fell by the way. Only the
hardy endured and arrived. There assembled on the western side of the
Sierra Nevada mountains a body of men such as never invaded and
claimed any other fastness, and they gave to the city they built up an in-
dividuality as strong as their own ; an individuality that never stopped
short of victory in any battle in which it engaged, and that loved its work
and its play with equal zest. Any endeavor to understand or appraise the
San Francisco of today must take into the consideration the character of
the argonauts and the Latin influence which remained after the authority
of the Latins had been usurped. A glimpse of the city's present import-'
ance will whet the interest for the entertaining and instructive story of
how that importance was attained. The adjectives are used with dis-
crimination, for none but the compiler of an almanac — the very opposite
of what this account sets out to be — could probe into the virile story of
San Francisco without revealing something of the red blooded drama
upon a wondrous stage that has made San Francisco the haunt of authors,
artists, soldiers of fortune and globe trotters who sought the fount of
veriest inspiration.

THE FACE TURNED TOWARD ASIA

San Francisco is the face that the nation turns toward Asia. It is the
great seaport of Pacific America. It receives the commercial drainage of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 45

a region that has the largest variety of natural resources of any similar
area of the earth. It sits over a sea and rail commerce that flows to every
civilized country. \Yith the completion of the Panama Canal its ships
will go uninterruptedly to Liverpool and Hamburg as they do to Honolulu
and Manila, carrying the richer cargo on the outer trip. The harbor
which is an indispensable adjunct to the marketing of the agricultural,
mineral, animal and manufactured products, is the largest, and mariners
say the most perfect, in the world. It will always serve because no ship
can touch its bottom and all the ships of the seven seas could not crowd
it. The roadstead is safe in all weathers ; the docking facilities have ex-
panded substantially as demand required. How necessary San Francisco
had become in the commerce of the whole Pacific Slope and of the nation
was manifested after the catastrophe, by the rapidity with which the city
was reconstructed on larger lines than before.

The water has most to do with San Francisco's trade relations abroad.
Ten railroads — some of them use rails not their own — with their own cars
loading and emptying in the city serve the ends of its domestic commerce.
Every state in the Union is a purchaser of the crops of California soil
with San Francisco, in the main, as the shipper. Yet quite aside from
its foreign and national commerce, San Francisco is market and supply
station to an adjacent country so populous and so thrifty as of itself to
maintain the metropolis. The city is the capital to a kingdom of agri-
culture, mining, lumbering and fisheries.

DISTINCTIVE ATMOSPHERE

Such are the attributes that anywhere would make a city great. The
human interest in San Francisco centers in the people who call it home.
The city proper contains 420,000 inhabitants ; across the bay to the east
and the north, and southward on the peninsula, are cities and towns which
are truly suburbs and which bring the total of people whose interest center
in the metropolis close to one million. It is highly probable that many
of the suburban cities and towns will soon be incorporated politically in
Greater San Francisco and governed from a single head under a borough
system. Although engaged in occupations singularly numerous and
diverse, the reason that the million live in and around San Francisco and

refuse to live anvwhere else is sentimental rather than commercial. Thev

i

love San Francisco. They love it for its climate and for its associations ;
and by associations is meant its "atmosphere," which — strange paradox —
was so firmly fixed that it could not be shaken loose by earthquake nor
dissipated by fire and remains as evident and unmistakable in the new

46 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

city as it was in the old. Turn now to a brief recital of the historical
events from which the old city took its existence and its form.

SPANISH MISSIONS

Though the Spanish and British crowns knew of the existence of the
land now named California through the explorations of Cabrillo in 1542,
Drake in 1549 and Vizcaino in 1603, it was not until 1768 that settlers
headed northward from Lower California to make conquest of it in the
name of the Cross. They were the Franciscans, led by Father Junipero
Serra, who set out with three small vessels and twro land parties for San
Diego, where they proposed to locate the first of three Missions. The
most northern was to be on Monterey Bay, which showed upon their maps,
the third was to mark the half-way point between the other two. The
trials of the brave pilgrims may not be recounted here. Caspar de Port-
ola, named governor of California by the King of Spain, led a party of
hardy followers northward along the coast to find the Bay of Monterey
as shown on the map made by Vizcaino. At length they realized that they
must have passed the bay they sought. With provisions all but exhausted
and ready to turn back, a reconnoitering party went forth, climbed a range
of hills and from the summit looked down upon the Bay of San Francisco.
At the time they believed they had discovered an inland sea. The news
was carried back to San Diego. On August 5, 1775, the little vessel San
Carlos, Captain Ayala, under orders from Spain, having come up» the
coast for the purpose, sailed into the Bay of San Francisco, the first ship
to navigate its magnificent waters. About this time two hundred emi-
grants set out overland from Sinoloa and Sonora in Mexico, with cattle
and supplies bound for San Francisco. The main party, considerably
depleted, arrived in June, 1/76, just about the time the Declaration of
Independence was being signed on the other side of the continent. They
pitched their tents near the site of Mission Dolores. When the San Carlos
arrived from Monterey with freight and supplies houses were contrived
of mud and tule thatch and a church for the friars was constructed in the
same way. A presido was built on the hill at Fort Point, above the
Golden Gate, and on September 17, 1776, it was formally taken pos-
session of in the name of King Charles III. The meager record says
that the celebration was spectacular, the precursor of many celebrations
on this peninsula of which all the world should hear. In the course of
time Father Junipero Serra came up from Monterey and the mission
was built with the assistance of the Indian converts, who were taught
to aid in the farming and the raising of herds. Yankee skippers sailing
home around the Horn in 1825 brought word that the Mission was rich
in cattle, sheep, wheat, merchandise and cash.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 47

INFLUX OF GOLD SEEKERS

Richard Henry Dana visited San Francisco in 1835. In "Two Years
Before the Mast" he tells of "a newly begun settlement, mostly of Yankee
Cahfornians, called Yerba Buena, which promises well. Here at anchor,
and the only vessel, was a brig under Russian colors, from Asitka, in
Russian America, which had come down to winter, and to take in a
supply of tallow and grain, great quantities of which latter article are
raised in the missions of the head of the bay." The missions were soon
to lose their splendor, however, for California had passed to Mexico,
which had gained its independence from Spain, and in 1833 the Mexican
government ordered the dispersion of the Franciscan friars of California
and the abandonment of the missions. Secularization was accomplished
in the succeeding years. Yerba Buena, or San Francisco as its name be-
came officially in 1847, grew slowly with a population of Mexicans, Rus-
sians and Yankee trappers, traders and whalers.

By the treaty of 1848 California became part of the United States
It was on January 24th of that year that James W. Marshall discovered
gold at Slitter's mill on the American river, a tributary of the Sacramento.
The news went round the world with the rapidity that only good news or
very bad news can attain. From every civilized country men started at
once for the new El Dorado. They came from all the countries and
islands of the Pacific Ocean, they came around the Horn and across the
Isthmus from the Atlantic states and Europe, and forty thousand men
women and children, the most remarkable pilgrimage since the Crusades,'
set out to cross the plains, mountains and trackless deserts in prairie
schooners, despite the fearful hardships, the constant menace from hostile
Indians and the scarcity of water and food along the way.

San Francisco was the common destination ; from San Francisco they
would scatter to the mining regions, to San Francisco they would come
back when they had made the strike. The shoal water of the bay ex-
tended up to Montgomery street (now half a mile inland from the docks)
the front was soon crowded with hundreds of old sailing ships in
which men had come from everywhere and which had been deserted by
crew and passengers alike as soon as they reached the anchorage The
Pacific Mail Company put on a line of steamers to Panama.

HAMLET BECOMES A CITY IN A DAY

In population the hamlet became a city in a day. Portsmouth Square
was the heart of things and the frame and canvas settlement grew out
from it m the three directions that the water permitted. It was the first

4s AMERICAN* BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

attack in the conquest of steep hills covered with shifting sand. There
were forests at no great distance, but no mills had invaded them and
lumber was so scarce and valuable that ingenuity was taxed in contriv-
ing such shelters from the weather as were never seen anywhere else and
which would not have served in a climate less mild. A cosmopolitan pop-
ulation not easy to control was incited to gambling and lawlessness by the
stream of nuggets and gold dust flowing in from the mines.

John Williamson Palmer gives this vivid picture of the times: "In
the first six months of 1849 fifteen thousand souls were added to the
population of San Francisco ; in the later half of that year about four
thousand arrived every month by sea alone. At first the immigrants were
from Mexico. Chili, Peru, and the South American ports generally ; but
soon our own Americans began to swarm in. coming by way of Cape
Horn and Panama, or across the plains : and the number of these was
swelled by the addition of thousands of deserters from the shipping, and
by a struggling contingent from China, Austria and the Hawaiian
Islands. Probably two-thirds of these newcomers proceeded at once to
the mines, but those that remained to try their fortunes in the city were
enough to give to the city at the end of the year a population of twenty-
five thousand — mostly men, young or of middle age, very few women,
fewer children, with here and there a bewildered matron or maiden of
good repute. Here were British subjects, Frenchmen, Germans and
Dutch, Italians, Spaniards, Norwegians, Swedes and Swiss, Jews. Turks,
Chinese, Kanakas, New Zealanders, Malays and Negroes, Parthians,
Medes and Elamites, Cretes and Arabians, and the dwellers in Mesopo-
tamia and Cappadocia, in Boston and New Orleans, Chicago and Peoria,
Hoboken and Hackensack.

"And how did they all live? In frame houses of one story, more
commonly in board shanties and canvas tents, pitched in the midst of
sand or mud and various rubbish and strange filth and fleas ; and they
slept on rude cots or 'soft planks' under horse blankets, on tables, coun-
ters, floors, on trucks in the open air, in bunks braced against the
weather boarding, forty of them in one loft ; and so they tossed and
scratched, and swore and laughed, and sang and skylarked — those who
were not tired or drunk enough to sleep. And in the working hours they
bustled, and jostled, and tugged, and sweated, and made money — always
made money. They labored and they lugged ; they worked on lighters,
drove trucks, packed mules, rang bells, carried messages, 'waited' in
restaurants, 'marked' for billiard tables, served drinks in barrooms,
'faked' on the plaza, 'cried' at auctions, toted lumber for houses, ran
a game of faro or roulette in the El Dorado or the Bella Union, or
manipulated three card monte on the head of a barrel in front of the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 49

Parker House ; they speculated in beach-and-water lots, in lumber, pork,
flour, potatoes, in picks, shovels, pans, long boats, slouch hats, knives,
blankets and Mexican saddles. They were doctors, lawyers, politicians,
preachers, gentlemen and scholars among them ; but they all speculated
and as a rule they gambled. Clerks in stores and offices had munificent
salaries; $5 a day was the smallest stipend even in the Custom House,
and one Baptist preacher was paid $10,000 a year. Laborers received a
dollar an hour; a pick or a shovel was worth $10; a tin pan or a wooden
bowl, $5 ; a butcher's knife, $30. At one time the carpenters who were
getting $12 a day struck for $16. Lumber rose to $500 a thousand
feet, and every brick in a house cost a dollar, one way or another.
Wheat flour and salt pork sold at $40 a barrel ; a small loaf of bread was
fifty cents, and a hard boiled egg a dollar. You paid $3 to get into the
circus and $55 for a private box. Rents were simply monstrous ; $3,000
a month in advance for a 'store' hastily built of rough boards. The
Parker House paid $120,000 a year in rents, nearly one-half of that
amount being collected from the gamblers who held the second floor :
and the canvas tent next door, used as a gambling saloon, and called the
El Dorado, was good for $40,000 a year."

In spite of the mad, excited life of day and night, the churches were
crowded on Sundays. In the Mission district bull fights, bear baiting,
prize fights, horse races and duels were held.

In a settlement which suddenly found itself with thousands of
newcomers before any proper system of policing could be established,
it is not surprising that depredations were common, murder not infre-
quent and that banded ruffians, known as "Hounds" and "Regulators,"
terrified the city by acts of. robbery and violence. The Vigilance Com-
mittee of 1851 and the reorganized committee of 1856 were the revolts
of the decent citizenship of the place. Capital offenders were given a
quick hearing and a quick execution. The moral effect of the hangings
was instantaneous. The spirit of the Vigilantes has never been wholly
extinguished and in some of the crises which the city has faced in later
years — rogues have taken warning and curbed themselves in time.

The early city suffered much from fire. Six disastrous conflagra-
tions, some of them incendiary, raged between 1849 ar>d 1851. Rebuild-
ing was always prompt and experience brought about the brick store
building with iron shutters which was so prominent in the older parts
of the city up to the time of the 1906 conflagration.

RAILROADS COME

In 1852 the mines produced eighty-five million, two hundred and fifty
thousand dollars in gold. In 1853 the production was smaller by ten

50 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

millions. Some alarm at the decline was felt, the city sobered and be-
gan to curb some of its extravagances. The famous pony express was
established between San Francisco and St. Joseph, Missouri, the western
terminus of the railroad, and it became possible to send a letter by pony
and rail to New York in thirteen days. Agitation for an all rail route
was vigorously carried on and at length Congress lent its aid. In 1863
work commenced. A party of Sacramento business men, including Le-
land Stanford, C. P. Huntington, Mark Hopkins, Charles Crocker and
E. B. Crocker secured land and money concessions from the Government
to build the Central Pacific, starting from the western end. Another
company was similarly assisted to start work upon the Union Pacific
from the eastern end. As each company was to have all the line it
had laid when the two roads met, each pushed work to the utmost. The
point of junction was on the desert, near Great Salt Lake, where Stan-
ford drove the golden spike in May, 1869.

CIVIL WAR TIMES

San Francisco saw exciting times when the Civil War began. A
strong southern element attempted to swing the city and the state for
the Confederacy, but the attempt was unsuccessful. Besides sending
volunteers to the war, chief among them the California Hundred and
members of a regiment which went into action from Massachusetts, the
city, having then a population of 1 10,000, subscribed $25,000 a month
to the Sanitary Fund, being half the amount subscribed by the entire
country. It was the discovery of large deposits of silver in Nevada that
gave San Francisco its second impulse. The mines were mainly owned
and controlled by San Franciscans. Speculation was indulged in on a
vast scale. Fortunes were made and lost in the stock market every day
on the reports that came from the mines at Virginia City. The Corn-
stock Lode produced six millions in silver in 1862. The stock of one
company actually soared above three thousand dollars a share. In the
next decade fabulous sums were mined from the Consolidated Virginia
and the Gold Hill Bonanzas. Belcher and Crown Point produced forty
millions in four years. Consolidated Virginia paid dividends of three
hundred thousand dollars a month.

Among the practical miners who went to Virginia City and took hold
were James W. Mackey and James G. Fair. At length James C. Flood
and W. S. O'Brien joined them and the four men got possession of Con-
solidated Virginia when its shares had only a nominal value. The
quartet worked the mine and unearthed a fabulously rich vein. The
stock went up and up until the four reaped enormous fortunes. They

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 51

joined C. P. Huntington, Charles Crocker and others in building beau-
tiful palaces on Nob Hill, San Francisco, and A. S. Hallidie invented the
cable car in order that they might reach their commanding retreat with
ease. The Comstock was a potect factor in all of San Francisco's finan-
cial affairs for many years. Many of the city's present fortunes were
founded in those days.

DESTRUCTION AND REPLACEMENT OF THE CITY

Such was San Francisco's beginning and such were some of the im-
portant events that developed its character and influenced its later af-
fairs. At the dawn of 1906 the city had become a powerful municipality
of more than 400,000 population; it was rich, individual and delight-
fully attractive to visitors from any and every section of the world. Or.
April 1 8th of that year befell a catastrophe such as never -visited another
city. Many cities never could have recovered from such a blow. Peer-
less San Francisco not only recovered, but its rejuvenation was so speedy,
so more than complete, that an unparalleled disaster may be treated
merely as an incident of the city's history. The destruction and re-
placement of the city will be dwelt upon briefly and the reader will then
be asked to consider San Francisco as it is today.

At 5:13 on the morning of April 18, 1906, the central section of the
California coast was visited by what is technically described as a No.
9 earthquake. The quake came at an hour when the fewest possible
number of citizens of San Francisco were stirring, and the loss of life
was very much lighter than it might have been under other circumstances.
A very few persons were killed outright by collapsing walls or falling
fragments. The lower business district of the city suffered most severely
because it stood upon "made ground" — ground which had been reclaimed
by filling in the original tide flats of the bay. The material damage from
the earthquake proper was estimated at five or six million dollars. Cor-
nices tumbled, a few buildings collapsed, many old structures were ren-
dered unsafe, and nearly every chimney in the city fell. Considered in
the light of what followed, the shake was trivial. The movement of the
ground snapped electric wires and water mains. Fires broke out in a
score of places. Some of these were extinguished, but soon the damaged
pipes refused to yield more water and the city lay helpless before the
leaping flames. Chief Sullivan of the Fire Department had been killed
in his bed, but his men remained as calm as men could under such cir-
cumstances. They were soon joined by troops from the Presidio, Gen-
eral Funston placing the city under martial law, and the one fighting
agent left them was employed— dynamite. Ordinarily the fire might

52 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

have been controlled by blowing up the frame structures in its path,
but not such a fire as this. The flames were leaping a mile into the air,
the roar was deafening and terrifying. From their refuge in Golden
Gate Park or the more distant hilltops the stricken populace, numbed
by the suddenness and scope of it all, looked down upon a spectacle such
as no other people ever witnessed.

On the night of April 2Oth, after three days of burning, burning,
burning, the city lay in shards. At the end of a week the diminishing
pall of smoke unveiled a spread of destruction such as never before
had frozen the tears in human eyes. Skyscrapers had vanished. As one
gazed up from the Ferry there were no unplumbed wrecks in the
strange skyline. All that would yield an inch lay prone in bits. Some of
the streets were entombed forty feet deep beneath the sharded walls
which had lined them. But it was neither the piles of broken bricks
nor the pits of sifted ashes which made the tongue of the beholder cleave
to the roof of his mouth. It was the steel skeletons of buildings frcm
which the flesh of stone and mortar had been seared, steel skeletons which
now drooped like lillies after a frost. They made it plain that nothing
of value might lie unconsumed beneath the bricks.

Five hundred and fourteen city blocks had been swept clean. Three
thousand acres of ground — more than four square miles — had been de-
nuded of buildings which had covered them solidly. Twenty-eight
thousand buildings were destroyed ; five thousand of them were of hteel,
stone and brick construction ; the remainder were of frame. About hah
of these buildings were occupied for mercantile, office and manufacturing
purposes ; the ether half were dwellings and hotels. The entire business
portion of the city was consumed, and more than half of the better resi-
dential section. The building loss was appraised at four hundred million
dollars; the complete loss, including consequential damages of all kinds,
was not less than one billion dollars.

\Yhen the fire had yielded to human control nearly half a million
men, women and children found themselves, for the most part, living
in shelter tents, or huddled, with no shelter at all, about the scant heaps
or stuff they had saved on the lawns of public parks and squares ; their
food the loaves doled to bread lines and the tins of meat, fish and fruit
pitched into their outstretched hands from soldier guarded drays.

Never did transformation crowd so hard upon the heels of devasta-
tion. Three years after San Francisco was wiped out one hundred and
fifty million dollars worth of stately buildings had arisen to eii'ace the
scar the fire made. One could stand upon the slopes of Twin Peaks and
gaze down across a majestic sweep of domes, towers, spires and roofs
to the Ferry building four miles away and hardly be conscious of the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 53

gaps that remained. In three years the new city won back the ground
and began then steadily and solidly to fill in the chinks. Five years after
the disaster the visitor could gain no knowledge whatever of the path
of the fire or its ravages except from the lips of his guide. In the re-
placement San Francisco became the heaviest and best paying employer
the world ever saw. Sixty thousand workers of the building and allied
trades set all building records at naught. \Yages were never so high in
history. The railroads were overwhelmed with the freight billed to
San Francisco. Ships came from around the world with building sup-
plies. Cost of materials, like cost of labor, soared. There was frantic
demand for haste. Many skyscrapers were built with three crews work-
ing day and night until they were completed. Carpenters got from ten
to twenty dollars for putting in an extra day on Sunday. Twenty
thousand horses were deliberately worked to death in the first two
years. Their value was figured into the estimates on the contracts. Re-
inforced concrete construction was employed on a scale unheard of
before because it was rapid. Labor troubles, a national money panic,
countless vexations came to try the spirits of beset San Franciscans, but
they never faltered. They proved that. their city was indeed the won-
der of the world. Rebuilding was, without exception in any business or
residence district, on a larger, more costly scale than before. New San
Francisco, completed, represented an investment of five hundred mil-
lion dollars.

In rebuilding the purview of the people remained broader than their
peninsula. The city was alive to its world importance. That San Fran-
cisco was to the Pacific Coast what New York was to the Atlantic states
was not the only, not the chief consideration. Ocean roads that lead
to Australia, Alaska, the Islands of the Pacific converge at the Golden
Gate. That San Francisco realized its importance as keeper of a world
gate shows upon the face of imposing new buildings. The city is re-
lieved of its one-time geographical isolation by the commercial and po-
litical developments in oriental countries. There is the matter of Panama
canal whose opening will usher in the era in which the Pacific Ocean
must become the theatre of leading events. Saving 6,000 to 7,000 miles
in travel and two months in time in the passage from east to west, the
impetus which commerce must receive from the canal is beyond estima-
tion. At first short-sighted persons saw in the completion of the great
ditch no advantage, and only a loss to San Francisco. It was suggested
that the commerce of New York and the Atlantic with the Orient v. ould
henceforth pass through the canal and no longer through San Francisco.
Then a geographical fact developed which proved this couid never be
true. It was found that ships coming through the canal and bound

54 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

for China, Japan, the Philippines, Siberia or Siam, following t'.ie great
circle, would pass within two hours run of the Golden Gate! Naturally
all ships would enter the harbor to break the voyage, to take on sup-
plies and fuel — in the main cheap fuel oil of which California offers so
inexhaustible a supply. The city took note that European travel and
European emigration would come to San Francisco almost as readily
as it might come to New York.

PANAMA-PACIFIC INTERNATIONAL EXPOSITION

It has been said of San Franciscans that they do not do things by
halves. The truth of the assertion was demonstrated by the manner in
which the city, backed by the state, set out to hold the great Panama-
Pacific International Exposition in celebration of the opening of the
Panama Canal to the ships of the world. The Exposition was first pro-
posed in a banquet speech in 1908 by Reuben B. Hale, a merchant. Early
in 1910 the city began to take active steps in the matter. First of all the
endorsement of the national government must be secured. New Orleans
loomed suddenly as a powerful rival in asking the same endorsement at
the hands of Congress.

On April 28, 1910, a mass meeting of prominent citizens was held
in the Merchants' Exchange. It was an afternoon meeting and busi-
ness was all but suspended while it was in progress. Charles C. Moore,
who presided, stated that it was necessary to raise as large a subscription
as possible in order that the committee of citizens about to leave for
Washington to work with the Congressional committee could make a
showing of the city's earnestness. In two hours and thirty-six minutes
the gentlemen present subscribed the sum of $4,089,000. The scene was
one of the wildest and most enthusiastic ever seen even in this city of
thrilling history.

Congress took no final action at that session, and when the committee
went to Washington again in the fall of 1910 they carried pledges from
city and state to the total of $17,500,000. Congress was asked, not for
money, but for a resolution inviting the nations of the world to par-
ticipate in an international exposition at San Francisco in 1915. After
a hard fight the city finally won over New Orleans on January 31, 1911,
by a good majority, whereupon Congress, at the request of the generous
Crescent City, made its action unanimous. San Francisco celebrated its
great victory fittingly.

The first important step of the Exposition committees was to choose
Charles C. Moore as President and General Manager of the Panama-
Pacific International Exposition. In time Allan Pollok was chosen as

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 55

Comptroller, Harris D. Connick as Superintendent of Construction, Fred-
erick J. V. Skiff as Director in Chief of Domestic and Foreign Exhibits,
and Willis Polk, Clarence R. Ward and W. B. Faville as Supervising
Architects.

Several sites for the big fair were proposed and warmly advocated. In
the end a compromise was made which differed from most compromises
in that it pleased everybody. Under its terms the Exposition goes not
into one place, but into several places. It will occupy a part of Golden
Gate Park adjacent to the Stadium, all of Lincoln Park extending from
Golden Gate Park to Harbor View, and a large tract at the latter place.
Buildings will crown eminences all the way along the northern water-
front from Harbor View to Telegraph Hill, and a magnificent boulevard
will connect all parts of the Exposition.

President Taft turned the first spade of earth for the Exposition at
the Stadium on October 14, 1911, at a function which for brilliance and
numbers has seldom had an equal on the Pacific Coast. Beyond all doubt
the energetic San Franciscans will succeed in their determination to give
the world the greatest exposition it has ever seen.

THE CITY OF TODAY

San Francisco today is the most modern of cities. No other city
has ever built on wholly modern lines for no other city was ever built
in a day. One may travel about all day without encountering a dilapi-
dated structure or one that bespeaks a vanished generation. Extreme
modernity does not stop with the new buildings and their equipment. It
extends to all the institutions of the city. The system of protection
against fire,' for instance, includes the most improved engines, trucks and
apparatus. The new water mains are ninety-two miles in length. The
auxiliary reservoir system forever precludes a repetition of the water
famine that came with the great fire. Three reservoirs on the highest
hill-tops in the city hold twelve million gallons of fresh water, supplied
by pumping artesian wells. Two large fireboats connect readily with the
mains on any of the wharves. Then there are ninety-five cisterns, each
of seventy-five thousand gallons capacity, located under the streets
throughout the city. Pumps stand ready to draw salt water from the
bay into mains at any time if that should be necessary or desirable.
Such a system of fire protection is entirely unique among cities.

Plans for a vast comprehensive sewer system were adopted. The
concrete mains, almost like subways beneath the city, represent many
new ideas in this sort of construction. Xo other American municipality
has a sewer system to compare with this one. Many engineering dif-

56 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ficulties has to be over-come on account of the peculiar topography. In
places it was necessary to drain valleys over hills. The system of re-
pavement of the streets did away with basalt blocks and cobbles except
where the steepness of hills demanded that sort of footing for horses,
and used asphaltum upon a firm foundation, greatly reducing the noise
of traffic.

An early undertaking in the new city looked towards the acquisition
by the municipality of its own water system, with Hetch Hetchy Valley
and Lake Eleanor, at the summuit of the Sierras, as the sources of sup-
ply. The Federal government, after an exhaustive hearing, gave per-
mission of the use of the water and the construction of dams and pipe
lines upon public lands. By vote the people authorized the issuance
of bonds. The first water is to come from Lake Eleanor with I letch
Hetchy available when the lake does not meet the full demand. The
franchise of the Geary street and Ocean Cable Railway having expired,
bonds were issued for the reconstruction and operation of the line as a
municipal property. Bonds were sold to cover the erection of splendid
grammar and high-school buildings throughout the city at a cost of live
million dollars. In addition to the usual courses, these schools have in-
dustrial and manual training departments ; even cooking is taught. The
salaried School Board consists of men who devote all their time tc the
work, and who, with the superintendent of schools, conduct all the city's
public educational affairs. The San Francisco Institute of Art develops
the young artist. Business and commercial schools are numerous and
of high standing.

The fire of 1906 was felt nowhere more heavily than in the ciiy's
libraries. Books could not be moved out of the path of flames. "With
determination the city set out to replace volumes that were reduced to
ashes. The public library is temporarily housed in several buildings in
different parts of the city. Andrew Carnegie proffered seven hundred
and fifty thousand dollars for a central library building. Erection of the
permanent buildings was deferred until buildings could go up such as
would ornament the city while providing for the convenience of a book-
loving people. By purchase and by gift the stock of books in the pub-
lic libraries were soon brought up to a fair standard. The gradual
accumulation of new, and of rare, volumes will give the city one of the
notable libraries by the time the permanent buildings are completed. The
.Mechanics Mercantile Library moved back into its reconstructed home
on Post street in the business heart of town in the summer of 1910 bet-
ter equipped than before the fire. The famous Bancroft Library of
Pacific Coast History has found a home at the L'niversity of California.
The Academy of Sciences will build up its scientific working library at

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 57

its new home in Golden Gate Park. The Bohemian Club saved some of
its rare editions as a nucleus around which to build anew. Both the
city and the Bar Association maintain law libraries.

Religiously San Francisco comprises nearly every known creed and
faith, as shown by its churches. The Roman Catholic is the strongest
numerically and has the largest number of houses of worship. St.
Mary's Cathedral is chief of these, though there are several large and
imposing structures. The new Episcopal Cathedral on Nob Hill, upon
the site given by the property heirs, is one of the most commanding
edifices to be found anywhere. The temple of Sherith Israel Congrega-
tion is the most splendid of four large Jewish synagogues. All the Prot-
estant denominations are represented, including Christian Science.
There is a Buddhist Temple. Chinatown has many joss houses. The
Young Men's Christian Association has a three hundred and fifty thou-
sand dollar home. The Salvation Army never ceases its labors in this
great port city. There are numerous societies and organizations grow-
ing out of the churches which engage in charitable and uplifting work. '

The city contains half a dozen great hospitals in charge of surgeons
and physicians eminent in their profession. Among these are the South-
ern Pacific, Lane's, St. Mary's, St. Luke's, Hahnemann, Mt. Zion, Adler,
McNutt, St. Winifred and Children's Hospitals.

San Francisco has always been famous for its hotels. When the orig-
inal Palace Hotel was built in Comstock days it was the finest hotel in
the world. The Palace of today ranks among the best, as do the Fair-
mont and St. Francis. They contain respectively 688, 511 and 700 suites
and rooms. A dozen hotels are in a class but little below them. The
city would have no difficulty in comfortably caring for one hundred
thousand visitors ; at the Portola celebration and carnival in October,
1909, seventy-five thousand were cared for comfortably for four days.
The great white Fairmont, crowning Nob Hill, commands an incom-
parable vista of bay and land. The guest, nourished upon all that the
gardens of California afford, and environed by all that makes luxurious
appeal to the human senses, may loll in the windows and watch the
world sail by in ships. It is doubtful if the classic beauty of this noble
marble pile is anywhere surpassed. The new Palace is more modern than
the old one which had housed kings, presidents and princes. The es-
sential features of the original building are preserved in the new. The
palm court is there, and somehow the atmosphere of the old place is there
too. The grills are larger even than before. On the opening night more
than two thousand persons sat down simultaneously to a table d'hote
dinner whose excellence suggested that a chef must be giving his in-
dividual attention to each of the small round tables. The St. Francis

58 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

overlooks green and blooming Union Square, and thus, may claim an
ample garden though situated in the midst of downtown. The fur-
nishings, service and ballrooms of these hotels are all that might be ex-
pected in hostelries which fashionable society loves to invade for its
pleasure. The Hotel Stewart has a never ending stream of Army and
Navy uniforms in its lobby. The Argonaut, Manx, Jefferson, Granada,
Normandie are of the class of hotels that might reflect credit upon any
city. There are many strictly family hotels and large elaborately fur-
nished apartment houses are so numerous that one guesses that they
must house at least half of the well to do class. The San Francisco apart-
ment house is a place of rare convenience for the lightening of house-
hold labor. It has been suggested that San Franciscans do not chafe at
the restrictions of space for the reason that they spend so much time
out of doors.

Among both the men and the women of the city clubs are numerous
and influential. Best known of these is the Bohemian Club, whose build-
ing on Post street is one of the most attractive club houses in the United
States. This club, whose symbol is the owl, stands for the fostering of
literature, art, music and the drama. In the fifty years of its existence,
it is numbered among its members many celebrated authors, artists, actors
and wits. Within its walls, plays and poems have been written and the
painter has drawn the inspiration for his picture. The club stands for
rarest good fellowship. The club owns a redwood grove of four hun-
dred acres at Monterio in Sonoma county where the famous Mid-Sum-
mer Jinks, lasting two weeks, is held each year. The Jinks conclude with
a play acted and sung by members, especially written and composed for
that year. These plays are the work of men of high ability and they have
established an unique standard in outdoor art. The stages embrace an
entire hillside, and the illumination has developed something new in
dramatic effects. The Pacific Union Club purchased the Flood mansion
on Nob Hill and had the place reconstructed to fit the club purposes. The
Family, University, Elks, Argonaut and Concordia Clubs are also in
their own buildings. The Press, Union League, Army and Navy, Trans-
portation, Merchants, and Southern Clubs have excellent quarters.
Among women's clubs the California, Century, and Town and Country
Clubs possess attractive buildings of their own.

The hills upon which San Francisco is built afford unlimited oppor-
tunities for beautiful homes, opportunities which the citizens have not
been slow to grasp. The finest residences command an inspiring view
of the bay or of the ocean. Pacific Avenue, Broadway, Washington, Jack-
son and California streets have long held preference among men with
fortunes to spend in building their homes. Presidio Terrace is a marvel-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 59

ously beautiful, though small, residence park. In later years the build-
ers of homes overlooking the bay have developed an architecture not seen
in other cities. It partakes of the Moorish and Mission but adds a new
element to the combination. The earliest era of extensive home building
found redwood plentiful and the people in a mood for ornate decora-
tions. The result was gimcrack-covered houses that offended the canons
of good taste. Most of the early houses bulge with bay windows —
even the office buildings have them without number. The new city pre-
sents a more harmonious attractive appearance.

PECULIAR CLIMATE

The builders have had wide latitude in shaping their homes on account
of the mildness of the climate, a climate that is peculiar to the peninsula
and that is unlike that even of the opposite side of the bay. The aver-
age summer temperature is about fifty-nine degrees, the average winter
temperature about fifty-two degrees. From May day until November
rain seldom falls at all. The lack of hot weather and the lack of really
cold weather is responsible for unusual costuming upon the streets. A
gentleman in tweeds and a straw hat may be escorting a lady who does
not conceal her pleasure in her costly furs. This is what Samuel Wil-
liams has written of San Francisco's climate: "There are not only days
but weeks when the skies are indescribably glorious. The Nile valley
is not so sweetly balmy, southern Italy not so rich in mellow splendor.
The golden sunshine permeates every pore, quickens every pulse of life.
The air has an indefinable softness and sweetness, a tonic quality that
braces the nerves to a joyous tension, making the very sense of existence
a delight. We may cry for blankets while the East swelters in dog-day
heat ; we throw open our doors and windows while you are cowering
beneath the sharp stings of winter. A wine you know not of is the dry,
clear, intensely electric air of this land of the Setting Sun." The fogs
which grow in the Golden Gate at certain seasons have a beauty of
their own and they are seldom chilling; most persons find them bracing
and pleasant.

GOLDEN GATE PARK AND THE PRESIDIO

The climate made Golden Gate Park possible. This park is half a
mile wide and four miles long, extending to the ocean's edge. Originally
it was a waste of sand. Cultivation under skilled hands has made it a
garden where trees and flowers from every clime, from every part of the
world, grow luxuriantly out of a carpet of grass. There are smooth
drives, walks, lakes, bowers, a conservatory, an aviary, buffalo and deer

60 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

paddocks, bear pit, observatories, children's playground, baseball grounds,
tennis courts, handball courts, bowling greens, speedways, and a great
stadium where twenty thousand spectators may watch games, races or
field events. This park is in every sense the playground and recreation
ground of the people. During most of the year a band plays the best
music at an elaborate music stand at the site of the Mid-Winter Eair of
1894 in the center of the park and these concerts are attended by crowds
that range from twenty to sixty thousand. The Memorial Museum,
which grew out of the Mid-Winter Fair, contains many treasures and
attracts crowds every day of the year. A Japanese tea garden presents
a real bit of old Japan. Stow lake affords excellent boating and fly-
casting. The men and boys who make and sail model yachts have a lake
all their own. The bird life on the lakes and everywhere through the
park is delightful and unusual. Many good statues are to be seen. The
Pan Handle, one block wide and eight blocks in length, provides a parked
approach. Throughout the city are many smaller parks and beautiful
squares and these, together with public playgrounds are to multiply in
accordance with an adopted plan.

Where the park meets the ocean stands the Cliff House, sixth struc-
ture to be erected upon its projecting rock. The Cliff House has been
famous ever since the days when it was to be reached only by riding
seven miles in a stage coach. In the old days so many interesting things
occurred there that the golden cumbered miner who came to indulge in
a champagne bath found that he created no splash outside of his own
bathtub. Since Captain Foster opened the Seal Rock House on the
cliff in 1858 the place has been favored by bon vivants. Who has not
gone there to eat a steak three inches thick? Certainly several presi-
dents have. The new Cliff House is a handsome concrete structure. A
few rods away the Asiatic cable comes up out of the sea. The beach
is a popular playground. Adjoining the Cliff House are the Sutro
baths and above is the quaint garden known as Sutro Heights. The
wide boulevard that stretches for miles southward along the water is
one of the celebrated driveways of the world. This suggests one of
the reasons why San Francisco leads nearly all American cities in the
number of its automobiles.

The Presidio is an interesting place. Here are located batteries of
big guns that protect the Golden Gate, in conjunction with those of Fort
Miley, Fort Baker and Alcatraz Island. In addition to these companies
of heavy artillerymen, there are always companies of infantry and cavalry
and light artillery corps quartered at the Presidio. The officers and their
families live in picturesque cottages. The social life of the Presidio is

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 61

«

part of the social life of the city. Glittering uniforms grace every large
function.

The water front of the city enchants its visitors. It is the same water
front that Stevenson, Norris, Stoddard and other authors loved and
wrote about. Stevenson said no other port offered such an opportunity
for the study of sea architecture. At the southern extremity is the
huge drydock at Hunter's Point. Next is the Union Iron Works, where
many vessels of the navy have been built. From the Union Iron Works
to the busiest ferry in the world, and from the ferry to where Telegraph
Hill marks a bend in the shore the wharves are arud with the hulls of
many nations. Steam finds here its bravest, sail its largest exemplifica-
tion. The red disk of Japan, the Union Jack of Britain, the emblems of
France, Germany and the South American republics are occasionally re-
lieved by the colors of Italy — even of Russia. When Man-o'War row
is not crowded with armor-clads, half a dozen liners drop the hook
there while they catch their breath. The stout steam lumber carriers
peculiar to the Coast puff in and out and crowd the light-draught stern-
wheelers which ply up the rivers. Little giants of the tug fleet are for-
ever straining in and out of the Golden Gate with their stately tows. The
lime-juicers, the vagrant windjammers and the enginedriven tramps exude
an atmosphere of spice islands, mysterious treasure cruises and the stiff
romance of green water. Around the bend of Telegraph Hill the quaran-
tine boats, custom boats and black colliers divide the landing space with
the fishing flotilla of the Italians and Greeks, who have the lagoon at
Fishermen's wharf as home port for the lateen-rigged small craft in
which they brave the sea in quest of crabs, lobsters and a hundred
varieties of fish. The swarthy fellows cling to the colorful caps and
sashes of their native Mediterranean. They are peaceful enough ex-
cept when the Chinese fishermen sail their junks upon the fishing grounds
claimed by the others. Under the guns of Fort Mason the Southern
Pacific Railroad Company has built landing slips which serve as side
doors to the city, and the Government is carrying out a system of docks
for its transports. The docking facilities of the port are being steadily
and comprehensively extended. The first ships that come through the
Panama Canal will find that ample berths are ready. The shipping, the
white and yellow ferryboats and the flocks of gulls are sights of which
visitors never tire.

It has been said that a man of any far country might come into San
Francisco and, no matter what his dress or his speech, he could find a
place where they could understand him and serve him the food to
which he was accustomed. The city's restaurants and cafes offer every
known variety of cookery, some varieties that seem to have developed

62 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

on the spot, and an atmosphere that makes the food itself but a part of
the pleasure of the meal. On or close to Market street, usually in roomy
basements, are to be found glittering cafes whose day begins at noon
and lasts until daylight the next morning. They serve choice viands and
rare products of the vintner to the accompaniment of an orchestra and
often of singers. After the theatres they become cafes chantant. They
are frequented for the length and variety of their menus and for the
glitter which increases as darkness comes on. Away from Market street
and mainly to the north of it are to be found the French, Italian, Mexican
and Turkish restaurants where the guest finds cookery that is in no
sense an imitation but the real thing that it purports to be. French and
Italian cooks came early to San Francisco, they found ready appreciation,
and the traditions which they fostered have endured. In lower Broad-
way one dines as in Naples and is better served if he speaks a little
Italian, while in Bush and Pine streets he may sit long before tooth-
some French dishes, such as only a guide might find for him in Paris.
Eurdpean chefs delight to exercise their skill here because of the abun-
dant garden produce in the market all year and the endless varieties of
fish in the stalls.

CHINATOWN

Chinatown is located above Portsmouth Square only half a dozen
blocks from Market street and yet if it were in farthest China it might
not be more utterly foreign in its visible phases, its methods or ideals.
The Chinaman becomes Americanized to the extent of learning the lan-
guage and the things the law forbids ; he never amalgamates, never re-
linquishes the manner and customs amid which he was born. The archi-
tecture of the quarter where dwell thirty to forty thousand Chinese,
perhaps one-fourth of them female, is bizarre and pagan. Under pagoda
domes are bazaars more magnificent than in the Orient. There is less
puzzle of blind alleys than there used to be, though the same life under
the ground. The Chinese women who appear on the street, whether
lily-foot or splay, move swiftly and silently and are always shrouded in
the impenetrable mystery of the East. Roast pig is exposed for sale on
the side-walk, with fire-crackers popping near at hand to denote the fear
of a devil, the celebration of a family event or a winning in the secret
lottery. The temples and theatres of Chinatown are elaborate. The
visitor forever elbows the Chinaman for the right of attendance upon
both places. Rich merchants maintain the solemn dignity of Chinatown,
gayly dressed boys and girls born here, light up its streets. It is by long
odds the city's best show. Its restaurants cater to curious visitors who

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 63

dip awkwardly with chopsticks into dishes of whose contents they can
only guess.

Barbary Coast, a district of dance halls and saloons, is the stamping
ground of the rough life of the port. Sailors flock here, so do soldiers,
and so often does the unwary citizen from the country. The place is
tolerated with police regulations sometimes severe and sometimes lax,
and the visitor usually includes a trip along Pacific street where the
lights are most brilliant among his nocturnal excursions.

The stores of San Francisco, particularly those where women shop,
compare with the best to be found in New York and other of the
largest cities. Stocks that are markedly complete are displayed in stores
furnished and decorated at great cost and in extreme good taste. Mod-
ern is the adjective that best describes these palaces of trade. The mer-
chant, when the city was rebuilding, felt that he could afford to show
his pride in what he expected to do. Surely he was justified for the busi-
ness and trade prospects of the city, due to the richness of the country
.round about, to the general prosperity of the people, and the influx and
impulse which the opening of the Panama Canal must bring, are and
must remain more than good.

BERKELEY AND OTHER SUBURBS

Across the bay from San Francisco, at Berkeley, is the University of
California where nearly four thousand students are enrolled. Oakland
and Alameda, on that side of the bay, contain the houses of many thou-
sands of men and women engaged in business in San Francisco who
cross the channel morning and evening. Across the bay to the northward
from the city lies pleasant Marin county and San Rafael, Mill Valley and
Ross Valley where dwell suburbanites. Over there, too, is Mt. Tamal-
pais. One climbs it via the crookedest of little railroads to get a view
that is almost without a parallel. Southward down the peninsula from
the city are many picturesque suburbs. At Burlingame is the fashionable
Country Club where society plays polo and engages in many outdoor
sports. Hillsboro, close to Burlingame is the suburban home of many
millionaires. It is to. the southward that the city proper is expanding.
Already it reaches across the San Mateo county lines. Fortunately there
is room for the greater expansion that is inevitable. Room to expand
is responsible for the fact that San Francisco has no tenement houses,
as they exist in Eastern cities. Fast electric cars enable the worker to
live where he pleases.

Market street is a broad, ideal highway for pageants. In the past
it has witnessed many of them and doubtless it is to witness many even

64 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

more brilliant and impressive. The people love a carnival. The city
owns a system of flag-staffs, electric illumination devices and banners
which can be set up in a day. The Portola festival of 1909, with its
illumination, pageants, including Chinese and Japanese sections, is ad-
mitted to have set a standard for shows of that class. The revel with
which the city annually welcomes the New Year is unique. The natural
beauty of the surroundings seems to foster the carnival spirit, seems to
inspire celebrations. There is an infection in the air. At times it de-
mands an outlet in some great general expression. Many writers have
noted this infectious wine of life. The spirit of the San Franciscan at
play is reflected in many books and tales. The elegance and number of
the theatres attest the nature of the people. San Francisco, warder of
the Golden Gate, works hard and earnestly upon the problems that point
her great destiny. Occasionally she lays down her tools for a season of
play and the visitor permitted within the gates at such a time engages in
the merry game and finds it rare and good.

THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX AND

TtLDEN FOUNDATIONS

R «•

Vol. I— B

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2
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a

I-H

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O

THE IMPERIAL VALLEY

IMPERIAL COUNTY FOR A DECADE — THE IMPERIAL VALLEY — IRRIGATION
OF THE VALLEY — PROTECTION FROM COLORADO'S FLOODS — CHARLES
R. ROCKWOOD — W. F. HOLT — TOWN OF IMPERIAL — CALEXICO —
BRAWLEY — HOLTVILLE — EL CENTRO — HEBER AND WESTON.

In the extreme southeastern part of California, with Arizona on the
east and the republic of Mexico on the south, is Imperial county which
embraces the main portion of the valley whose great possibilities are
not exaggerated by its name, and whose reclamation and salvation, despite
the handicaps and the dire threats of nature, present to the American peo-
ple one of the most noteworthy examples of human determination and
engineering genius in the national history. And for this practical romance
and wonderful achievement which have given homes and prosperity to
thousands of good Americans, the reader and admirer of southern Cali-
fornia history has only to retrace the events of the past decade which
have transpired in this gem of the old-time Colorado Desert.

IMPERIAL COUNTY FOR A DECADE

In 1900 the population of Imperial county, according to the United
States census, was confined to the 817 Indians of the Yunia reservation;
the last census (1910) gives the county 13,591 people, of whom 11,047
were residents of the valley, or the townships of Brawley, Calexico, El
Centre, Holtville and Imperial. The urban centers of population in the
Imperial Valley embrace five cities which bear the names of the town-
ships, as well as the village of Heber just northwest of Calexico. El
Centro and Imperial cities have populations of 1,610 and 1,257 respec-
tively; Brawley, 881 ; Calexico City, 797; Holtville City, 729.

THE IMPERIAL VALLEY

This garden spot of southern California ; this fertile tract of three
million acres, stretching eighty-four miles from north to south and fifty-

67

68 AMERICAN" BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

four from east to west, with its perennial fields of cotton and alfalfa, its
teeming vegetable gardens, its luscious beds of berries, its burdened grape
vines, its green patches of plump melons, and its groves of dates, figs,
oranges and lemons, which are bravely struggling toward the perfection
of the other varieties which have so finely acquitted themselves : — this
really imperial valley of southern California, with its prosperity founded
upon the inexhaustible richness of its deep alluvial soil, was a desert
tract in December, 1900, when work was commenced on the Imperial
Canal system into which water was not actually turned until March,
1902. Then the blossoming of field and orchard, of village and city, be-
came a thing of magic.

The main line of the Southern Pacific, from Yuma to the pass through
the Chucawalla mountains and thence to the coast, traverses that part
of the basin which is still a desert of sand and gravel. The road runs be-
tween the mountains and a great ridge of wind-driven sand to Imperial
Junction, where it throws out a branch to the south and binds together
Brawley, Imperial, El Centro, Holtville, Heber and Calexico. From Im-
perial Junction the line continues in a northwesternly direction near the
eastern shores of Salton sea, a lake four hundred square miles in area
and two hundred feet below the level of the ocean which, within this
same notable decade, was known as Salton Sink and has been thus trans-
formed from the vast overflows of the Colorado river to the east. The
prodigality of the Colorado created the Imperial Valley, and it was from
the fury of its waters that it was finally saved by the Southern Pacific
Company backed by all the financial and engineering strength of that great
corporation. But that is a matter to be spoken of more at length after
the preliminary steps have been traced which resulted in making the Val-
ley known to the country, and letting the first water into its parched soil
of vast latent strength and fertility.

A few miles south and west of where the railroad approaches Salton
sea the character of the country begins to change, and between the south
end of that body and the gulf of California are more than three thousand
miles of rich alluvial land. The soil is silt that was carried in suspension
by the waters of the Colorado and deposited by the periodical overflows
of that river into the basin now known as Imperial valley. It is hun-
dreds of feet in depth and as rich as Nile mud.

IRRIGATION OF THE VALLEY

Water for the irrigation of this redeemed valley is now taken from
the Colorado through great cement gates planted just above the inter-
national border line at what is known as the Hanlon heading, and con-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 69

ducted by the old Alamo channel and main canals southward and west-
ward through .Mexico to Sharp's heading, and thence northward again
across the border to the distributing system of canals and ditches con-
trolled by the Imperial Water Company.

There are about seven hundred miles of canals in the system, pro-
viding for the reclamation of about 325,000 acres of land on the Amer-
ican side and 200,000 acres on the Mexican. On the American side
about 200,000 acres are reclaimed and irrigated, and exclusive of closing
the break of the Colorado made by the floods of 1905-1906 — the cost of
the system has been less than $4,000,000. The United States reclama-
tion service has projected a great canal from Laguna dam westward
through the Yuma Indian reservation to a point just northwest of Han-
Ion heading, thence paralleling the Imperial canal for about half its dis-
tance in Mexico and turning northwest into California, whence it has
been surveyed to the northern line of the county between the hilly sand
ridges and the eastern districts of the Imperial valley. This project is
known as the High Line canal and, if constructed, will add 120.000 acres
to the irrigable land of this section of the state. The "high land" has
been temporarily withdrawn from entry pending the decision of the gov-
ernment as to the feasibility of the canal.

PROTECTION FROM COLORADO'S FLOODS

A general picture of the work which has been accomplished in the
Imperial valley in the way of protecting it from the Colorado floods and
reclaiming the land to the uses of the husbandman and the comforts of
the home-seeker is thus given by the Imperial I 'alley Press of a late
date: "Imperial valley is desert only in the matter of climate. It is a
land of little rain. It is not the home of cactus and sage, and in no
respect does it resemble the deserts of Nevada and Arizona. Its native
vegetation consists chiefly of cottonwood, willow, mesquite and grease-
wood, and is vivid green instead of gray. Before the break of the Colo-
rado in 1905 the annual summer overflow of the river usually sent some
water into the central and northern part of the valley by way of shallow-
channels, and lakes were formed in depressions in many places. Along
the water courses and about the lakes, mesquite, cottonwood and willows
grew rankly. The inrush of the whole volume of the river in 1905-6
cut the shallow arroyas to gorges from thirty to sixty feet in depth and
from a hundred yards to a mile in width, drained the lakes and created
the Salton sea. The gorges of New river and the Alamo now serve as
drainage channels for the irrigation system, solving a problem that would
have puzzled the engineers.

70 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

"The half of the valley south of the Mexican border comprises the
delta of the Colorado, and much of it is under water during the summer,
a partly submerged forest of willows, cottonwoods and mesquite, varied
by vast swamps of tule and cane. In the winter, when the water sub-
sides, the open lands are covered with grasses that furnish pasturage for
tens of thousands of cattle. The Colorado left its old bed in the summer
of 1909 and is now flowing through the delta forests to the gulf. Ob-
viously it is a gross abuse of the term to call that region a desert.

"When the irrigation project of Imperial valley was inaugurated, the
Colorado was about ready to make one of its periodic excursions into
the basin. It had made a start in 1891 and partly submerged the salt
works at the bottom of the bowl, but the flood of that year was only a
'flash' and did not last long enough to make a deep cut in the bank, and

MAGNIFICENT LEVEE WHICH PROTECTS THE VALLEY

the river returned to its old course and resumed the preparatory work of
building up the ridge from which it would eventually rush down into the
basin below sea level. The real problem of the engineers, had they but
seen it, was not how to get water into the valley but how to keep it out.
They made an intake at one of the points of inflow of the flood of 1891,
but their headworks were only temporary structures and when the river
launched one flood after another against the frail barrier the gates went
out and the Colorado went on its appointed way to carry on its ages-
old task of filling the basin with fertile soil.

"How the big problem of control of the Colorado was solved for the
time by the titanic work of forcing the floods back into the old channel is
an old story. The break was closed, but the permanent works required
for complete mastery of the river were not constructed, and in 1909 the
Colorado made another break westward below the levees and again left
its bed. The engineers had recognized the real problem and forseeing

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 71

renewal of the river's efforts to continue its constructive work in the
basin, had built a barrier to its northerly flow that turned the flood into
the channels of the delta to find its way to the gulf by way of Hardy's
Colorado. How to keep the water out is no longer a problem ; it is merely
a matter of construction of substantial barriers."

The floods of 1905-6 were the most imposing and threatening mani-
festations of the power of the Colorado which have been witnessed by
the Imperial valley since it entered the lists of American progress. The
late William E. Curtis wrote of them as follows in the issue of the
Chicago Record-Herald of May 6, 1911: "All of the irrigation works
projected by the California Development Company were done as cheaply
as possible, and to increase the inflow from the Colorado river into the
irrigating canals a channel about half a mile long was excavated in 1904

PRESENT CEMENT HEADGATES

at a point four miles above the international boundary. During the great
floods of the Colorado river in 1905-6, the swift flowing waters enlarged
this cut from its original dimensions — forty feet wide by eight feet deep
— to a width of one hundred feet and a depth of more than twenty feet,
and the managers of the irrigation company entirely lost control of the
situation. Conditions made it impossible to head off this flow. There
was no material to use for dams, and if the company could have em-
ployed all the shovels in the world the water would have carried away
everything they could have thrown into it.

"When the managers realized that the overflow was beyond their con-
trol they appealed to the Southern Pacific Railroad Company, which runs
through the Imperial valley, and borrowed $200,000 to build dykes to
protect the farms of the settlers. This was very soon found to be im-
possible.

"The water came in so fast and enlarged the channel so rapidly that

72 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

within a few weeks it was 1,100 feet wide and 60 feet deep. Practically
the entire river came down that way. If it had been permitted to con-
tinue it would have filled up the entire valley to an indefinite depth
and swept away property estimated at a valuation of $22.000,000 and
the homes of 10,000 people. It would also have wiped out the govern-
ment works at Yuma and millions of dollars' worth of property belonging
to citizens on the Arizona side of the river.

"Theodore Roosevelt, who was president at that time, called upon
Mr. Harriman, president of the Southern Pacific Railroad, to take charge
of the situation and use the extensive forces at his command to close the
artificial channel and turn the river back into its natural bed. The gov-
ernment had no money or authority to do anything, and Mr. Harriman
responded to the appeal of the president. The entire construction force
of the Southern Pacific Railway was called into the work. The railway
company spent $1,636,063 in rescuing the people of Imperial valley ;
dumped 3,000 cars of rock and 8,000 car loads of gravel upon wooden
trestles driven into the bottom of the channel.

"Mr. Cory, the engineer in charge, said : 'The entire river was com-
ing down through this second break. The width was 1,100 feet and the
depth varied, but reached a maximum of about forty feet. The river
was in sandy soil that eats away like so much sugar ; no more staple ma-
terial than that for hundreds of feet in depth, with sides as easily eroded
as the bed. Many engineers came out to look at the work — for it at-
tracted a great deal of attention — and I think without exception they re-
garded us as being little less than crazy to think we could divert that river
before the coming spring floods. However, we went to work and put a
trestle across that break and brought in rock at a tremendous rate and
dumped it from the trestle. It may interest you to know that for three
weeks two divisions of the Southern Pacific system, embracing about
1,200 miles of main lines, were practically tied up because of our de-
mands for equipment and facilities. We had a thousand flat cars ex-
clusively in our service, and shipping from Los Angeles' seaport — San
pedro — Was practically abandoned for two months, until the work was
finished.' "

CHARLES R. ROCKWOOD

There are probably no personalities which so closely carry along with
them the entire history of the Imperial valley as those of Charles R. Rock-
wood and W. F. Holt. Mr. Rockwood has been called a dreamer, but the
people of the valley know that he has been a doer in the most determined
and practical way. He is a Michigan man, now in his fifty-third year.
After an incomplete university education and three years of active en-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 73

gineering in Colorado, in 1880, then but twenty, he joined the en-
gineering corps of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway, and from 1882 to

1889 was in the same line of service with the Southern Pacific. After
being connected with the United States Geological Survey for a time, in

1890 Mr. Rockwood was appointed chief engineer of the Northern Pacific,
Yakima & Kittitas Irrigation Company, organized for the purpose of re-
claiming the lands of the Yrakima valley, state of Washington. Two

CHARLES ROBINSON ROCKWOOD

years later, after the railroad had withdrawn its support from the pro-
ject on account of the "hard times," Mr. Rockwood accepted a com-
mission from John C. Beatty to examine and report on the feasibility of
irrigating certain northern Mexico lands. In the prosecution of this work
he discovered and made known the possibilities of the Imperial valley
above the international boundary line.

Mr. Rockwood's narrative of how he came to discover the Imperial
valley is here reproduced from a paper which he contributed to the

74 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

magazine edition of the Cale.vico Chronicle of May, 1909 : "Early in
1892, while located at North Yakima, Washington, I received a letter
from one John C. Beatty, writing from Denver, sending to me a pros-
pectus and plans of what was called the Arizona & Sonora Land & Irri-
gation Company. They proposed to take water from the Colorado river
and carry it on to a tract of a million and a half acres in Sonora, which
they claimed to own. The board of directors of the company consisted
of several of the leading financial men of Colorado, and Mr. Beatty's de-
sire was that I should make them a proposition whereby I 'would become
the chief engineer of that project and undertake the construction of its
proposed canals.

"After a correspondence extending over a period of four or five
months, I finally met Mr. Beatty at Denver in August, 1892, and entered
there into an agreement with this company, and in September of that
year came to Yuma in order to outline and take charge of the project of
their company.

"In Denver I met Mr. Samuel Ferguson, who afterward became con-
nected with me in the promotion of the California Development Com-
pany, and who was at that time the general manager of the Kern County
Land Company. Mr. Ferguson had written to me previously asking me
to become the chief engineer of the Kern County Land Company, situ-
ated at Bakersfield, California, and he met me in Denver in order to out-
line their project to me before I might close with Mr. Beatty. As the
Kern county canal system was partially completed, I decided to under-
take the new project rather than the rebuilding of an old house, with the
result, that I came to Yuma in September of the year 1892 and under-
took surveys to determine the feasibility of the Arizona & Sonora
Land & Irrigation Company's proposition. After projecting these sur-
veys I decided that the irrigation of the Sonora. land at the time was en-
tirely unfeasible and reported to my people that, in my opinion, they
would lose any money they might spend on the project.

"In the meantime, however, while these surveys were in progress I
had taken a team and made a trip into that portion of the Colorado
Desert which is now known as the Imperial valley. We knew that dur-
ing the flood of the Colorado river in the year 1891 the overflow had
found its way into this territory. Mr. Hawgood, at the time the resi-
dent engineer of the Southern Pacific Company at Los Angeles, had for
his company made a study of this overflow and from the data at his
command had compiled a map of the territory. This map as well as the
government surveys of 1854 and 1856 showed that not only was there
in all probability a large area of fertile land in the valley, but that these
lands lay below the Colorado river and could be irrigated from it. Many

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 75

years before this, Dr. Rosencraft, of San Bernardino, had attempted to
get the government to bring water into the Colorado Desert, and I be-
lieve that General Fremont also attempted to get the government to turn
the water into what is now known as Salton sea, not for the purpose of
irrigation, but for the purpose of creating a large inland lake in the hope
that it would ameliorate the severe climatic conditions that obtained in
this territory.

"The result of my investigations at this time was such as to lead me
to believe that, without doubt, one of the most meritorious irrigation
projects in the country would be bringing together the land of the Colo-
rado Desert and the water of the Colorado river.

"In the preliminary report made to the Denver corporation early in
the year 1893, I urged them to undertake the surveys which might be

SUNSET ON SALTON SEA

necessary in order to prove or disprove my belief, and I was authorized
to run preliminary lines in order to determine the levels, the possible
acreage of available lands and, approximately, the cost of construction.

"They were so well assured from the nature of my preliminary re-
port that the Colorado Desert project was a meritorious one that they
immediately took steps to change the name of their company from the
Arizona & Sonora Land & Irrigation Company to that of the Colorado
River Irrigation Company, and assured me that if my report, after mak-
ing the necessary surveys, was sufficiently favorable, that they had back
of them a fund of two million dollars to carry out the project.

"I undertook then during the winter of 1892-3 very careful surveys,
starting from a proposed heading about twelve miles above Yuma at a

76 AMERICAN BIUGRAI'IIV AND ( 1HXKALOGY

point called the Pot Holes, situated about one mile below the Laguna
dam of the Reclamation service ; the surveys extended from this point
into the Colorado Desert and around to the Southern Pacific Railroad in
the neighborhood of Flowing Well."

\\'e pass over the obstacles encountered in getting the right-of-way
through the northern Mexico lands for the construction of the canal
and the vexatious financial difficulties of the succeeding seven years, all
of which were bravely surmounted by Air. Rockwood, with the stanch
support of such men as Samuel Ferguson, A. H. Heber and George Chaf-
fey. In 1896 the California Development Company had been formed with
Mr Rockwood as vice president (subsequently president). The Imperial
Land Company was organized in -March, 1900, for the purpose of un-
dertaking the colonization of the lands of the valley, and in the following
month it entered into a contract with the California Development Com-
pany, with Mr. Rockwood as president, by which the former should be
allowed to acquire and own the town sites in the valley and the Develop-
ment Company should confine itself to furnishing the water The sign-
ing of this contract marked the real commencement of practical work
in the irrigation and the colonization of the Imperial valley.

Under the direction of Mr. Rockwood, C. N. Perry, for several years
one of his engineering co-workers, began the survey at Flowing Well,
his superior being at the time absent in New York attending the annual
meeting of the California Development Company Having obtained per-
mission from the Mexican government to construct the canal through the
lands of the southern republic, Mr. Rockwood returned to the Imperial
valley, completed the surveys upon which the present system of dis-
tribution is based, and, with Thomas Beach as superintendent, com-
menced the construction of the canals. The only water in the valley at
that time was at Blue and Cameron lakes and at the Calf holes in New
river, northwest of the town site of Imperial.

Continuing the story in Mr. Rockwood's words: "Imperial \Yater
Company Number i had been formed, settlers were coming in in large
numbers, and the Imperial Land Company, under Mr. Ferguson's man-
agement, in connection with the Mutual Water Company, was to find all
of the funds necessary for the construction of the distributary system.
Outside funds, however, were not forthcoming. The process of lifitng
ourselves by our bootstraps was not entirely successful. We were sell-
ing water stock on the basis of $8.75 a share payable one dollar down,
the remainder one dollar per year, and this one dollar had to go to the Im-
perial Land Company to pay for its actual expenses in advertising and
expenses it was necessarily put to in bringing the people into the valley ;
consequently there was nothing left for construction. Mr. Chaff ey had.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 77

r.

78 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

however, advanced some money for this purpose and at my earnest
solicitation a new agreement was entered into whereby the responsibil-
ities for the construction of the distribution system was taken from the
Imperial Land Company and placed upon the California Development
Company"

After explaining the unfortunate financial conditions which prevailed
for several months after construction of the irrigation system had been
inaugurated, he tells how Calexico, Brawley, and the other towns in the
valley came to be, or "happened:" "Calexico, which derives its name
from a combination of California and Mexico, simply happened The
engineering headquarters of the company were first established at Cam-
eron lake, but I decided for permanent quarters to erect the company
buildings at the international line on the east bank of the New river.
When the buildings were established at this point we knew that we
would build a town on the line but its exact location was not fully de-
termined upon. Mr. Chaffey laid off the town of Calexico at the point
where it is now established, in the fall of 1901, and placed the property
on the market, but it was soon withdrawn from sale for the reason that
the Southern Pacific Railroad in building the branch through the valley,
desired to run straight south from Imperial to a point near the inter-
national line, from which point they would swing eastward toward Yuma.
The railroad would have been so built and the town of Calexico would
then have been located to the west of New river and about two miles
west of its present location, but for the fact that it would have thrown
a portion of the town site on a school section which was held by a lady
living in Los Angeles, who refused to listen to what we believed to be
a fair offer for her property, and as we were unable to obtain the lands
necessary for our uses, we got the Southern Pacific to run the road
from Imperial straight to the present location of Calexico.

"The townsite of Brawley was not, in the first place, controlled by
the Imperial Land Company. The Imperial Water Company No. 4 had
been organized and the major portion of its stock sold in a block to
J. H. Braly, a banker of Los Angeles, who had undertaken the colon-
ization of this tract of land. In the agreement with him, he was to have
the right to locate a townsite within the tract. Afterward, before the town
was started, the properties owned by Mr. Braly were re-purchased by
the Imperial Land Company and the Oakley-Paulin Company, and the
town was laid out on its present location. Mr. Heber desired to name
the town Braly in honor of Mr. J. H. Braly, but as the latter refused
to have his name used in connection with the town, it was named Braw-
ley in honor of a friend of Mr. Heber's in Chicago.

"The town site of Holtville was selected by Mr. W. F. Holt and laid

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 79

out by him under an agreement between himself and the Imperial Land
Company.

"The history of El Centre is so recent in the minds of the people that
it is not necessary to refer to it here except to say that these lands were
originally selected as a townsite by Mr. W. F. Holt, and he gave at that
time to the town the name of Carbarker. The Imperial Land Company,
realizing that the establishment of a town at this point would not only
injure its property in Imperial but would also injure the investment of
the many people who had already purchased property at that point, made
a contract with Mr. Holt whereby it agreed to buy from him the lands
on which Carbarker was located, and the townsite of Holtville as well.
The Imperial Land Company, after paying many thousands of dollars
on this contract, found that it was unable to carry out its contract on
account of the depression due to the agitations in the year 1904-5, and
it made a new contract with Mr. Holt whereby it agreed to turn back
to him the town site of Holtville and the lands on which Carbarger had
been located on condition that the establishing of a town at the latter
point should be abandoned.

"The townsite of Heber was named in honor of Mr. A. H. Heber."

Water was turned into No. i of the main canal for irrigation in
March, 1902. Then commenced the fight against shortage of water and
the incursions of the river floods, hampered by a shortage of funds, the
troubles culminating in 1905 which was a year of five 'floods of unusual
severity. By the month of August the entire river, by the caving of the
banks of the intake and of the canal below, had been turned aside into
the canal and thence into the Salton Sink, thus forming the sea. In
April, 1906, Mr. Rockwood had completed what was known as the Rock-
wood gate, and which was carried away by the flood of the same summer.

In June, 1905, the management of the California Development Com-
pany had been turned over to the Southern Pacific Railroad Company,
and after the going out of the Rockwood gate in the summer of 1906 it
turned over its entire trackage facilities to the task of turning the Col-
orado river back into its old channel which so long had been bearing its
floods toward the gulf of California.

"Quarries from all over the country were brought into requisition and
passenger trains were ordered to give way to the rock trains that would
be required," says Mr. Rockwood, and what is probably one of the most
gigantic works ever done by man in an equal length of time was then
inaugaurated, and the work of filling the channel began. Most of the
cars used were of the pattern called Battle Ships, carrying fifty cubic
yards of rock, and the trains were so handled that for several days, or
until the fill was above the danger point, one car of rock was dumped

80

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY* 81

on the average every five minutes night and day. This plan was success-
ful. The Hind dam was completed and the water turned down its old
channel toward the gulf of California on the 4th of November, 1908.

"The river did not stay long turned, however. A few weeks after
the closure had been made, a flood came down the river which broke
under the earth levees which had been constructed from the Hind dam
down the river for the purpose of preventing an overflow from entering
the channel below the dam.

"The floods which had occurred during the year 1905-1906 had caused
a deep deposit of silt upon the lands below the dam. This silt deposit
was filled with cracks, and when the Hind dam was completed, the water
at first raised above the natural ground surface and lay against the levee
to a depth of from four to eight inches in the neighborhood of where
the second break occurred.

"Even this slight pressure of water found its way beneath the levee
in many places, and a large gang of men was required to prevent it from
breaking, but nothing was done to make it safe, and when the next flood
came down the river in December, 1906, it broke under the levee and
again the waters turned down to the Salton sea.

"This second break was closed in the same manner as the first had
been; on the nth day of February, 1907. After repairing the second
break the levees were rebuilt and extended farther down the river and,
in my opinion, they will now stand any pressure that may come against
them ; and I believe that the people of the Imperial valley are now en-
tirely safe from the probability of destruction due to future floods in
the Colorado river — not that these floods may not occur, but because it
is impossible that the flood waters of the Colorado should again find
their way to the Salton sea, but as the river has been twice turned, it
can be turned again by the same means should it ever become necessary
to do so."

W. F. HOLT

W. F. Holt, now of Riverside, appeared in the valley in 1900, several
years after the pioneer work had been accomplished by Mr. Rockwood,
but he surely "eat up the ground," like a blooded race-horse after he once
arrived. From the first he has been a wonder of practical foresight, intense
physical and mental energy and finely marshalled efforts. Fortunately he
has behind his constitution the out-of-door, farming stamina of Northern
Missouri, a good banking and business training in his native state, Col-
orado and Arizona, and a firm and enthusiastic faith in the future of
Southern California and the southwest; and that faith has all but removed
mountains in the path of his progress within the past few years. In the

82 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

pushing forward of his plans Holtville, El Centra and other towns have
arisen; the centers of population and scattered farmers have been united
into a closely-knit community by telephone and railroad; electricity, in
both light and power, has been distributed throughout the Valley ; manu-
factories, banks, newpapers and churches have been founded — and Mr.
Holt is the father of them all, although he is still in the vigor of middle
age. As he believes, and as Imperial Valley earnestly hopes, he has yet
thirty years of fruitful effort before him. But, as Mr. Holt would say
himself — "to get down to facts."

In the sketch of Mr. Rockwood the founding of Imperial, Calexico
and Brawley have been narrated at some length, as were Mr. Holt's con-
nection with them. In 1902 Mr. Holt completed a telephone line through
the valley and founded the Imperial Valley Press, its first newspaper.
During the same year he took the first steps in railroad building, and in
1903 incorporated the Holton Power Company, through which the most
important improvements with which he has since been identified have
been conducted. The electrical power plant was built at his town of Holt-
ville (first called Holton), and by 1905 its founder had covered the valley
with an electric system which included Holtville, Imperial, Brawley and
Calexico and, later, El Centro. In that year he also completed the twelve-
mile railroad from Holtville to the town site of El Centro, the section to
Imperial being surveyed at his own expense. He thus completed what
the California Development Company had failed to do, and when El Cen-
tro was laid out by the land company formed at Redlands in July, 1906,
he largely centered his activities at El Centro. He erected business blocks,
an opera house, a hotel, an ice plant, an electric and steam plant, and
founded numerous other industries. He launched the Imperial Valley
Gas Company, with headquarters at El Centro, and in 1906 established
the Valley State Bank at El Centro and the Citizens Bank at Holtville,
having during the previous three years founded similar institutions at
Imperial and Calexico and bought the Imperial Valley Bank at Brawley.
During the dark period of the "floods" he never wavered in his develop-
ment and building movements and more than any other one personal force,
held the settlers together until the coming of brighter times. In August,
1907, during the season of floods and gloom, his El Centro ice plant
burned, but he rebuilt at once and in the following year increased its
capacity. In 1908 he further increased its capacity, commenced building
the electric plant at El Centro and erected a water-power plant at Holt-
ville. In line with his genius for development and expansion he has even
spread his enterprises over the international boundary into Mexico. For
one man to be virtually the source of supply for the power and light, and
the means of transportation and communication, enjoyed by the people

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 83

of a truly Imperial Valley, is honor enough — but Mr. Holt is even a
greater source of benefits, as this sketch has already demonstrated.

TOWN OF IMPERIAL

In the order of their founding the five leading towns of the Valley are
Imperial, Calexico, Brawley, Holtville and El Centra (the county seat).

The town of Imperial was laid off by S. W. Ferguson, of the Imperial
Land Company in 1901. It was incorporated in 1904 and enjoyed that
sole distinction in the valley for three years. It has progressed from the
first, being at about the geographical center of the valley and surrounded
by prosperous ranches, stock farms, and fruit and truck lands. Imperial
is an up-to-date little city, furnished with good telephone and railroad
service, electric light and power, and all the modern requirements of an
intelligent and progressive community. Some of the finest brick blocks
in the valley are to be found here ; the town has a handsome grammar
school and a fine high school, both well supplied with teachers and
equipped with all the modern facilities for educating the children of the
community. The same way with churches. Imperial has a Christian
church and a Methodist Episcopal church and several organizations of a
like nature. The town has organized many fraternal lodges, including
the Masons, Odd Fellows. Fraternal Brotherhood, Woodmen and Red
Men. The social life of the community is another attractive and binding
force. Women's improvement clubs are doing much toward beautifying
the town as similar organizations are doing in other parts of the valley.
From the temperance standpoint, Imperial is a "dry town," but is full of
good, rich wholesome life. It enjoys a complete city government, and has
several miles of cement sidewalks and well graded streets. The city has
two well organized banks — the First National and Imperial City ; a first-
class hotel, daily and weekly newspapers, an auditorium for public gather-
ings, and brisk and substantial merchants and professional men.

CALEXICO

Calexico originated in 1901 when the California Development Com-
pany established engineering headquarters near the international bound-
ary line on the east bank of New river. The settlement finally consol-
idated just north of the line in California (although it still straggles over
the boundary), but retained its hybrid name, and in 1903 was laid out
into lots by the company. The town proved of good solid material, as the
country around it was not only the equal of any in the valley, but the
land was among the first to be irrigated and improved. Its tributary

84 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

country includes the rich district to the west, known as "No. 6" from the
company which supplies it with water, and which contains some of the
best paying farms in the valley; No. 7 to the east; and to the south the
richest portion of old Lower California (Mexico). There are really no
competing towns north of Calexico on the railroad until El Centro is
reached.

Calexico was incorporated as a city of the sixth class in April, 1908.
In the following year a bond issue of $20,000 for improvements of the
streets and parks and building of a city hall was taken up, and the good
work has since gone merrily along. Good streets, cement sidewalks, at-
tractive residences, a $10,000 brick school building (including high
school), and prosperous business houses are some of the strong points to
be noted about Calexico. The First State Bank handles its finances and
the Hotel Calexico takes care of the traveling public and not a few res-
idents. Its newspaper, the Chronicle, has both daily and weekly editions.
Four churches have organizations — the Methodist Episcopal, Congrega-
tional, Catholic and Christian Science — and social and fraternal life is
represented by the Modern Woodmen, Woodmen of the World, Fraternal
Brotherhood and Odd Fellows. Finally, but by no means last in import-
ance, Calexico is "dry" and as ideal a residence town as any in the Im-
perial Valley, notwithstanding the proximity of the border.

BRAWLEY

Brawley is the northern gateway to the Imperial Valley, through
which pass its varied products over the Southern Pacific railroad. Its
founding by J. H. Braly, the Los Angeles banker, in 1904, and its christen-
ing as Brawley, in honor of a Chicago friend of A. H. Heber, have been
noted. It is now the third city in the valley, both in population and age
—although it is still a five-year-old. Brawley's steady growth and present
solidity are based on the wonderful adaptability of the surrounding
country in the production of cantaloupe melons, alfalfa and other hay
crops, and its adaptability to market gardening and poultry and live stock
raising. As stated by a local observer and writer: "Beginning at the
Southern Pacific depot are the cattle shipping and immense cantaloupe
packing sheds, the latter the largest in the world. The daily freight train
for Los Angeles picks up here, almost every day, from one to four cars
of cattle, hogs or sheep, and the refrigerator car attached carries a daily
contribution of poultry, cream and seasonable fruits. It is the cantaloupe
shipping season, however — from May to August — that the great sheds
are the center of marvelous business. From all directions teams haul the
newly picked fruit to the sheds and scores of men. adept in the work, sort,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 85

pack and ship it to all parts of the country. From the preparation and
seeding of the land to the picking, packing and shipping of the melon
crop (as the cantaloupe crop is locally known), hundreds of men are
employed and the weekly payrolls make excellent business. Immense
hay and barley crops also center in Brawley for shipment. So important
has alfalfa become around Brawley, both for cattle and hogs, that many
farmers have set their whole acreage to it, and either raise pork or feed
cattle for their cream. In the event of raising more than they can thus
use, they have a fine market for the hay and a constant demand at top
prices."

In the development of the town the Brawley Town and Improvement
Company (Philo Jones, general manager), with the Brawley Cooperative
Building Company, has been the most potent single force. Their co-
operation in the sale of lots and the erection and finishing of buildings
has been close, harmonious and effective. Householders have now both
gas and electric light. In the spring of 1908, with outlying districts, a
Union High School was organized and opened, and the town had also a
good grammar schoolhouse until the two were consolidated and the pupils
accommodated in a commodious and modern structure. Brawley is rep-
resented in the newspaper field by the News, a weekly ; the Imperial
Valley Bank attends to its money matters ; it supports two of the largest
lumber yards in the valley and its general supply stores and special busi-
ness houses are well stocked and growing concerns. Cement walks are
the rule and tree-planting ordinances are being enforced in a way to make
the town a most desirable place of residence. Brawley has the usual
array of lodges and benevolent societies, embracing the Masons, Odd Fel-
lows, Woodmen and Fraternal Brotherhood, and its religious organiz-
ations include the Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists and Catholics.
Brawley is a good place in which to live and its residents are usually
"stayers."

HOLTVILLE

Holtville, which is about the same size as Calexico, is located at the
terminus of the Interurban Railway, the line from El Centra, the county
seat, which branches from the Southern Pacific. Its origin has been told
in the sketches of its founder, W. F. Holt, and in the story narrated by
Charles R. Rockwood. Mr. Holt completed its railroad about seven years
ago, erected its electric power plant, put up many of its brick stores,
founded most of its industries and still takes a deep interest in its every
step of advancement. Holtville has a chamber of commerce, a $35,000
Union schoolhouse, cement walks, well shaded and improved streets and
comfortable residences. It is the trading point for the entire territory

86 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

east of the Alamo river ; or, in local parlance, "all of No. 7 and nearly all
of No.. 5 come to Holtville to trade." It is the center of a rich dairy
district, one of its most prosperous concerns being the plant of the Cal-
ifornia Cream and Butter Company. The Citizens' Bank, a weekly news-
paper (the Tribune), a complete lumber yard, and well stocked stores in
substantial buildings are other testimonials to the good standing of Holt-
ville.

EL CENTRO

El Centre, the seat of justice of Imperial county, exhibits the most
remarkable growth of any town of the valley, as it is both the youngest
and the largest of its important centers of population. Its founder, W. F.
Holt, commenced systematic building and development at Holtville and
Calexico in 1904. In July, 1906, with several other business men of
Redlands, he formed the El Centre Land Company, and the town was
at once laid out along modern lines with building restrictions placed on
part of the lots ; that is certain kinds of fireproof buildings, brick and
other kinds of materials should be erected in a certain district. The Hotel
Frankling was the first building in El Centro, part of it being moved down
there from Imperial. The El Centro Land Company made Mr. Holt a
proposition to give him twenty-four of the best business lots in town if
he would build on them. He accepted and built that block running from
Fifth to Sixth streets, from the Valley State Bank to the Valley Depart-
ment Store, one block 600 feet long, all brick buildings, also started the
Opera House that year. This is one of the most modern opera houses
in southern California. He also built the Masonic Hall and commenced
the ice plant, completing and putting it in operation the 6th day of June,
of the following year, 1907.

On August 2Oth of that year the ice plant burned with a loss of over
$70,000 and very little insurance. This was also at the time the water
was pouring in and about the bluest time ever seen in the valley. Mr.
Holt says the hardest thing he ever did was to muster up courage to re-
build under those conditions, not knowing where the money was coming
from, but just as quick as the ruins were cold enough to put men at
work he went at it and rebuilt the present plant, and the following year,
as soon as that was completed, he started in to increase the capacity more
than one and a half times. In 1908 he also commenced building the
electric plant at El Centro, an auxiliary steam plant, of 5,000 horsepower
and established the only steam laundry in the Imperial Valley.

During the year 1907 Imperial was formed into a new county and El
Centro was put in the race for the county seat and won out by a good
majority in August of that year. In April, 1908, El Centro was incorpor-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 87

ated as a city of the sixth class; at once voted $40,000 bonds to build a
modern sewer system and has since placed itself on record as a truly
modern municipality. Mr. Holt has never ceased to give it his best efforts
and it has become what it is largely through his abilities as a promoter,
and the splendid work of the Holton Power Company (of which he was
the "power"), the El Centre Chamber of Commerce and the Ten Thou-
sand Club. In this connection, also, is mentioned with pleasure the Ladies'
section of the Ten Thousand Club which has accomplished so much in
the beautification of the county seat. As to finances and business — the
El Centre National Bank and the Valley State Bank have the money
field, while the latter is represented by substantial mercantile establish-
ments and a progressive implement house and lumber company, as well as
several busy real estate firms and corporations. El Centre has three
newspapers — two weeklies and one evening journal; also a monthly agri-
cultural journal. The oldest paper is the Imperial Valley Press, founded
in 1901. The evening daily (except Sunday), is the Free Lance. Speak-
' ing of educational matters — El Centre has a grammar and a high school
of superior grade, a credit to southern California. It has also well-at-
tended churches, generously patronized lodges and is fully up to the stand-
ard— in things material, social and generally progressive — of much older
and larger communities.

HEBER AND WESTON

Heber and Weston are minor but promising centers of trade, with
rich adjacent districts. Heber, in the southern part of the Valley, five
miles above Calexico, on the Southern Pacific line, was named in honor
of A. H. Heber. It is the seat of the Imperial Valley Agricultural In-
stitute, has a Chamber of Commerce and a good trade in hay and live
stock.

The town of Weston is situated in the northwestern portion of the
Imperial Valley, and is the center of the famous No. 8 water district. The
newest of the towns, it has the advantage of being far enough removed
from the other natural centers of trade already established to give it a
strong assurance of a substantial future. Provisions as to real estate titles
and building are in force which promise to make Weston an attractive
place, well fitted for comfortable residences and social, moral enjoyment.
In laying out the town, the Imperial Water Company No. 8 adopted the
liberal policy of providing So and roo-foot streets, with abundant reser-
vations for public parks, schools, railroad facilities and industrial plants.
A special feature of the surrounding county is its fine adaptability to the
raising of citrus fruits.

.saws" \

AMERICAN" BIOGRAPHY A.XD GENEALOGY 91

GEORGE A. KXIUHT. Strength, courage, independence, self-reliance,
fine intellectual powers and splendid professional talent are the char-
acteristics that, coupled with personal integrity of the highest type, well
justify the designation of Mr. Knight as "one of California's foremost
lawyers and one of the nation's most brilliant orators," and further than
this, in offering succinct estimate of the man, there is naught of incon-
sistency in the following quotation : "A physique of heroic mould, a
personality pleasing and magnetic, a character of integrity and honor, a
voice the wonder of a continent, a vocabulary the envy of an Ingalls, an
articulation so perfect that no syllable or accent is lost in the largest
auditorium, and withal an eloquence as bright and as sparkling as the
purest waters of a mountain rivulet and as strong and deep as the flow
of a Niagara — such is a snap-shot pen portrait of George A. Knight."

For more than thirty years Mr. Knight has been engaged in the prac-
tice of his profession in California, and he has long been recognized as
one of the most gifted and successful members of the bar of the state
which has been his home from his childhood days. His reputation in
his chosen profession has far transcended local limitations, and his fame
as an orator is nation-wide. His influence has permeated in many di-
rections and ever along benignant lines. He is large of mind and "large
of soul, is an unconscious optimist, overflowing with kindliness and
good-will for all of humankind, and no man has a sturdier devotion to
principal. Thus he is a man of value in the world, and that value has
shown a cumulative tendency at all stages in his career.

George Alexander Knight is a scion of the staunchest of New Eng-
land stock, and the families of which he is a representative in the agnatic
and maternal lines, were founded in that historic section of the nation
in the early colonial epoch. Both gave valiant patriots to the service of
the colonies in the war of the Revolution and the lineage of both is
traced back to English origin. Mr. Knight was born in the city of
Worcester, Massachusetts, on the 24th of July, 1851, and is a son of
George H. and Elizabeth Knight, the mother a native of St. Andrews,
New Brunswick, the father of Providence, Rhode Island, from which
place he removed with his family to California and established his
home at Eureka, Humboldt county, where he ran the First hotel for
many years. He was one of the honored and influential citizens of the
county and there aided materially in the work of development and prog-
ress along both civic and material lines.

George A. Knight was two years of age at the time of the family
removal to California, in 1853, and he is indebted to the public schools
of Eureka, this state, for his early educational discipline. After the
completion of the curriculum of the high school at Oakland he there en-
tered Oakland College, in which he continued higher academic studies
for a period of three years. In outlining the career of Mr. Knight
recourse will be taken largely to a previously published review, though
such paraphrase will be made as to obviate the necessity of direct
quotation.

Those who have known George A. Knight from his childhood have
stated that the traits that characterized him at that time are the same

92 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

that have gained to him so marked popularity in later years, that is, he
has always been light of heart, courageous, generous, bright of mind and
a natural leader. In 1870, in his home town of Eureka, Mr. Knight
began the study of law under effective preceptorship, and his fine pow-
ers of absorption and assimilation enabled him to make rapid and sub-
stantial progress in his technical studies. He was later admitted to the
bar and the confidence reposed in him by the people of his home county
was soon afterward given significant exemplification, in that he was
elected district attorney of Humboldt county, in which office his ad-
ministration was such as to gain him succesive re-election and to insure
his retention of the position for six consecutive years. From that period
to the present time the people of Humboldt county have loved, honored
and claimed him as "Our George." It took young Knight but a short
time after his election to the office of district attorney to demonstrate
to the electors of Humboldt county that they had made no mistake in
conferring that honor upon him, for he at once developed such an
aptitude for his official duties, such eloquence of address and such
vigor of administration that ere long he had established a record as
one of the most successful prosecutors the county had ever had. His
eloquence in court and in local political campaigns was a source of
popular pride in Humboldt county for several years prior to the state
campaign of 1879, so that when he was invited in that campaign to
enter the broader field of state politics, the friends of his childhood
and young manhood in old Humboldt county felt assured that he would
fill the state with his fame as an orator — and he did. With the initia-
tion of that campaign, in which Hon. George C. Perkins, later United
States senator from California, was the Republican nominee for gover-
nor of this state, this young champion of the party cause suddenly
appeared in the north and, with magnetic personality, clear voice and
forceful logic, threw himself into the midst of the battle, with the
result that he gained for himself a place among the foremost orators
of the Pacific coast. This memorable contest, which resulted in the
election of Governor Perkins by a splendid plurality, cemented an en-
during friendship between the new governor and Mr. Knight, whose
appreciative intimacy has continued to the present day.

In 1880 the Republicans of the northern district insisted that Mr.
Knight should become their nominee for congress, in opposition to the
Democratic candidate, Charles P. Berry, but in that campaign the
Democratic party was in the ascendancy, with the result that Mr. Knight
was defeated by a small margin. Concerning this episode in his career
the following pertinent statements have been made : "This defeat proved
one of the most fortunate events of his life, for it took from him en-
tirely the idea of political office-seeking and created in him a fixed de-
termination to stick to the practice of law and to make for himself a
name and a fortune in his chosen profession. He removed to San
Francisco, opened a law office and began the work of his profession in
earnest. The prestige he had gained in one state campaign, coupled
with his magnetic personality, vigor, ability and force of character, at
once gave him a foothold and a standing at the bar of the western

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 93

metropolis, and his future was assured. His growth in his profession
was steady and rapid, and for years he has been regarded as one of
the very brightest lawyers of the west. The firm of Knight & Heg-
gerty, of which he is the senior member, has long held rank with the
strongest firms in the legal profession on the Pacific coast and has re-
tained the clientage of some of the wealthiest litigants of the time, be-
sides taking part in many of the most famous criminal and civil cases
in the state's history. Thus it will be seen how well Mr. Knight has
succeeded in his determination to stand at the head of his profession,
for his fame as a court lawyer and a pleader has become even national
in its scope."

Success is the prerogative of valiant souls, and this prerogative Mr.
Knight has effectually exercised, the while he has had the genius for
hard work, so that it may be realized that his talents, though brilliant,
are the very antipodes of superficiality. Early in his professional career
Mr. Knight gained prominence as a criminal lawyer, and he has ap-
peared in connection with many of the most important criminal cases
presented in the courts of his state. With his incisive logic, his resource-
fulness and versatility, and his brilliant oratory, he has won splendid for-
ensic victories. His fame as a criminal lawyer was significantly enhanced
in 1882, when he appeared for the defense, in San Francisco, in the
case of the People versus Josh Hamlin, who was charged with the mur-
der of John Massey. Hamlin had been convicted of murder in the
first degree, but was granted a new trial. In the meanwhile his at-
torney had died and when the case again came to trial Judge Toohey
appointed Mr. Knight to defend the accused man. Apropos of this
matter the following statements are worthy of prepetuation in this con-
nection : "In this case Mr. Knight, who was at the time just winning
his oratorical spurs, was pitted against the redoubtable Henry Edger-
ton. After a notable succession of court battles Mr. Knight's logic
and eloquence saved the life of his client, who secured a light sentence.
As the case was the cause celebre of its time and as Henry Edgerton's
fame as a lawyer and orator was general, the outcome of the case gave
Mr. Knight a statewide reputation. He has always considered his ad-
ress on the final trial of the Hamlin case his greatest legal forensic
effort."

Another noteworthy vehicle by which Mr. Knight's reputation as a
.lawyer was significantly advanced was his defense of Dr. Lewelling
Powell, charged with the murder of Ralph Smith, editor of the San
Mateo Gazette, at Redwood City. There were five trials in this case
and the final result was acquittal. In the case on appeal it was de-
cided that the statute authorizing the change of venue to the people
was unconstitutional. Mr. Knight appeared as attorney for Cordelia
Botkin, charged with murder, by poisoning, of two women in Dover,
Delaware. This case involved several important questions never be-
fore presented for adjudication in the California courts, and the list of
important criminal-code victories won by Mr. Knight might be am-
plified far beyond the limitations of a sketch of this order. In later
years he has given his attention largely to the civil branch of his pro-

94 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

fessional work, and in the same his powers have been even more suc-
cessfully employed. He was retained in the litigation over the great
estate of Thomas Blythe, the contest of the will of Jacob Z. Davis, and
was attorney for Charles L. Fair in the latter's successful contest of the
will of his father, Hon. James G. Fair, who served as United States
senator from California. It is not necessary to multiply instances of
important professional achievements on the part of Mr. Knight, for his
record in this connection is a very part of the history of jurisprudence
in California. He has appeared in the various state and federal courts
of California and also before the supreme court of the United States,
in which he has presented briefs that were veritable models in the
conciseness and pertinence and strength of argument.

A previously published resume of the career of Mr. Knight has
effectively outlined his activities in the domain of politics, and from
the same are taken to a large extent the statements appearing in fol-
lowing paragraphs.

His devotion to his profession has not lessened Mr. Knight's in-
terest in political affairs nor abated his ardent advocacy of the prin-
ciples and policies for which the Republican party stands sponsor. In-
deed, there has been scarcely a state or national campaign since 1879
in which he has not participated. His services upon the stump have
always been at the disposal of his party, and that without the accept-
ance on his part of any remuneration for his work. He has, perhaps,
been more prominent in national politics in California during the past
quarter of a century than has any other man within its gracious bord-
ers, but always as a worker and only once as a candidate for office. He
has been a central figure in nearly all of the state conventions of his
party in California and has been considered the strongest convention
man in the state, a tower of strength to measures that have com-
mended themselves to his political judgment and a terror to a "slate"
not to his liking. He has been, with one exception, a delegate to every
Republican national convention since and including that of 1884, and
the one convention in which he failed to appear was that of 1888, when
he was on the electoral ticket of his state and received the largest Re-
publican vote of that year. He was the special champion of Elaine,
of McKinley, of Roosevelt and of Taft, and was a leading factor in
the conventions that nominated these standard-bearers.

In his historic national convention of 1884, when James G. Elaine
was made the Republican nominee for the presidency, Mr. Knight first
attracted the attention of the nation through his talent as an orator.
The California delegation of that year included a number of the state's
most brilliant public men, but when it came to the battle royal it was
the youthful Knight, then but thirty-three years of age, who stood
forth as the champion of the peerless Elaine and measured swords with
such a veteran orator as George William Curtis, of New York, who, as
editor of Harper's Weekly, had so severely criticised Mr. Elaine that it
would be impossible for him to support the latter in case of his nomination.
In the convention the feeling ran so high and the opposition to Elaine
was so intense that, in order to place such men as George William

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 95

Curtis on record, Delegate Hawkins, of Tennessee, presented to the
convention the following resolution :

Resolved, As a sense of this convention, that every member of it is
bound in honor to support its nominee, whoever that nominee may be,
and that no man should hold a seat who is not willing to so agree.

Then it was that the storm broke. The gauge of battle was thrown
down and the young California!! made such a speech in support of the
resolution as to place him at once in the front rank of political orators.
The critics of the time were forced to concede that at last the great
George William Curtis had met his match, and that match, too, a mere
youth. The incident and the address were thus described by Wells
Dury, the widely known newspaper man, who was a correspondent at
the convention :

George A. Knight, of California, followed the convention custom
and got upon a chair when he rose to poke the ribs of George William
Curtis, the best known and most distinguished member of the conven-
tion, who was threatening to bolt if the convention refused to nominate
his man, Arthur. It seemed to me in that moment that Knight was the
handsomest and most eloquent man I had ever seen or heard. He will
never improve on that speech if he lives to be a hundred. It was worth
half a lifetime just to witness that scene. It was the climax of the
convention. The excitement was greater than at any other time, — sup-
pressed but terribly, painfully, dangerously intense. That speech made
the nomination of Elaine imperative. It showed his friends could not
turn back at the supercilious behest of a handful of Mugwumps, who
were willing enough to join in the game as long as they could rule but
who were threatening ruin if their slightest wishes were disregarded.
This, Knight said, was not American; it was not honorable. He called
on such delegates to announce their fealty to the decision of the major-
ity of the convention, as had ever been done since the signing of the
Declaration of Independence, or to take themselves and their disreput-
able ideas to a more congenial companionship. That speech was never
properly reported. It could not be reported as it was delivered. Words
may be jotted down, but inflections, tones, gestures, lightning glances,
the electric communion between the speaker and his auditors, can never
be recorded. Even with the latest and greatest inventions at command,
the inspiration of the moment, the mastering passions of a great audi-
ence, must be lacking.

Every sentence, almost every word, received deafening applause,
and the tumult was beyond control. Knight had struck the keynote.
His speech was neither too short nor too long. It was a clean-cut gem,
worthy of Demosthenes or Patrick Henry. A more impassioned ap-
peal never burst from the lips of a man. It rushed forth like an ir-
resistible stream. The word had been spoken ! That was the whisper
and that the feeling in everybody's heart. The popular pulse had been
touched by a master's hand, but nobody seemed to know the magician.
Who is he ? was the impatient question on all sides. That morning George
A. Knight walked into the convention obscure and unheard of. Be-

96 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

fore evening his name was on the lips of sixty millions of people, and
a nation read his words with ringing approbation.

As has already been noted, Mr. Knight was not a delegate to the
national convention of 1888, as it was the desire of the party that he
accept a place on the electoral ticket of that year, and when the votes
were counted he led all others in popular favor. In the convention of
1892, when General Benjamin Harrison was nominated for the second
time, Mr. Knight was again a delegate and participated actively in the .
work of the convention. In each of these campaigns his voice was
heard in all sections of California, in behalf of the Republican candi-
dates and the principles of the party.

In the winter of 1895-6 there was formed in the capital city of
California an organization called the McKinley League, the purpose
of which was the securing of an instructed delegation to the national
convention of 1896, in behalf of the nomination of William McKinley
for president. Mr. Knight was one of the first to become a member
of that organization. While popular sentiment in California was known
to be very largely in favor of McKinley, yet there were very strong
influences at work in favor of an uninstructed delegation, presumably
in the interests of other aspirants for the presidential nomination. The
league had hundreds of members on its rolls, from all over the state,
so that when the state convention was held, in Sacramento, to select
delegates to the national convention, at St. Louis, a strong front was
presented against the combined influences that were determined no
"instructions" should be given. The "programme" was against in-
structions and as Mr. Knight was known as a stalwart partisan of Wil-
liam McKinley he was "programmed" to stay at home. But he knew
the people were with him, and he was with the people. He held his
peace until after the convention had been organized and the committee
on resolutions had made its report. In the meanwhile he had secured
an advance copy of the resolution of the committee as touching the
presidential nomination, the same being far from what the friends of
Major McKinley desired, and when the report was read in the conven-
tion Knight was on his feet. His very personality seemed to enthuse
the convention, and as he passed down the aisle to the platform every
delegate in the vast pavilion knew instinctively that there was "some-
thing doing." As he mounted the platform he held aloft a small bit of
paper containing a substitute resolution, absolutely pledging the Cali-
fornia delegation to the national convention to "support and vote for
the nomination of William McKinley for president of the United States
as long as his name remained before the convention ;" and the speech
he there made, with the convention's response to it, form one of the
most remarkable incidents in the history of the state. In less than five
minutes he had nearly the entire convention on its feet. The enthusi-
asm knew no bounds, the great audience joined with the delegates in
the mighty demonstration, and even a foremost representative of the
opposition mounted his chair and seconded the motion to adopt the sub-
stitute ! But the end had not yet come. The substitute was not only
adopted almost unanimously, but smash also went the "slate," and the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 97

valiant Knight was elected one of the delegates to bear the resolution
to the St. Louis convention! There he was among the leaders in the
nomination of McKinley and formed strong personal friendships with
many of the foremost statesmen of the country.

The Republican national convention held in Philadelphia, in 1900,
found Mr. Knight as one of its delegates, and on this occasion he was
invited by President McKinley himself to second the latter's renomi-
nation. Here again California's representative scored another orator-
ical triumph. Of this speech and this event Edward H. Hamilton, cor-
respondent of the San Francisco Examiner, said :

It was the oratorical triumph of an occasion when the big and pop-
ular men of the party were competing in the lists. Foraker, Roose-
velt, Wolcott, Lodge, Depew, Thurston and the rest had been on the
platform, but that evening everybody was talking of Knight of Cali-
fornia. In the first place the voice of the "Silver Trumpet," as they
called Knight in 1884, was the only one equal to the exigencies of the
great auditorium and the immense throng. People in the back rows —
thousands of them — had been for three days looking at the platform
performance as if it were a pantomime or a show of marionettes. They
suddenly heard a human voice break in among them. They hushed
their hubbub as if by magic. Here was a speaker who could compel
attention. And once Knight caught them he held them. He pioneered
the way out of the beaten tracks of declamation. He left the dread
and drear domain occupied by the "grand old party," our great leader
four years ago, and carried his hearers into a breezy realm of oratory
where there were no dry leaves and sweepings of language. As a
consequence he won the reward of the heartiest applause and the most
general popularity accorded any speaker. Shouts of laughter alter-
nated with the wild roars of approval which tell that an orator has
carried his listeners into a sort of ecstacy. Hanna's face wore a pleased
smile, and Foraker, who sat beside him. nodded approval as the big
Californian went on winning his way. Odell. in the New York dele-
gation, sat in pop-eyed appreciation. Quay leaned put in the aisle from
his seat at the head of the Pennsylvania delegation, and enthusiasti-
cally joined in the hand-clapping. Chauncey M. Depew sat with his
mouth open, drinking in the tumultuous oratorical flood, and Chairman
Henry Cabot Lodge lay back in complete relief that at last the generally
restive throng was all attention. On the cars and omnibuses going
home the name of Knight was taken approvingly by every tongue; The
hotel lobbies were ringing with his fame. He had won his triumph,
and the great men of the land were quick and eager to do him honor.

In the great national convention of the Republican party in June,
1904, in the city of Chicago. Mr. Knight added anew to his fair orator-
ical laurels. A short time before the convention was held Mr. Knight
wrote to an old-time friend, telling him that a letter from President
Roosevelt had requested his making one of the seconding speeches of
his nomination, and Mr. Knight requested his friend to make sugges-
tions as to what subjects he should touch upon in his speech. The
friend returned the only reply possible, as follows : "I know of no

98 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

man in California who can tell you what to say or how to say it. My
only advice would be to make a regular 'George Knight speech.' " And
this the recipient of the letter proceeded to do. President Roosevelt was
a man after Knight's own heart, so his theme was one that called forth
his personal enthusiasm. From the moment he uttered his first sent-
ence he had with him the thousands who packed the great auditorium
to suffocation, and before he had concluded all had forgotten every other
speech that had been made in the convention. Collier's Weekly gave
the following report of this speech :

The last day was devoted to nomination oratory. It was a severe
test for the speakers, since the day was hot and the list of speakers was
unconscionably long. The nominating address for president, by ex-
Governor Black of New York, was epigrammatic and ornate. That
of Senator Beveridge, who made the first seconding speech, was ex-
cellent, although a trifle over-rhetorical for the occasion. Indeed, the
soporific dominated in the addresses, and the big audience wearied of
it. The best speaker of the day was George A. Knight, of California.
He had terse, meaty, sense-bearing phrases, and his magnificent voice
reached every man in the great hall. His first words, "Gentlemen of the
convention," brought ringing cheers from the straining audience. His
next sentence was interrupted by a voice from a remote gallery, ''Not
so loud," and everybody, including Mr. Knight, roared with laughter.
Mr. Knight should stand hereafter with Mr. Thurston in voice attain-
ment. And his speech, as a whole, was a really great effort, — by far the
finest of the entire convention.

Following are a few of the opinions given by the leading New York
newspapers in referring to this speech :

.Mr. Knight is California's pet orator. He has a voice like a
Sandy Hook foghorn. He hadn't said three words of his speech be-
fore a voice from the gallery roared out "Not so loud, if you please,"
and this brought forth cheers and laughter, which Mr. Knight acknowl-
edged by a gracious bow. Several of Mr. Knight's utterances were
joyously applauded. — New York Sun.

George A. Knight, of California, a man of commanding presence,
with a voice so strong that a spectator in the gallery cried : "Not so
loud." wrought the audience up to a great pitch of enthusiasm. — New
York Herald.

Mr. Knight was an instantaneous hit with the convention because
of his voice. It is a voice which would carry from California to Maine.
Mr. Knight soon demonstrated that he had other qualities to recom-
mend him as an orator, in addition to a big voice. His declaration that
socialism can not live in this republic, his assertion that the party needed
Roosevelt more than he needed the party, and his clever epigrams and
sallies were enthusiastic applauded. — Neiv York Times.

The convention was treated to an agreeable surprise in the speech
of George A. Knight, of California, who revives, in physical type, in
voice and in oratorical methods, the liveliest memories of the late Robert
G. Ingersoll. He made the great hit of the whole convention and could
have stormed it for any political favor he had to ask. The applause.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 99

whenever called for, came in gusts and storm, sweeping the hall and
sometimes coming back again after it seemed to have spent its force. —
AVii' York Ereniiic/ Post.

At this convention Mr. Knight was chosen representative of Califor-
nia on the Republican national committee and was at once called upon
by the leaders of his party to enter upon a campaign tour of the east
and the middle west. He made a prompt response to this call. In the
meantime his name had been metioned in connection with the United
States senatorship in California and some of his friends advised him to
remain at home to look after his interests in that direction. But he
had heard his party's call and conceived his place to be in the thickest
of the fight, — in the states which were then deemed to be in doubt.
Wherever he went the highest pitch of enthusiasm was aroused and
the name of the eloquent Californian was on every tongue. An alarm
was sounded in New York, and all of the great spellbinders of the party
were summoned to the rescue. At Madison Square Garden — the place
of all places where the true measure of the political orator is taken —
a meeting of the giants had been called, and there, where so 'many other
aspiring orators had failed, the big Californian awaited judgment. A
press dispatch of the next day, from New York to a Los Angeles paper,
told of the result :

Standing in the presence of twenty thousand Republicans, George
A. Knight, California's silver-tongued orator got a reception in Madi-
son Square Garden last night that will be talked of in party annals for
years to come. Knight was third on the list of speakers. "Eli" Root,
the idol of New York Republicans, and Frank Higgins, the popular
nominee for governor, had already spoken at length, and the audience,
enthusiastic as it had been, was growing weary of much oratory and the
lateness of the hour. "California stretches her hands across the moun-
tains, deserts and fertile valleys tonight to the Republicans of the Em-
pire state, and bids you stand with her and give a mighty majority for
Theodore Roosevelt, the champion of human rights," said Knight, and
his victory was won. From thence on it was cheering and singing for
over and hour. . . . When Knight, after a glorious tribute to Grant,
said. "The Republican party offers you another Grant for your leader,"
a cheer went up from ten thousand throats that shook the garden. On
the platform were two score party veterans of fifty years. When Knight
spoke of them as pathfinders who had followed Fremont as the first
Republican leader, the old men rose in a body and led the most re-
markable demonstration of the night. Knight, in closing, said that in
the olden days the farmer made a man of straw and stuck him in the
fields where the crops were choice, to let the crows know where the
good stuff was. "So the Democrats have placed bogie men in the Phil-
ippines to let the people know the grand work the Republican party
has accomplished." said Knight: and the audience cheered for five min-
utes. The Californian tried to cut short time and again, to make way
for Senator Fairbanks, but each time the audience roared its disap-
proval and told him to "talk all night."

In the boxes were many distinguished Republicans, — Senators Platt

Vol. 1—7

100 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and Depew, Senator Scott, Chairman Cortelyou, Judge Blanchard, Sec-
retary Coolidge of the national committee, — most of them with their fam-
ilies. They were fairly carried away with Knight's eloquence, and
joined with a will in singing patriotic airs that punctured Knight's
triumph. Delegates from Columbia. Princeton, the University of New
York, Yale and Harvard occupied sections in the body of the house and
gave exhibitions of "rooting" never before equaled in a political gath-
ering.

All New Y^ork was at once agog over the western orator, and de-
mands by the dozen poured in upon the national committee for his as-
signment to as many different cities in the east. Probably no man on
the Pacific coast enjoys the^acquaintance and friendship of so many men
of national distinction as does Mr. Knight, and the state of California
and the entire Pacific slope thus receive the benefits flowing from this
close relationship with those who are chiefly instrumental in shaping
the industrial and political destiny of the nation.

Mr. Knight again represented his state as a delegate to the Repub-
lican national convention of 1908, in the City of Chicago, and was one
of those personally selected by Judge Taft to second his nomination for
president of the United States. This duty Mr. Knight performed in a
characteristically eloquent speech, in which he fully sustained his high
reputation as an orator. At this convention he was also chosen to suc-
ceed himself as a member of the Republican national committee, of which
position he is still incumbent. He has never been a seeker of political
office, and the only offices ever held by him were those of state insurance
commissioner, under Governor Perkins, judge advocate on the staff of
Governor Markham, and attorney of the. state board of health, under
Governor Gage. In 1894 he was made chairman of the Republican state
convention that nominated M. M. Estee for governor, and in 1908 he
was chairman of the Republican state convention that selected delegates
to the national convention of that year. In 1905 his name was presented
to the California legislature for United States senator, but his indepen-
dence of character was too pronounced to suit the elements of his party
then in control, and another was chosen.

Not lightly or casually has been given the following earnest and well
merited estimate of the character and services of Mr. Knight :

Of him it may be truly said that he has never been the "man" of
any man or set of men, but with a vigor and spirit born of honest pur-
pose, and with an independence of thought and action that all true men
do most admire, he has stood out among the people as one of the very
best types of California's stalwart manhood, — as one of her very best
specimens of citizenship. The most commendable thing that can be said
of any man is that those who know him best love him most, and this
can be said in truth of George A. Knight. He is resolute and aggres-
sive, and has the courage of his convictions. He is straightforward and
direct in his dealings with men, and will not brook deception or bad
faith in others. And, above all, he is one of the most independent of
men. He has always preserved that absolute independence of spirit where
he could afford to "salute a beggar or kick a king" without apologies to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 101

any man, — a natural inclination of the man, particularly if the beggar
were a decent fellow and the king a dishonest knave.

In a fraternal way Mr. Knight is a valued member of the Bohemian

and Pacific Union Clubs; is past grand master of Humboldt Lodge No.

77, Independent Order of Oddfellows; California Lodge, Chapter and

. Commandery No. i, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; and the Mystic

Shrine.

JOHN W. SHENK. The present incumbent of the office of city at-
torney of Los Angeles is numbered among the representative members
of the California bar and is a citizen whose progressive ideas have been
manifested in no uncertain way. Mr. Shenk claims the fine old Green
Mountain state as the place of his nativity, and the name which he bears
has been identified with the annals of American history since the early
colonial epoch.

John W. Shenk was born at Shelburne, Chittenden county, Vermont,
on the 7th of February, 1875. and is a son of Rev. J. W. Shenk. D. D.,
a native of the state of New York and a distinguished member of the
clergy of the Methodist Episcopal church, who was for many years
editor of the Omaha Christian Advocate. His mother's maiden name
was Susanna C. Brooks. She was born and reared in the state of New
Jersey. Of his father's family four sons and two daughters are living,

Mr. Shenk was about five years of age when the family home was
established in the city of Omaha, Nebraska, and after, availing himself
of the advantages of the public schools and graduating from the Omaha
High School he entered the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware,
Ohio. He was graduated from that institution in 1900, with the degree
of A. B. He came to California in September of the same year, but re-
turned to the East in October and entered the law department of the
University of Michigan, in the class of 1903, in preparation for the work
of his chosen profession. In October, 1903, he was admitted to the
bar and became eligible to practice of the law in all the courts both state
and federal. He initiated the practice of his profession in Los Angeles
and in his efforts and their attendant success soon demonstrated the
wisdom of his choice of vocation. In 1906 he was appointed deputy
city attorney of Los Angeles and on the ist of January, 1909, he became
first assistant city attorney, a position of which he continued to hold
until August 10, 1910, when he was advanced to the office of city at-
torney, in which office he succeeded Hon. Leslie R. Hewitt. At the city
election held December 5, 1911, he was elected to the office of city attor-
ney for another term by a majority of 34, 663 votes. This preferment
indicates the efficiency of his previous services and also his distinctive
ability as a lawyer. Such is his personality and his scrupulous observ-
ance of the ethics of his profession that he retains the high regard of
his professional confreres, who accord him place as one of the strong and
versatile members of the bar of his adopted state.

At the inception of the Spanish-American war Mr. Shenk was a
student in the Ohio Wesleyan University, and was one of the patriotic
young men who responded to the president's first call for volunteers.

102 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

He was mustered in as a private in Company K, Fourth Ohio Volunteer
Infantry, in April, 1898. and accompanied his regiment to Porto Rico,
under command of General Nelson A. Miles. He continued in service
until January, 1899, when he was mustered out and received his honor-
able discharge.

In politics Mr. Shenk accords allegiance to the Republican party. ,
He was reared in the faith of the Methodist Episcopal church, and has
his membership in the First Methodist Episcopal church of Los Angeles.
He is affiliated with the Beta Theta Pi and Phi Delta Phi college fra-
ternities; with South Pasadena Lodge, No. 367, Free and Accepted
Masons, of which he is past master; with Los Angeles Consistory No. 3,
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite Masons, East Gate Chapter of Royal
Arch Masons, Al Malaikah Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of
the Mystic Shrine ; and Los Angeles Lodge, No. 99, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, besides which he holds membership in the
Union League Club of Los Angeles and in the San Gabriel Country
Club. He was married June 2g, 1907, to Lenah R. Custer, to whom
was born a son of the I7th day of August, 191 1.

ROBERT McG.\RviN. Among those who have been conspicuously and
worthily identified with the development and upbuilding of "Greater Los
Angeles" and who were numbered among the honored and influential
citizens of the fair metropolis of southern California was Robert Mc-
Garvin, who there maintained his home for thirty-five years, and within
which his extensive and well directed operations in the handling of real
estate in this city and county, as well as other counties in the southern
part of the state, had marked and beneficent influence in furthering both
material and civic progress and prosperity.

A scion of staunch Scottish stock, Robert McGarvin was born in the
little city of Chatham, Kent county, province of Ontario, Canada, and
the date of his nativity was June 2, 1841. He was a son of John and
Susan ( Hughson ) McGarvin, both of whom were likewise born in Kent
county, Ontario, where the respective families were founded in the
pioneer days. The major portion of the active career of lohn McGarvin
was devoted to farming interests, and both he and his wife continued to
reside in their native county until their death. They were zealous mem-
bers of the Methodist church and he was long numbered among the in-
fluential citizens of Kent county.

Robert McGarvin is indebted to the common schools of his native
province for his early educational training. In 1861, shortly before at-
taining to his legal majority, he came over into "the states" and located
in 'Michigan, where he entered upon an apprenticeship at the trades of
carpenter and millwright. He perfected himself as an artisan by work-
ing at various places in Michigan, and after there being employed for
some time as a journeyman he went to Ohio, where he was similarly en-
gaged for a period of years. Later he went to Wood county, West
Virginia, where he entered the employ of the Logan Oil Company. After
installing oil machinery for this corporation it gave distinctive manifesta-
tion of its appreciation of his character and ability by assigning him to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 105

the management of its oil fields and incidental business, and this incum-
bency he retained for some time, in the pioneer epoch of the great oil
industry in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

In 1866 Mr. .McGarvin removed to Baxter Springs, Cherokee county,
Kansas, where he engaged in the manufacturing of carriages and other
vehicles, with which line of enterprise he there continued to be identified
until the autumn of 1875, when he came to California and established his
home in Los Angeles. Here he engaged in the same line of business and
was one of the pioneers in connection with this line of industrial enter-
prise in southern California. His carriage shop was located at 220-222
South Spring street, where he erected a two-story brick building. His
faith in future development was shown by the fact that he constructed
for this building foundations and walls of sufficient strength to permit the
building of four additional stories. This improvement was finally made
by him, and his was the first six-story building to be erected in Los
Angeles. He continued to be actively engaged in the manufacturing of
high-grade vehicles for a period of twelve years, at the expiration of
which, in 1887, he sold the business and turned his attention to the buying
and selling of real estate, in which he had previously made a number of
judicious investments. He continued in this business, and in connection
therewith handled and brought about the improvement of many import-
ant properties in his home city. Careful, conscientious and fair in all
his dealings and transactions and never making or permitting misrepre-
sentation of conditions or values, he gained and maintained a reputation
that was unassailable, and he was long one of the best known and most
influential real-estate men of Los Angeles.

In all relations and activities Mr. McGarvin exemplified the most dis-
tinctive progressiveness, public spirit and civic loyalty, and his aid and
influence was earnestly given to the promotion and support of measures
and enterprises tending to advance the social and material prosperity of
the community. He always had a most appreciative and enthusiastic
faith in Los Angeles and viewed with gratification its advancement to
the status of a metropolitan center and to the position of one of the most
modern and attractive cities in the entire Union. He had been a mem-
ber of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce from 1890, and was a
valued member of its board of directors from 1902. In politics he gave
his allegiance to the Republican party in a generic sense, supporting its
cause in national and state affairs, but in local matters he maintained an
attitude independent of partisan lines and gave his support to the men
and measures meeting the approval of his judgment.

On the 4th of July, 1869, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Mc-
Garvin to Miss Arminta Bernice, who was born at Bentonville, Arkansas.
The passing away of this representative citizen, Robert McGarvin, oc-
curred on the I7th of July, 1912.

DON C. MCGARVIN. Large of mind and large of heart was the late
Don Clio McGarvin, who died at his home in the city of Los Angeles,
on the 2ist of June, 1910. He was one of the favored mortals whom
nature launched into the world with the heritage of sturdy ancestry, a

106 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

splendid physique, a masterful mind and energy enough for many men.
Such a man could not obscure himself. He was a natural leader in
thought and action, and such was the timbre of his very personality that
integrity of purpose was a foregone conclusion. He brought his
splendid equipment to bear in connection with political affairs in Cali-
fornia and also gained prestige as one of the able and essentially rep-
resentative members of the bar of the state in which practically his en-
tire life was passed. His character was sane, clean, distinct, and marked
by loyalty to himself and to others. He placed true values upon men and
affairs, and his philosophy of life was generous and kindly marked by
deep insight but free from intolerance and stoical indifference, as his sym-
pathy was intense as was also his appreciation of the humorous side of
life. He won and retained friends, and he played well his part on the
stage of life's activities until he summoned therefrom in the very prime
of his strong, useful and honorable manhood. He loved the world and
the world loved him, and better than this can scarcely be said of any man.

Don Clio McGarvin was born at Baxter Springs, Cherokee county,
Kansas, on the 2gth of March, 1870, and as a review of the career of his
father, Robert McGarvin, appears preceding this article, it is not
necessary in the present connection to offer further data concerning the
family history. Mr. McGarvin was a lad of but five years at the time
of the family removal from Kansas to Los Angeles, California, in the
autumn of 1875, and here he was reared to maturity under most benig-
nant conditions. After completing the curriculum of the public schools
he formulated definite plans for his future career, there having been no
uncertainty or indirection in his mental processes at any period in his
life, so that it was to be assumed that he would press forward to the
mark set by himself. He decided to prepare himself for the legal pro-
fession and at the age of twenty years he began reading law in the office
and under the preceptorship of Judge Waldo M. York, but within a
short period of weakness of his eyes compelled him to abandon his
studies. Under these conditions he entered the service of the Chamber
of Commerce and, as has been facetiously stated, "conspired with Frank
Wiggins to depopulate the frozen east." At the World's Columbian
exposition in Chicago and the Midwinter Fair in San Francisco he was
first lieutenant of Mr. Wiggins, who was at that time superintendent of
the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, and he gave valuable aid in
promoting the migration schemes through which has been compassed
the wonderful growth and magnificent upbuilding of Los Angeles and
which have made her world-famous.

Concerning the various stages in the career of Mr. McGarvin there
is all of consistency in offering in this article a reproduction, with but
slight paraphrase, of an article written at the time of his death by Harry
C. Carr, one of his staunch friends and one who knew and appreciated
the sterling qualities as well as the talents of the man. The article in
question appeared in the Los Angeles Times of June 22, 1910, and from
the same the following excerpts are made :

After an illness of five days, Don Clio McGarvin, one of the fore-
most figures of political life in southern California, died yesterday morn-

AMERICAN 6IOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 107

ing at his home, No. 1547 Gramercy Place, of scarlet fever. One of
the most interesting men of California has passed. Were I asked in
a foreign country to describe a typical American, I should draw a picture
of Don C. McGarvin, who was my friend and who had died. He had
every American characteristic. He looked American ; he thought as
an American. In the middle of a crowd, in the wilds of Kamchatka, he
would have been picked out at first glance as an American. He was the
most perfect exemplification of the new race type I have ever known.
He had the true American's faculty of doing intense, accurate, tremend-
ous work in an easy, earless way. He had an American way of being
shrewd and keen without being sharp or hard. He had the American's
way of meeting his most stunning successes and his hardest bumps with
the same whimsical, humorous philosophy. He could have received
the news that he had been made king or pauper without letting his cigar
go out. He was a good loser, but he was also what is much finer and
much rarer, a good winner, because a generous, modest one.

The picture of a true American type would have been marred if
McGarvin had not been a politician. I can't imagine a man so thor-
oughly and typically American without seeing him immersed to the neck
in our great national game. McGarvin played politics unselfishly. With
him it was a kind of aggrandized sport. His political career in its im-
portant phase began in the county campaign of 1898. He was at that
time already well known in Los Angeles, for he had lived here nearly
all his life. He was in the real-estate business with his father in 1898,
when elected secretary of the Republican county central committee. He
held this position through two campaigns — that is to say, for eight
years. He showed the highest ability as a city organizer and tactician.
He never grew excited, he never was thrown into panics ; he was wary
and shrewd and keen, yet open and "square" in his dealings. He "said
it to your face." In 1005 he was made chairman of the city central
committee of his party in Los Angeles — a fierce fighting job. McGar-
vin enjoyed every minute of it — this was "the game," for all it was
worth. At the same time he was a member of the Republican^ state
central committee, which managed the Gillett campaign.

In 1902 Mr. McGarvin was elected public administrator of the
county. I don't believe that anyone else who ever held that office got
so much fun out of it. The public administrator sees life as it comes,
hot and strong; he sees life with the cover stripped off. McGarvin had
fine literary instincts, and he appreciated the little comedies and trag-
edies of the administration of his office as no public administrator ever
did before or, I guess, ever will again. While in this office he completed
his legal studies and was admitted to the bar, in 1904. After his term
expired he became associated with Judge J. W. McKinely in the law
business, and had a big practice. Mr. McGarvin was in a fair way to
be a rich man. His profession yielded him a large income and he had
made fortunate real-estate investments, particularly in Tulare county
ranch lands.

The foregoing estimate, somewhat colloquial and intimate in its in-
vestiture, brings its subject before the reader in a distinct way, and is

108 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

well worthy of perpetuation in this volume. It may be stated farther
that his early educational discipline included a course in the Los Angeles
high school and the Woodbury Business College, and that in 1904-5 he
was a student in the law department of the University of Southern Cali-
fornia. The social qualities of Mr. McGarvin were of the most at-
tractive type and he won and retained inviolable friendships, the while
he looked for and found the good in every man. He was a natural and
intellectual optimist and altruist, and while he placed no false estimates
upon men or affairs he was a force for good in all the relations of his
strong, generous and kindly life, whose close was a source of personal
bereavement to his wide circle of valued and loyal friends. His political
allegiance was of the staunchest order and he was specially sure and
resourceful in the manoeuvering of political forces. In the Masonic
fraternity he attained to the Knights Templars degrees and also held
membership in the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine, besides which he was identified with the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, the Knights of the Maccabees, and the Knights of Pythias,
as well as with the Jonathan, the California and the Union League Clubs
in his home city.

On the igth of December, 1900, Mr. McGarvin was united in mar-
riage to Miss Una Taylor Adams, of Los Angeles, who survives him,
as do also his parents. His only child, Marjorie Helen, died on the
24th of June, 1910, only three days after he himself had been summoned
to eternal rest, and thus his cherished and devoted wife was doubly
bereaved, while the home, whose associations had been of the most ideal
character, was made desolate. Don McGarvin will long be remembered
in Los Angeles, and his strength of character was on a parity with his
winning personality, which gained him friends, among all classes and
conditions of men.

W. F. GILLETT. of Holtville, is looked upon with much admiration
in the valley, for he was one of those brave, courageous spirits who
first blazed the trail into this garden spot of California, and made it
possible for others to follow in their footsteps. He helped to dig the
great canals and plow the lines for the numerous ditches radiating from
them. When he caught his first glimpse of the valley there was
nothing but sand, constantly moving, shifting hills, that changed the
contour of the surrounding country so that when one woke up in the
morning it was easy to imagine that one had had a trip on Aladdin's
magic carpet. Now, as far as his eye can reach, he sees nothing but
green fields, threaded with little silvery streams, well kept farm build-
ings, and fine groups of cattle. That he had an active hand in this trans-
formation that brought so much happiness to the human race, and gave
homes to so many people who might have been sweltering in one hot lit-
tle room in some city tenement, just the thought of this aside from his
own success is enough to bring happiness to the soul of this man.

Mr. Gillett was born in Kalamazoo county, Michigan, on the 2d of
October, 1862. His father and mother were John and Mary A. (Ed-
munds) Gillett. His father was a native of New York and his mother
was born in Vermont. W. F. was the youngest of three children born

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND, GENEALOGY 109

to Mr. and Mrs. Gillett, one of whom died, and the other, Charles E.,
is ranching in Imperial Valley. In 1868 Mr. Gillett moved his family to
Henry county, Missouri, where W. F. Gillett grew up. At the age of
fifteen he lost both of his parents and the lad was thrown on his own
resources. In 1877, when he reached his fifteenth birthday, he fell heir
to a small property. This proved to be quite a windfall to him, and
the probate judge was so struck with his manly bearing and evident
good sense that he deemed him capable of handling the property him-
self. He sold his estate in Henry county as soon as possible and moved
to Kansas. Although he had discretion beyond his years, yet he was not
experienced enough to cope with some of the sharpers and get-rich-quick
men that he came up against, consequently he lost his small patrimony.
His brother advised him to go to Pulaski, Missouri, which he said was
the poor man's county in the United States. So there the young man
decided to go, and found his brother's words to be only too true, for
there were so many poor people there that there was no chance for a
man to make anything. Seeing that there was no opportunity for ad-
vancing himself there, he decided to try the west, and moved to Salt
River Valley, in the state of Arizona. There he remained for ten years,
managing to keep his head above water, but that was about all, so in
1900, hearing of the big engineering project that was soon to be begun
out in the southern part of California, he packed his household goods
and moved to Imperial Valley. His only property of any value was his
team of horses and five dollars in cash. He drove overland by way of
Yuma, a tortuous and difficult journey. When he reached the Colo-
rado he halted and gazed across the muddy and turbulent stream, with
no ford within many days' journey of the place where they were, and
thought to himself, ''Have we come so far to be turned back on the very
edge of the land of hope?" But the C. D. Company furnished the lum-
ber from which a raft was made to cross the Colorado river. Five men
entered into this partnership, namely, W. F. Gillett, W. A. Van Horn,
L. M. Van Horn, Thomas Beach and Mobley Meadows. None of them
knew the scientific way in which a raft should be constructed, but by
dint of hard work they managed to fashion a rude craft that would bear
their weight. Upon this they loaded their families, teams 'and wagons,
and all their household goods, and set forth, rather timorously it must
be confessed, for they were dealing with an unknown element, and the
thought of seeing their wives and children swept away in the swift cur-
rent struck terror to their hearts. The crossing was made and this
sturdy band of pioneers must have felt somewhat as the Children of
Israel when the Egyptians were swallowed up by the Red Sea and they
were free to go on with their journey, for now these people felt that
with the passage of the angry river their troubles had been left on the
other side and a new life was beginning for them.

The first work performed on the Imperial canal system at Yuma
and Calexico was done by Air. Gillett. This work consisted in plowing
for the scrapers, the latter machines being handled by W. A. and L. M.
Van Horn, M. Meadows, Thomas Beach and Dennis Deane. The pay
was one-half cash and one-half water stock, but with the high living
expenses and poor pay it was impossible to make both ends meet, so

110 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Mr. Gillett left there to work on the construction of another canal, and
this proved to be the turning point in his career. The C. D. Company
furnished Mr. Gillette some Mexicans, horses and scrapers, and with
this larger outfit he was able to make things move more easily. As soon
as he could rake the money together he was off to Arizona for the purpose
of securing more horses. He brought fifteen beasts into camp and now
was fairly launched on his career as a contractor. Presently he was
doing work on a large scale and had all of it he could handle, and his
wife was able to sit down and fold her hands for the first time in many
moons, for she had been helping the family exchequer by housing and
feeding the men who were working on the canal. In addition, she
could never be certain whether she would ever sleep in the same spot
from which she rose in the morning, for the advancing work necessi-
tated a corresponding advance in their home. In these days if the rou-
tine of a household is slightly disturbed the Madame is quite ready to
have an attack of hysterics, how would she feel to come home some fine
day and see her home moving off, even her nice clean wash that she
had left on the line being bundled up and carried along? This was a
scene that Airs. Gillett had to often witness, but now she has her reward
for the uncomplaining service which she gave, for Mr. Gillett is the
owner in Number Seven of a fine ranch. In Holtville he is the proprie-
tor of the Cash Grocery store and is one of the leading citizens of the
town. His identification with the Imperial Valley has been so long and
so close that he is known throughout the valley and is universally looked
up to as one to whom the country owes more than it will ever be able to
pay.

Mr. Gillett was married to Mary C. Gilbert in 1881. Nine children
have been born to them. These are: Augusta A., John T., Harriet A.,
Alice, Charles, Bertha, Elsie, Gilbert and Jessie. Mr. Gillett holds the
distinction of being the father of the first male child born in the valley.

A strong, courageous man, who simply through the determination to
succeed won his long battle with fate, who fought his fight unassisted,
and won by the force that lay in his bare brown hands, that is Mr. Gil-
lette, and he is just one example, though one of the finest ones, of the
force of character, the grit and tenacity of the early settlers of this
great valley.

\YILSOX C. PATTERSON. In tracing the record of lives conspicuous
for definite achievement the most interesting feature of the study is to
find the key to their success. The more critically exact this study be-
comes, the more convincingly certain it is that the key is in the man
himself. Usually the men who accomplish most do it against the very
obstacles before which other men succumb. They gain not more through
special gifts than through the rallying the full forces of mind and body
into the service of their purpose. Wilson Campbell Patterson, of Los
Angeles, has illustrated in a very marked degree the power of con-
centrating the resources of the entire man and lifting them on to the
plane of high achievement ; of supplementing splendid natural endow-
ments by close application, marked tenacity of purpose and impregnable
integrity. His efforts have extended into various fields of activity and

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 113

in each he has demonstrated his resourcefulness and constructive energy.
In a preliminary way it may be stated that he is today numbered among
the representative financiers and business men of California and that he
is one of the most loyal and progressive citizens of Los Angeles, where
he has maintained his home for more than thirty years, within which
he has contributed his quota to the development and upbuilding of this
most beautiful of cities.

Wilson Campbell Patterson was born on a farm in Ross county near
Greenfield, on the loth of January, 1845, and his early training was that
gained in connection with the tilling of the willing soil and other inci-
dental labors of concomitant order. He is a son of Robert D. and
Margaret (Holly day) Patterson, the former a native of the state of
Alabama and the latter of Ohio. The father devoted the major part of
his active career to the great basic industry of agriculture and both he
and his wife passed the closing years of their lives in Ross county, Ohio,
secured in the high regard of all who knew them. -Of their children
two sons and one daughter are now living. While assisting in the work
of the home farm during the summer seasons Wilson C. Patterson availed
himself of the privileges of the district school, which he attended during
the winter terms. After completing this preliminary curriculum he
entered Salem Academy, at South Salem, Ohio, where he continued his
studies until he felt called upon to subordinate all personal interests in
order to tender his services in defense of the Union, whose integrity
was in jeopardy through armed rebellion. He withdrew from the aca-
demy and on the 4th of July, 1863, when eighteen years of age, he en-
listed as a private in Company A, First Ohio Heavy Artillery, but he
was soon assigned to detached duty and sent to the headquarters of the
Fourth Division, Twenty-third Army Corps, with which he continued
in active service until the close of the war. He made an admirable
record as a valiant soldier of the republic and received his honorable
discharge, at Knoxville, Tennessee in July, 1865.

After the close of his military career Mr. Patterson again entered
Salem Academy, from which he shortly afterward withdrew to initiate
his independent career as one of the world's army of workers, — a com-
mand in which he has been able to offer further proof of the statement
that "peace hath her victories no less renowned than war." After teach-
ing in a district school in Ohio for three months he secured a clerical
position in the office of the county treasurer and afterward with the
clerk of court and probate judge of Ross county, that state, being thus
engaged, with residence in Chillicothe, from 1866 until 1868. In 1869
he assumed the position of bookkeeper for the wholesale grocery firm of
M. Boggs & Company, of Chillicothe, and with this concern he re-
mained for the long period of nineteen years, within which he was
gradually advanced until he became one of the principal executive em-
ployes of the firm. His resignation was prompted by reason of im-
paired health, and under these conditions he decided to come to Califor-
nia. He established his residence in Los Angeles in January, 1888,
and in the same year he became a partner in a firm that was here en-
gaged in the wholesale produce and commission business. The name
of the firm was soon changed to W. C. Patterson & Company and he

114 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

eventually became sole proprietor of the business, with which he con-
tinued to be actively identified for twelve years and in connection with
which he attained a position as one of the leading factors in the com-
mercial activities of the rapidly growing city. Two years prior to his
retirement from this line of enterprise he was elected president of the
Los Angeles National Bank. This event had significant bearing in the
shaping of his future career, as his close identification with the admi-
nistration of the affairs of this important monetary institution brought
him into prominence in local financial circles, with the result that he
has gradually pressed forward to commanding position as one of the
leading bankers and financiers of the state. He continued as president
of the Los Angeles National Bank until the autumn of 1905, when, upon
its consolidation with the First National Bank, he was made vice-pres-
ident of the latter, a position that he has since retained and in which he
has proved a potent force. This is one of the great banking institutions
that have given financial prestige and solidity to the state of California
and that have had great influence in furthering the commercial and in-
dustrial progress of Los Angeles.

From an appreciative review of the career of Mr. Patterson are
taken, with but slight paraphrase, the following statements: "In public
life Mr. Patterson has figured conspicuously, as has he also in the civic
affairs of the city, though he has never been prevailed upon to accept
political office or honors, despite manv tenders of the same. Even be-
fore he came to the Pacific coast he had been influential in connection
with matters of public import. At Chillicothe, Ohio, he had served as a
member of the board of education, and his interest in the cause of edu-
cation has been of vital and helpful order during the years of his res-
idence in Los Angeles. He has served as a member of the board of
trustees of the Whittier State Reform School, at Whittier, as a member
of the California state board of charities and corrections, besides which
he was a member of Los Angeles board of education for two years and
a member of the board of trustees of the city public library for one
year. He is a trustee and also treasurer of Occidental College, one of
the excellent educational institutions of the state, located at Los Angeles,
California. He has been one of the active and valued members of the
Los Angeles Board of Trade and after serving as a member of its di-
rectorate for two years he was elected its president, an office of which he
was incumbent during the year 1892-3. He did much to promote its
usefulness and high civic ideals, and he has also been a prominent factor
in the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, of which he was made a
director in 1894 and of which he became president in the following
year : he served as executive head of the institution for two years and
made a specially admirable record in this position. During the strug-
gle, in 1906, to make San Pedro the free harbor of Los Angeles, Mr.
Patterson was one of the most zealous and influential factors in further-
ing the important enterprise. He was twice sent to the national capital
to present the matter properly before congress, and so well did he with
his conferers, accomplish his purpose that further comment in this con-
nection is not demanded ; the result speaks for itself and in no equivocal
terms."

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 115

Mr. Patterson has served as president and director of the Los Ang-
eles Clearing House Association, as chairman of various civic com-
mittees of important order, and he has frequently been called upon, and
loyally responded, to lend his time and resourceful energies in the pro-
motion of enterprises and measures for the general good of the com-
munity. His labors in these connections have invariably been character-
ized by unflagging zeal and mature judgment. It may well be said that
during the long years of his residence in the metropolis of southern
California Mr. Patterson has been a dominating factor in its higher busi-
ness and civic life, and that he has been one of those sterling citizens
of strong initiative and civic loyalty who have compassed the magnificent
progress of California within the past two decades.

Aside from his association with the First National Bank Mr. Pat-
terson is president and a director of the Empire Securities Company,
president and director of the West Coast Produce Company, vice-pres-
ident and director of the Los Angeles Pressed Brick Company, and a
director in the corporations here designated : First National Bank of
Corcoran, American National Bank of Monrovia, Home Telegraph &
Telephone Company, Security Land & Loan Company, and the Los
Angeles Trust & Savings Bank. Further evidence of his versatility is
shown forth in the following statements from a previously published
sketch: "Mr. Patterson is an effective writer on financial and civic topics
and several of his brochures have found through the press an apprecia-
tive public. In all civic movements for betterment he is always at the
forefront, and despite the exactions of his manifold business activities
he has ever been found ready to give his time, influence and energies in
support of everything that tends to conserve the advancement and pros-
perity of Los Angeles : he is a man of whom the city in general is proud."

In politics Mr. Patterson gives his allegiance to the Republican party
and he is well fortified in his opinions as to matters of public polity.
He is a member of the University Club, of which he was president for
two terms, and he also holds membership in the Sunset, California,
Union League, and Annandale Country Clubs, — all representative social
organizations of Los Angeles. Besides these organizations he is a mem-
ber of the Archaelogical Institute, the Municipal League and the South-
west Society and the Grand Army of the Republic. In the Masonic
fraternity He has completed the circle of both the York and Scottish
Rites, in the former of which his maximum affiliation is with Los An-
geles Commandery, No. 9, Knights Templars, and in the latter of which
he has attained to the thirty-second degree, besides which he is a mem-
ber of the allied organization, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine. He is a member of the Presbyterian church.

In January, 1868, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Patterson to
Miss Virginia Monette Moore, who was born in Virginia and who is a
daughter of the late Hambleton Moore, a representative citizen of the
communities in which he lived. Mr. and Mrs. Patterson have been
prominent and valued factors in connection with the best social activ-
ities of Los Angeles. They have two daughters, — Ada, who is the wife
of Harry Rea Callender, of Los Angeles, and Hazel, the wife of John
Stuart also of Los Angeles.

116 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ED. E. BOYD is one of the few residents of Holtville who have seen
the city rise from nothingness to a thriving and prosperous little city.
In him the Imperial Valley, as well as Holtville, have had an enthusias-
tic advocate and admirer, and their best interests have been uppermost
in his mind since he first became identified with this favored section of
the state of California. From an infinitesimal beginning Mr. Boyd has
evolved a splendid real estate business in Holtville, and much of the
credit for the steady and rapid growth of the place is due to his unre-
lenting activities. As mayor of the city from 1905 to 1909 and as super-
visor of his county since the latter named year, he has been a help and
inspiration in the administration of the affairs of the municipality, as
well as in the more personal side as represented by his business life.

Ed. E. Boyd is a native of Missouri, born there in 1875, and he is
the son of John F. and Molly (Cullar) Boyd, they being of Scotch-Irish
and German extraction, respectively. They were the parents of six
children, Ed. E. being the second in order of their birth. John F. Boyd
visited the Imperial Valley in 1904 and established a lumber business,
in which his son, Ed. E. was connected for some time. In the year 1902
Ed. E. Boyd made a second visit to the Valley, at which time he pros-
pected about carefully and finally located a tract of one hundred and
sixty acres of Government land, on which he filed a claim. Later he
disposed of the land and bought heavily in the newly platted city of
Holtville, at one time owning as much as two-thirds of the site. Mr.
Boyd was chosen the first mayor of Holtville in 1905, retaining the of-
fice until 1909, at which time he was elected to the office of county super-
visor, which office he now holds and is filling in an admirable manner
and with satisfaction to all. He is also a prominent member of the
Chamber of Commerce. Since giving up his interest in the lumber
business launched by his father, he has given his attention entirely to the
real estate business, in which he is heavily interested, and in which he is
regarded as being one of the most successful men in the community.

In January, 1912, Mr. Boyd was united in marriage with Miss Grace
Jones, a young woman of high standing in Holtville. Mr. Boyd is a
member of the Masonic fraternity.

TAMES D. SCHUYLER. In this age of colossal enterprise and marked
intellectual energy the prominent and successful men are those whose
abilities lead them into large undertakings and to assume responsibil-
ities and labors as leaders in their respective fields of endeavor. Suc-
cess is methodical and consecutive and however much we may indulge
in fantastic theorizing as to its elements and causation in any isolated
instance, in the light of sober investigation we shall find it to be but
the result of the determined application of individual abilities and pow-
ers along the rigidly defined lines of labor, whether mental or manual.
The mere statement that James D. Schuyler, of Los Angeles, is a con-
sulting hydraulic engineer gives slight evidence of the splendid work
accomplished by him in his chosen profession. His career as an engi-
neer has been conspicuous for the magnitude and variety of its achieve-
ment and the extent of this accomplishment has been such as to give
him precedence as one of the leading engineers of the world today. It

THE NEW YORK

PUBLIC LFBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX AM)

TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

« L

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 119

is not easy to describe adequately within the limitations of an article
of this scope the magnificent work that stands to the credit of Mr.
Schuyler and in this connection it can be hoped only to note the more
salient points of his career. It should be stated, however, that he is
in the most significent sense the architect of his own fortunes and that
his advancement to pre-eminence in his chosen vocation represents the
direct result of his abilities and labors.

James Dix Schuyler was born in the city of Ithaca, New York, on
the nth of May, 1848, and is a son of Philip Church Schuyler and
Lucy M. (Dix) Schuyler, both of whom were likewise born in the old
Empire state of the Union and both of whom were representatives of
old honored families identified with the annals of American history
from the colonial epoch.

The ancestors can be traced some years prior to 1650, when Philip
Pieterse Schuyler emigrated from Amsterdam, Holland, and came to
New York to cast his fortunes in the new world. He soon became
manager of the vast estates of the Patroon, Killian Van Rennselaer,
situated on the Hudson below Albany. This ancestor was evidently
a gentleman of good family, as he brought a family coat of arms, which
has been handed down from generation to generation, and now deco-
rates the home of the subject of this sketch.

Philip Pieterse Schuyler was married in Albany, then known as
Beverwyck, on December 12, 1650, to Margarita Van Slichtenhorst,
who was the only daughter of Brant Arentse Van Slichtenhorst, a very
prominent man in the Colonial days of New York. From this union
has sprung the entire Schuyler family in America. Among the dis-
tinguished descendents of this pair was General Philip Schuyler, of
Revolutionary fame, who was grandson. Eugene Schuyler, an own
cousin of James D., was a distinguished diplomat, who served his
country in the courts of Europe with distinction and honor, as Secretary
of Legation and Charge d'Affaires, at St. Petersburg, at Constanti-
nople, at Athens, Rome, and other cities. He was author of "A His-
tory of Peter the Great," "A Journey to Central Asia," "American
Diplomacy," etc., and won the gratitude of all England in 1878 by his
timely publication of the truth about the Bulgarian atrocities and mas-
sacres, from personal observation. On his mother's side, Mr. Schuyler
is descended from an English family of note, among whose members
is the present Lord Ashburton.

The parents of Mr. Schuyler continued to maintain their home in
the state of New York until their death and the major portion of the
active career of the father was devoted to general business. After due
preliminary discipline in the common schools of James D. Schuyler en-
tered Friends College, at Union Springs, New York, in which he con-
tinued his studies from 1863 to 1868. His training for his chosen pro-
fession has been gained through his own well directed studies and in-
vestigation and through his practical association with technical enter-
prises of the broadest scope arid importance.

In 1869 Mr. Schuyler became identified with railroad construction
work on the western end of the Kansas Pacific Railway in Colorado,
as has been well said — "in the days when it was necessary to fight the

120 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Indians as well as to combat the elements of nature in a wild country.''
From a previously published review of the career of Mr. Schuyler in
\\ bo's Who in America are taken the following statements concerning his
identification with railway construction, as just noted: "Many thrilling
adventures and hair-breadth escapes resulted and in one battle with the
Indians he was severely wounded. In 1870 Mr. Schuyler became res-
ident engineer, at Denver, for the Kansas Pacific Railway and in 1871
he held a similar position with the Denver & Boulder Valley Railway.
In 1872 he became identified with the Denver & Rio Grande Railway
as engineer on exploration and location surveys and he resigned to take
extensive contracts for grading upon which he was occupied until he
removed to California, in June, 1873, when he took a position as as-
sistant engineer on the North Pacific Coast Railway. After a year at
this employment he was appointed chief engineer for the Stockton &
lone Railway. From 1878 to 1882 he was assistant to the state engineer
of California, in charge of irrigation investigations. In 1882-3 he was
chief engineer and general superintendent of the Sinaloa & Durango
Railway, in Mexico, and he returned to California in 1883 to avoid
yellow fever. During 1884-5 ne 1:>unt a section of the San Francisco
sea-wall as one of the firm of contractors and engineers in charge and
in 1886 he had charge of construction of sewers and street-grading in
San Francisco. In 1887-8 he designed and built the famous Sweet-
water dam, near San Diego, California, which is now (1910) being
extended and enlarged to double its present capacity under Mr. Schuyler's
plans and supervision. In 1889 he was city engineer of San Diego, where
he subsequently served as commissioner of public works. In the same
year he visited the Hawaiian Islands to report pn the development of
water for irrigating sugar cane on the Ewa plantation. In 1890-1 he
designed and superintended the building of the Hemet dam in River-
side county, California, the highest masonry construction in the state.
During subsequent years Mr. Schuyler devoted his attention to hydrau-
lic engineering in general, in which connection he designed and built
water-works in many cities and towns, including Denver, Colorado, Port-
land, Oregon, and numerous others. From 1903 to 1905 he was con-
sulting engineer for the building of the great dam on Snake river, at
the head of Twin Falls canal, probably the largest irrigation system
in America, and he held a similar relation to the American Beet Sugar
Company, in California and Colorado, during a period of nine years
of irrigation and water-supply development."

Mr. Schuyler has been consulting engineer in water-right litigation
and water-works construction from Hawaii to Ohio and from British
Columbia to the City of Mexico. He has been identified with the build-
ing of large power plants in California and Mexico and extensive works
for irrigation and po\ver development in Mexico, Brazil. New -Mexico,
Colorado and in other western states. From the article to which re-
course has already been had, are taken the following pertinent state-
ments with but slight paraphrase: "In the midst of his other activ-
ities Mr. Schuyler made such a specialty of the constructing of dams
by the interesting and novel process of hydraulic sluicing as to have
become a recognized authority among engineers the world over on

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 121

that subject. One of his first works of this type was the Lake Frances
Dam built for the Bay Counties Power Company, in Yuba county, Cali-
fornia. As consulting engineer of the Great Western Power Com-
pany of California he was foremost in pointing out the rare possibili-
ties of a project which has since become the largest power development
in the state."

One of the most noteworthy and beneficent works accomplished by
Mr. Schuyler in connection with public improvements in California is
that rendered through his service as a member of the board of three
consulting engineers appointed, in 1907, to make investigation and enter
report on the plans for the Los Angeles aqueduct designed to bring
water from Owens river to Los Angeles — a distance of about two hun-
dred and fifty miles. He brought to bear in this connection his wide
and accurate knowledge of engineering and incidentally made sugges-
tions which resulted in the avoiding of about twenty-five miles of
heavy construction work, which would have entailed an expenditure of
several million dollars. The changes thus suggested by him in direct-
ing the course of the aqueduct were adopted by the board and the
result is one that should be a matter of appreciation on the part of the
citizens of Los Angeles for all time. Mr. Schuyler was also consulting
engineer for the territorial government of Hawaii on the construction
of the Nuuanu dam in Honolulu and for the United States Indian
bureau on the building of the Zuni dam, New Mexico. He was consult-
ing engineer for the British Columbia Electric Railway Company and the
Vancouver Power Company in connection with dam construction, the
reclamation of swamp lands, etc. He acted in the same capacity for
the Monterey Water Works & Sewer Company, Limited, of Mexico ;
the Kobe syndicate in connection with the development of an exten-
sive power project in Japan, involving the construction of a very high
dam ; the Mexican Light & Power Company, Limited, in connection
with the building of four large dams for power purposes in Necaxa
valley, state of Pueblo, Mexico; the Vancouver Power Company. Lim-
ited, Vancouver. British Columbia, in connection with the building of
a dam at Coquitlam.

A most consistent recognition of the professional abilities of Mr.
Schuyler was that paid him in January, 1909, when President Roose-
velt appointed him to accompany President-elect Taft to Panama as
one of the seven engineers selected to report on the canal plans, the
Gatun dam, etc. The unanimous report of this board was in favor
of carrying out the plan adopted by Congress for a lock canal but a
recommendation was made for the modification of the height and slopes
of the Gatun dam. lowering it by twenty feet. The dam is being con-
structed according to this recommendation. Mr. Schuyler is a valued
member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, of which he has
served as vice-president ; is a member of the Institution of Civil Engi-
neers of London, England ; a member of the Technical Society of the
Pacific Coast ; a member of the Engineers & Architects Association of
Southern California; a member of the Franklin Institute; and the
American Geographical Society. He has made valuable contributions
to the literature of his profession and in this connection it should be

122 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

noted that he is the author of a work entitled, "Reservoirs for Irriga-
tion, Water P'ower and Domestic Water Supply," a work of six hun-
dred quarto pages, published by John Wiley & Sons, 1908 (revised
and enlarged). This is a standard" work on the subject treated and is
the recognized authority on the use of sluicing in dam construction.
He has also contributed numerous technical articles to professional
publications and papers to engineering societies, two of which won the
Thomas Fitch Rowland prize in the American Society of Civil Engineers.
He first won this prize in 1888 and for a second time in 1906. Mr.
Schuyler has also written various articles for the United States Geo-
logical Survey and these have been published in the public documents.
He has also contributed various reports on irrigation for the state of
California. He is a charter member of the California Club of Los
Angeles and in his home city he also holds membership in the Union
League Club. He has maintained his home in California since 1873
and has had his permanent residence in Los Angeles since 1893. In
politics Mr. Schuyler gives his support to the Republican party and as
a citizen he is essentially broad-minded, progressive and public-spirited.
On the 25th of July, 1889, at San Diego, California, was solemnized
the marriage of Mr. Schuyler to Mrs. Alary ( Ingalls) Tuliper and she
presides with graciousness over their beautiful home in Ocean Park—
a home noted for its generous hospitality.

REV. H. B. HOLLINGSWORTH. There is, perhaps, not a man in Holt-
ville today who has been a more active participant in the material and
spiritual advancement of that thriving and prosperous city than has H. B.
Hollingsworth. He is a pioneer of the Imperial Valley in the truest
sense of the word. He helped to lay out the town of Holtville and as-
sisted in the planting of the first trees in what afterward materialized
into a busy city. He was the first pastor of the Christian church in
Holtville. which he organized there in 1904, and the little society wor-
shipped in convenient shacks in the village, the first church of the or-
ganization being erected there in 1908. He has seen life in its many
phases as a pioneer of the 'Valley. He preached the first sermon there,
married the first couple, and officiated at the first funeral. In short, he
has been the servant of the people from the beginning of his connec-
tion with Imperial county, and now. although retired from active serv-
ice in the ministry, he is ever ready to lend his aid and support where
needed, and is justly regarded as one of the most worthy men and valu-
able citizens of the city.

H. B. Hollingsworth was born in Indiana in 1857, and is the, son of
J. C. and M. J. (Hill) Hollingsworth, both natives of Indiana, and all
their lives devoted to agricultural pursuits. They were the parents of
ten children, H. B. being the third in order of birth. He was educated
in the common schools and the high school of his native town, and
finished in a Baptist college in Nebraska, to which state he moved in
1892. While in Nebraska he followed farming as a regular occupation,
but in 1893 he was appointed deputy county clerk, and in the following
year was chosen for the secretaryship of the Young Men's Christian As-
sociation at North Platte, Nebraska, which position he retained until

THE NEW YORf
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX AND

TILDEN FOONDAT10N8

K L

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 125

1901. About that time he moved to Chicago, there entering the Moody
Bible Institute, but in 1902 returned to Nebraska, where he proceeded to
complete his early ministerial studies. In 1904 he was ordained to the
ministry, and the winter of 1904-5 found him established at Holtville as
the pastor of the Christian church, which he organized on his arrival
there. The labors of the pastor were rewarded many fold, and to him
is largely due the credit for the rearing of the first Christian church edi-
fice in Holtville. This building was erected at a cost of three thousand
five hundred dollars, and has a seating capacity of three hundred. At
the time of its erection it had a membership of about forty, of whom
seventeen persons were charter members of the church society, and a
Sunday-school enrollment of forty students. The present membership
of the church is one hundred and ten, with a Sunday-school enrollment
of eighty-five, showing a splendid increase. In 1906 he retired from the
pastorate, and is now chairman of the local board of trustees of the
church. He has held the office of elder for a number of years, in addi-
tion to his other duties in connection with the church.

In December, 1903, Mrs. Hollingsworth filed claim on a tract of two
hundred and forty acres of government land in Imperial county, in addi-
tion to which Mr. Hollingsworth bought forty-five acres of the original
lownsite. Mr. Hollingsworth also owns eighty acres four miles west of
Holtville. This land is practically all under cultivation, his interest in
an agricultural way being devoted to dairying and the growing of al-
falfa, a particularly abundant and profitable crop in southern California,
and he is fast pushing to the front in the ranks of successful agricultur-
alists in the Valley. Since April, 1910, he has been superintendent of
the Holtville water system.

On June 26, 1895, Mr. Hollingsworth was united in marriage to
Miss Mamie A., the daughter of John E. and Eliza J. Curtis, at Arling-
ton, Nebraska. She is a native of Indiana and as his helper and ad-
viser in the early days of his ministry did much to promote his work.
Five children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Hollingsworth. They are
Vern C., Oak B., Faith E., Cecil B., and another who died in infancy.

EDWIN W. SARGENT. If success be predicted from mark of definite
accomplishment and the utilization of individual powers and ability then
Edwin W. Sargent certainly has achieved success. Looking into the clear
perspective of his career there may be seen the clear defination of courage,
persistence, determination and self-confidence, which, as coupled with
integrity of purpose, are the factors which conserve and make is consist-
ent. To the larger and surer vision there is no such thing as luck. No
man achieves anything worthy until he learns the power of conviction
and appreciative thereof, bends his energies to the accomplishment of
a definite purpose. To have accomplished so notable a work as has
Mr. Sargent in connection with financial and title-guaranty enterprises
in California would prove sufficient to give precedence and reputation
to any man with this to represent the sum total of his productive efforts.
He is frequently mentioned as the "father" of the title business in south-
ern California and for nearly a quarter of a century he has been numbered
among the representative citizens and business men of Los Angeles. Not

126 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

only has his accomplishment in this direction been large and beneficent,
but he his also one of the able members of the bar of the state and has
been a potent, though unostentatious factor in connection with the civic
and material development of the beautiful city, which represents his home
and in which he is accorded the most unequivocal confidence and esteem.
He has been in the most significant sense the artificer of his own fortunes
and thus the distinctive success which he has achieved is the more grat-
ifying and inspiring in an objective sense. He is at the present time
vice-president of the Title Guarantee & Trust Company, of which he
was the chief promoter and with the upbuilding of which his influence has
been most potent, making the same one of the strong institutions of the
state. This corporation exercises important functions and, fortified
by all that is reliable in executive control and capitalistic reinforcement
it holds strong vantage ground. Thus as a man of affairs, as a citizen of
liberality and public-spirited views and as a representative member of
the bar of the state Mr. Sargent is eminently entitled to recognition in this
edition.

Edwin W. Sargent claims the Badger state as the place of his nativ-
ity and is a scion of one of its sterling pioneer families. He was born
at Oregon, Dane county, Wisconsin, on the I5th of August, 1848, and is
a son of Croyden and Lucy W. (Hutchinson) Sargent, the former of
whom was born in Chesterfield, New Hampshire, in 1821, and the latter
of whom was born in Sutton, Vermont, in 1822. The father was reared
and educated in New England, where the family was founded in the
Colonial days, and he was a son of Edward Sargent, who likewise was a
native of Chesterfield, New Hampshire, and his life was there devoted
to agricultural pursuits : he died when about seventy-eight years of age.
Mrs. Lucy W. (Hutchinson) Sargent was a daughter of William Hutch-
inson, who likewise passed his entire life in New England and who was
eighty-one years of age at the time of his death. Croyden Sargent was
reared to maturity in the old granite state and in the '403 he numbered
himself among the pioneer settlers of Wisconsin, where he maintained
his home for many years and where he was a citizen who ever commanded
unqualified confidence and esteem. He was summoned to the life eternal
in the year 1902, at the venerable age of eighty-six years, and his cher-
ished and devoted wife passed away in the year 1900, at the age of sev-
enty-eight years. Croyden Sargent was identified with the great basic
industry of agriculture during the major portion of his active career
and was a man of strong intelligence and sterling integrity of
character. He united with the Republican party at the time of its organ-
ization and ever afterward gave to the same his earnest allegiance. Both
he and his wife held membership in the Methodist Episcopal church.

Edwin W. Sargent gained his early educational discipline in the com-
mon schools of his native county and was reared under the conditions
and influences of the pioneer epoch in Wisconsin. After due prelimin-
ary training he was enabled to enter the University of Wisconsin, at
Madison, in which he was a student from 1867 to 1870, thus gaining ex-
cellent training in the academic way. In 1871 he entered the law depart-
ment of the University of Iowa, at Iowa City, in which institution he
completed the prescribed technical course and was graduated in 1874,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 127

with the degree of Bachelor of Laws. He was simultaneously admitted
to the bar of Iowa and he initiated the practice of his profession at Den-
ison, Crawford county, that state, where he continued his professional
labors until 1879, when he removed to Atchison, Kansas, where he be-
came a leading member of the bar of the Sunflower state and where he
continued to be engaged in the active work of his profession until 1886,
in July of which year he established his permanent home in Los Angeles,
California. Here he engaged in the practice of law and he continued
active in the work of his profession for a number of years, though much
of his time and attention has been demanded in connection with other
important interests, with which he is identified.

Early in the year 1887, Mr. Sargent assisted in the organization of the
Los Angeles Abstract Company, which absorbed such minor concerns as
could be classed as competitors. Prior to the organization of this com-
pany land titles were given without guaranty and the prime object of
Mr. Sargent in organizing the new corporation was to make proper pro-
vision for the protection of those investing in real estate in southern
California. The company exercised as one of its special functions the fur-
nishing of unlimited certificates of title. The new concern gained dis-
tinctive popular approval and support and the growth and expansion of
the enterprise finally rendered expedient a reorganization of the com-
pany, which was effected in the year 1893, under the name of the Title
Insurance & Trust Company. Mr. Sargent was one of the principal
stockholders and an executive officer, as well as attorney for the corpora-
tion, until 1895, when he retired therefrom and effected the organiza-
tion of the Title Guarantee & Trust Company of Los Angeles, of which
he has since been vice-president and legal advisor. In connection with
this line of enterprise he has brought to bear his fine initiative and ad-
ministrative ability and has made a close and careful study of means and
methods so that the fine corporation with which he is now identified
holds high standing and affords admirable service in its various depart-
ments. The company is incorporated with a capital stock of half a mil-
lion dollars and it is widely recognized as one of the strong and ably
managed institutions of its county in the state.

Though never a seeker of political preferment Mr. Sargent has ever
been a staunch advocate of the principles and policies for which the Re-
publican party stands sponsor and as a citizen he has maintained high
ideals and shown the utmost liberality and progressiveness. He made
an excellent reputation at the bar, being well fortified in the minutia of the
science of jurisprudence and having been an effective advocate and able
counselor. His technical knowledge has been of great value in connection
with the directing of the affairs of the financial institutions with which
he has been identified. Mr. Sargent is an appreciative member of the
time-honored Masonic fraternity, in which he has attained the chivalric
degrees, being affiliated with the Los Angeles Commandery, Knights
Templar, in Los Angeles, and also being identified with the Ancient
Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is a member of
the Jonathan Club and other representative civic organizations in his
home city.

At Sterling, Illinois, on the 3Oth of August, 1876, was solemnized the

128 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

marriage of Mr. Sargent to Miss Ella G. Barr, and the one living child
of this union is Lillian, who was born in Iowa.

WILLIAM H. WIMP, M. D., since 1910 the only practicing physician
and surgeon in Holtville, claims the state of Kentucky as the place of
his nativity, but the charm of southern California, particularly of the
Imperial Valley, are sufficiently alluring to cause him to forswear his
allegiance to the old Kentucky commonwealth and cast in his lot with
the newer country.

William H. Wimp was born in Irvington, Kentucky, on April 18,
1882, and he is the son of J. R. and Ellen H. \Vimp, both of whom were
natives of Irvington. The elder Wimp was an agriculturist and banker,
and he was able to give his two sons liberal educational advantages,
both of whom are now residents of Imperial county. The elder son,
J. R. Jr., is one of the prominent ranchers of the Valley, having been
established here since 1905.

The younger son, W. H., in his boyhood and youth was a constant
attendant at the public schools of his home city, graduating from the
grammar and high schools in due season, and later graduating from
Irvington College. He then entered the State University, followed by
a course in the Louisville Medical College, from which he received his
degree of M. D. He practiced for a short time in Stephensport, Ken-
tucky, but in 1906 and 1907 he gave his attention to mining matters in
Nevada, giving up his professional duties for the time being. In 1907
his health failed him to such an alarming extent that he went to Califor-
nia for climatic change, and he passed almost two years on the ranch of
his brother in the Imperial Valley, to such good purpose that at the end
of that time he took up his work again. After spending some months
in post-graduate work in Los Angeles he returned to the Valley and
opened up an office in Holtville, where he has been engaged in success-
ful practice from that time on. His genial and kindly manner, combined
with his professional skill, have done much to advance him, and his
future in the medical profession is practically assured. Dr. Wimp is
popular in social and fraternal circles, and is a member of the Fraternal
Brotherhood, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Order of
Eagles.

HOMER LAUGH LIN. The history of Mr. Laughlin's association with
industrial affairs of broad scope and importance stretches far into the
prospective to the plane of small beginnings from which he has risen to
that of commanding influence as one of the veritable captains of in-
dustry in our great republic. For nearly forty years he has been con-
cerned with the manufacturing of fine white and decorated earthen-
wares, in which connection he has built up an enterprise that is still un-
excelled in extent and precedence in the entire country.

Since his retirement from active business he has done much to fur-
ther the material and civic development and progress of the beautiful
city of Los Angeles, where he established his home upon coming to
California in 1897.

A strong symmetrical character designates the man, his integrity of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 131

purpose is impregnable and through his liberal and public spirited ef-
forts he has contributed in a large measure to the upbuilding of the
city in which his capital is largely invested and his interests wide and
varied, including the ownership of valuable real estate which he has
improved with splendid structures. His loyalty in the "piping times of
peace," has been on a parity with that which prompted him when a young
man to tender his services in defense of the integrity of the nation when
armed rebellion threatened the dissolution of the Federal union. He
stands today as one of the representative capitalists and honored citi-
zens of Los Angeles, and as such he is eminently entitled to recognition
in this California edition of American Biography on Genealogy.

A noted politician has in happy paraphrase said that "Some men are
born great, some achieve greatness and some are born in Ohio." Homer
Laughlin at least finds classification in the final category. He manifests
no small mede of satisfaction in reverting to the fine old Buckeye state
as the place of his nativity.

He was born in village of Little Beaver. Columbiana county, Ohio,
on the 23rd of March, 1843, the son of Mathevv and Maria (Moore)
Laughlin, the former of whom was born in Beaver county, Pennsyl-
vania, March 31, 1799, and the latter of whom was born in Columbiana
county, Ohio, in the year 1814 — a member of one of the sterling pioneer
families of that section of the state. The lineage of the Laughlin fam-
ily is traced back to the staunch Scotch Irish stock and the original rep-
resentatives in America settled in Maryland in the early colonial epoch.
In Maryland was born James Laughlin (grandfather of Homer Laugh-
lin), who passed the closing years of his life in Pennsylvania. Mathew
Laughlin, was reared to maturity in his native state and was numbered
among the pioneers of Columbiana county, Ohio, where for nearly half
a century he was engaged in the milling mercantile business at Little
Beaver. His wife was a descendant of Thomas Moore, the poet.

Homer Laughlin was reared to adult age in his native county, and
after availing himself of the advantages of the common schools of the
locality and period he was enabled to pursue his higher academic studies
in Neville Institute, near East Liverpool, Ohio. He was a student in
this institution at the inception of the Civil war, and on the I2th of July,
1862, when nineteen years of age, he subordinated all other interests to
tender his aid in defense of the Union. On that date he enlisted, at
East Liverpool, as a private in Company A, One Hundred and Fifteenth
Ohio Volunteer Infantry, which was assigned to the Army of the Ten-
nessee and with which he continued in service until victory had crowned
the Union arms and peace had been restored. He took part in many of
the important engagements marking the progress of the great internecine
conflict and he was mustered out with his command at Murfreesboro.
Tennessee, whence he proceeded with his regiment to Cleveland. Ohio,
where he received his honorable discharge on the 7th of July, 1865, as
sergeant of his company.

After the close of the war Mr. Laughlin was identified with oil oper-
ations in Pennsylvania for some time, and he then went to New York-
city, where he became associated with his brother, Shakespeare Moore
Laughlin, in the wholesale importation of English china, with which

132 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

line of enterprise he was thus identified for a period of about three years,
under the firm name of Laughlin Brothers. In September, 1873, the
firm built and equipped at East Liverpool, Ohio, a pottery for the manu-
facture of fine white earthenware, and the enterprise was there con-
tinued under the firm title of Laughlin Brothers until 1879, when Homer
Laughlin purchased the interest of his brother. Thereafter he con-
ducted the business under the title of the Homer Laughlin China Com-
pany until 1897, and within the intervening years he brought to bear
such fine initiative and technical powers as to develop the industry to
the status of the most extensive of its kind in the LTnited States. 'The
original title is still retained and from the splendid potteries of the com-
pany the fine products go forth into every state and territory of the
Union, the extensive trade having its basis in correct business methods
and superiority of the output. A portion of the time from 1878 to 1898
.Mr. Laughlin was president of the United States Potters' Association,
and during the entire period thus indicated he was chairman of the ex-
ecutive committee of the association, in the promotion of whose in-
terests he was a dominating force. The products of the Laughlin pot-
teries received medals for superiority in the Centennial exposition at
Philadelphia, in 1876; in the Cincinnati exposition of 1879; and in the
World's Columbian exposition, in the city of Chicago, in 1893, where
Mr. Laughlin was given three diplomas and a medal for both plain and
decorated china. In 1882 he was made a member of the board of man^
agers of the American Protective Tariff League, and of this position he
has since remained incumbent. That he is an authority in dictums con-
cerning tariff matters will be noted in a later paragraph.

In 1897, after many years of earnest and fruitful endeavor. Mr.
Laughlin decided to lay aside the exacting responsibilities of active busi-
ness, and in that year he came to California and established his home in
Los Angeles. It was but natural that a man of such marked vitality and
such long and successful experience in connection with business affairs
of wide scope should not be content with sybaritic ease, and thus Mr.
Laughlin was soon found actively concerned" with enterprises that have
resulted in inestimable benefit to the metropolis of southern California.
Concerning his activities in this respect the following statements ap-
peared in a recently publication entitled "Makers of Los Angeles," and
they are well worthy of perpetuation in this article:

"Immediately after taking up his residence in Los Angeles, Mr.
Laughlin recognized the possibilities of the city and commenced the con-
struction of the Homer Laughlin Building on Broadway, — the first fire
proof office building in southern California. This undertaking estab-
lished a standard for fire proof construction much in advance of the
times. Furthermore, at that time most investors believed that he had
chosen a site beyond the limits within which a costly business building
would be profitable. This building was completed in 1898. In 1901 he
built the building occupied — since its construction — by Jacoby Brothers,
a few doors south of the Homer Laughlin Building. It occupies the
original site of the First Methodist church. In 190^ he began the con-
struction of the 'Annex' to the Homer Laughlin building, and this is a
typical reinforced concrete structure, covering a large area and extend-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 133

ing to Hill street. It has the distinction of being the first reinforced
concrete building in southern California."

Mr. Laughlin's prescience as to the growth and demands of the busi-
ness center of Los Angeles was significantly shown in connection with
the erection of the building that bears his name, and in this, as in all
other relations of his notably successful career, he did not lack the cour-
age of his convictions, — fortunately for the interests of the city. The
Homer Laughlin building and its annex have a depth of three hundred
and twenty-seven feet and a frontage of one hundred and twenty-one
feet each on Broadway and Hill street. The fine structure is now in
the very heart of the business district and constitutes one of the prin-
cipal income properties within such limits. Mr. Laughlin has in mani-
fold other ways manifested his deep interest in the progress and civic
welfare of his home city, where he has identified himself with various
industrial and capitalistic enterprises and where he has shown at all
times a broad-minded and public spirited attitude. For a number of
vears he was a member of the directorate of the American National
Bank, which was finally consolidated with the Citizens' National Bank.
He was a member of the building committee under whose careful su-
pervision was erected the Chamber of Commerce building, and he was
one of the committee of three who selected and purchased the site of
this building.

Mr. Laughlin's entire life has been governed by the highest principles
of integrity and honor and he has been signally true to all the duties of
citizenship. He has been an uncompromising advocate of the princi-
ples and policies for which the Republican party stands sponsor and has
done much to promote its interests, especially during the years of his
residence and business activity in Ohio, where he was a valued friend
of such leaders as the lamented President McKinley, General James A.
Garfield, James G. Elaine, William R. Day, Hon. John Sherman, and
Robert W. Taylor, who succeeded McKinley in congress. At the time
of his death. November 26, 1910, Judge Taylor occupied a position on
the bench of the LTnited States district court of the northern district of
Ohio. Mr. Laughlin was one of the founders of the American Protec-
tive Tariff League and is still a member of its board of managers, as
has already been stated in this context. He has been prominent in the
councils of his party and has commanded the high regard of its leaders,
who have been appreciative of his sincerity and also of his mature judg-
ment in regard to the matter of public polity. He is positive and well
fortified in his opinions but has shown naught of intolerance in any of
the relations of his long and useful career as an influential business man
and representative citizen. The estimate placed upon him by his fellow
men, and well known to the writer of this review, constitutes the mete-
wand by which his character may well be gauged. For thirty years Mr.
Laughlin was a loyal and intimate friend of the late President McKinley,
and their confidential relations continued to be of the most cordial order
until the president fell low at the hands of his cowardly assassin.

Apropos of the intimate relations of Mr. Laughlin and the lamented
president and also of his standing in regard to the much mooted tariff
question, the following extract from special New York correspondence

134 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

appearing in the Cincinnati Enquirer of August 6, 1910, is worthy of
embodiment in more enduring vehicle :

Judge Nathan Goff, of West Virginia, justice of the United States
circuit court has been spending part of the summer season in New York.
As former congressman from West Virginia, when that state was strug-
gling to become safely Republican, Judge Goff was an intimate con-
gressional and close personal friend of William McKinley. They served
on the ways and means committee together in congress and remained
devoted friends throughout McKinley's career as governor and presid-
ent. Many times and oft when McKinley and Goff were building up a
tariff law McKinley would remark to Goff : "You ought to know my
friend Homer Laughlin, of East Liverpool. He knows mpre about the
practical details of the tariff than any man who advises me." Of course
Judge Goff rejoined that he would be glad to know Laughlin, but some-
how the meeting was never arranged. President McKinley would tell
Mr. Laughlin that he ought to know Goff. so the years sped by and no
coming together of two eminent men who had heard so much good each
of the other. Then it came to pass that they met this week at the Wal-
dorf, thanks to Frank B. Gessner. who knows everybody worth know-
ing, and he introduced them. Then followed a remarkable conversation
on every phase of tariff legislation, past and present, and throughout the
long talk there was much told of McKinley, whom both revered. Neither
Judge Goff nor Homer Laughlin is now in politics, but they know what
is doing and what ought to be done, and their views are always sought
by men who remain in the active whirl of political life.

Mr. Laughlin has long been an appreciative member of the time
honored Masonic fraternity and is identified with both its York and
Scottish Rite bodies, including Allegheny Commandery, No. 35, Knights
Templars, at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. In connection with this chivalric
order he was one of a company of forty Sir Knights, known as the
First Crusaders, that visited Europe in 1871. Through this association
he was made an honorary life member of Girvan Encampment, Ancient
Accepted Rite, in the city of Glasgow, Scotland. He is a member of the
Republican Club of New York city and the California Club of Los An-
geles, besides which he is identified with other representative civic or-
ganizations.

On the 1 8th of June, 1875, at Wellsville, Columbiana county, Ohio,
was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Laughlin to Miss Cornelia Batten-
berg, who was there born in the year 1846 and who was a daughter of
Eli Battenberg, a sterling pioneer of the Buckeye state. The great loss
and bereavement in the life of Mr. Laughlin came when his loved and
devoted wife was summoned to eternal rest, on the I3th of October.
1907, and her memory is revered by all who had come within the com-
pass of her gentle and gracious influence. Mr. and Mrs. Laughlin be-
came the parents of three children, Homer, Jr.. who is virtually suc-
cessor to his father's extensive business interests and who maintains his
home in Los Angeles ; Nanita, who died at the age of ten years ; and
Guendolen V., who is a young woman of most gracious and attractive
personality and is a valued factor in connection with the best social act-
ivities of her home city.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 135

Homer Laughlin has made of success not an accident but a logical
result, and he has not permitted himself to become self -centered or
selfish, as he has at all times maintained a high sense of his steward-
ship, is kindly and tolerant in his judgment, sympathetic and generous,
and urbane and democratic in his association with his fellow men. He
has secure vantage ground in the confidence and regard of the people
of Los Angeles, and his worthy life and labors well entitle him to this
brief tribute in a work dedicated to the representative men of California.

F. A. FLEISHMAN. Of the few prominent men in the Imperial Val-
ley who can claim California as the state of their birth, F. A. Fleishman,
the proprietor of the* leading livery stable in the city of El Centro, is
one of the best known. He has been a resident of El Centro since 1909,
and his business has been on the increase all of the time. Before com-
ing to the Yalley he had become acquainted with it as a desert, for he
had made several trips across it, when the only stops were at water
holes, most of which are now the sites of thriving towns. Gifted with
business ability and owning a fine stable of horses, he has been able to
give his patrons splendid service.

Mr. Fleishman was born in Trinity county. California, in 1863, the
son of Frederick and Rebecca Fleishman. His parents were both of
German birth, but before coming west they had lived for some time in
Pennsylvania. Upon leaving Pennsylvania they went to Iowa, and from
there made the long overland trip to California, leaving Iowa in 1851.
As all the pioneers of these times who came into the west by land, Mr.
Fleishman did his traveling in one of the huge ships of the prairies, the
schooner wagon drawn by faithful oxen. Mr. and Mrs. Fleishman were
strong and healthy, and look back upon that trip as one of the most
enjoyable experiences in their whole lives, in spite of the sand storms
and the heat and the fear of the unknown dangers of the uninhabited
wastes through which they had to pass. Mr. Fleishman was a miner
and followed that work in his new home until 1856. These brave pio-
neers of early California days had seven children, of whom F. A. Fleish-
man was the third in order of birth.

T. A. Fleishman was reare'd and educated in his native county, and
as most boys will in a rather new country, he tried his hand at various
things. He took the precaution, however, of learning a trade, feeling
that a man with a trade is much more likely to be able to keep himself
from starving than the man who knows none. The trade he chose was
blacksmithing, and for seven years he stuck quite closely to his chosen
pursuit. Then he turned to clerking, in which work he was employed
for six years, part of the time being spent in Arizona. In 1883 he
formed his first acquaintance with the Imperial Yalley. when he
crossed it with a party, experiencing no difficulty whatever, and missing
all the thrills that the tales of the travelers had led him to expect. He
crossed the desert not just this once, but four times, and always had
the good fortune to come through without meeting one of the dreaded
sand storms, or having the bad luck of finding the water-hole he was
looking to for the replenishment of his water skin nothing but a damp
spot. In 1909 he came into the valley to stay, choosing El Centro as

136 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

his future home. The livery stable which he now owns, was built by
Dr. Blackinton originally, and later was leased to J. Cudiback. He was
the proprietor when Air. Fleishman arrived on the scene. Going into
partnership with Mr. Horn, they bought out Mr. Cudiback and up to
December of 1910 the stable was operated under the firm name of
Horn and Fleishman. At this time Mr. Fleishman bought out the in-
terest held by his partner, and since then the stable has been known as
the Depot Livery Stable. The capacity of the buildings of the Depot
Livery is sixty head of horses, and in carrying on his own business
Mr. Fleishman uses twenty head of horses and the same number of
vehicles, consequently the stable is pretty well filled. The buildings
are as clean and well cared for as possible, and the appearance of one
of Mr. Fleishman's sleek, well groomed animals is sufficient proof of
his fineness of character, as shown in his consideration for his dumb
beasts.

Mr. Fleishman is a popular member of the Elks, where his genial-
ity is warmly appreciated. The material prosperity of Mr. Fleishman
is largely due to his ability to seize the crucial moment and to his con-
fidence in the future of the country. For, believing that the growth
of the country would be phenomenal, he has gone into his business re-
lations on a bigger scale than the conditions at the time seemed to jus-
tify, but his prophetic instinct has been proven to have been true, so he
has only himself to thank for his present comfortable position.

He was married on the /th of August. 1900, to Miss Josie Breed-
love, a native of Springfield, Missouri. Mrs. Fleishman came to Cal-
ifornia in 1884.

JOHN H. NORTOX. Among the honored and influential citizens of
Los Angeles who figured as pioneers of the great west and whose ex-
periences were most varied and interesting was the late Mr. Norton —
known in business circles in the Southwest as "Major" Norton — who
had maintained his home in Los Angeles since 1894 and who stood as
one of its progressive business men and loyal and public-spirited citi-
zens. His interest in the city was of no desultory order, but was shown
in the promotion of enterprises and measures that have aided in the
civic and material advancement of the city. A substantial man of af-
fairs, he exemplified that strength and aggressiveness that have brought
about the magnificent development of an imperial domain in the west,
and even in the circumscribed limits of this sketch adequate data will
be given to indicate the wide scope and benignant influence he exercised
as one of the world's noble army of productive workers. The sad news
of his death, in 1911, was received as a matter of deep regret through-
out the city and his memory will long remain green in the hearts of
hosts of friends and admirers.

Mr. Norton claimed the historic old Bay state as the place of his
nativity. He was born in the town of Milton, Norfolk county, Massa-
chusetts, on the igth of August, 1847, and was a son of Hubert and Mary
( Milton) Norton. His parents were natives of Ireland and they passed
the closing years of their lives in Boston, Massachusetts, the major part
of the active career of the father having been devoted to general business

THE NEW Y<
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LEN'O.T A Kl>
TILDEN /OUMDATfONS

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 139

affairs. John H. Norton was indebted to the common schools of his
native state for his early education, which was of sufficient scope to
well fit him for the active duties and responsibilities of life when he
set forth to make for himself a place in the world. Dependent entirely
upon his own resources, he left New England soon after attaining his
nineteenth year. He made his way to Kansas, where he remained about
one year, and he then, in 1868, became one of the pioneers of the little
town of Los Animas, Colorado, to which state much of the migration
from the east was at that time directed. At Los Animas he was en-
gaged in the general merchandise business about three years and he then
responded to the lure of the southwest, whose manifold resources were
just beginning to be exploited. In 1876 he thus made the journey by
stage to Tucson, Arizona, by way of Silver City, New Mexico — a dis-
tance of eight hundred and fifty miles. After remaining a few months
at Tucson he was appointed by the secretary of war, Hon. Don Came-
ron, to the position of post trader at Fort Grant, Arizona, a govern-
ment military post that was at that time eight hundred miles distant
from the nearest railway point, which was Trinidad, Colorado, which
place the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad had reached in the
extending of its line to the west. At Fort Grant were quadquarters for
a regiment of cavalry, the duties of which were principally involved in
holding the Indians in subjection. There Mr. Norton became senior
member of the firm of Norton & Stewart, in which his coadjutor was
the late H. W. Stewart. This firm handled a great many government
contracts, including the carrying of mail from various points in the
southwest. Concerning this period in the career of Mr. Norton the
following pertinent statements have been made and they are worthy of
reproduction in this article: "All freighting in those days was done by
mule and ox trains, the mail being carried by stages, two-horse buck-
boards and once a week on horseback. The nearest town to the frontier
post was Tucson, which place was one hundred and twenty miles distant.
The regular custom of Mr. Norton for a number of years was to pur-
chase his goods in New York and to ship them by rail to Trinidad, Colo-
rado, at that time in the extreme western terminus of the Atchison,
Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, from which point the freight was trans-
ported to Fort Grant by mule and ox teams — a distance of eight hun-
dred miles, as has already been stated. To make this round trip a mule
team required about four months and an ox team demanded for the
same journey about one year. Frequently this enterprise was attended
with great danger and on several occasions Indians who were on the
warpath attacked the freighting outfits, killed the drivers, and appro-
priated such supplies as they1 needed. Inventory would then have to
be taken of all the damages done by the Indians, and the claim was then
made to the Government for recompense. With the usual delay and
red tape such claims were adjusted only after years of more or less
patient waiting on the part of those concerned. Mr. Norton also pur-
chased large herds of cattle in old Mexico, to supply the needs of the
San Carlos and Apache Indians. The cattle would be delivered on the
Indian reservations and distributed under the supervision of the Indian
agents."

140 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

In 1882, soon after the Southern Pacific Railroad Company had com-
pleted its line through Arizona, Mr. Norton founded on this line the
town of Willcox, which he named in honor of General Willcox, who was
at that time in command of all the United States troops in the territory.
At that time the firm of Norton & Stewart established at Willcox a gen-
eral trading and merchandise business, and the enterprise is still suc-
cessfully continued by the Norton-Morgan Commercial Company, of
which Mr. Norton was president at the time of his death. This con-
cern controls a large and important business throughout the southwest,
its annual transactions reaching an enormous aggregate. Mr. Norton
was also president of the John H. Norton Company, which has its head-
quarters at Los Angeles, where he transacted his general and private
business.

It was in 1894 that Mr. Norton established his home in Los Angeles,
and from that time he was actively identified- with its business interests.
He gave a general supervision to various important corporations and was
a director in some of the banks. He gave admirable council and service
as a member of the Los Angeles board of water commissioners. In
March, 1907, was completed the erection of the John H. Norton Block,
at the corner of Broadway and Sixth streets, and in the building of this
magnificent, modern structure he became the pioneer in the erection of
fine business structures on Sixth street, whose consequent development
has fully justified the prescience and enterprise shown by him. A clear-
minded, clean-hearted and aggressive man of affairs, Mr. Norton did
not become self -centered, but rather broadened his field of productive
activities to include in his operations such measures and undertakings
as have conserved the general welfare, his public spirit and civic loyalty
having been of the most insistent and yet practical order. In politics
he was found arrayed as a stalwart in the camp of the Republican party
and he did much to further its cause, the while he manifested a most
lively and intelligent interest in the questions and issues of the day, be-
ing well fortified in his opinions as to matters of public import. In
1904 he was a delegate from California to the Republican national con-
vention in Chicago, and this distinction was again his in connection with
the convention of 1908, when President Taft was made the party nom-
inee. In 1910, in company with his wife and daughter, Mr. Norton
made an extended European tour, in connection with which they visited
England, Scotland, Ireland,' France. Germany and Austria. He was
especially impressed with the spirit of political unrest manifested in the
various countries visited and was moved to greater appreciation of the
attractions and advantages of his own land.

In the year 1885 Mr. Norton was united in marriage to Miss Mary
Frances VanDoren, of Petaluma, California, and this ideally happy mar-
riage was blessed by the birth of one daughter, Amy Marie, who is
taking her place as a popular factor in the social activities of her home
city.

One of the city's leading journals pays Mr. Norton the following
tribute in the course of a long article published upon the occasion of his
demise :

"After an illness of barely two weeks, through which the sturdy

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 143

spirit of the pioneer and frontiersman fought stubbornly though hope-
lessly for life, John H. Norton, known everywhere in business circles
in the Southwest as Major Norton, passed away at his home at 834,
West Twenty-eighth street. With him died one of those whose hands,
trained to the task by toil, served for the moulding of the future of
the great Southwest in days long before the railroad came. In his
adopted city, as in all places where he had lived, he made his presence
felt as an aggressive power for good, for progress, and for betterment,
<rivic and general. He threw his resources and his personal services
unreservedly into the scale for the advancement of that in which he
believed, and there are few capitalists in the city whose absence will
be more deeply felt."

Besides his devoted wife and daughter Mr. Norton is survived by
a brother, Bernard E. Norton, a retired business man of Willcox, Arizona.

ARTHUR ANDREWS. A man of energy and enterprise, possessing
much mechanical ability, Arthur Andrews, of Imperial, a representa-
tive of the industrial interests of this section of the state and as a gen-
eral blacksmith, is carrying on a thriving business. A son of T. C.
Andrews, he was born, in 1865, in Iowa. A native of Ohio, T. C. An-
drews for a number of years in Iowa, from there moving to Kansas
in 1870. He married Mary E. Brooks, who was born and reared in
Pennsylvania, and they became the parents of eight children. Arthur,
with whom this brief sketch is chiefly concerned, being the fifth child
in order of birth.

But five years old when his parents removed to Kansas, Arthur
Andrews was there educated in the common schools. Going, in 1889,
to Oklahoma, he there learned the blacksmith's trade, in which he is
now exceedingly proficient. In 1900 he went from Oklahoma to Texas,
where he remained for about seven years, being industriously em-
ployed. In 1907 Mr. Andrews followed the pathway of migration into
Imperial county, California, becoming a resident of the city of Impe-
rial on the I3th day of April. He immediately established himself at
his trade, and is now proprietor of a large blacksmith's shop, sixty-two
and one-half feet by one hundred and fifty feet, advantageously lo-
cated on Eighth street, where he does general blacksmithmg and re-
pairing, turning out durable, honest and faithful work, most satisfac-
tory in every respect to his numerous patrons. Mr. Andrews keeps an
average force of two men busy in filling his orders, in regard to facil-
itating his work using a six-horse-power gasoline engine to run his ma-
chinery.

On July 17, 1891, Mr. Andrews was united in marriage with Nan-
nie B. Minnis, a native of Missouri, and they are the parents of six
children, four of whom are living, namely: Thomas D. ; Mabel B.,
Alvin O. and John C.

NORMAN BRIDGE, A. M.. M. D. Dr. Bridge was long a resident of
the city of Chicago, where he was prominent in the educational work
of his profession for over two score of years, as a member of the faculty
of Rush Medical College, now the medical department of the Univer-

144 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

sity of Chicago, with which it has become affiliated within recent years.
For the past decade Dr. Bridge has been emeritus professor of medicine
in that institution. Not only has he gained prestige of wide order as
a physician and surgeon and as an educator, but while a resident of
Chicago he was in many ways prominent and influential in civic affairs.
He has made his home in California since 1891, and while impaired
health was the primary cause of his removal to this state, his restoration
to health has given him eighteen years of active and most agreeable
work. He is now a well known and highly esteemed citizen of Los
Angeles and it is a matter of gratification to be able to present within
these pages a brief review of his career.

The genealogy of Dr. Bridge in the agnatic line is traced back to
Deacon John Bridge, a sturdy Puritan who came from England to
America with the Braintree Company, in 1631, and who settled in Cam-
bridge, Massachusetts, in the following year, the place at that time hav-
ing been known as Newtown. From this ancestor Dr. Bridge is of the
seventh generation in line of direct descent. It is worthy of note, inci-
dentally, that General James A. Garfield, who became president of the
LTnited States, was descended from Captain Benjamin Garfield and that
the latter's wife, Elizabeth, was a granddaughter of Deacon Judge
Bridge. The church in Cambridge, or Newtown, was organized in 1635,
and John Bridge was made its first deacon There are in records now
extant many evidences of the fact that Deacon John Bridge was one of
the most influential citizens of his community. He served as represen-
tative in the legislature of the colony for four years and he ''saved the
settlement" of Cambridge when Hooker seceded to Connecticut in 1636.
He was thus responsible for the location of Harvard College where this
great university still stands and he aided powerfully in its nurture. A
statue in bronze of Deacon John Bridge, in the garb of a Puritan, was
erected on Cambridge Common September 20, 1882, and the same was
formally unveiled on the 28th of the following month. It is the work
of the well known sculptors T. R. and M. S. Gould, father and son.
Matthew Bridge, a grandson of Deacon John, was "a soldier in King
Philip's war and in the Canadian expedition of 1690."

Ebenezer Bridge, of Lexington. Massachusetts, a great-great-grand-
son of Deacon John and great-grandfather of Dr. Norman Bridge, was
a valiant soldier of the Continental line in the war of the Revolution, in
which he served in turn as captain, major and colonel.

Dr. Norman Bridge was born in Windsor, in the district later des-
ignated as West Windsor, Vermont, on the 3Oth of December. 1844,
and is a son of James Madison Bridge and Nancy A. (Bagley) Bridge,
both of whom were likewise born in the Green Mountain state. Mrs.
Nancy A. (Bagley) Bridge was a daughter of Thomas and Nancy
(Marsh) Bagley and was born in Windsor, in 1818. Her father served
in the war of 1812 and her paternal grandfather served for several
years as a patriot soldier in the war of the Revolution. In recognition
of his services he was later granted a pension by the government. The
paternal grandmother of Nancy A. (Bagley) Bridge was Olive (Greene)
Basjley. who had a slight strain of the blood of the North American
Indian, to the extent of probably one-sixteenth. She became the mother

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 145

of twelve children. The original representatives of the Marsh family
in America came from Wales, in 1621, and the father of Nancy (Marsh)
Bagley was a Revolutionary soldier.

In December, 1856, when Dr. Bridge was a lad of twelve years, the
family removed to Illinois and settled on a farm in Malta township,
DeKalb county, where the home was maintained until 1868. At the time
of the removal to the west the family consisted of the parents, two sons
and one daughter, the last mentioned being the youngest of the children.
Edward, the elder of the two sons, was a soldier of the Union in the
Civil war. He became sergeant of Company B, Fifty-fifth Illinois
Volunteer Infantry, was wounded at the battle of Shiloh and after par-
ticipating in several subsequent battles he finally died of disease at Lar-
kinsville, Alabama, in January, 1864. James Madison Bridge, father
of the Doctor, moved to Iowa, to the town of Scranton, where he re-
sided until his death, which occurred in 1879. His devoted wife sur-
vived him by many years. She passed the closing years of her life in
Pasadena, California, with her son and daughter-in-law, where she died
in 1903, at the age of eighty-five years.

Dr. Bridge gained his rudimentary education in the schools of his
native state and after the removal to Illinois he attended the district
school in Malta township near his home, after which he attended the
high schools of DeKalb and Sycamore in that state. He never attended
college in the academic sense. He taught in a country school in the
winter of 1862-3, in the interval between the years of his high-school
work. In 1864 he engaged in the fire-insurance business in Grundy
county, Illinois, where he traveled through the country districts and
often passed the nights at hospitable farm houses. In 1865 he began
the study of medicine in a private way, and during the session of 1866-7
he was a student in the medical department of the University of Mich-
igan. He thence went to the city of Chicago, where he attended the
summer and ensuing winter sessions of the Chicago Medical College,
which later became, and still continues, the medical department of North-
western University. In this institution he was graduated as a member
of the class of 1868, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. During
part of each summer prior to his graduation he worked on his father's
farm.

After his graduation Dr. Bridge became at once a teacher in his
alma mater, in the department of anatomy. He thus continued for two
years and thereafter he was professor of pathology in the Woman's
Medical College. Chicago, for three years. He then entered, in 1874, '
Rush Medical College, now of the University of Chicago, in the de-
partment of internal medicine. He has been a member of the teaching
corps of this institution for thirty-seven years, and for the past ten
years has been emeritus professor of medicine. He received an ad-
eundem degree in medicine from Rush Medical College in 1878, and
in 1889 Lake Forest University, Illinois, surprised him, while he was
abroad, by conferring upon him the honorary degree of Master of Arts.
His entry into the faculty of Rush Medical College, in 1874, was the
result of a public contest in lecturing or concours. He was appointed
lecturer on the practice of medicine. Though he was without financial

Vol. 1-9

146 A.MKR1CAX BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

resource of adequate amount to enable him to render assistance in a
monetary way, he yet aided materially in the rebuilding of the structures
of Rush Medical College in 1875, following the great Chicago fire of
1871. For the. intervening period the college had been housed in a
rude temporary building on the premises of Cook County Hospital, at
the corner of Eighteenth and Arnold streets. The county hospital was
soon rebuilt, near the new college building, and some time later Dr.
Bridge became one of the attending physicians of the hospital, and in-
cumbency which he retained for many years. The Presbyterian Hos-
pital was soon built adjacent to the college, and of this institution Dr.
Bridge became an attending physician, continuing in its service until
1900.

Through the decades of the '8os Dr. Bridge was greatly overworked,
and it has been characteristic of the man that he has never placed bounds
upon his work and services. At this time, however, he was forced to
realize that there was a limit to his endurance. With a growing practice,
with exacting hospital duties and taxing college work a large part of the
year, he accepted also public office, of which he continued in tenure for
seven years, — first as a member of the Chicago board of education, on
which he served from 1881 to 1884, and afterward as Republican elec-
tion commissioner for four years, — from 1886 to December, 1890. He
then discovered that he had pulmonary tuberculosis, and he immediately
dropped all work. Early in January, 1891, he came to California,
where he has since maintained his home, — first at Sierra Madre, later
at Pasadena, and finally in the city of Los Angeles. By 1893 the
Doctor has so far recovered as to resume his work for a few weeks
each autumn in the college and Presbyterian hospital, but he returned
to California before the more rigo'rous winter weather had set in. This
work he kept up until the autumn of 1905, inclusive; then he found him-
self so much engaged in business matters, in addition to his practice,
that he availed himself of the prerogative of an emeritus professorship,
which he has held since his unsuccessful effort to resign entirely from
the college, in 1900, that he has regarded his active college work as
terminated.

The public appointments conferred upon Dr. Bridge in Chicago were
unsought, and came as a surprise in each instance, — that to the school
board at the hands of Mayor Carter H. Harrison, Sr., and the election
commissionship through appointment of Judge Prendergast, of the county
court. The work as a member of the board of education proved very
enjoyable but also very laborious. On his entry into the board the
Doctor was immediately elected vice-president of that body, and a few
months later he was made president, to serve out a fractional year, at
the expiration of which he was elected to the same office for a full
year term. These preferments he regarded as specially flattering, as he
was a Republican and the personnel of the board included twice as many
Democrats as Republicans. The election office was illuminating in the
study of human nature and government ; in ward politics and party
strife. The Republican commissioner was one of three, the other two
being Democrats and the county court also being Democratic. When
Dr. Bridge was thus appointed to the election commission it was for an

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 147

unexpired term 'of one year, and he consented to serve for that time.
Near the end of the term the Chicago Tribune, the strongest Republican
newspaper of the city began editorially to attack his Republicanism, —
really because he was a long-time personal friend of the editor of the
Chicago Daily A'cii's. which had been for years an independent news-
paper and which was rather severe in its handling of the editor of the
Tribune. The editorial writer of the Tribune was under instruction
to lampoon frequently the Republican commissioner, and one Saturday
he wrote a particularly severe attack upon him, for the Sunday edition,
because of his alleged failure to do a particular thing in the canvassing
board on the preceding Friday. As a matter of fact he had tried
hard to do the thing referred to, but had been outvoted, as the Saturday
edition of the Tribune, in its local columns, plainly and truthfully re-
ported. Next day both the Daily News and the Inter Ocean printed
in parallel columns the words of the Tribune on Saturday and Sunday,
and ridiculed the paper for its inconsistency and lack of care. This
led, not to a correction or an apology but to worse and more bitter at-
tacks, which begat scathing retorts by the other papers. Finally there
appeared in the Inter Ocean of the following Thursday a biting open
letter from the election commissioner himself to the editor of the Tri-
bune. This led to reckless attacks on the commissioner and on the
other papers, and finally, on Sunday morning, to a direct libel on his
character as a physician. Then he went with his attorney to the editor,
with whom he had a quiet and much restrained conversation, which re-
sulted in an editorial correction and apology on the editorial page the
following morning. Thus ended a newspaper war of a week. At the
end of the week the county judge reappointed Dr. Bridge, for a full
term of three years, and he served until the close of the term. The
only elective office Dr. Bridge has held was that of one of the fifteen
"freeholders" to frame a new charter for the city of Pasadena, in
1900. The charter produced was adopted. At the polls Dr. Bridge re-
ceived a higher vote than any other candidate save one.

Dr. Bridge has contributed extensively to the leading medical jour-
nals and somewhat to the lay press, besides which he has written four
books : "The Penalties of Taste,'' "The Rewards of Taste," "House-
Health," and "Tuberculosis," the last mentioned being a condensation of
one of his courses of lectures delivered on this subject at Rush Medical
College. He was for a year or more one of the editors of the Chicago
Medical Journal & Examiner. A list of some fifty articles iji various
periodicals and his books, which the dates of their appearance, reveal,
by the vacant periods, the times of his overwork and illness.

Dr. Bridge belongs to several scientific and professional societies,
among them the Association of American Physicians, the American
Climatological Association, the American Academy of Medicine, the
Wisconsin Academy of Science, Arts and Letters the Los Angeles Aca-
demy of Sciences, and the local, state and national medical associations.
In Chicago he holds membership in the Union League, Hamilton and
University Clubs ; and in Los Angeles, he is identified with the California,
University, Sierra Madre, and Sunset Clubs. He is a member of the
Sons of the American Revolution.

1-18 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

In the year 1874 Dr. Bridge was married to Miss Mae Manford,
daughter of Rev. Erasmus Manford, a clergyman of the Universalist
church, publisher of Manford's Magazine and author of a work en-
titled "Twenty-five Years in the West." Mrs. Hannah (Bryant) Man-
ford, mother of Mrs. Bridge, was a woman of great influence in her
church and in philanthropic work, and she was coeditor of Manford's
Magazine. Dr. and Mrs. Bridge visited Europe in 1889 and in 1896,
and in April, 1906, he individually made a hurried business trip abroad.

From January, 1906, to the present time Dr. Bridge has given a
large part of his time to the oil and gas business, and he is now a di-
rector and treasurer of the Mexican Petroleum Company. Limited ; the
Mexican Petroleum Company ; the Huasteca Petroleum Company ; the
American Petroleum Company ; the American Oilfields Company ; the
Midland Oilfields Company, Limited; the Midway Oil Company; the
Cousins Oil Company; and the Mexican National Gas Company.

GORDON L. DUTCHER. Well known as an active and prosperous
business man of Imperial, Gordon L. Dutcher owns and operates the
"Valley Livery Stables," which are among the finest establishments of
the kind in Imperial county, and are most cleverly managed. A native
of Michigan, he was born, in June. 1885, in Sanilac county, being the
youngest of the eight children of his parents, Byron M. and Rebecca
E. Dutcher neither of whom are now living.

Going to South Dakota in 1897, G. L. Dutcher there continued his
studies until 1902, when he went to Colorado, where he completed his
early studies, being graduated from the high school at Buena Vista.
In 1904, responding to the lure of the desert climate, soil and possibil-
ities, Mr. Dutcher located in the Imperial Valley, where he filled sev-
eral contracts, principally connected with the leveling of the land.
Having accumulated some money, he embarked in the livery business
in 1908, in Imperial, and as a liveryman has met with almost unpre-
cedented success. His finely equipped barns cover an area embracing
six lots, and can easily and comfortably accommodate fifty horses, of
which he usually keeps a good supply. He has now, in 1912, twenty-
five carriage horses, with suitable buggies and vehicles, and several fine
saddle horses. Thoroughly understanding his business, and being ge-
nial, kind and accommodating to all, he has built up a substantial and
remunerative patronage, which increases in large proportions each year.

In 1907 Mr. Dutcher was united in marriage with Nellie Rae, a
daughter of Adam Rae, of Portland, Oregon. In politics Mr. Dutcher
is a Republican, and he was created a Mason in Imperial Lodge, No.
390, A. F. & A. M.

W. JARVIS BARLOW, M. D. There would be a distinct didactic value
to a more critical and exhaustive record of the career of Dr. W. Jarvis
Barlow than can be given within the circumscribed limitations of a pub-
lication of this order, but it may be stated in a preliminary way that he is
not only one of the distinguished representatives of his profession on the
Pacific coast but it also worthy of definite classification as one of the
world's benefactors, particularly through his effective efforts, primarily

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY ir,l

of semi-charitable order, in connection with the study and prevention of
tuberculosis. — a field in which he is one of the prominent and influential
factors not only in California, but also in the nation. He is the incum-
bent of the chair of clinical medicine and is also dean of the faculty of
the Los Angeles Department College of Medicine of the University of
California, in the city of Los Angeles, where he is engaged in the active
practice of his profession ; he was the founder and is the executive head
of the Barlow Sanatorium, to which more specific reference will be made
in later paragraphs : is a man of specially fine professional and intellec-
tual ability; and is a citizen whose influence is invariably cast in support of
the measures and enterprises tending to advance the general welfare of
the community. His services as a physician, as a humanitarian with a
high sense of stewardship, and as a man of distinctive loyalty and public
spirit have made his influence potent and benignant, while his earnest,
sincere and kindly nature has invariably prompted objective confidence
and esteem. He is one of the world's workers, mindful of his responsi-
bilities, free from ostentation and intellectual bigotry, and a citizen whom
California may well feel proud to claim.

In tracing the ancestral history of Dr. Walter Jarvis Barlow the rec-
ord is found to touch most graciously and worthily the early colonial
epoch of our national history and indicates that there have been strong
men and true to represent the family name in the various generations
that have appeared upon the stage of life's activities. The founder of
the American branch of the Barlow family was John Barlow, who immi-
grated from England in 1620 and established his home in the Massachu-
setts Bay colony, where he became a citizen of no inconsiderable promi-
nence and influence. The name of this family has been closely linked
with the annals of New England, that gracious cradle of so much of the
history of our country. Joel Barlow, born in 1754, the poet, statesman
and philosopher, was a grandson of Samuel Barlow and a direct descen-
dant of this same barnch of the family. He was born near Fairfield.
Prominent among his writings are the "Columbiad" and "Hasty Pud-
ding." John Barlow the great-great-grandfather of Dr. Barlow, was
also born at Fairfield, Connecticut, in which commonwealth he became a
successful merchant. He married Sarah Whitney, a member of the well
known New England family of that name, and their son John, reared to
maturity in Connecticut, chose as his wife Larana Scott. John Barlow,
Jr., son of this last mentioned couple and grandfather of him whose
name initiates this review, was likewise born and reared in Connecticut,
where was solemnized his marriage to Miss Julia Ann Jarvis, a repre-
sentative of a family of staunch English lineage, whose name has been
prominently identified with the history of Connecticut and has stood ex-
ponent of the deepest patriotism, the paternal grandfather of Julia Ann
(Jarvis) Barlow having been a valiant soldier in the Continental line
in the \yar of the Revolution. She was also a niece of Bishop Abraham
Jarvis, the first prelate of the Anglican or Episcopal church to be conse-
crated in America, and the second to serve at the head of the diocese of
Connecticut.

William H. Barlow, father of Dr. Barlow, was born in Connecticut,
where he was reared to maturity and received good educational advan-

].-.:? AMERICAN UlOGKAl'llY AXU GENEALOGY

tages, as gauged by the standards of the locality and period. He finally
removed to the state of New York and established his home at Ossining,
where he engaged in the hardware business and became a citizen of prom-
inence and influence in the community, his sterling quality of mind and
heart gaining and retaining to him the high esteem of those with whom
he came in contact in the varied relations of life. His political allegiance
was given to the Democratic party ; he was affiliated with the Masonic
fraternity, and both he and his wife were devout communicants of the
Protestant Episcopal church. He married Miss Catherine Stratton Lent,
who likewise was a native of Connecticut and of colonial stock. They be-
came the parents of five sons and four daughters, and of the number four
sons and one daughter arc now living. The devoted wife and mother
was summoned to the life eternal in 1891, at Ossining, New Y'ork. and
William li. Barlow, her husband and the father of Dr. Barlow, died in
New York City in 1901.

Dr. Walter Jarvis Barlow was born at Ossining in beautiful old
Westchester county. New York, on the 22d of January, 1868, and is in-
debted to the public schools of his native place for his preliminary edu-
cational discipline. At the age of thirteen years he entered the Mount
Pleasant Military Academy, in his native county, and from this institu-
tion he was graduated as a member of the class of 1885. He was that
year matriculated in Columbia University, in the city of New York, in
which he completed an academic or literary course and was graduated in
1889, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He had in the meantime
formulated definite plans for his future career and in harmony therewith
he entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the medical depart-
ment of Columbia L'niversity. in which he devoted himself to his studies
and technical work with characteristic zeal and devotion, so that his
standing was high at the time of his graduation, as a member of the
class of 1892. After thus receiving from this celebrated institution his
well earned degree of Doctor of Medicine, he wisely availed himself of
the privilege of gaining valuable and comprehensive clinical experience
by assuming the position of interne in a New York City hospital, the
Mount Sinai Hospital, an incumbency which he retained for two and a
half years.

In 1895 Dr. Barlow, admirably fortified for the work of his exacting
profession, came to California for his health, and established his home in
Los Angeles in 1896. where he has since continued in active general
practice as a physician, and where he has gained prestige of more than
local order. He is a recognized authority in the department of internal
medicine and is dean of the medical department of the University of Cal-
ifornia, in which admirable institution he is the able and popular incum-
bent of the chair of clinical medicine. The Doctor is actively identified
\\ ith the American Medical Association, of which he is now vice-presi-
dent, the American Academy of Medicine, the American Clinatological
Association, the California' State Medical Society, and the Los Angeles
County Medical Society. He takes deep interest in the educational work
of his profession and aside from his direct service as a member of the
medical facnltv of the University of California he has also been a fre-
quent and valued contributor to the standard and periodical literature of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 158

his profession. Though never active in the domain of practical politics
Dr. Barlow is aligned as a staunch supporter of the cause of the Repub-
lican party, and in his home city he is identified with the California and
University Clubs. He is a member of the Protestant Episcopal church.

A most beneficent and noble work has been that accomplished by Dr.
Barlow in connection with the admirable sanatorium which bears his
name and which was founded by him in the year 1902. His interest in
the study and prevention of tuberculosis has been of the deepest order and
his research and labors in this field have been indefatigable. His hu-
mane interest in the prevention of this dread malady found concrete and
emphatic form in his founding of what is known as the Barlow Sanato-
rium, and it is but consistent that brief record be incorporated con-
cerning this noble institution. Such record is taken, with minor para-
phrase, from an article published in the Bulletin of the California Asso-
ciation for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis, of which Dr. Barlow
is an influential and valued member, as is he also of the local and affiliated
association of Los Angeles county, in which latter he is a member of the
executive committee. From the article mentioned are made the follow-
ing extracts :

The Bulletin in this issue presents a brief account of the work being
done by the Barlow Sanatorium of Los Angeles in its work for the indi-
gent consumptives. This institution and the Redlands Settlement are
the pioneer organized efforts in anti-tuberculosis work in California. It
was incorporated on April 28, 1902, completing its first buildings and re-
ceiving its first patient on September i, 1903. The founder of the Bar-
low Sanatorium was Dr. W. Jarvis Barlow, of Los Angeles, he and his
family having given the first twenty thousand dollars with which to
purchase grounds and erect buildings, and he himself in these interven-
ing years having borne the brunt of the upkeep of the institution. The
Barlow Sanatorium was so named by the board of directors out of recog-
nition to the generous thought and financial aid given by its founder and
his family. The site of the instituton is a tract of twenty-five acres with-
in the city limits and located in a beautiful little valley of the Chavez
ravine, just to the south of and bordering on Elysian Park.

The idea of a sanatorium where indigent consumptives of Los Ange-
les, who were still in the curable stages of the disease, could obtain ad-
vantages of the open air treatment and so be given a fair chance for re-
covery suggested itself to the founder of the institution several years
ago. Recognizing that little or no aid was at that time to be obtained
from the city or county, and yet deeply stirred by the sad lot of these un-
fortunate victims of the great white plague. Dr. Barlow decided to turn
to his friends for aid and with and through them to establish, if possible,
a Los Angeles institution where such work as that instituted by Dr. Ed-
ward Trudeau at Saranac Lake, New York, could be carried on, — to the
direct benefit, on the one hand, of the poor consumptives, and on the
other of the city as a whole. After careful thought and investigation of
desirable sites Dr. Barlow decided upon that now occupied by the sana-
torium and personally gave the purchase price of the land. The adminis-
tration building was erected and equipped by Mrs. W. Jarvis • Barlow,

154 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and the Solano cottage or infirmary was built and equipped by Mr. and
Mrs. Alfred Solano.

At the Barlow Sanatorium, whose facilities and equipment have been
brought up to high standard, patients receive for five dollars treatment
that costs twenty-five dollars or more per week in private sanatoriums.
Patients who can afford to do so are, however, requested to pay five dol-
lars a week, as by this means the benefits of the institution can be ac-
corded to a much larger number of patients. As the actual cost of main-
tenance of the institution is about nine or ten dollars a week for each pa-
tient, this leaves a deficit of four or five dollars a week to be made up
by the institution.

The funds for running expenses of the Barlow Santorium are raised
through dues, donations and entertainments. The grounds, buildings
and equipment, the large number of faithful friends and workers, and
the excellent results among the patients not only make the Barlow Sana-
torium an interesting institution but also make it worthy of the thought
and generosity of every citizen in Los Angeles.

The faithful and earnest labors of Dr. Barlow in connection with the
practical work and maintenance of this institution entitle him to lasting
honor as a true benefactor and friend of humanity. He has bravely
faced exigencies and problems that would have discouraged one less loyal
and unselfish, and the sanatorium which perpetuates his name should
long continue a monument to his zeal, liberality and generous devotion.
He controls a large and representative practice as a physician and is held
in unqualified esteem by his professional confreres, as well as by all
others who know him and have appreciation of his admirable qualities,
through which he must needs measure up to the full demands of the ac-
curate metewand of popular approbation.

On the 8th of November, 1898, was solemnized the marriage of Dr.
Barlow to Miss Marion Brooks Patterson, of Los Angeles, and both are
popular factors in the leading social activities of their home city. Mrs.
Barlow was born in 1872, at Dunkirk. New York, and is a granddaughter
of the late Horatio Gates Brooks, who was a representative citizen of
Dunkirk and founder of the Brooks Locomotive Works. Dr. and Mrs.
Barlow have three children, — Walter Jarvis. Jr., Catherine Lent and Ella
Brooks.

JOHN JOSEPH SWEENEY. In the forefront among the active and
enterprising hustlers of Imperial. Imperial county, is John J. Sweeney,
who came to the Valley in early pioneer days and, in Western parlance,
has since "made good." Imbued with the same courage and spirit that
populated the Central and Pacific states, the Imperial county pioneers
crossed the desert "as of old the pilgrims crossed the sea," and in the
rough work of transforming the vast area of sand into a fruitful and
habitable region suffered hardships and privations of which the com-
ing generations will have but scant realization. Prominent among these
earlier settlers of Imperial is J. J. Sweeney, who is actively associated
with the industrial advancement and prosperity of this part of the
county.' A son of Professor Edward Sweeney, he was born January 7.
1870. in Texas, where he was bred and educated.

THE NEW
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX ANC

TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

R 1-

AMERICAN" BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 17.9

Born in Ireland, Edward Sweeney came to this country when
young, and having acquired a superior education was for many years
engaged in educational work, being very successful as a teacher. Lo-
cating in Caldwell, Texas, he continued his professional career in that
place, and was also engaged in agricultural pursuits, owning and oper-
ating an extensive stock ranch. He married Jaley P. Roberts, a native
of Mississippi, and of the eleven children born of their union six are
living, J. [., the subject of this sketch, having been the oldest child.
The others that survive are as follows: Mrs. J. L. Waldrit; Mrs. H. G.
Sanger; B. F. Sweeney; Michael Sweeney; and Laura.

At the age of seventeen years, having obtained a practical educa-
tion in the common schools. J. J. Sweeney went to San Diego, Califor-
nia, where he was employed for a time as a teamster. In 1897 he em-
igrated to Mexico, where he followed mining and camp work, and at
the same time became proficient as a blacksmith. After leaving Mex-
ico he lived in Arizona for a short time, from there coming to Im-
perial county, arriving at Imperial, October 12, 1902, with a young
wife, two trunks, and a cash capital of sixty-one dollars. Securing a
position in a blacksmith's shop. Mr. Sweeney worked for wages for
thirty days, and then purchased a half interest in the smithy. Sixty
days later he bought out his partner, and since that time has carried
on a substantial business, his trade having 'largely increased each sea-
sou, his reputation as a general blacksmith, including the repairing of
all kinds of machinery, being widely known. He keeps on an average
six men busily employed the year around, his machinery being oper-
ated by electric power. Beginning with a capital of but sixty-one dol-
lars, Mr. Sweeney has now property valued at fifteen thousand dollars,
to say nothing of outstanding debts, which he can never collect, of
four thousand dollars. All of this money he has made within the past
few years, his only factors in its accumulation having been industry,
sound judgment and wise management.

Mr. Sweeney has been twice married. He married first, in 1892,
Laura Tower, who died in 1893, leaving one child, who is also deceased.
He married, December 25, 1901. Lauretta Allison, and into their home
two children have made their advent, namely: Earl T., born in 1906,
and Ledford J., born in 1907. Mrs. Sweeney is also a native of Cali-
fornia, San Bernardino having been the place of her birth. Frater-
nally Mr. Sweeney belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows
and to the Daughters of Rebekah.

AKTIIUR LETTS. Among the essentially representative citzens of Los
Angeles, California. Arthur Letts holds prestige as one whose loyalty and
public spirit in connection with all matters affecting the general welfare
has ever been of the most insistent order. He was born at Holmby, Eng-
land, on the I7th of June, 1862, and is a son of Richard and Caroline
(Coleman) Letts, members of old and honored English families. His
father was a farmer, and was the eldest son of a Richard Letts, the same
name having been bestowed upon the eldest son for nine generations.

Mr. Letts gained his early educational discipline in the schools of his
native land, and subsequently he broadened his outlook on life through

IliO AMERICAN BIOGRAFIiV AXU GENEALOGY

well directed reading and study, and through active association with
men and affairs. When about twenty years of age he came to America
and located in the city of Toronto, Canada. Soon afterward, however, in
the year 1885, he volunteered to the Canadian government his services in
the suppression of the well remembered Riel rebellion. He distinguished
himself as a loyal and gallant soldier, and in recognition of his bravery
and effective service he was awarded a medal with bar and clasp, also a
grant of land by the British government. In Walker's great department
store in the city of Toronto Mr. Letts gained his initial experience con-
nection with the general merchandise business, and he contributes much
of his subsequent success in the same line of enterprise to his early train-
ing in that establishment — the then leading department store of the Do-
minion of Canada.

In 1887, soon after the close of his military service, Mr. Letts came to
the United States, soon making his way to Seattle, Washington, where
he resided for the ensuing seven years. In 1895 he removed to Cali-
fornia and established his home at Los Angeles, where he has gained dis-
tinct recognition as a prominent and influential business man. He has
built up one of the greatest department stores on the Pacific coast and
has shown himself possessed of marked initiative and administrative abil-
ity. He has been most prominently identified with the business activities
of Los Angeles and has been concerned with many important financial
enterprises aside from those involved in the development of his great
mercantile business. Correct methods and close application have been
the master-key of his success. The managers, department superintend-
ents, buyers and other executives of his great mercantile establishment
have been selected with discrimination and prove effective coadjutors,
earnest cooperation being assured by the kindly and appreciative asso-
ciations which are maintained between employer and employe.

The business is conducted under the title of the Broadway Depart-
ment Store, and the large and finely equipped store is eligibly located in
the best business section of the city. Until recently Mr. Letts was vice
president of the California Savings Bank, and a member of the director-
ate of the Broadway Bank & Trust Company, as well as that of the Sina-
loa Land Company, but is gradually withdrawing from the management
of enterprises outside of his own business, although he has other capital-
istic interests of broad scope and importance. No citizen has shown
more zealous or helpful interest in the promotion of enterprises and
undertakings tending to advance the material and civic prosperity of Los
Angeles, and none has been more liberal in contributing to the attrac-
tions of this most beautiful of all cities in the "land of sunshine and
flowers."

In his political allegiance Mr. Letts is aligned as a stalwart supporter
of the cause of the Republican party. He is a member of the California
Club, of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Athletic Club, and of the Bo-
hemian Club, of San Francisco. He is a trustee of the State Normal
School, and also takes a deep interest in the local work of the Young
Men's Christian Association, of which he has served as president for six
years. It is worthy of special note that under his administration the Los
Angeles association has gained precedence as the largest of all Young

AMERICAN BIOGRAI'lIV AXU GENEALOGY 161

Men's Christian Associations in the entire world in point of member-
ship. In 1909 Mr. Letts was a delegate to the world's convention of the
Young Men's Christian Association, held at Barmen-Elberfeld, Germany,
and he was an influential factor in this great assemblage.

In the city of Toronto, Canada, on the 251)1 of August, 1886, was
solemnized the marriage of Mr. Letts to Miss Florence Philp, daughter
of the Reverend S. C. Philp, a representative citizen of that city. The
three children of this union are Edna, Gladys and Arthur. Jr.

The personality of Mr. Letts and the princely contribution that he has
made to the material attractiveness of Los Angeles are indicated in the
following modified extracts from a recent issue of the Los Angeles Times:

Los Angeles is honored in the selection of Arthur Letts to represent
America on the advisory board to the committee having in charge the
International Horticultural Exhibit to be held in London in 1912. On
this board are the king and queen of England, as well as eminent bota-
nists from every country in the world. Mr. Letts has been chosen be-
cause of his knowledge of American flora and because his love of flowers
and trees has prompted the expenditure of a large fortune in the horti-
cultural development of his superb thirty-acre 'tract near Hollywood.
The great London show is designed as an inspiration to the horticulture
of all countries and Mr. Letts has accepted the position noted because it
will give him a splendid opportunty to make a further study into that
matter, which has so long absorbed his interest. In doing this his service
to California and to the United States will be twofold. He will see that
American plants are properly represented to the world's students who
assemble at London and he will learn more about the flowers and shrubs
of other countries which are suitable to the climates and soils of the dif-
ferent sections of the United States.

Mr. Letts is a rich man who can well afford a hobby, and it is a
cause for congratulation on the part of the public that his interest lies in
a subject which is of profit to everyone. How much money he has spent
in making beautiful his grounds at Hollywood he does not know, but the
sum has been large and the results gratifying. The public derives benefit
from the rich expenditure of Mr. Letts upon his grounds in three ways.
The grounds are open to everyone every Thursday from early morning
until night, and may be enjoyed for their beauty or as a study in effective
landscape gardening, as well as for showing the multiplicity of beautiful
growing things suited to southern California. Every plant is labeled with
its scientific name, and the total bontanical knowledge to be gained in
these gardens has never been compiled in a single volume. The student
and lover of plants and flowers could spend weeks at this wonderful place
with endless pleasure and profit. Either the palms or the cacti on these
grounds are so numerous that weeks might be devoted to their apprecia-
tion. Mr. Letts has several collections of palms on which a monetary
value could not be placed. Their great value lies first in their exquisite
beauty, and second in the fact that they are exclusive. This means that
they are hybrid or "sports" of his own production and that they have no
duplicates in any other garden.

Mr. Letts has the largest collection of cacti, as far as he has been able
to learn, in the United States, and he has never seen a larger in any

162 AMERICAN I'.IOCR AI'IIV AXD GENEALOGY

country. This Cactus Garden has been recently created a United Stutr-
sub-station, and from Washington come many rare specimens, here to
grow to maturity under the warm sunny skies of Calfornia. He keeps
twenty-six men at work on the place year in and year out. but he himself
is the head gardener and works in the different gardens of the place every
morning from nine o'clock until after luncheon hour. He knows every
tree on the place and feels that the attention he gives that tree establishes
a personal relation between him and it. The trees, shrubs and flowers of
his magnificent gardens seem to him almost sentient beings, and he has
the enthusiasm of the true devotee — the one who knows and loves and
appreciates.

A magnificent palmhouse on the place is something entirely new in
this line and is given specially to the propagation of ferns and palms.
The structure provides shelter and abundance of light and air without
producing light and heat. There is no glass about it, it is simply a great
ampitheatre with a lattice roof which will eventually be covered by count-
less entwining vines, rich in foliage and blossom. The magnitude of this
house is something to ponder upon. Tt is two hundred feet long, one
hundred and fifty feet wide and has a magnificent dome fifty-five feet in
heighr. The garage on the place is surrounded by wonderful palms and
through their gracious foliage floats the golden cadence of mellow chimes.
One of the features of the Italian garden, and for that matter of the
entire place, is the statuary. \Yhile abroad Mr. Letts gave a commission
to Italian artists of note for the reproduction of a great many master-
pieces from famous Italian galleries. Four of these beautiful figures
stand in full life size on the headstones above the terrace steps. A copy
of the world's most beautiful "Aurora," done in massive Italian marble,
occupies a place a! the foot of this terrace. It is a piece which artists
would travel hundreds of miles to see. Scattered over the premises are
terra cotta duplicates of the Xeptune urn. Their beauty recalls the death-
less lines of Keats' ode to a Grecian urn. Mr. Letts has added to the
ornamentation of all Los Angeles in commissioning the reproduction of
these treasures. He has done it at an expenditure of a small fortune,
but his garden is his one great hobby, and he has not allowed the thought
of expense to enter into his calculations. His water supply has been de-
veloped at a large expense, but it is both private and plentiful and is
absolutely dependable. The water is pumped for half a mile, and he has
all he wants when he wants it — a tremendous satisfaction in gardening.
Xot long ago Mr. Lett's secretary came to him to enquire if he had any
idea what his place had cost him to date. "Xo," replied Mr. Letts, "and f
do not want to know. This garden is the one thing in my life that is
going to measure up to my ideal now and for a hundred years to come,
and I do not propose to place a money value on it." That has been the
spirit with which he has worked and this spirit is reflected in a thousand
beautiful ways about a striking homestead.

The artificer of his own fortunes, the winner of his own success. Mr.
Letts is not only a man of affairs, but is also a citizen whose contribution
to progress and development has been an important factor in connection
with the material and civic life of California.

He has lived an exemplary life and has ever supported those interests

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 165

which are calculated to uplift and benefit humanity, while his own high
moral worth is deserving of the highest commendation.

CLAUDE E. STANDLEE, M. D. A rising young physician of Impe-
rial, Claude E. Standlee, AI. D., is making rapid progress in his pro-
fessional career, which is one of the most exacting to which a man
may bend his time and energies, requiring the knowledge, skill and wis-
dom which shall properly guide and direct the mind and keep the phy-
sical conditions of the human bod)' in its normal condition. Having
early familiarized himself with the rudiments of medicine and surgery,
he has continually added to his acquired knowledge by close study and
earnest application, and is now well qualified, not only by birth and
education, but by experience, to meet the grave responsibilities and
requirements of his chosen profession.

One of California's native sons, Dr. Sandlee was born in Los An-
geles, in 1885, a son of E. J. and Sarah Standlee, the latter of whom
passed to the life beyond in 1892. The oldest of a family of five chil-
dren, the Doctor was educated primarily in the public schools of his
native city, completing the course in the high school. Turning then,
as is natural to one of his mental calibre, to a professional life, he en-
tered the medical department of the University of California, from
which he was graduated with the class of 1907, receiving the degree of
M. D. The following two years he practised at Soldiers' Home, and
also did much work in the hospital, gaining valuable experience in di-
agnosing and treating diseases. Foreseeing the future development
awaiting Imperial county, Dr. Standlee located in Imperial in 1909, and
in the time that has since intervened has met with great success in his
professional labors, having built up a large and remunerative practice
in this part of the Valley, and gained a wide reputation as a physician
of skill and ability. The Doctor is interested in everything pertaining
to his work, and is a member of the Imperial County Medical Society
and of the California State Medical Society. He was created a Mason
in Downey Lodge, No. 220, at Downey, California, and is a member
Los Angeles Consistory, No. 3, of the Scottish Rite.

LEE C. GATES. In the election of Hon. Lee C. Gates to the state
senate of California, on the 8th of November, 1910,, the voters of the
thirty-fourth senatorial district not only made a most admirable choice
as touching the furtherance of wise, honest and progressive legislation,
but also paid honor to a man whose character and ability well justified
such distinctive recognition. A representative member of the California
bar, a man of broad views and well fortified opinions, a citizen of utmost
loyalty and public spirit, and a man whose integrity of purpose is as
impregnable as are his intellectual and pragmatic powers well reinforced,
— he is the type of citizen most valuable in the public service, in which
all too few of such character are to be found. His activities and accom-
plishment in the senate have already justified in most emphatic manner
the wisdom of the popular choice.

Mr. Gates has been a resident of California for nearly a score of years,
and has thoroughly identified himself with the interests of this favored

166 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

commonwealth. He established his home in the city of Los Angeles,
and here the major part of his professional work has been in connection
with his responsible duties as chief counsel for the Title Insurance &
Trust Company. He first became attorney for the Los Angeles Abstract
Company, and he retained this incumbency until the corporation was
succeeded by the Los Angeles Title Insurance & Trust Company, organ-
ized and incorporated in 1894, and of the latter he has been chief counsel
from the time of organization to the present.

The old Buckeye state has sent its sturdy sons forth into many of the
commonwealths of the great western portion of our national domain,
and many of them have here attained to marked distinction and success,
thus honoring the state of their nativity and also that of their adoption.
Senator Gates takes a due measure of satisfaction in reverting to Ohio
as the place of his nativity and he is a scion of one of its sterling pioneer
families. He was born on a farm in Preble county, that state, on the
4th of April, 1856, and is a son of Laborious A. and Maria (Brumbaugh)
Gates, both of whom were likewise natives of the Buckeye state, where
the respective families were founded in the early pioneer epoch. Henry
Gates, the paternal grandfather of the senator, was born in Pennsylvania,
and the maternal grandfather, Otto Brumbaugh, was born in Maryland.
In the ancestral lines of Senator Gates are found represented strains of
German, English and Swiss blood, and the Gates family was founded
in America in the colonial era of our national history. Laborious A.
Gates, a man of strong character and inflexible integrity, devoted his
entire active career to agricultural pursuits. He was a staunch supporter
of the principles of the Republican party from the time of its organiza-
tion until his death. Of the children four sons and two daughters are
now living.

Senator Gates was reared to the sturdy discipline of the farm and is
indebted to the public schools of Ohio and Indiana for his early educa-
tional advantages. That he made good use of such opportunities is as-
sured by the fact that as a young man he proved himself eligible for
the pedagogic profession, in connection with which he was for five
years a successful teacher in the schools of Wayne county, Indiana, and
Montgomery county, Ohio. In the latter county he initated his work of
preparation for the legal profession. He prosecuted the study of law under
effective preceptorship at Dayton, the county seat, and he was admitted
to the bar of his native state in i8Si, upon examination before the
supreme court. It is worthy of note in this connection that he was a
member of a large class of applicants and that after a searching and
rigid examination he stood second on the list in the matter of equipment
for professional practice. He served his novitiate in the active work
of his profession at Dayton, where he continued in practice until 1885,
when he removed to Butler county. Kansas, where, in order to recuper-
ate his health, he devoted considerable time to ranch work, in which
connection he became the owner of a well improved farm. After he
had regained his wanted physical energies he engaged in the practice
of his profession at Eldorado, the judicial center of the county, and he
gained secure prestige as one of the leading members of the bar of that
section of the state, where he continued to devote his attention to gen-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY Hi?

eral practice until 1892, when he came to California and established his
home in Los Angeles, where he has since resided and where his prin-
cipal professional activity is in connection with the affairs of the Los
Angeles Title Insurance & Trust Company, which is one of the sub-
stantial and important corporations of its order in the state and of which
he has been chief counsel from its inception, as has already been noted
in this context. Concerning him the following pertinent statements have
been made: "No man in the state is better informed in respect to the
laws relating to titles to real estate. Indeed, he is an authority on that
subject, and the knowledge he thus possesses is of great value to a legis-
lator."

Since establishing his home in California Senator Gates, with distinc-
tive civic loyalty, has been active in connection with state and municipal
reforms. In politics he is an independent Republican and has been a
staunch and effective advocate of its principles, as exemplified by Pres-
ident Lincoln, as well as by Presidents Roosevelt and Taft. In 1906 the
senator was made the candidate on a non-partisan ticket for the office
of mayor of Los Angeles, and while he received the earnest support of
the best element in the community his defeat, was compassed by the
machine and push forces of both contending forces. He has never be-
longed to a clique or faction, but has been manly and straightforward
in his political activities. In advocating the election of Senator Gates the
Rural Calif ornian used the following expressions, which are worthy of
reproduction in this article : "It is fortunate for the people of the thirty-
fourth senatorial district that such a man as Mr. Gates has consented
to be a candidate for the important position of senator. He is well
equipped by knowledge and character. He is an industrious worker, has
broad and generous views, is democratic in sentiment and manners, ap-
proachable and genial. What is equally important is that he is an able
speaker and debater, can make his views understood without mistake,
is sincere and earnest in his convictions, and his highest aim is to pro-
mote the welfare of the state. Mr. Gates is thoroughly familiar with
the needs of this part of the state, having taken an active and effective
part for years in promoting the development and welfare of the section
in which he has resided. The people of his senatorial district did honor
to themselves as well as to him in making him their representative in the
upper branch of the legislature. Mr. Gates will do much to further and
maintain the ascendency of the Republican party by doing good work
for the whole people, along all lines that tend to promote human welfare
and happiness. He is a clean man in habits, morals, home and social
life, business and politics, and is in the height of matured manhood."

In the election on the 8th of November, 1910, after he had made a
dignified but most masterly campaign throughout his district, Mr. Gates
succeeded in rolling up a most gratifying majority at the polls, and in
the senate he has brought to bear his' splendid powers in the fostering
of wise economic measures and general legislation of the best type. He
has proved one of the most influential factors on the floor of the senate
and in the delibrations of the committee room, and introduced many
important bills which he ably championed and brought to enactment.

108 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Among these should be specially mentioned the initiative and referendum
and the recall measures.

Senator Gates is president of the California Land Title Association,
and is a member of the American Association of Title Men. He is a
charter member of the Los Angeles City Club, of which he was the first
president, and is one of the most influential and valued members of the
Union League Club in his home city. Of this latter organization he
served as president in 1901, and in January, 1911, he was again chosen
its chief executive officer, a position of which he is in tenure at the
time of this writing.

In the year 1883 was solemnized the marriage of Senator Gates to
Miss Bessie B. Caldwell, of Richmond, Wayne county, Indiana, in which
state she was born and reared. They have two daughters, Hazel and
June, and the family home is known for its gracious and unostentatious
hospitality.

WILLIAM WESSEL. Distinguished as the pioneer undertaker and
furniture dealer of the Imperial Valley, W'illiam Wessel, a valued and
highly esteemed resident of Imperial, is widely known, and has an ex-
tended reputation for professional knowledge and skill. A son of Her-
man Wessel, a native of Germany, he was born, in 1863, in Philadel-
phia, Pennsylvania, being the third son in a family of ten children, four
of whom survive. Herman Wessel migrated with his family to Texas,
where, but a few years later, his death occurred. His wife, whose
maiden name was Frederika Eppinger, subsequently moved with her
fatherless children to California, locating in Los Angeles, where she
spent her remaining years.

Brought up and educated in Los Angeles, William Wessel was va-
riously employed throughout the days of his boyhood and youth, for
awhile working with an uncle in a bakery. He afterwards learned the
tinsmith's trade, but abandoned it later, turning his attention to under-
taking, a profession in which he has acquired skill and ability. In 1902,
while Imperial county was in its infancy as regarded its settlement,
Mr. Wessel opened an undertaking and furniture establishment at Im-
perial, being willing to sacrifice a little that the incoming settlers of the
desert might have the benefit of his professional services if required,
even if at the start his financial recompense should be scant. For seven
years he continued both branches of his industry, but since 1909 has de-
voted his time solely to his undertaking business. On coming into the
desert he took up forty acres of land from the Government. Subse-
quently disposing of that tract, he bought another tract of sixty acres,
forty acres of which he has placed under a high state of culture, while
twenty acres of it is used as a cemetery.

In February. 1884, Mr. Wessel was united in marriage with Ida
Hendricks, and into their home three children have been born, namely :
Pearl ; Victor P.. professor of music and leader of the Imperial Band ;
and Hallie. Fraternally Mr. Wessel is identified with various organiza-
tions, being a member of the Order of Eagles ; of the Fraternal Broth-
erhood ; of the Rathbone Sisters ; of the Knights of the Maccabees ; and
of the Uniform Rank. Knights of Pvthias.

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 171

CHARLES E. HARWOOD. One of the substantial capitalists and rep-
resentative citizens of San Bernardino county is Charles Edward Har-
\vood. who is president of the Commercial National Bank of Upland, and
who has been an influential factor in the civic and material development
of this favored section of the state. He is a man of much constructive
and administrative ability and his sterling integrity in all the relations
of life has gained to him the high regard of his fellow men. As one of
the leading citizens of San Bernardino county he is especially entitled
to recognition in this publication.

Charles Edward I larwood was born at Bennington, Vermont, on the
ipth of October. 1830, and is a son of Hiram and Eliza (Haswell) Har-
wood. both of whom were likewise natives of the old Green Mountain
state and representatives of families, of English lineage, that were
founded in New England in the early colonial epoch of our national his-
tory. The original progenitors of the Hanvood family in the new world
came from England in 1630 and settled in Plymouth colony, Massachu-
setts, and members of the family were later numbered among the earliest
settlers in Vermont, as is assured by the fact that the first white child
born in Bennington was a Hanvood. Hiram Harwood, a man of strong
character and sterling integrity, was identified with the great basic in-
dustry of agriculture during virtually his entire active career, and he
lived for many years on his old homestead farm in Bennington, Ver-
mont, whence he went to Missouri and joined his children soon after the
close of the Civil war. He resided at Springfield, that state, for twenty
years and then came to California, where he passed the remainder of his
life. He died at Upland, San Bernardino county, in 1892, at the patriarchal
age of ninety-three years, and his cherished and devoted wife, who was
summoned to the life eternal in 1900. was nearly one hundred years of
age at the time of her death. She was a woman of exceptionally bril-
liant mentality and distinctive refinement, and she retained her mental
and physical faculties in a wonderful degree until the time of her demise.
She was a daughter of Anthony Haswell. who was the founder of the
Vermont Gazette at Bennington, the first paper established in the south-
ern part of the Green Mountain state and the second to be published
within the borders of the state. For the publication of a severe criticism
of an act passed by Congress under the administration of President lohn
Adams — the alien and sedition act, abolishing the right of free speech, —
he was subjected to a heavy fine and also served a term in the penitentiary.
In later years the amount of the fine, together with interest on the same
for the intervening period, was returned to his heirs by a special act of
Congress, under the administration of President Polk. He founded the
J'eniitnit Gazette when he was scarcely more than a boy and continued
to publish the same until the close of his life. Early in the War of the
Revolution he entered the Continental army as substitute for a man who
had dependent upon him a large family, although Air. Haswell was a mere
boy at the time. For a number of years he held the office of postmaster
general of Vermont and he was long numbered among the most honored
and influential citizens of his state. Hiram and Eliza (Haswell) Har-
wood became the parents of three sons and tliree daughters, all of whom

172 \-\IKRICA.\ mOGKAPJIY AXD (iENEALOGY

are living in southern California, and the family reputation for longevity
is being well upheld.

Charles E. Harwood, the eldest of the six children, was reared under
the sturdy discipline of the old home farm in Vermont, and after avail-
ing himself of the advantages of a seminary at Bennington, he entered
Williams College, in Massachusetts, in which he was graduated as a
member of the class of 1852, under the regime of President Mark Hop-
kins, who long presided over the destinies of that fine old institution. Mr.
Harwood then took up the study of law, under effective perceptorship,
and was admitted to the bar in Wisconsin in 1858. In the same year
he located at Janesville. Rock county, Wisconsin, where he was engaged
in the practice of his profession until 1865. In the year last mentioned
Mr. Harwood removed to Springfield, Missouri, and soon afterward was
one of the syndicate taking over the railway known as the southwest
branch of the Missouri Pacific Railroad, now the St. Louis & San Fran-
cisco Railroad. He was associated with this system during the construc-
tion of fifteen hundred miles of its line. — through Arkansas to Paris,
Texas, also to Wichita, Kansas. While a resident of Springfield, Mis-
souri, Mr. Harwood became one of the founders of Drury College, to
the funds for which he was the first subscriber on the list. He was ap-
pointed a member of the first board of trustees of the new institution and
this position he has retained during the years that have intervened. He
has contributed many thousands of dollars to the support and expansion
of this admirable college, and is now the only surviving member of its
original board of trustees. In recognition of his services to the cause
of higher education Drury College conferred on Mr. Harwood the degree
of LL. D. For many years he was president of the Green County Na-
tional Bank, of Springfield, Missouri, and he wielded much influence
in the reviving of the industrial and social prosperity of southwestern
Missouri after the section had suffered greatly from the ravages of the
Civil war. He had intended to engage in the practice of his profession
at Springfield, but his business interests became so extensive as to de-
mand his entire time and attention, so that he virtually withdrew en-
tirely from the practice of law. He continued to maintain his home in
Springfield for a quarter of a century and was there an interested prin-
cipal in many important enterprises.

In 1887, owing to impaired health, Mr. Harwood came to California,
and he identified himself with what was known as the Ontario Colony,
in the southwestern part of San Bernardino county. At that time most
of the land in this section of the country was unimproved, and about six
thousand acres were owned by a syndicate, known as the Ontario Land
& Improvement Company. On this land are now situated the beautiful
and prosperous little cities of Upland and Ontario. Mr. Harwood and
his brother Alfred P. acquired a one-fifth interest in the new corporation.
At this time about four hundred acres, including the original to^vnsite of
Upland, became the property of the Harwood brothers, who likewise
purchased additional land, largely increasing the area of their holdings.
The original plat of what is now LTpland had been made some time pre-
viously, and the two brothers gave themselves with all earnestness and
progressiveness to the development and upbuilding of the town and sur-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 173

rounding country. Upland has a population of twenty-five hundred and
is a fine little city of modern facilities and beautiful homes. Ontario
adjoins the corporate limits at the south, and has a population of about
five thousand, so that the community is one of the most attractive and
prosperous in southern California, with a diversity of business and in-
dustrial interests that gives assurance of continuous growth and cumula-
tive prosperity. The Harwood brothers have been most influential in
the furtherance of this admirable advancement along all civic and material
lines and to them is due in a large measure the splendid record of prog-
ress thus made. Liberal, loyal and public-spirited, they have given their
time, energies and m'eans to promoting the best interests of this favored
section, and no citizens command more secure place in popular confidence
and esteem.

Charles E. Hardwood is president of the Commercial National Rank
and the Citizens' Savings Bank of Upland, in the organizations of which
he was instrumental, and under his careful and conservative administra-
tion these have become solid and popular financial institutions. He is
one of the leading members of the California Fruit Exchange and is
president of the Upland Lemon Growers' Association, also president of
the O-K Fruit Exchange. He has done much to further the advancement
of the citrus-fruit industry in the state and to foster the economical
handling and transportation of the products in this important line. He
also has large interests in Mexico, where he is president of the Mexico
Asphalt and Paving Company, which has installed asphalt pavement in
many of the principal cities of that republic. He is also vice-president
of the Mexican Petroleum Company. The company now produces thirty
thousand barrels of oil daily and has facilities for the output of double
this amount. It furnishes all oil utilized by the Mexican National Rail-
way, and owns in Mexico five hundred thousand acres of land.

Mr. Harwood continues to take a lively interest in educational af-
fairs, as well as in all other agencies tending to maintain the best stand-
ards of citizenship. He has been for many years a valued member of
the board 01 trustees of Pomona College, and has made most gener-
ous contributions to its support. In politics he accords unswerving
allegiance to the Republican party, though he has shown naught of ambi-
tion for political office. Both he and his wife are members of the Con-
gregational church and their beautiful home in Upland is a center of
most gracious and refined hospitality.

In the year 1858 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Harwood to
Miss Catherine Seymour Henry, who was born at Bennington, Vermont,
and who is a daughter of the late Paul M. Henry, for many years a rep-
resentative farmer near Bennington, and later a resident of Geneva.
New York, where he passed his remaining days, and where his wife also
died. Mr. and Mrs. Harwood have four children, concerning whom the
following brief record is given in conclusion of this sketch : Isabella is
the widow of Dr. Walter Scott, and has been for several years the ex-
ecutive head of the Rescue Home in the city of Sacramento, where she is
doing effective philanthropic work. Miss Aurelia remains in the par-
ental home. She is a graduate of Drury College, Springfield, Missouri,
and took a post graduate course at Wellesley College, in Massachusetts.

174 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GEXEALUGV

She is an active member of various clubs in Untario, Los Angeles and
San Francisco. Edward C. is one of the representative fruit growers
of San Bernardino county, and is a graduate of both Leland Stanford,
Jr., University and of Columbia University, Xew York, as is also Paul
H., who is chief executive of the Gas Company in the city of Mexico,
and chief engineer of the Mexican Asphalt & Paving Company of Mex-
ico. Mrs. Ilarwood and daughter. Miss Aurelia, are members of the
Suciety of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

HARRY N. DYKE. A young man of talent and culture, well versed
in legal lore, H. X. Dyke, of Imperial, is well known as an able and
successful attorney, being a man of much force of character, of pleas-
ing address, and of considerable power in presenting a case to the jurv.
The oldest of the two children born to Eugene B. and Emily Dyke, his
birth occurred in Iowa in 1873.

Eugene B. Dyke was a man of high mental attainments and widely
known throughout Iowa as a brilliant and successful journalist. For a
full quarter of a century he was editor of the Charles City Intclli-
(/encer. of which he kept complete files, rendering the paper especially
useful for reference when questions of moment arose in regard to pub-
lic or private affairs. He was an able and fearless writer, and his death,
which occurred in 1897. was a distinct loss to the community and to
the journalistic world, as well as to his immediate family.

1? rough t up in Iowa. Henry X. Dyke acquired his elementary
knowledge in the public schools, after leaving the high school enter-
ing the law department of the State University of Iowa, from which
he was graduated with the class of 1896. He was admitted to the bar
the same year, and began the practice of law in Iowa. After the death
of his father, he assumed the management of the Charles City Intelli-
gencer, with which he was identified for four years. In 1901, decid-
ing that the extreme AYest was the proper place for an ambitious young
man to begin his career. Mr. Dyke came to California, and in 1902 lo-
cated in the Imperial Valley, settling here in pioneer days. He took up
one hundred and sixty acres of wild desert land, but ere he had made
many improvements sold it at an advantage. In 1904. when Imperial
became incorporated, Mr. Dyke had the honor of being elected the first
city clerk, and held the office continuously until 1910. For three years
he served as secretary of the Imperial Chamber of Commerce, and for
a brief period was justice of the peace. He is now devoting himself
to his profession, and as an attorney has built up a good patronage in
Imperial and vicinity.

Mr. Dyke married, in 181 »S. Adele Hammer, and they have one child,
a daughter named Dorothy.

BYROX '\YATKRS. One of the specific and impi >rtant function-; of
this publication is to enter enduring record concerning those who stand
essentially representative in the various professional circles in C ali-
fornia. and there is no profession that touches so closely the manifold
interests of society in general as does the legal. This calling naturally
has drawn to it. by very virtue of necessity, minds of power and bril-

7

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 177

liancy, and as properly represented in attorneys and counselors of char-
acter as well as of technical ability, the profession safeguards and fost-
ers all human interests. Lawyers have been the most potent forces in
shaping governmental policies in guiding and formulating the most ef-
fective systems for insuring equity and justice, and in promoting and
protecting the welfare of all sorts and conditions of men in the con-
crete and generic communities. Thus in considering the careers of
those who have been influential in the development and upbuilding of
the great state of California it is not a matter of expediency but of
emphatic consistency to accord special attention to those who have stood
or now stand as earnest, loyal and able representatives of the bench
and bar of this commonwealth. In this connection there is all of pro-
priety in giving recognition to the prominent and influential member of
the bar of San Bernardino county whose name initiates this iparagraph.
Byron \Yaters, senior member of the law firm of Waters & Goodcell.
of San Bernardino, has an ancestry of which he may well be proud, as
in his veins is mingled the best blood of early Xew England and the
cavaliers of the old south. In both the paternal and maternal lines he
traces his genealogy back to families founded in America in the early
epoch of our national history. Mr. Waters claims the Empire state of
the south as the place of his nativity, as he was born at Canton, Cherokee
county, Georgia, on the igth of June, 1849, — the youngest of the three
children of Henry H. and Frances ( Brew'ster ) \Yaters. Henry Haw-
ley Waters was born in Renssalaer county, Xew York, near the city
of Albany, in the year 1819, his parents having been numbered among
the pioneers of that section, whither they removed from Massachusetts,
where the respective families were founded in the colonial days. Henry
H. Waters was the youngest in a family of five children, and, owing
to the conditions and exigencies of life in a pioneer community, his
early educational advantages were limited, — a handicap which he ef-
fectually overcame through self-discipline and through definite advance-
ment by personal effort. He served an apprenticeship as a mechanic
and assisted in the construction of one of the first steam road locomo-
tives ever operated in the state of Xew York. He had no little inven-
tive ability, but there can be no reason to doubt that he did well to turn
his attention to effort along other lines. When about twenty years of
age he went to Georgia, where he proved himself eligible for pedagogic
honors and was successfully engaged in teaching for a period of about
two years. In the meanwhile he had determined to prepare himself
for the legal profession, and by close application he gained an excellent
knowledge of the law, so that he duly gained admission to the bar of
Georgia. For several years he was engaged in the practice of his pro-
fession at Canton, that state, and in 1849. at the time of the ever memor-
able gold excitement in California, he became one of the intrepid ar-
gonauts who made their way by various routes to the New Eldorado.
He was one of the first in Georgia to set forth for California. The
company of which he was a member made the voyage to Havana, Cuba ;
crossed the Tehauntepec isthmus in Mexico, by means of pack trains ;
and made the remainder of the journey on a sailing vessel. In later
years Mr. W'aters frequently reverted to the fact that all of the men

178

AMERICAN BIOGRAI'IIV A XI) GENEALOGY

of his party who drank whiskey while on the trip across Tehauntepec
were attacked by disease that soon terminated their lives. He finally
disembarked in the port of San Francisco and thence made his way to
the original placer mines in Tuolumne county. The mining camp was
then known as Jimtown, and the little city at that point at the present
time bears the more dignified appellation of Jamestown. Mr. Waters
passed about two years in this state and then returned to Georgia, hav-
ing made the return journey across the plains. lie resumed the prac-
tice of his profession, but a few years later he again made the trip across
the plains, for the purpose of visiting his brother, the late James W.

HKNKY H. WATKRS

Waters, of San Bernardino county. He remained for a more limited
time on this occasion and then mad'e his third trip overland by returning
to his home in Georgia. In 1858 he was appointed executive secretary
to Governor Joseph E. Tlnnvn, of that state, whose son, Joseph M., is
the present governor of that commonwealth, and he retained this office
until 1865, when Governor I'.rown was deposed from office by the
Federal authorities, after the close of the Civil war. During the prog-
ress of the war. as executive secretary to the governor. Mr. Waters had
much to do with the directing of military affairs in the state. He held
the rank of colonel on the staff of the governor and was instrumental

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 179

in mustering in thirty regiments for the Confederate service. He thus
lived up to the full tension of the great conflict between the north and
south, during which his loyalty to the Confederate cause was of the
most insistent order. In the meantime Mr. Walters had purchased a
plantation in Coweta county, Georgia, and after the disorganization of
the state government and the installation of the "carpet-bag" regime at
the close of the war, he retired to this plantation. Two years later he
sold the property and located in Harris county, Georgia, where he
engaged in the manufacturing of lumber. Later he established his
home at Geneva, Talbot county, where he gave his attention principally
to the management of his large cotton plantation in that county. He
died in the city of Macon, that state, in 1869, as the result of a stroke of
paralysis, and his name is on record as that of one of the loyal, pro-
gressive and honored citizens of Georgia. His devoted wife died in
1860, at Milledgeville, Georgia, in which state her entire life was passed.
She was born in Gainesville, Georgia, and was a daughter of Dr. John
Brewster, a native of South Carolina and a scion of one of the old and
distinguished families of that commonwealth. Dr. Brewster was one
of the able representatives of his profession in Georgia, where he was
engaged in active practice for many years. Mr. and Mrs. Water be-
came the parents of three children, Emmett, the eldest of the three, was
accidentally killed, at Paris, Kentucky, on the day following his gradu-
ation in Millersburg College. Prior to this, when but eighteen years of
age. he tendered his services in defense of the Confederate cause, by
enlisting in the First Georgia Regulars, at the inception of the Civil
war. He gained promotion through the various grades until he was
made adjutant in his command, and he participated in many engage-
ments. On July 26, 1864, in the battle of Peach Tree Creek in the
front of Atlanta, he was shot through the right leg, and the injury was
so severe as to necessitate the amputation of the member. Henrietta,
the second child, became the wife of Edwin A. Nisbet and they came to
California in 1867. and resided for many years in San Bernardino,
where both died. They reared eleven children to years of maturity.
Mrs. Nisbet was long numbered among the successful and popular
teachers in the schools of California. She followed this profession for
twenty years in San Bernardino and for a decade was one of the most
loved and valued teachers in the schools of Los Angeles. The third
and youngest of the children is he to whom this sketch is dedicated.

Byron Waters was reared to the age of eighteen years in his native
state and was afforded the advantages of its best private schools, in
which he continued his attendance until the close of the war between
the states. The family experienced serious financial reverses, as did
nearly all others in the south at this time, and after leaving school he
worked for nearly three years in the cotton fields on his father's planta-
tion. He became associated as a boy with those who afterward formed
the KuKlux Klan, and under these conditions his father suggested that
he take some cotton to market and utilize the proceeds in going to
California. The devoted father, bereaved of wife and elder son, re-
alized that by this procedure the younger son would escape the difficulties
and troublous experiences incidental to the so-called reconstruction pe-

ISO AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

riod in the south, for it was but natural that intense sectional prejudices
had been aroused in the youth of the south, owing to contemplation of the
frightful ravages worked by the war just ended, — especially the devasta-
ting effects of Sherman's victorious march through Georgia from Atlanta
to the sea. Accordingly Mr. Waters came to California in 1867, at the
age of eighteen years, and here he began work as a cowboy on his
uncle's ranch in San Bernardino county, said uncle having been the late
James W. Waters, previously mentioned and honored as one of the
sterling pioneers of this section of the state.

The ambition of young Waters was not to be thus satisfied, how-
ever, and in April, 1869, he began the study of law in the office and
under the able preceptorship of Judge Horace C. Rolfe, of San Ber-
nardino. Later he continued his technical reading under the direction
of Judge Henry M. Willis, of the same city, to whom a memoir is de-
dicated on other pages of this work. He was admitted to the bar in
January, 1871, and during the many intervening years that he has been
in active practice in the various courts of the state it has been his to
gain and retain high prestige and distinction as one of the ablest mem-
bers of the California bar, as well as one of the most successful. His
list of causes presented before the supreme court of the state is one of
the largest that can be claimed by any member of the bar of this favored
commonwealth, and in this and other tribunals there stand to his last-
ing honor many noteworthy victories as an advocate of great strength
and versatility. Nearly forty years of consecutive devotion to the work
of his profession have made Mr. Waters one of its peers in the state,
and the bar has been honored and dignified alike by his character and
his services. He has made his home and professional headquarters
in San Bernardino during all these years ; has stood as an exponent of
the most loyal and public-spirited citizenship ; and none has a more
secure place in popular confidence and esteem.

In 1 88 1 Mr. Waters effected the organization of the Farmers' Ex-
change Bank of San Bernardino, and the same is now one of the solid
and leading financial institutions of southern Califoria. He was its
first president and held this office for several years. During the forma-
tive period in the history of the bank he guided its affairs with a firm
hand and with utmost discrimination and progressiveness, showing the
same characteristic energy, earnestness and integrity that have marked
his career in all its relations. The present high standing of the Farm-
ers' Exchange Bank is due in large measure to his able administration
of its affairs in earlier days.

Always unwavering in his allegiance to the Democratic party, Mr.
Waters has clone much to promote its cause in California, while he has
resided in a county and state that show large Republican majorities
under normal conditions. Though he has not been imbued with any
ambition for political preferment, in his home county there early came
recognition of his ability and sterling character, as is shown by the
fact that in 1877 he was elected to represent the same in the state legis-
lature. At the ensuing session he became a recognized leader of his
party in the house and before the close of the session he stood at the
head as a member of that body. His reputation for talent and personal

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 1*1

and official integrity brought about in the following year, iS/8, his elec-
tion as a delegate at large to the state constitutional convention, and
he had the distinction in this connection of receiving a larger majority
than any other candidate for such representation in the state. Though
he was one of the youngest members of that convention, Mr. Waters'
thorough knowledge of constitutional law, his exceptional powers in
debate and his prescience as to future growth and demands, won for
him a commanding influence in the deliberations of the convention. His
adherence to and earnest advocacy of certain opinions while in the con-
vention temporarily cost him somewhat of his popularity, but time and
the subsequent working of constitutional provisions which he opposed
have demonstrated that he was right in the course he pursued at the
time. In 1886 Mr. Waters was made Democratic candidate for the of-
fice of judge of the supreme court of the state, but while he was em-
inently qualified for the position and was defeated by a small majority,
he was unable to overcome the far greater strength of the Republican
party, and thus ordinary political exigencies compassed his defeat, to-
gether with that of the other candidates on the ticket of his party.
Air. Waters, has been affiliated with the Masonic fraternity since 1873
and is identified with a number of social organizations of representative
character, though his interests have ever centered in his profession and
his home. He is liberal in his religious views, and his wife and chil-
dren are communicants of the Catholic church. Mrs. Waters is also
a member of the Native Daughters of the Golden West, the Order of
the Eastern Star and the California Pioneer Society. She has been a
prominent and popular factor in connection with the best social activi-
ties of her home city and presides as a gracious chatelain over the beau-
tiful home.

On the 3ist of December, 1872, was solemnized the marriage of
Mr. Waters to Miss Louisa Brown, who was born at old Fort San Ber-
nardino, on the 24th of July, 1852, this fort having been the refuge
place of the colony at that time. She is a daughter of the late John
Brown, Sr., who was one of the well known and highly honored pio-
neers of this section of the state. Mr. and Mrs. Waters became the
parents of eight children, all of whom are living except one, and their
names, and respective dates of birth are here recorded : Clara, born in
November, 1873; Sylvia, in 1875; Frances. 1877; Helen, 1878; Brew-
ster, 1880, (died in IQOS, at the age of twenty-four years) ; Emmett,
1883; Byron, Jr- 1886; and Elizabeth. 1889.

W. NICHOLS. The worth of a man to the community of
which he forms a part is not made evident by the words which he
speaks, but through his achievements in the line 'of adding to the im-
provement and betterment of the neighborhood and its residents. Com-
ing to the Imperial Valley in 1899, at an early period of its settlement,
George W. Nichols immediately embarked in the real estate business.
in which he has since been actively engaged, and, it is safe to say, no
other man has been more conspicuous in aiding its growth and up-
building than he. A ''booster" from the start, he has been identified
with the Valley's interests in its seasons of prosperity and in its days

182 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

of adversity, and is now known as one of its most progressive cham-
pions, being never so happy as when saying a good word for his adopted
home town. Coming from honored New England stock, he was born,
in 1856, in New Hampshire, where he was brought up and educated.
His parents, John and Emeline Nichols, life-long residents of New
England, reared five children, of whom George W. is the oldest, and
the only one living on the Pacific coast, or near it. He comes from a
family noted for its longevity, his grandfather, who was a sea captain,
having reached the remarkable age of one hundred and four years,
while his grandmother lived to be one hundred and three years old.

Having learned the trades of a tinsmith and plumber when young,
George W. Nichols followed these occupations in his native town un-
til 1876. Going then to Hillsboro Bridge, New Hampshire, he was em-
ployed as foreman for a large concern for three years, when, in 1879.
his employers placed him at the head of the branch house which they
established at Great Falls. Montana. In 1882 Mr. Nichols entered the
employ of George K. Paul, of Saint Paul, Minnesota, who took a con-
tract for the plumbing and steam work in the Grand Fountain Hotel at
Yellowstone Park. At the end of seven months Mr. Nichols, having
completed the contract, journeyed to the Pacific coast, visiting Tacoma,
Seattle, Portland and San Francisco, finally locating at San Diego, Cal-
ifornia, where he purchased a hardware and plumbing establishment,
which he conducted successfully for seven years, until 1898.

Locating in Imperial Valley in 1899, Mr. Nichols has been an im-
portant factor in promoting its best interests. In its early history he
was employed to secure the right of way for the public highways, and
likewise in the apportionment of the school districts. He was one of
the original members of the Cantaloupe Company of Imperial \ alley,
and, with other men of energy and public-spirit, organized the El Cen-
tro Creamery Company, which was subsequently sold. Mr. Nichols has
been associated with the San Diego and Arizona Railroad Company,
and with the Imperial Abstract Company of El Centro. At the pres-
ent time he is a member of the Mount Signal Canal Company and
manager of the town-site of Dixieland for the San Diego Company.
Mr. Nichols is president of the Bee Keepers' Association of Imperial
Valley, an office which he has held for a year, having previously been
one of its directors for three years.

When Mr. Nichols moved to the Valley, in 1899, he took up a tract
of desert land, and now owns two ranches, one containing eighty acres
and the other two hundred and forty acres, both being on the west side
of the valley. At the time of the great. overflow he labored with untir-
ing energy, working on his ranch in the daytime and on the levee nights,
at the same time filling contracts in the building of the main ditches.
He has the distinction of having been one of the first men to introduce
cows into the valley, and one of the first to produce cream, being num-
bered among the pioneer dairymen. Great strides in the development
of this industry have been made, the sales of the valley cream amount-
ing today, in 1912, to $134.400 a month. Mr. Nichols shipped the sec-
ond load of hogs sent from Imperial valley to market in 1905, and this
industry, too. is flourishing.

THE NEW YORK

PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX .01
TILDEN FOUNDATlrr-
R L

A.MP.kJCAX I'.IOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 185

Jn 1907 Air. Nichols embarked in the culture of bees, beginning with
one hive, and since that time he has sold five hundred swarms of bees,
and has now three hundred hives in his apiary. The honey produced
in the valley is of a beautiful amber hue, heavier in body than the
white sage or white clover honey, while its sweetness is the same.
From his one hundred and forty-five hives he raised two hundred and
sixty-four cases of honey, which he sold for six cents a pound. In 1911
there were forty-eight car loads of honey shipped from the valley.

Mr. Nichols married, in 1894, Kitty H. Keith, a daughter of Elmer
and Elizabeth Keith, who, like Air. Nichols, is of Scotch ancestry, she
being descended from Royal blood. Eight children have blessed the
union of Air. and Airs. Nichols, namely: Dorothy K., Alilton S., George
W., Elmo K., Paul P., I'earl K.. Edwin K.. and baby Katherine. Air.
rind Airs. Nichols are members of the Pirst Congregational church.

ROBERT E. BLEDSOE. This honored and representative member of
the bar of San Bernardino county is a scion of a family whose name has
been intimately identified with the annals of American history since the
early colonial epoch, and there have been many of the name to achieve
distinction and high honors in connection with the progress of our great
republic. The lineage is traced back to staunch English and Welsh
origin. Two brothers of the name were numbered among the early set-
tlers of the colony of Virginia, and three brothers of a later generation
in the historic Old Dominion were Carey, Isaac and Joseph Bledsoe, the
first-named of whom was a pioneer of Tennessee, where Bledsoe county
was named in his honor, and the latter two of whom, Isaac and loseph.
established homes in Kentucky at a time when that state was on the
very frontier of civilization. Joseph Bledsoe, from whom the line of
descent is traced to Robert E. Bledsoe of this review, was an associate
of Dankl Boone and other pioneers of Kentucky, where he took up his
abode just prior to the inception of the War of the Revolution. He and
his wife, Elizabeth, had immigrated to Kentucky from Spottsylvania,
Virginia, and they were living in a fort, constructed for protection against
the Indians, at the time of the birth of their youngest son, Jesse, on
the 2oth of May, 1776.

Jesse Bledsoe, grandfather of him whose name initiates this article,
was reared to manhood in his native state, and he became one of its
distinguished lawyers and most brilliant orators, as well as a prominent
factor in public affairs. He served one term as United States senator
from Kentucky, and later he was employed by the provincial govern-
ment of the republic of Texas to prepare its constitution. In com-
pensation for the services thus rendered he received three leagues of
land in the new republic. While en route to his home in Kentucky he died
suddenly, at Nacogdoches, Texas. On the 22d of November, 1802, he
married Sarah Howard Gist, who was born August 5, 1785, and who
was the eldest daughter of Colonel Nathan and Judith (Carey) Gist.
During the entire period of the war of the Revolution Colonel Gist
served as aide-de-camp on the staff of General Washington, and he
was one of the most valued and trusted members of the staff of the great
commander.

\.\iKRicA\ jjiotrk. \riiv AXD GENEALOGY

There are numerous branches of the Bledsoe family, and representa-
tives of the name have been found scattered in the southern, middle and
western states. Among the distinguished members of the Kentucky
branch was Albert Taylor Bledsoe, who was born at Frankfort, Kentucky,
on the gth of November, 1809. He was graduated in the United States
military academy at West Point, and at the time of the Civil war he served
as assistant secretary of war in the cabinet of Jefferson Davis, president of
the Confederate States. During the latter years of his life he was edi-
tor of the Southern Review, and he was known as a man of great liter-
ary talent.

Robert E. Bledsoe has in his possession a most interesting and highly
valued family heirloom. This is an old family Bible, handed down by his
grandfather, who entered in the same the family records of births, mar-
riages, death, etc., in the blank pages provided for this purpose. The Bible
is fully a century old. Mr. Bledsoe is eligible for membership in the his-
toric Society of the Cincinnati, by reason of his ancestors having served
as officers of the Continental forces in the war of the Revolution. It
will be understood that this great patriotic organization was formed
on the 1 3th of May, 1/83, and that its membership was confined to offi-
cers who had served with honor for three years of the war and those
who had been honorably discharged on account of disability. The per-
petuation of the order was effected by the provision that male descendants
of such officers in a direct line should be eligible for membership, and,
in default of male representatives in any generation, the eligibility should
be perpetuated through the female line. General Washington was presi-
dent of the society from 1787 until his death and was succeeded by Alex-
ander Hamilton.

Joseph Henry Bledsoe, father of the subject of this review, and son
of j'esse and Sarah H. (Gist) Bledsoe, was born in Lexington, Kentucky,
on the 1 6th of June, 1805, and he was afforded the best of educational
advantages, including those of Transylvania University, in his native city,
in which institution, then as now, one of the best in the south, he was
graduated. He prepared himself for the legal profession and was duly
admitted to the bar, but his tastes and inclinations were such that he
gave little if any attention to the active practice of his profession. He
was a man of fine scholarship and ever continued a close and appreciative
student of the best in literature, both classical and contemporary. He was
specially fond of sports afield and afloat, and found his chief recreation
in hunting and fishing expeditions. For many years he gave his alleg-
iance to the great basic industry of agriculture, and in connection there-
with he was a pioneer in Missouri, as was he later in Texas and Oregon.
He seemed to have a natural predilection for the work and experiences
of the pioneer and he found satisfaction in pushing forward into new
fields when the march of civilzation began to overtake him.

In the year 1870 Joseph H. Bledsoe removed with his family from
southern Oregon to California, and here he secured a tract of land in
the beautiful San Bernardino valley, where he established his home and
where he passed the residue of his life, secure in the high regard of all who
knew him. He was a man of high ideals and of impregnable integrity
of character, so that he was well equipped for leadership in thought

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 1*7

and action, though he never manifested aught of desire for public office in-
political honors. In Kentucky was solemnized his marriage to Miss
Mary Jane Baylor, who was born at Paris, that state, and whose father,
George W. Baylor, was one of the distinguished members of the Ken-
tucky bar. Air. Bledsoe died in San Bernardino county, on the I5th of
April, 1879. at the age of seventy-four years, and here his cherished and
devoted wife was summoned to the life eternal on the 24th of June,
1894, at the venerable age of eighty-four years. Both were members
of the Christian church. They became the parents of thirteen children,
of whom five are living and of the number Robert E. was the eighth in
order of birth. The other surviving children are Howard, Mrs. Jessie
Amy, Nelson C., and James B., and with the exception of Mrs. Amy,
who lives in Oregon, are engaged in agricultural pursuits in San Ber-
nardino county, — prominent and honored citizens of this fair section
of the state. Howard, the eldest of the number is now more than
eighty years of age. All are Democrats in their political affiliation.

Robert Emmett Bledsoe was born at Lexington, Lafayette county,
Missouri, on the 26th of April, 1845. and he passed his boyhood and
youth in Texas and Oregon, where the conditions and exigencies of
pioneer life were such as to render his early educational privileges
limited in scope, — a handicap that he has effectually overcome in later
years and through self-discipline when a youth. He accompanied his
parents on their removal to California, in 1870, and thereafter he was
actively concerned with farming in San Bernardino county until 1875,
when he was elected justice of the peace. This official preferment,
secured without solicitation on his part, resulted in his making a radical
change of vocation, and thus the election proved fortunate in a double
sense, in that it prompted him to prepare himself for a wider field of
activity and also gave to the community an able and successful lawyer.
While incumbent of this minor judicial office Mr. Bledsoe began the
study of law, to which he devoted himself with all of assiduity and
with excellent powers of absorption and assimilation. In April, 1883,
he proved himself eligible for the profession of his choice and was
duly admitted to the bar. upon examination before the supreme court
of the state. He had previously engaged in practice in the county
courts and in 1882, prior to his admission to practice before the supreme
court, he had been elected district attorney, an office of which he was
incumbent for one term, of two years' duration. His marked facility
and success as a public prosecutor led him to make a specialty of
criminal law. and in this department of his profession he has appeared
in connection with many important cases, incidental to which he has
attained to reputation as one of the strongest and most successful cri-
minal lawyers in southern California. He controls a large and rep-
resentative practice and during his entire professional career he has
maintained his home in the city of San Bernardino, where he is influ-
ential in civic affairs and where he commands an impregnable place in
the confidence and esteem of all who know him. He has a broad and
exact knowledge of the science of jurisprudence and his application of
the same is at all times ready and assured, so that he proves a formid-
able adversarv in anv forensic contest. He is now the second oldest

188 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

practitioner in San Bernardino, in point of consecutive service in his
profession, and his close observance of the unwritten code of ethics ha?
retained to him the respect and good will of his confreres at the bar.

In politics Mr. Bledsoe clings to the faith of his ancestors and is
found a staunch supporter of the basic principles of the Democratic
party, as exemplified by Jefferson and Jackson. Though never- avidi-
ous for the honors or emoluments of political office he has shown a
loyal interest in party affairs and has given effective service in t he-
cause. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the Knights of
Pythias, in which latter he is past chancellor of his lodge and a mem-
ber of the grand lodge of the state. He is president of the San Ber-
nardino County Pioneers' Society, of which he has been a valued and
appreciative member for many years. As before stated, he is eligible
for membership in the Society of the Cincinnati, as is he also in the
Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, though he has never
identified himself with these organizations.

On the 2Oth of April, 1873, Mr. Bledsoe was united in marriage
to Miss Althea Bottoms, who was born and reared in San Bernardino
county, where her father, the late John Bottoms, a native of England,
was a pioneer ranchman. Mr. and Mrs. Bledsoe have two children, —
Benjamin 1-".. who is judge of the superior court and who resides in
San Bernardino, he being individually mentioned on other pages of this
work; and Miss Ruby, who remains at the parental home. Mr. Bledsoe
has been a resident of San Bernardino for more than forty years, has
here contributed his quota of civic and material progress, has won suc-
cess and high reputation through his own earnest and well directed en-
deavors, and is a citizen who is known and valued for his sterling worth
as a man.

BENJAMIN F. Bi.Knsni-:. One of the native sons of California who has
attained to distinction as one of its able legists and jurists is Judge Bled-
soe, of San Bernardino, who has presided on the bench of the superior
court since 1901 and whose administration has been admirable in every
respect. He has dignified and honored his profession by his able services
and sterling character, and he has the securest of vantage ground in
popular confidence and esteem in the community that has represented
his home from the time of his nativity to the present.

Judge Benjamin F. Bledsoe was born at San Bernardino, California,
on the 8th of February, 1874, and is a son of Robert E. and Althea ( Bot-
toms I Bledsoe, the former a native of the state of Missouri and the latter
of California. The Bledsoe family has been one of distinction in con-
nection with the history of the southern portion of our national domain
and representatives of the same have been prominent in public affairs and
in the various walks of "life. Robert E. Bledsoe established his home in
San Bernardino. California, in 1870, and here he has long been engaged in
the practice of law. A specific review of his career appears on other
pages of this work, together with an outline of the family history, and
thus it is not necessary to repeat the data in the sketch at hand. Ben-
jamin F. Bledsoe is indebted to the public schools of his native city for
his early educational discipline and was graduated in the San Bernardino

AMERICAN I1IOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY I'll

high school as a member of the class of 1891. lie was soon afterward
matriculated in Leland Stanford, Jr. University, in which he was gradu-
ated in 1896 and from which he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts.
Concerning his prominence in college affairs in his undergraduate days
the following pertinent statements have been made: "While a student at
the university he was ever at the forefront of affairs. He served as a
member of the executive committee of the student body, as associate
editor of both the college daily and the college annual ; and also partici-
pated, as one of Stanford's representatives, in the annual inter-collegiate
debate with the University of California. In the University he was
affiliated with the Delta Upsilon and Phi Delta Phi fraternities." He
took a course in legal education along with and in addition to academic
course. He is now president of the Stanford University Alumni Asso-
ciation.

After his graduation in the University, Judge Bledsoe forthwith be-
came associated with his father in the practice of law in San Bernardino,
and within the ensuing four years he effectually demonstrated his powers
as an advocate, through participation in a number of important and strenu-
ously contested cases presented in the courts of this section of the state.
As a trial lawyer he gave evidence of the solidity and wide scope of his
technical knowledge of the law and also showed much versatility and
resourcefulness in the presentation of his causes. His success and his
manifest integrity of purpose marked him as specially eligible for higher
honors along the line of his profession. In 1900, within four years
after he had entered upon the practice of law, he was made the nominee
on the Democratic ticket, for the important office of judge of the superior
court, (the only court of general jurisdiction in the state, known as
superior court of the state of California, having jurisdiction over the
entire state, the various judges thereof being elected by counties) and
no better voucher for his personal popularity and the public apprecia-
tion of his ability could have been given than that afforded in his elec-
tion, as he successfully overcame at the polls, the large Republican
majority normally given in that county. Upon the face of the returns,
his Republican opponent and he were "tied." Under the law as then
existing, there could be no "recount," so by aid of the ancient Common
Law writ of quo warranto. directed against the incumbent who was
claiming the right because of the "tie" to hold over. Judge Bledsoe finally
secured a recount and was adjudged entitled to the office by a plurality
of seven votes. Immediately upon the rendition of the judgment, in
July 1901. he entered upon the duties of the office and has since
continued incumbent of this office, as he was re-elected, without
opposition, as the choice of all parties, at the election in 1900. His
present term will expire in January, 1913, and he is assured of re-elec-
tion in case he consents to become again a candidate for the office. Within
his administration in this high judicial office. Judge Bledsoe has presided
at the trial of some of the most important civil and criminal cases that
have been submitted for adjudication in the courts of southern Califor-
nia, and in this connection he has been called up at different times to
hold court in practically every county in this section of the state. Thus
his reputation as a lawyer and jurist is by no means circumscribed.

\MKRICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

The record of Judge 1'iledsoe on the bench of the superior court
was such that in KJIO. at the direct primaries, he was made the nominee
of the Democratic party of the state for the office of associate justice of
the supreme court. At the ensuing election, however, he suffered defeat
at the polls, together with the rest of the party ticket. His defeat was
thus compassed by normal political exigencies, though he made an ex-
cellent showing at the polls.

As a citizen. Judge Bledsoe is essentially broad-minded, progressive
and public-spirited, and he has shown a lively interest in all that has
touched the welfare of his home city, county and state. He has served
for a number of years as a member of the board of directors of the San
Bernardino Chamber of Commerce and for a much longer period as a
member and president of the board of trustees of the free public library
of his native city. In business matters he has his share of responsibil-
ities, and he is still a member of the directorate of each of a number of
active commercial and industrial corporations, including Farmers' Ex-
change National Bank, of San Bernardino, and Golden State Life In-
surance Company, of Los Angeles. In fraternal circles his influence
and assistance have been both sought and felt. After having given
effective service as Grand Vice-Chancellor of the California Grand
Lodge of Knights of Pythias, he was a logical candidate for higher
honors, and in the election held at the convention of this body in May.
1911, he was elevated to the station of Grand Chancellor, which exalted
position he is now filling. In 1908 he was Grand Orator of the Cali-
fornia Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and he
still holds a high place in the councils of this time-honored fraternity.
He is a past Eminent Commander and the present Grand Warden of
the California Grand Commandery of Knights Templars, and he is also
identified with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and the
Native Sons of the Golden West. He was also the unanimous choice
of the Board of Directors, of the newly founded Young Men's Chris-
tian Association of San Bernardino, for president of that organization
and has already entered upon his duties with his accustomed zeal. Both
he and his wife are zealous members of the Congregational church in
their home city and he is a member of its board of trustees. They are
popular factors in connection with the best social activities of the com-
munity and their- attractive home is a center of gracious hospitality.

On Christmas day, of the year 1890. was solemnized the marriage
of Judge Bledsoe to Miss Katharine M. Shepler. of Council Bluffs.
Iowa. Mrs. Bledsoe was graduated in Leland Standford. Jr. University,
as a member of the class of 1898, and in that institution she attained
to high honor for her proficiency as a student. She is affiliated with
the Delta Gamma sorority and was elected to membership in Phi Beta
Kappa, the great honor fraternity among American colleges. She was
born at Topeka, Kansas and is a daughter of John \Y. and Sarah ( Trott)
Shepler. who now reside in Council Bluffs. Iowa, to which state they re-
moved from northeastern Ohio, where the respected families had re-
moved from western Pennsylvania in an early day. For more than a
quarter of a century Mr. Shepler has been a valued employe of the
Chicago. Milwaukee £ St. Paul Railroad Company on its Iowa lines.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 195

Judge and Mrs. Bledsoe have two children, — Barbara Shepler, a true
native daughter, born on the Qth of September, 1902, "Admission Day,"
and Frances Priscilla, who was born on the I5th of June, 1910.

1. W. ISOM. The Old Fuller Ranch, situated near Heber, Califor-
nia, is one of the best known properties in the Imperial Valley, and
since the opening of this section has been operated by some of the most
capable and experienced ranch men here. Its full resources, however,
were not developed until the advent of its present owners, I. W. Isom
and J. F. Ingram, men who are well known all over this section of the
country. Although practically newcomers to the Valley, these gentle-
men have already gained a reputation as skilled ranch men and the
extent of their operations assures them of a position among the lead-
ers in their line of work.

I. W. Isom, of this partnership, is a native Californian, and was
born in 1876, in Santa Cruz county, the second in order of birth of the
five children of D. C. and Susan Isom, natives of Virginia arid North
Carolina, respectively. He was reared and educated in his native place,
and after leaving the common schools turned his attention to agricul-
tural pursuits. In 1910 he formed a partnership with Mr. Ingram, and
they purchased their present property, where they have made a spe-
cialty of hog raising, and they now raise approximately fifteen hundred
hogs annually, their animals bringing high prices. Although they make
a specialty of this industry, all branches of ranching have received due
attention at their hands and have been. proportionately successful. Like
other progressive men here, they use modern, scientific methods in their
work, and are enthusiastic adherents of the use of high-power ma-
chinery, t

Mr. Isom was married in 1899, to Miss Helen Miller, and to this
union three children have been born : Inez, who is eleven years of age ;
Audrey, who has reached his eighth year; and Ida, the baby, who is
one year old.

AP.RAM EHLE POMEROY (familiarly known as A. E. Pomeroy).
Viewing the great state of California in the opening of the second dec-
ade of the twentieth century and taking cognizance of the manifold at-
tractions and opulent prosperity of this commonwealth, a citizen whose
privilege it has been literally to "grow up with the state" has much of
reason to view this circumstance with pride and satisfaction. This dis-
tinction is accorded to A. E. Pomeroy, of Los Angeles, as he was a mere
boy at the time of the family removal to California, in the pioneer
epoch of its history, and it has been his not only to witness but
also to assist, in the development and upbuilding of this magnificent state,
in which connection his success has been on a parity with the remarka-
ble progress made along material and civic lines during the years of his
residence here. No citizen accords a more distinct loyalty to the state
and none takes greater pride in contemplating its present status and the
unmistakable auguries for its still more brilliant future as one of the
greatest of the sovereign commonwealths of the American Union. His
opment and progress and he himself has wielded marked influence in

196 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

honored father was a prominent figure in connection with early devel-
furthering the advancement and upbuilding of the state in later years.
He has been most successful in exploiting real estate interests, in .which
connection he has manifested unlimited faith and courage, and many
prosperous communities attest to the efficiency of his efforts along this
important line of enterprise. As one of the representative men and loyal
and public-spirited citizens of Los Angeles and southern California he
is eminently entitled to recognition in this publication.

A. E. Pomeroy was born in Clinton, Lenawee county, Michigan, and
is a son of Charles W. and Permelia (Valentine) Pomeroy, both of whom
were natives of the state of New York, where the respective families
were founded in an early day, both being of staunch New England stock
that became identified with the annals of American history in the colon-
ial epoch. Charles W. Pomeroy was one of the pioneers of Lenawee
county, Michigan, where he had varied interests and where he continued
to reside for a short time, when he removed with his family to Misha-
waka, Indiana, where he resided until 1849, and then came to Califor-
nia, arriving in January, 1850. He died in Los Angeles in 1906, in his
99th year. The mother was a life-long member of the Methodist Episco-
pal church and the father gave his allegiance to the Republican party
from the time of its inception until his demise. He had much to do with
business affairs and industrial and social development in California in
the early days, and his name merits an enduring place on the roll of the
honored pioneers of the state. To him was due the projection of the
Sacramento & Shingle Springs Railroad, a primitive line that was des-
tined eventually to have marked influence in connection with the develop-
ment and progress of the state. Associated with him in the carrying out
of this early railroad project was the well known pioneer engineer of
California, the late Theodore P. Judah, who later became especially
prominent as chief engineer in the construction of the first overland
railroad. The little Sacramento & Shingle Springs road constituted the
nucleus about which was developed the great Central Pacific Railroad
system. Concerning this early enterprise the following pertinent state-
ments have been made and are worthy of reproduction in this article :
"Obscure as the Shingle Springs project seems today, in the light of the
immense constructive enterprises now freely undertaken by modern cap-
italists, at the period in question it was an undertaking of vast impor-
tance. In those times railroad building, especially in the far west, was a
very different proposition from what it is today. The rails had to be
taken across the Isthmus of Panama and carried inland by ox teams
or other primitive means of transportation, and the cost in a relative
sense was stupendous. That his father was so intimately associated
with the first of the great railroad plans in California is now recalled
with pleasure by A. E. Pomeroy. It is undoubtedly from his father that
Mr. Pomeroy has his inherent gift for organization, and as the years
have passed he has had many business undertakings, some of which have
been state-wide in their application and influence, and as a rule all of his
plans have had direct bearing upon the upbuilding of the state."

A. E. Pomeroy was a lad at the time of the family removal to Cali-
fornia and in 1856 the home was established in Santa Clara county,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 107

where he was reared to maturity. He was afforded the advantages of
the public schools of San Jose and also those of the University of the
Pacific, in which he was graduated as a member of the class of 1863, and
from which he received the degree of Bachelor and Master of Arts. In
the meanwhile he had gained business experience through his identifi-
cation with the "art preservative of all arts." He entered the office of the
Courier, an influential newspaper then published at Shasta, which was
then an important center. From the dignified office of "printer's devil"
he advanced to that of a full-fledged compositor, and he has never re-
gretted the experience which he thus gained in connection with the news-
paper and printing business — a discipline that has been called equivalent
to a liberal education.

Almost immediately after his graduation in the university Mr. Pom-
eroy was appointed deputy county clerk of Santa Clara county, and later
he was elected county clerk, of which office he continued incumbent for
four years. After having thus been identified with the affairs of the office
of county clerk for a total period of eight years, Mr. Pomeroy engaged
in the hardware and grocery business in San Jose, the county seat. He
also became cashier of the San Jose Savings Bank and he continued to
be numbered among the representative business men of San Jose until
1881, when he removed to Los Angeles, which city has continued to
be his home during the long intervening period of thirty years, — years
marked by large and worthy accomplishment on his part, in connection
with normal and effective lines of enterprise. As a dealer in real estate
his operations have been of wide scope and importance, and through his
well directed endeavors have been compassed the development and up-
building of a number of attractive towns and ranches. His activities in
this field of enterprise have been exceptional and beneficent, and among
the towns platted and developed by him may be noted such attractive
and flourishing communities as Gardena, Alhambra, Puente, Temecula,
San Jacinto, Burbank, Hermosa, Sunset Beach, Providencia Ranch,
parts of San Bernardino and the beautiful little city of Long Beach.
Apropos of his association with real estate enterprises the following state-
ments are worthy of reproduction: "In the development of these proper-
ties an important adjunct was the coming of rapid transit facilities, but
Mr. Pomeroy and his associates were so aggressive that they did not
sit idly by and wait. They forced conclusions, and it is amusing today,
in retrospect, to recall that in order to place Long Beach on the map the
bold projectors established a horse railroad connecting the last station on
the steam railway with the beach. It was a primitive line, but was the
best the times afforded, and in due course was succeeded by better facili-
ties for transportation.

Mr. Pomeroy, as a substantial capitalist, has admirably utilized his
resources in connection with a number of the important financial insti-
tutions of southern California, and he has been specially prominent in
the promotion of the interests and work of the State Mutual Building
& Loan Association of Los Angeles, which has exercised functions of
the most benignant and helpful order, thus materially aiding in the up-
building of the beautiful metropolis of southern California. This cor-
portation has extended financial loans that have made possible the erection

198 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GEXEALOGY

of more than three thousand buildings in Los Angeles, thus advancing
its noteworthy precedence as a veritable city of homes. Of this asso-
ciation Mr. Pomeroy is vice-president.

Mr. Pomeroy is essentially liberal and public-spirited in his attitude
as a citizen and takes a lively interest in all that touches the general wel-
fare of his home city. He has ever given a staunch allegiance to the Re-
publican party, is prominently affiliated with the Masonic fraternity,
in which he has attained to the thirty-second degree of the Ancient Ac-
cepted Scottish Rite, and both he and his wife are zealous members and
liberal supporters of the Methodist Episcopal church. He has served as
president of the board of education of Los Angeles, and for nine years
was a valued member, and president of the board of trustees of the Cali-
fornia State Normal School at Los Angeles, is also a trustee and secre-
tary of the University of Southern California, a splendid institution that
lends precedence to Los Angeles as an educational center, and he is a
charter member of the California Club and the Los Angeles Chamber of
Commerce.

JOHX NORTON". El Centro is an exceedingly prosperous and well-
governed city. Its municipal prosperity must be attributed in a great
degree to the business-like and economical administration of the city's
affairs; its good government must likewise be assigned to the enforce-
ment of law and the preservation of order, so essential in every well-
regulated community, by the city's chief executive, the Hon John Nor-
ton, who also capably discharges the duties attached to the office of re-
corder of Imperial county. He has husbanded the city's resources, in-
sisted strenuously upon economy in expenditures and stood firmly
against the incurring of obligations where the way to meet them has
not seemed clear, and is giving El Centro an effective, clean and sane
administration, which has been featured by the bringing about of some
much needed reforms in the municipal government.

John Norton is a native of Canada, but has resided in the L'nited
States since he was two years of age. his parents, Joel and Margaret
Norton, removing to the state of Michigan in 1871. He was educated
in the public schools and learned the carriage maker's trade, at which
he worked for a number of years, but on coming to the Imperial Val-
ley, in 1901, turned his attention to agricultural pursuits. To his orig-
inal purchase of one hundred and twenty acres he has since added
forty acres, and his land is now all in a high state of cultivation and
well irrigated. Noting his success in his own interests, the voters of
Imperial county, in 1909. elected him to the office of mayor of El Cen-
tro, and in January, 1911. they showed their confidence in the unswerv-
ing integrity of the man and their appreciation of his services by elect-
ing him recorder of the county. As recorder Mr. Norton is quietly,
and in his usually unassuming manner, carrying on the same well-
founded policies of systematic economy that have made his administra-
tion as mayor a success. The reforms which he has accomplished have
not been spasmodic, but have been carried on consistently and con-
scientiously. When the ladies of the Ten Thousand Club founded a
park in the city. Mayor Norton immediately went about to establish a
duplicate place of recreation, as a gift of the city, and these parks have

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 201

done much to enhance El Centre's natural beauty. He has been prom-
inent in Masonry, and is past noble grand of Oddfellowship. But lit-
tle more can be said of this man's honorable career, which is now in
its zenith. He has enjoyed, is enjoying and will continue to enjoy the
confidence and respect of the people of his city. The citizens of El-
Centro have repeatedly shown their sincere appreciation of his untir-
ing industry and sterling integrity. He has the reins of city govern-
ment firmly in hand, his executive ability is of a high order, and his
administration has been a wise and a just one. Both in his official and
private life he deserves and has the highest esteem of his fellow men.

Mr. Norton was first married in 1888, to Miss Jennie Harmon, of
Vassar, Michigan. She died in 1904, and on February 3, 1910, Mayor
Norton was married to Miss Genevieve Case, of Riverside.

In politics Mr. Norton is a Republican. He was elected to his high
office November 8, 1910, on the Republican ticket, for a four years'
term.

TIREY L. FORD. Essentially worthy of designation as one of the really
great lawyers and influential men public of California is Hon. Tirey L.
Ford, who is engaged in the active practice of his profession in the city
of San Francisco, who has served as a member of the state senate and
as attorney general of the state, as well as in other positions of distinc-
tive public trust, and who is a citizen exemplifying the highest civic
ideals and most progressive policies. His influence has permeated in
many directions and has ever been benignant, and he is not only a
strong character but is descended from a strong and worthy ancestry,
as even the curtailed data of this sketch will indicate.

When William, Prince of Orange, proceeded from Holland to claim
the throne of England, in November, 1688, three of his regiments, com-
prising about seven hundred and fifty men each, were French Huguenots.
As an expression of gratitude to these supporters, William, after he
became king of England, invited them to make their home in his new
dominion in America. Accordingly, in the year 1700, four ship-loads
of these Huguenots, sometimes called French Huguenots, numbering
some five hundred and including men, women and children, came to
Virginia and settled on the James river. In the first ship, which ar-
rived in the latter part of January, 1700, came Pierre Faure (later called
Peter Ford) and with him his wife and one child. In the same vessel
came also his brother, Daniel, and two sisters whose names are not a
matter of record. From Pierre Faure, a representative of that class of1
French Huguenots who fled from their native land to escape the re-
ligious persecutions incident to the revocation of the Edict of Nantes
and who found refuge in Holland, as already intimated, is General
Tirey L. Ford a direct descendant, and the genealogy will be briefly
traced in the following paragraphs.

Pierre Faure (Peter Ford) settled in Manakin Town, on the James
river, in 1700. Later, just when it is not certain, he was allotted one
hundred and seven acres of land on the south side of this river, in
Henrico county, this allotment being a part of a large body of land
surveyed and set apart for the colony of French refugees. This allot-

202 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ment was confirmed by a grant on the part of the lieutenant governor of
Virginia, Alexander Spottswood, under date of October 31, 1/17. This
grant was to Peter Faure, and later grants were made to him, under
the name of Peter Ford, as follows: January 13, 1/25, four hundred
acres on south side of James river, in Henrico county; January 13, 1725,
three hundred and fifty acres on south side of James river, in Henrico
county; July 19, 1735, one hundred and ninety-five acres in Goochland
county. Thus Peter Ford owned, either at one time or at various times,
about one thousand acres of land in that section of the Old Dominion.
He died in 1745, and following is a copy of his last will and testament,
the same being designated at the head as the "Will of Pierre Faure:"

In the name of God, Amen. I, Peter Ford, of the parish of King
William, county of Goochland, being sick and weak of body, but of per-
fect mind and understanding, do make this my last will and testament
as follows: i. To my son James Ford, the plantation whereon he now
lives, to him and his heirs and assigns forever. 2. To my son Peter
Ford, three hundred acres on Mathew Branch where he now lives.
3. To my son John Ford, one hundred and twenty-five acres where he
now lives on Jones creek, also one negro wench. 4. To my son Daniel
Ford, the plantation where I now live, being in Manakin, on the river;
also to my son Daniel one negro boy Tom, also one feather bed and
furniture, also two cows and a calf, also one sow and pigs. 5. To my
daughters Judith and Mary Ford all the remainder of my movable
estate equally between them. If either of my daughters should die un-
der the age of twenty-one years or not marry, then the suvivor to have
her part of the estate. I do appoint my sons John Ford and Daniel
Ford to be the executors of this my estate and of this my last will,
dated this 29th day of April, 1744.

PETER FORD.
Witnesses :

Samuel Weaver, Demetrius Young, John Harris. Proved at a court
held for Goochland, 16 April, 1745. (Book 4, page 525.)

James Ford was the eldest son of Peter Ford and was probably the
child mentioned in the ship's record, though this can not be authenti-
cated. The records of the Manakin Town show that James Ford's wife
was named Anne and that they had seven children. Among these chil-
dren was a son designated on the register of Manakin Town as "Pierre
Faure, son of James Faure and Anne, his wife, born n January, 1733."
This son was generally called Peter Ford. It will be noted that he was
somewhat less than a year younger than George Washington. James
Ford removed to Albemarle county, from which Buckingham county
was later formed, and there several grants of land were made to him.
This removal was made about the year 1750.

Peter Ford (Pierre Faure II) was born, as above noted, on the
nth of January, 1733, and was the third child and eldest son of James
and Anne Ford. He lived in Buckingham county, Virginia, on the
James river. He was four times married and was the father of a
large number of children, but as the records of Buckingham count}'
were destroyed by fire the exact number of his children and the re-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 203

spective dates of birth can not be authentically stated. For his first wife
Peter Ford married Judith Maxey, and one of their children, the next
in line of descent to the subject of this review, was Jacob Ford, who
was born in Buckingham county, Virginia, about the year 1771. At
the age of sixteen years he served three months in the war of the Revo-
lution, and he was present at the surrender of Lord Cornwallis, at
Yorktown. At the age of seventeen he left the parental roof and, after
several adventures, went to Kentucky, where he cleared some land. He
then returned to Virginia, and thereafter he made several trips to Ken-
tucky, traversing each time a wild Indian country and participating in
many conflicts with the Indians. About the year 1796, as nearly as
can be ascertained, Jacob Ford removed permanently to Kentucky, and
he settled in Garrard county, as did also his father. A considerable
company made the journey and though they were on the lookout for
Indians, the party was surprised one night in the Cumberland moun-
tains and many were slain by the Indians. Jacob Ford and his father
escaped and finally reached their destination. Jacob Ford married Lu-
cretia Maxey about the year 1790, and to whom were born six sons
and two daughters, namely : Pleasant. Nathaniel, Samuel, Daniel, John,
Jacob, Elizabeth and Kizziah. The exact places and dates of birth of
all the children are not known, but records show that the son Pleasant
was born in Buckingham county, Virginia, in the year 1793 and was
about three years of age at the time of the family removal to Ken-
tucky. His mother taught him to read and otherwise gave him the
rudiments of an education. In August, 1812, he volunteered for ser-
vice in the war of 1812, in the army commanded by General William
Henry Harrison, and in the following winter he assisted in the build-
ing o'f Fort Meigs, Ohio. In March, 1813, he returned to Kentucky
and married Miss Ellen Harris, who was born in South Carolina, in
1797, of Irish parentage. She was a child at the time of the family's
removal to Garrard county, Kentucky.

In 1819 Pleasant Ford immigrated to Monroe county, Missouri,
about two years prior to the admission of the state to the Union, and
there he continued to reside, save for two brief intervals, until his
death, in August, 1844. at the age of fifty-one years. Pleasant and Ellen
(Harris) Ford became the parents of three children, namely: Elgelina,
who was born in Kentucky, on the 23d of February, 1816; Tirey, who
was born in the same state, January 21, 1818; and Jacob Harrison, who
was born in Monroe county, Missouri, August 21, 1821, just ten days
after the admission of Missouri to the Union. Mrs. Ellen Ford died in
the autumn of 1825, and in 1832 Pleasant Ford contracted a second
marriage, being then united to Miss Mary Williams, who was born in
Kentucky but was a resident of Monroe county, Missouri, at the time
of her marriage. Four children were born of the second union, — Wil-
liam Henry, Pleasant L., Charles Warren, and Lucretia Barbary.

Jacob Harrison Ford, youngest of the children of Pleasant and
Ellen (Harris) Ford, was born in Missouri, as already noted, and, like
all of his ancestors in the paternal line, he identified himself with the
agricultural industry. He acquired a small farm of his own after
reaching manhood. On the I7th of January, 1844, when a little over

204 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

twenty-two years of age, he wedded Miss Mary Winn Abernathy. then a
resident of Monroe county but a native of Howard county, Missouri,
where she was born February 28, 1818. The names of their nine chil-
dren, with respective dates of birth, are here indicated: Ellen, January
26, 1845; James Pleasant, March 4, 1847; Davidella, September, 1849;
William Henry, October 22, 1851; Mary, December i, 1853; Arzelia
Rozannah, December 21, 1855; Tirey Lafayette, December 29, 1857;
Zeralda Thomas (daughter), April 29, 1860; and Hugh Wilson, July
18, 1865. The married companionship of Jacob and Mary W. (Aber-
nathy) Ford covered a period of forty-five years. They were devout
Christians and regular church attendants. A few years after their mar-
riage they secured a tract of prairie land in Monroe county, Missouri,
where virtually the residue of their lives was passed. Jacob H. Ford
was a man of strong views and sterling integrity. He was rather strict
in his moral views and was a man of correct personal habits. He never
used tobacco or indulged in wines or other intoxications of any kind.
He was devoted to his family and his disposition was most kindly and
affectionate. He died at the home of his son Hugh W., in Kansas City,
Missouri, in November, 1908, at the venerable age of eighty-seven years.
His first wife, Mary, died in 1891, a woman of the sweetest nature and
of blameless life. A few years after her death he married her widowed
sister, Mrs. America Tribble, who preceded him to the life eternal by a
few years.

Tirey Lafayette Ford, to whom this sketch is dedicated, was the
seventh in order of birth of the' children of Jacob H. and Mary W.
Ford and was born on a small farm in Monroe county, Missouri, on
the 29th of December, 1857. His birthplace was a small, two-room
farm house in the midst of a large prairie that was yet wild and uncul-
tivated save for a few isolated and newly settled farms, with the pri-
mitive dwellings rudely constructed by the settlers who had ventured
into the prairies of northeastern Missouri. The earlier settlers had
confined themselves to the streams and wooded sections. The child-
hood and youth of Mr. Ford were passed under the conditions and in-
fluence common to those of the average farmer boy of the locality and
period, — characterized by early rising and early retiring, with plenty of
hard work between. About four months of each winter season were
spent in attending the district school. This discipline was supplemented
by a two years' course in the high school at Paris, the county seat,
where he so diligently applied himself as to complete a three years'
course in the two years, during which he worked evenings, mornings and
Saturdays to pay his board. Success is justly the prerogative of such
valiant souls.

On the ist of February. 1877, at the age of nineteen years, Mr.
Ford severed the ties that bound him to home and his native state and
set forth for California. He made the journey on what was termed
an immigrant train, and he reached his destination after the expiration
of ten clays. He worked as a laborer on ranches in Butte and Colusa
counties until the close of the year 1879, but his ambition had not been
somnolent and he had clearly defined plans for his future career. On
the ist of January, 1880, after having saved a few hundred dollars from

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 205

liis earnings, lie entered the law office of Colonel Park Henshaw, at
Chico, iiutte county, and under such effective preceptorship he began
the study of law. He was admitted to the bar by the supreme court of
California, in August, 1882, and he forthwith initiated the practice of
his profession at Oroville, the judicial center of Outte county, but
clients, for a time, were few, and he was compelled to supplement his
meager professional earnings by those received from clerical work for
some of the local merchants. In January, 1885, Mr. Ford removed to
Downieville, the county seat of Sierra county, where he made some-
what better progress in his profession. In November, 1888, he was
elected district attorney of the county, and in the election of 1890 he
was chosen as his own successor in this office.

In 1892, after a somewhat strenuous struggle with the then control-
ling power in the Republican party, Air. Ford was nominated and el-
ected to office of state senator from the third senatorial district, com-
prising the counties of Plumas, Sierra and Nevada. His senatorial ser-
vice covered the legislative session of 1893 and 1895, and he took rank
among the leading members of the upper house, in which he was as-
signed to a number of the more important committees. In the senate
a resolution was introduced in favor of the free and unlimited coinage
of silver at a ratio of sixteen to one, and this received the support of
every member of the body except Senator Ford and one other member.

In April, 1895, having removed to San Francisco, General Ford was
appointed attorney for the state board of harbor commissioners, and
this incumbency he retained until his election to the office of attorney
general of the state, in 1898. While attorney for the state board of
harbor commissioners he solved a legal problem that had long been a
source of trouble to that body. The area in San Francisco known as
Channel street, in reality an arm of the bay and its frontage a part
of the state's harbor line, had long been "squatted upon" by private par-
ties, whom the harbor commissioners had repeatedly sought to have
ousted. General Ford carried through litigation by which the property
was recovered, and it is now a portion of the city's harbor. His nomi-
nation for the distinguished office of attorney general of the state was
opposed by the so-called Republican "organization," which desired the
nomination of another candidate. He entered upon the duties of the
office of attorney general in January, 1899. His first official act was
to call his deputies together and lay before them the plan which he had
formulated for the systematic conduct of the business of the office, at
the same time saying to them, in substance: "With law making and
with state policies this office has nothing to do. The governor and the
legislature will attend to these matters. Our business is to know the
law, to disclose it as we find it, and to protect and maintain the state's
legal rights." To this simple creed he tenaciously adhered during his
tenure of the office, — covering a period of three and one-half years.

\\ hen he assumed office as attorney general he found pending, on ap-
peal, the matter of the estate of Leland Stanford, deceased. The pro-
bate court had assessed an inheritance tax of two hundred and fifty
thousand dollars against the estate, which amount was payable into the
state school fund. The supreme court had, on an appeal of the heirs.

206 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

set aside this assessment. A petition for rehearing had been filed and
the matter was pending on rehearing at the time General Ford took
office. He argued the case on rehearing and secured a reversal of the
former decision of the supreme court and an affirmance of the probate
court's assessment, thus finally converting the two hundred and fifty
thousand dollars to the use of the public schools. In August, 1892,
about six months prior to the expiration of his term, General Ford re-
signed his office to accept that of general counsel of the United Rail-
roads of 'San Francisco, which position he still retains. Having some
pride in the office he was about to resign, he set about to secure the nomi-
nation and election of a successor who would continue the work of the
office on the same high plane which he had established. He selected
his friend and mountain neighbor, U. S. Webb, who was at the time
the district attorney of Plumas county. Again he was opposed by the
regular Republican organization and again he succeeded in overcoming
this opposition.

In April, 1905, Governor Pardee asked General Ford to accept an
appointment to membership on the state board of prison directors, and
after some hesitation he consented to assume this position. After ac-
quainting himself thoroughly with the duties of his new office he de-
voted himself especially to that branch of the prison work relating
to reformation and paroles. In the matter of paroles he secured the
adoption of a systematic procedure, and enlargement of the work, and
the creation of a bureau to look specially after paroled prisoners. The
parole law was enacted in 1893, but up to the time when General Ford
became a member of the board, in 1905, a period of twelve years, there
had been but two hundred and thirty-five prisoners released on parole.
Since then, during a period of six years, nine hundred and sixty-three
prisoners have been paroled, with the result that today ten per cent, of
California's prison population is on parole.

General Ford has also taken a deep interest in the establishment of a
reformatory for first offenders. In furtherance of this most worthy en-
terprise he visited, in 1910, the principlal reformatories in the United
States and made an elaborate report thereon to the California state
board of prison directors. His interest in all that touches the material
and civic welfare of his home city and state is of the most insistent
order, and he is known as a loyal, broadminded and progressive citizen.

General Ford is a member of the Pacific Union, Bohemian, Union
League, Press, Transportation, Commercial, Amaurot, and Southern
Clubs, and for many years has been a member of the board of trus-
tees of the Mechanics Institute. In the Masonic fraternity his max-
imus affiliation is with Golden Gate Commandery, Knights Templar.
The general's favorite diversion is golf. His hobby for reducing every-
thing to system led him to keep a record of his first one thousand rounds
on the links, and it is said that he can tell you just what distance he
has walked on the golf course, the amount of energy expended, and the
number of strokes made in these thousand trips over the Presidio golf
course.

On the ist of February, 1888. was solemnized the marriage of Gen-
eral Ford to Miss Emma Byington, daughter of Hon. Lewis Byington,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 207

one of the honored pioneers and most influential citizens of Sierra
county, where Mrs. Ford was born and reared. General and Airs. Ford
have three children, concerning whom the following brief record is
entered in conclusion of this review : Relda, who was born on the 8th
of December, 1888, is now the wife of Frederick V. Stott, of San
Francisco; Byington, who was born November I, 1890, is a member
of the class of 1912 in the University of California; and Tirey L., Jr.,
who was born November 8, 1898, is a student in the public schools of
San Francisco.

WILLIAM J. DRIGGERS. The opening of the Imperial Valley
brought settlers from every state in the Union, North, South and East
contributing to the citizenship of this fertile section ; but probably
outside of California itself the greatest number of pioneers came from
Texas, and representatives of the Lone Star state can be found in every
part of the new country. William J. Driggers, one of the men who has
participated in the transformation of this region, the development of
which seems almost magical, has by his own efforts and abilities over-
come the difficulties attendant upon the settlement of a new community,
and by his industry, perseverance and capacity for affairs of breadth
and importance has worked his way to a position of prominence. He
was born in Texas, in 1859, and is a son of William J. and Catherine
(Ross) Driggers, natives of Tennessee.

The third of a family of eight children, Mr. Diggers was reared
on the ranch of his father, who had moved to Texas as a young man,
and there learned the business of successfully conducting a large prop-
erty. Cattle breeding was an important part of his training, and his
hours were well filled with the hard, vigorous and healthy life of the
plains, but his educational training was not neglected and he was a regu-
lar attendant of the public schools. - At the time the Imperial Valley
began to attract attention, Mr. Driggers decided to try his fortunes
in the new region, and after settling up his affairs in his native state
came to his present property, well equipped to develop the resources of
the prosperous land and to take his place among its successful men.
Since 1907 he has been engaged in raising alfalfa, corn and barley, on
a ranch of one hundred and eight acres, and the bounteous crops
which he raises and markets are ample proof that his early training
was not wasted. In addition to his ranch Mr. Driggers is the owner of
a five-acre tract in the city of El Centro, where he erected a handsome
brick residence in 1910. On this city property he carries on poultry
raising, and like his other venture this has proved a decided success.
He now has about three hundred hens, and has preferred the White
Leghorn, Rhode Island Red and Plymouth Rock breeds. He has made
good improvements and has been discriminating in his management of
his business affairs, being known as one of the enterprising ranchers of
the Imperial Valley. He is a man of unflagging industry and has al-
ways worked with a determination in view, his success being only the
well-merited reward for a life of integrity and industry. Fraternally
Mr. Driggers has associated himself with the Modern Woodmen of

208 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

America, and among the members of the local lodge has a number of
warm personal friends.

In 1887 Mr. Driggers was united in marriage with Miss Sophie
Hinman, a native of the state of Wisconsin, and to this union there has
been born one child, Minor, on December 19, if

CHARLES C. BROWNING, M. D. has not only gained special prestige as
one of the representative physicians of California, but has also been
notably prominent in connection with the educational, institutional and
other specific work along the line of his profession, besides which he has
shown marked progressiveness and loyalty as a citizen, and has had to
do with enterprises tending to advance the material and civic prosperity
of the various communities in which he has lived within the period of
his residence in the state. A man of fine intellectual and professional
attainments and of sterling character, he has secured vantage ground in
popular confidence and esteem. He is engaged in active and successful
practice in Los Angeles, where he gives exclusive attention to the treat-
ment of tubercular diseases of the chest and throat, in which field he
maintains an authoritative status. He resides in El Cerrito, 1227 Dia-
mond avenue, in the beautiful suburban town of South Pasadena, and his
office headquarters are in suite 1003-5, Walter P. Story building, Los
Angeles.

Dr. Browning was born at Denver, Hancock county, Illinois, on the
25th day of May, 1861, the son of Rev. Enoch Clifton Browning and
Sophia Louisa (Pennock) Browning, the former a native of Illinois,
where the family was founded in the pioneer days, and the latter a native
of Indiana. At the close of the Civil war, Rev. Enoch C. Browning re-
moved with his family to northeastern Missouri, and in that state he be-
came one of the prominent and influential members of the clergy of the
Christian church, in the work of which he has served for many years
with all zeal and consecration. He was the organizer of the Missouri state
board of home missions of the Christian church and became its first
secretary, an office of which he continued the incumbent for many years.
From there he went to the state of Arkansas, in which field he labored
for fifteen years. He and his wife are still living in Little Rock, where
he is the pastor of the Wright avenue Christian church, which he organ-
ized. Of their children, two sons and two daughters are living.

Dr. Charles C. Browning was a child at the time of the family re-
moval to Missouri, and after due preliminary discipline in the public
schools he attended a preparatory school in Shelbyville, Shelby county,
that state, in 1878-9. During the following school year he continued his
studies in Shelbina college, in the same county, and in 1880-1 he was a
student in Christian University, at Canton, Missouri. He was then ma-
triculated in the medical department of the University of Missouri, in
which he completed the prescribed course and was graduated as a member
of the class of 1883, duly receiving his well-earned decree of Doctor of
Medicine. During the last year of his course in the university, he served
as an interne in a dispensary at Columbia, the seat of that institution,
and in 1888-9 ne took a post graduate course in the medical department
in the University of the City of New York, in the meanwhile gaining

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY i'll

valuable clinical experience as an interne in the New York House of Re-
lief. From 1888 to 1891 he was a member of the medical staff of the
New York City Asylum for the Insane, on Blackwell's Island.

Shortly after his graduation from the University of Missouri, Dr.
Browning returned to Denver, Illinois, his native town, and at that place
and Adrien in the same county, he continued in the general practice of his
profession until 1888, when he went to the national metropolis, as has
already been noted elsewhere. There he remained until 1891, when he
came to California and located at San Jacinto, in what was then San Diego
county, but is now Riverside county, where he continued successful prac-
tice until 1893, when he removed to Highland, San Bernardino county,
which was the stage of his professional activities until 1905, in March of
which year he removed to Monrovia, Los Angeles county, where he be-
came associated with Dr. F. M. Pottenger in the incorporation and opera-
tion of the Pottenger Sanatorium, for the treatment of diseases of the
lungs and throat, to which line of physical ailments he had previously
given special study. He became medical director of the institution named
and served in this capacity, as well as vice-president of the corporation
controlling the sanatorium, until April 11, 1910, when he severed his
official and executive connection with the same to give his attention to
the private practice of his profession, as a specialist in the diagnosis and
treatment of the diseases of the throat and chest. His work in this
field of practice has been marked by most earnest study and investigation,
and by consequent success of unequivocal order, his devotion to his pro-
fession being that of a true humanitarian and his sympathy having tran-
scended mere sentiment to become an actuating motive for helpfulness.

Dr. Browning has served as president of the Redlands Medical So-
ciety and the San Bernardino County Medical Society, and he is at the
present time second vice-president of the California State Association
for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis. In September, 1911,
there came further and well merited recognition of his ability along the
line of his special department of professional work, in that he was ap-
pointed by the state board of health a member of the executive committee
of the California Commission for the study and prevention of tuberculo-
sis. In December. 1910, he was elected associate professor of medicine
in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, which constitutes the medi-
cal department of the University of Southern California, and he is a
valued and popular member of 'the faculty of this institution. He is
actively identified with the American Medical Association for the Ad-
vancement of Science, the National Association for the Study and Pre-
vention of Tuberculosis, the International Congress on Tuberculosis, the
California State Medical Society, the Southern California Medical So-
ciety, the Los Angeles County Medical Society, the Los Angeles Clinical
and Pathalogical Society, the California Association for the Study and
Prevention of Tuberculosis, and the Los Angeles County Association of
the same province of work. He is also a member of the National Child
Labor Society, the American Health League, the Committee of One
Hundred on National Health, the American Academy of Social and Poli-
tical Science, and the National Geographical Society.

The Doctor is an omnivorous student of the best in literature, espe-

212 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

daily along professional and general scientific lines, and he has made
many and valuable contributions to both standard and periodical liter-
ture of his profession.

Dr. Browning was one of the organizers of the First Bank of High-
land, San Bernardino county, and was the first vice-president of the same,
besides which he was one of the incorporators and the first secretary of
the Highland Domestic Water Company. At Highland he was also one
of the organizers and incorporators of the San Bernadino County Savings
Bank, and he was also an influential factor in effecting the organization
of the Highland Fruit Growers' Association, of which he served as
vice-president. He also held the office of president of the Highland
Literary Club, of which he was one of the organizers, the University and
City Clubs of Los Angeles and the Municipal Waterways Association.
These various notations indicate the progressive spirit he has shown as a
citizen, and he is thoroughly en rapport writh southern California, to which
his loyalty is one of the most insistent and appreciative order.

In the time-honored Masonic fraternity. Dr. Browning has completed
the circle of the York Rite, in which his maximum affiliation is with the
San Bernardino Commandery, Knights Templars, and he is past patron
of the Order of the Eastern Star, besides which he is a member of Al
Malaikah Temple of the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the
Mystic Shrine, in Los Angeles. He was a charter member of the Redlands
lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and is still actively
identified with that fraternity. In politics he gives his allegiance to the
Republican party. Both he and his wife hold membership in the Chris-
tian church.

On the 26th of August, 1885, Dr. Browning was united in marriage
to Miss Helen Tillapaugh, who was born at Bowen, Hancock county,
Illinois, and whose father, Gilbert Tillapaugh, who resides with them,
was one of the pioneers of that state, to which he removed from the state
of New York. Dr. and Mrs. Browning have one daughter, Helen Gilberta.
The family of Dr. Brown is distinctly one of prominence in connection
with the representative social activities of South Pasadena, where their
attractive home is known as a center of gracious hospitality.

REV. W. G. CONLEY. Where eminent abilities and unblemished in-
tegrity, combined with unimpeachable virtue derivable from the daily
practice of religion and piety, contribute to adorn the character of an
individual, then it is most proper to be set forth as an example to those
who would make themselves useful to the rest of mankind. A brief
sketch of the life of Rev. W. G. Conley, pastor of the State Street
Christian church of El Centro, California, is not inappropriate in this
connection.

Rev. W. G. Conley was born in Tennessee. He entered Transyl-
vania University at Lexington, Kentucky, from which he was gradu-
ated with the degrees of A. B. and A. M. After his graduation he com-
menced teaching in the same institution, where he remained for six-
teen years, occupying the chairs of Latin and Greek. During this time
he did a great deal of church work, preaching in the various churches
in and adjacent to Lexington, and in TQOI he gave up his professorship

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 215

to give his entire time to ministerial work, in which he has continued to
the present time. His first pastorate in California was at Redlands,
where he remaned for five years, and he then went to Covina, where
he spent four years. In September, 1910, Rev. Conley came to El Cen-
tro to accept his present charge.

The El Centre Christian church was organized two years ago, but
for several years services had been held in the Holt Opera House. The
present beautiful and commodious edifice was commenced in October,
1910, and dedicated in January, 1911. Its cost was ten thousand dol-
lars, and its capacity six hundred persons, while its present member-
ship is about one hundred and fifty persons, as compared with forty-
five in 1909. Rev. S. T. Martin was the first pastor. During Rev.
Conley's ministerial career he was for nine years a member of the
Southern California Mission Board, and for the ten preceding years
was treasurer of the Kentucky Mission Board. Devoted to his work,
carrying on his duties with .a zeal and earnestness that leave no doubt
as to where his whole interests are concentrated, Rev. Conley is a faith-
ful worker in the service of his Master, while he is beloved by his con-
gregation and honored and esteemed by all who know him. He is not
only a good preacher, a close student and deep thinker, but by his
masterly handling of the church's financial affairs has proven himself
a business man of no mean ability. The poor and needy have in him a
sincere friend, and the extent of his private charities probably will
never be known.

In 1891 Rev. Conley was married to Miss Mary Crabtree, of Ken-
tucky, and they have two children : Elmo H. and Mary G. Rev. Con-
ley is the oldest of six living children of T. F. and Cordelia J. ("Green)
Conley, natives of Tennessee. The father was born in 1832 and died
in 1890, in Alamo, Tennessee. He was a successful farmer. The
mother was born in 1844 and died in 1898, in Lexington, Kentucky.

Hox. THOMAS R. BARD. This distinguished citizen of California
stands as an honored member of a striking group of men whose influence
on the social and economic life of the Nation has been of the most
beneficent order. The career of Senator Bard has been conspicuous for
the variety and magnitude of his achievement and his influence has
transcended local environs to permeate the national life. So marked ac-
complishment of itself stands in evidence of high character, and as a
statesman and a man of affairs this former member of the United States
senate has rendered service to his state and country to the full extent of
his splendid powers, his labors having been unsparing and his honesty of
purpose beyond cavil. The reflex of the honors conferred upon hirri has
been the honors which he has in turn conferred. As one of the nation's
legislators his record is one of distinction, and while a representative
of California in the upper house of congress he left the impress of his
strong and resourceful individuality in no uncertain way, as the govern-
ment records during the period- amply show. His home is Berylwood
near the village of Hueneme, Ventura county. Throughout the state
he is recognized as one of California's able and distinguished men.

The Bard family has been one of prominence and influence in Amer-

216 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ica since the colonial epoch in our national history, and in 1905, while
making a European tour. Senator Bard found many branches of the fam-
ilies of Bards represented in Great Britain, France and Italy, in which last
mentioned country in the ninth century of the Christian era, the name is
found on record and perpetuated in connection with the history of Fort
Bard, in valley of Aosta, Piedmont. The genealogy of the American
branch of the family is traced to Archibald Bard, or Beard, who came
from the north of Ireland to Chester county, Pennsylvania, and after-
wards settled near the present city of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in 1740.
That this immigration must have been made at an early date is authenti-
cated by the fact that Richard Bard, son of this sterling progenitor of
the American line, was born in Pennsylvania and had sufficiently ma-
tured to be able to serve as a soldier in the French and Indian war. In
April, 1758, after Braddock's defeat, he and his wife were captured by
the Indians and held for ransom. Mr. Bard succeeded in making his
escape after ten days of captivity, but his wife was held by the savages
for two years and five months before her whereabouts became known
and her release effected. This was accomplished by paying to the In-
dians forty pounds sterling. Richard Bard's son. Captain Thomas Bard,
was born in Franklin county, Pennsylvania, and he upheld the military
prestige and loyalty of the family name by his service as a soldier in the
war of 1812. Bardstown. Kentucky, was founded by David and Wil-
liam Bard, brothers of Richard Bard.

Robert M. Bard, father of Thomas R. Bard, was born in Franklin
county, Pennsylvania, and he gained precedence as one of the leading
members of the bar of that section of the old Keystone state, beside
which he was an influential factor in public and civic affairs. The year
prior to his death he was made nominee of the Whig party for represen-
tative of his district in congress, and he died, at Chambersburg, in 1851,
at the age of forty-one years, thus being cut off in the very zenith of his
strong and useful manhood. He married Miss Elizabeth Little, who
was born at Mercersburg, Franklin county, Pennsylvania, and whose
father Dr. Peter W. Little, was a native of York county, that state. Dr.
Little was a student of Dr. Benjamin Rush and was one of the early
graduates of the historical old Jefferson Medical College, in the city of
Philadelphia, and he continued in the successful practice of his profes-
sion at Mercersburg until his death. His wife, whose maiden name was
Mary Parker, was a daughter of Captain Robert Parker, a gallant officer
in the war of the Revolution, after the close of which he was engaged in
mercantile pursuits. His sister became the wife of General Andrew
Porter. They were the great-grandparents of General Horace Porter,
late United States embassador to France.

The mother of Senator Bard was born December 7, 1813, and died
on her birthday anniversary December 7, 1881. while on a visit to her son
at "Berylwood," California.

Hon. Thomas R. Bard, the immediate subject of this sketch was born
at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, on the 8th of December, 1841, and he
has a due measure of pride and satisfaction in reverting to that old and
historic commonwealth as the place of his nativity and as that honored
bv the lives and services of his ancestors. He was afforded the advant-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 217

ages of the common schools and supplemented this discipline by a course
in Chambersburg Academy, in which well ordered institution he was
graduated at the age of seventeen years. He read law in the office of
Hon. George Chambers of Chambersburg. Pennsylvania. Thereafter
he was for a time employed in a railroad engineer corps on the Hunting-
don and Brand Top Railroad, after which he went to Hagerstown, Alary-
land, where he assumed a position in the office of David Zeller, who was
engaged in the grain and forwarding business.

This was at the climacteric period leading up to and culminating in
the Civil war, and young Bard formed deep and inflexible anti-slavery
sentiments and a determined advocate of the maintenance of the Union,
no matter what the cost. His opinions were largely fortified through
his careful and continuous reading of the "Atlantic Monthly" and the
Neiv York Tribune, whose attitude at the time is well remembered. Even
before the rebel guns had. thundered against the ramparts of old Fort
Sumter, and the war had thus become a certainty, Mr. Bard was one of
the few outspoken supporters of President Lincoln, who for self-protec-
tion, and for the cause of the Union, organized a Secret Semi-Military
Association that was afterward merged into the Union League. In the
Border states it was instrumental in compelling men to take sides openly,
for or against the government and in preventing sympathizers with the
Rebellion from giving aid and comfort to the seceding states. Mr. Bard
was the local agent of the Cumberland Valley Railroad, at Hagerstown,
involving duties of assistant to the superintendent and as such was re-
sponsible for securing the safety of trains and other property of the com-
pany by keeping well advised of movements of Confederate forces oper-
ating in the Shenandoah Valley. With the telegraph operators, he was
accustomed to keep within or near the enemy's line, collect all available
information about the strength and movements of the raiding parties
and communicate it to the general commandery of the military depart-
ment.

His activities at Hagerstown, attracted the attention of Colonel
Thomas A. Scott, then assistant secretary of war, as well as president of
the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, who prevailed upon Mr. Bard to take
charge of the extensive landed interests in California which Colonel Scott
had recently acquired. As Mr. Bard's mother's home at Chambersburg.
Pennsylvania had been burned by the Confederate forces under General
McCausland by orders of General Early on July 30, 1864, and as his busi-
ness at Hagerstown, Maryland, had also suffered severe losses by destruc-
tion and seizure of property by Confederate forces, he was quite ready
to accept Colonel Scott's proposals. He spent several months in Colonel
Scott's office, and then sailed for San Francisco via Panama, arriving
at his destination on January 5, 1865. From that city he soon made his
way to Ventura county, which has continued to be his home during the
long intervening period of nearly half a century, within which he has con-
tributed in generous measures to the material and civic development and
upbuilding of this beautiful section of the state. Here he assumed charge
of the landed interests of Colonel Scott and eventually his own holdings
became very extensive, through his careful management and judicious
investments. In 1868 he subdivided the Rancho Ojai and sold the same

Vol. 1—12

218 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

in small farms, and somewhat later he disposed of the Rancho Canada
Larga in the same manner, and afterwards the Ranches La Coloma,
Las Posas and Simi. The effect of this was to give great impetus to the
development of the magnificent agricultural and horticultural resources
of this section, as the lands handled by him in Ventura county had an
aggregate area al 277,0*00 acres.

In the meanwhile Mr. Bard had established his residence in the vil-
lage of Hueneme, of which he was the founder, as he laid out the town
in 1871. in which year he also built the local wharf, of which he sub-
sequently acquired the ownership, by purchasing the property from
Colonel Scott. He then erected extensive warehouses and thus devel-
oped Hueneme into an important shipping port. The large landed estate
secured by Senator Bard in the earlier days was through purchase, and
for a number of years he was largely interested in sheep growing, in con-
nection with which industry he held at one time as many as thirty-five
thousand head of sheep. He has been president of the Hueneme Wharf
Company from the time when the present fine wharf was constructed,
and he was one of the organizers of the Bank of Ventura, of which he
served as president for many years. He also founded and is president
of the Hueneme Bank, and his capitalistic and industrial interests have
long been of wide scope and importance, the while his influence and
tangible aid have been given in support of every measure and enterprise
tending to advance the general welfare of the community. He was one
of the pioneers in the development of the great oil industry in southern
California, in which connection he was one of those most prominently
concerned in the organization of the LTnion Oil Company and the Torrey
Canon Oil Company.

The political career of Senator Bard has been prolonged and of
marked distinction and honor. He has been a supporter of the cause
of the Republican party from the time of attaining to his legal majority
and has long been an effective worker in its ranks. He was a delegate
to the Republican national convention of 1884, when the great statesman,
James G. Elaine, was made the standard bearer of the "grand old party,"
and in 1892 he was the only Republican elector sent from California to
the national electoral college. At a special session of the California
legislature in 1900 Mr. Bard was elected to the United States senate by
a unanimous vote of the Republican members of the assembly. While
serving as a member of the senate he made a special study of the Panama
canal question, and to him is given uniform credit for certain sugges-
tions that resulted in a number of important amendments to the Hay-
Paunceforte treaty. Senator Bard took an active part in the deliberations
of both the floor and committee room during his five terms in the United
States senate, and he did much to further the best interests of the state
which he so ably and acceptably represented and from which he retired
in March, 1905. Since that time he has continued to give his attention
to his large real estate and private interests and to promoting such un-
dertakings as tend to conserve the material and social advancement of
his home town, county and state. He is still active as a valued factor
in the councils of the Republican party in California. He is a man of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 219

tine physique, of courtly and dignified bearing, and his genial personality
has gained to him a wide circle of staunch friends among all classes.

Senator Bard is a member of the Presbyterian church and he is an
appreciative member of the time-honored Masonic fraternity, in which
he has his maximum affiliation with Ventura Commandery, Knights
Templars, at Ventura. He also holds membership in the California
Club, one of the representative civic organizations of the city of Los
Angeles. Airs. Bard is a member of the Episcopal church. Since 1873
Senator Bard has maintained his residence in Hueneme, which is one of
the most attractive of the many beautiful towns of southern California.
He has found special pleasure in the developing of his beautiful gardens
and grounds, and on the same are to be found great varieties of flowers
and decorative plants, many of which have been imported from foreign
lands. His is one of the beautiful homes in Ventura count}- and within
its gracious portals, a generous and cultured hospitality is ever in evi-
dence.

On the I7th of April, 1876, was solemnized the marriage of Senator
Bard to Miss Mary Gerberding, of San Francisco. She was born at
San Francisco and is a daughter of C. O. Gerberding, one of the found-
ers of the Evening Bulletin, long one of the leading newspapers of San
Francisco. Senator and Mrs. Bard have seven children, namely : Beryl
B., Mary L. (now Mrs. Roger Edwards of Saticoy. Ventura county),
Thomas G., Anna G., Elizabeth Parker, Richard and Philip. All of trie
children are at home except the married daughter.

WINTHROP PIER. As there is no business more closely identified
with the settlement of a new agricultural district and the upbuilding of
its towns than that of real estate, so is there no class of business men
more deserving of mention in a record of its history and development
than the realty dealer. The success or failure of a new community
is often left in his hands ; he it must be to interest the early settlers and
get them to interest their friends in turn ; later, he must act as interme-
diary between the inside and outside parties and arrange transactions ;
and eventually, when the commercial interests of the locality are be-
ing developed, it is often the real estate dealer, in behalf of his own
interests as well as those of the locality which he represents, that must
secure the outside capital. The successful real estate dealer is a man
who necessarily must be possesed of much tact and judgment, must be
a hard and untiring worker, when called upon, but must also be the
possessor of the equanimity to bear the brunt of either booms or depres-
sions, which are especially liable to strike a new country. Possessing
these qualities, and proving by long experience that he is an able realty
man, Winthrop Pier, of El Centro, California, takes a prominent place
among the citizens of this community. A large land owner himself,
Mr. Pier is well posted on realty matters, soil conditions and farm val-
ues, and his sterling integrity and natural qualifications for his position
have made him a valuable man in his community. Mr. Pier came to the
Imperial Valley in 1903, and since that time has amassed four hundred
acres of valuable and productive land, which is especially adapted to

220 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

dairying and hog raising, in which he engages, milking one hundred
cows.

Mr. Pier was born in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, in 1886, and is a son
of William S. and Alice M. Pier, of Pittsburg, who had three other
children, all older than Winthrop. He was given an excellent educa-
tional training, eventually graduating from Harvard College, Class of
1909, and then came to California and located in the Imperial Valley,
at a time when the wonderful productiveness of the land here had just
been discovered. He is a republican in politics, and has been active in
local affairs, being a member of the republican board in 1911. He has
given his support to all movements of a progressive nature, and can be
depended upon to do his share in forwarding matters of a religious
or charitable nature. He is a popular member of the Masonic lodge at
El Centra.

In 1911 Mr. Pier was united in marriage with Miss Josephine Case,
of Los Angeles.

HARVEY D. LOVELAND. No citizen of California has more fully ex-
emplified the progressive spirit of the west than has Colonel Loveland,
who is a most valued member of the state board of railroad commis-
sioners, as representative of the second district, and who is one of the
most enterprising and public-spirited citizens of San Francisco. He
is in the very prime of active manhood and his career has been one of
varied experiences, as he has directed his splendid energies in various
channels and incidentally proved his versatility of talent and breadth of
view. He prepared himself for the legal profession and was successful
as a practitioner, and prior to this he had been in the pedagogic ranks,
as a popular teacher in the public schools. He has been identified with
important mercantile and industrial enterprises, is a prominent figure
in connection with the affairs of the National Guard of California, as
well as in the Masonic fraternity, and in his present official position his
services have proved of distinctive value to his home state, as he is
a recognized authority in regard to traffic matters, than which nothing
more closely touches the general advancement and material prosperity
of any community, state or nation. He is essentially one of the rep-
resentative men of California, and his accomplishment has been such
as to justify in the fullest measure his recognition in this historical
compilation.

A scion of old and honored families of the Empire state, Colonel
Loveland was born in Oneida county, New York, on the igth of July,
1853, and he is a son of William S. and Lucy (Gaut) Loveland, who
continued to reside in that state until their death, the father having
devoted his attention to farming during the major part of his active
career. After duly availing himself of the advantages of the public
school of his native state Colonel Loveland prosecuted higher academic
studies under the direction of a private tutor. For nine years he gave
his attention to teaching in the public schools, — in New York and
Kansas, — and in the meanwhile he began the study of law under ef-
fective preceptorship. In 1881 he was admitted to the bar of the state
of Kansas, and he was thereafter engaged in the practice of his profes-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 223

sion in that commonwealth until 1887, when he came to California and
engaged in mercantile pursuits, in which connection he was manager,
at different times, of two of the largest wholesale houses on the Pacific
coast. His association with this line of enterprise led him to investigate
and study traffic arrangements and facilities, and few have covered the
subject more thoroughly and effectively. He lias represented, with
others, the Pacific coast country in many important cases brought before
the inter-state commerce commission for adjudication. He was for
three years traffic manager for the Pacific Coast Jobbers' & Manufactur-
ers' Association, and for six years was president of that body. In this
connection he did much to secure to this section of the country equit-
able adjustments of traffic rates, and there was all of consistency in his
appointment to the office of railroad commissioner of the state, which
office he assumed, under appointment by the governor, in 1907. In 1910
he was elected as his own successor in this position, of which he is
now incumbent, and his retention of the office by such election affords
the best evidence of the popular appreciation of the value of his services.
He has labored with all of zeal and ability to secure for California
proper regulation of traffic facilities, and in his official position has thus
done much to further the civic and industrial progress of this great
commonwealth.

Colonel Loveland has served on the military staffs of three different
governors of California and has been a most loyal and efficient promoter
of the interests of the National Guard of the state, in which he is now
paymaster general, with the rank of colonel. He manifests a vital in-
terest in all that touches the general welfare of his state, and has been
influential in forwarding measures and enterprises advanced along this
line. He is a member of the general committee of the Panama-Pacific
Exposition Company, is vice-president of the National Irrigation Con-
gress, and has served as president of the Trans-Mississippi Commercial
Congress. He was one of the organizers of the International Mercan-
tile & Bond Company, of which he is vice-president, and this important
corporation, whose headquarters are in San Francisco, with offices in
the principal cities of the east and west, is more specifically mentioned
in a sketch of the career of its president, Solomon L. Bright, appearing
on other pages of this work.

Colonel Loveland is unswerving in his allegiance to the Republican
party and has been an active and influential worker in behalf of its prin-
ciples and policies. He has twice served as a member of the Republican
state central committee of California, and at different times his name has
been prominently suggested in connection with candidacy for the office
of governor of the state, though he had manifested no predilection for
political preferment. In the time-honored Masonic fraternity Colonel
Loveland is affiliated with San Francisco Lodge, No. 360, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, of which he is past master; is a member of San
Francisco Chapter, No. i. Royal Arch Masons; is past commander of
Golden Gate Commandery, No. 16, Knight Templars, and in the chival-
ric body of Masonry he also has the distinction of being past grand
commander of Knights Templars. He is also past patron of the Order
of the Eastern Star, and in the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite he has

±.'1 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

attained to the thirty-second degree. He is at the present time intendant
general for California of the Red Cross Knights of Constantine, a
higher order of Masonry. He is a representative of a family founded
in America in the early colonial days, and the genealogy is traced back
to sterling English origin. Representatives of the name were valiant
soldiers in the Continental line in the great struggles for independence,
and on this score he is eligible for and holds membership in the Cali-
fornia Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. Among the
more important and essentially representative clubs with which Colonel
Loveland is identified in his home city may be mentioned the Bohemian.
Army & Navy, Union League, Commercial, and Commonwealth.

Colonel Loveland was married before leaving his native state, and
his first wife died in California, leaving one son, William J Loveland,
who is associated with him in business. In 1894 was solemnized his
marriage to Miss Lulu P. Edwards, of San Francisco, and she is a
popular factor in connection with the social activities of her home city.

GEORGE H. WOLFLIN. Some men attain to more than ordinary
prominence through the recognition by their associates of their ability
to discharge certain duties, and this is undoubtedly the case of George
H. Wolflin. of El Centro, California, who at the time of the organi-
zation of the Imperial Valley Mercantile Company, in October, 1911,
was chosen secretary and manager of this large concern, in recogni-
tion of his long and successful career in this line of endeavor. The
company was organized in September, 1910.

Mr. Wolflin is a product of the South, having been born in Ken-
tucky, but he was reared and educated in the state of Missouri, whence
he was taken by his parents as a child. Shortly after leaving school
he became a clerk in a general store, and for many years he was con-
nected with the mercantile business in Missouri, eventually becoming
the proprietor of an establishment of his own. From Missouri, where
he had been successful in his ventures, he went to Texas, and like many
others from the Lone Star state migrated to the Imperial Valley when
it became known what a wonderful country had been opened. Here he
associated himself with several other ambitious and enterprising busi-
ness men, and in September, 1910. the Imperial Valley Mercantile Com-
pany was formed, with A. M. Ham. of San Bernardino, president; E.
I. Esenmeyer, vice-president ; and Mr. Wolflin, secretary and manager.
This business confines itself to wholesale groceries, and carries a com-
plete stock of both staple and fancy goods, carrying on transactions
throughout the Imperial Valley, and being a great convenience to the
merchants here, as everything handled in a first-class grocery stock is
to be found in the three-story plant, one hundred by one hundred and
twenty feet, located at El Centro, where the firm also owns several ad-
joining lots. This building, which is modern in every respect, is thor-
oughly equipped to take care of its large and valuable stock, and in-
cludes a compartment for cold storage. Eight hands are necessary to
conduct the affairs of this concern, and its rapid growth up to the pres-
ent time makes it appear that it will be one of the largest industries
in a country that promises affairs of a large nature. The officers of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 227

this concern are all men of much business experience and unblemished
character, and the firm has thoroughly established itself in the confi-
dence of the trade. Mr. Wolflin has, so far, given all of his attention
to his arduous business duties, and therefore has not engaged in poli-
tics, but he gives his support to progressive movements, and takes a
good citizen's interest in the matters of the day. He is popular in fra-
ternal circles, and is a Sir Knight in Masonry, a member of Redlands
Commandery, No. 45.

WASHINGTON HADLEY. The value and significance of a worthy life
were shown forth in the career of the late Washington Hadley, who died
at his home in Whittier, Los Angeles county, on the 21 st of December,
1911, at the patriarchal age of ninety-four years. There can be but little
reason to doubt that at the time of his demise he was not only the oldest
active banker in the United States but also in the entire world. He was
president of the Whittier Savings Bank and a member of the directorate
of the First National Bank of Whittier up to the time when he was sum-
moned to the life eternal, and of him it may consistently be said that
his strength was as the number of his days. To be honored of men im-
plies much, for it can not be denied that popular approbation is the mete-
wand of character. Washington Hadley stood exponent of the most
loyal citizenship, and his noble and unassuming personality will cause
his memory to be long venerated and cherished. It is easy to attribute
the elements of greatness to any man who has been in the least con-
spicuous in public affairs, but the world's productive workers find them-
selves not denied their due measure of honor and appreciation, no mat-
ter what their sphere of endeavor. The fame of Mr. Hadley rests on
the basis of work accomplished and honors worthily won, and in study-
ing his strong, distinct character interpretation follows fact in a straight
line of derivation. His character was the positive expression of a force-
ful and loyal nature, and while the laurels of definite achievement rested
upon his head he also had the gracious heritage of sterling ancestry.

Washington Hadley was born in Guilford county, North Carolina,
on the 1 2th of December, 1817, and was a son of Jonathan and Ann
(Long) Hadley. the former of whom was born in Chatham county, that
state, in 1779, and the latter of whom was born in Virginia, in 1783.
The father was a planter, miller and merchant ; was a man of impregnable
integrity and ever commanded the confidence and respect of those who
knew him. He continued to' reside in North Carolina until his death,
which occurred on the I2th of April, 1826, and his wife, long surviving
him, passed the closing years of her life in Henry county, Indiana, where
she was summoned to eternal rest in 1871, both having been earnest and
zealous members of the Society of Friends. The Hadley lineage is
traced back to staunch Scotch-Irish origin and the founders of the
American branch of the family came from England in the seventeenth
century, to establish their home in Pennsylvania, whence representatives
of the 'name later removed to North Carolina. The paternal grandfather
of the subject of this memoir was born in Pennsylvania, in the year 1743,
and passed the closing years of his life in North Carolina.

Washington Hadley" gained his rudimentary education in his native

228

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

state and when fourteen years of age accompanied his widowed mother
on her removal to Indiana. Settlement was made by them in Morgan
county, that state, in 1831, and Mr. Hadley thus became identified with
the pioneer annals of the fine old Hoosier commonwealth, within whose
borders he was reared to maturity. He recalled in later years, with
pleasing reminiscence, the little log school house in which he conned
his lesson when a boy in North Carolina, and he spoke with apprecia-
tion of the facilities of this primitive institution, which was equipped
with puncheon floor, slab benches and window of greased paper in lieu
of glass. In the pioneer schools of Indiana he continued his studies,
and in his eighteenth year he proved himself eligible for pedagogic honors,
as is shown by the fact that during the winter of 1835-6 he taught in
the Sulphur Springs school house, which was located two and one-half
miles southwest of the little hamlet of Mooresville, Morgan county, and

BIRTHPLACE OF WASHINGTON HADLEY, GUILFORD COUNTY, N. C.,
ERECTED BY HIS FATHER IN 1804

which had an enrollment of about forty pupils. In the early spring of
1836, at the expiration of the school term, Mr. Hadley went to Parke
county, Indiana, where he assumed the position of clerk in the general
store conducted by his elder brother, Alfred. He was thus employed
about two years, and for the ensuing four years he was a partner in the
business. Upon severing this association Mr. Hadley engaged in busi-
ness in an individual way, and as a merchant he dealt largely in produce,
which he shipped down to Wabash, Ohio and Mississippi rivers on flat-
boats, to the market in New Orleans. He continued in the mercantile
business until 1859, when he was elected treasurer of Parke county, as
candidate on the old-line Whig ticket. Of this position he continued the
incumbent for two terms, and his services in this capacity may have had
definite influence in shaping his future career. Concerning him the fol-
lowing pertinent statements have been made, and the same are worthy
of reproduction, as showing his attitude and study of conditions at a cli-
macteric period in the nation's history. "During the Civil war Mr. Had-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 229

ley watched with keen interests the money markets. Gold payments
were practically suspended. It was not for the lack of gold but because
gold had been retired from circulation and hoarded up in private coffers,
instead of being thrown on the market for practical utilization. It was
in 1863 that the first 'greenbacks' were issued, and prior to that the
United States treasury was not responsible for the currency issued by
the state banks."

After the close of the war Mr. Hadley removed with his family to
the west and established his home at Lawrence, Kansas, in July, 1865.
There he effected the organization of the National Bank of Lawrence,
which was duly incorporated with a capital stock of one hundred thou-
sand dollars and which opened its doors for business in January, 1866.
For nearly a quarter of a century Mr. Hadley continued to serve as
president of this bank, and in the meanwhile he contributed largely to
the development and progress of the Sunflower state. In 1889 he dis-
posed of his various interests in Kansas and came to Los Angeles, Cali-
fornia, where he brought his long experience and mature judgment into
effective play as a member of the board of directors of the National Bank
of California, with which he was thus identified until 1900 and of which
his son Albert was cashier during this interval.

In 1890 Mr. Hadley became one of the interested principles in the
Pickering Land & Water Company, of Whittier, Los Angeles county,
a town that had been founded in the year 1887, and upon assuming this
connection he identified himself actively with the upbuilding of the
new town, which is now one of the most attractive in this favored sec-
tion of the state. In 1896 Mr. Hadley organized the Bank of Whittier,
and this institution formed the nucleus of the First National Bank of
Whittier, which was organized under his direction in 1900 and which
was at that time incorporated with a capital stock of twenty-five thou-
sand dollars. In 1902 the expansion of the business of the institution
warranted the raising of the capital stock of fifty thousand dollars, and
in the following year the capital was increased to the present figure. —
one hundred thousand dollars. Mr. Hadley became president of the
First National Bank at the time of its organization and continued the in-
cumbent of this position until 1908, when he resigned, owing to im-
paired health, and assumed the advisory office of member of its board of
directors, a position in which he continued to serve until his death. In-
cident to his resignation of the presidency, on the 3oth of June, 1908,
the directorate of the bank gave the following appreciative estimate and
resolutions, which were duly signed by the entire board, comprising John
Crook, W. V. Coffin, Truman Berry, E. V. Hadley, A. Jacobs, Ralph
McNees, A. C. Maple and A. H. Hadley (who became president upon his
father's resignation). The text of the testimonial is as here noted:

"Resolved, That we extend to Mr. Washington Hadley this expres-
sion of our regret at his retirement and wish to express our great appre-
ciation of his valuable services to the bank during the many years of
his administration, and we trust that the release from official cares will
result in a great improvement to his health. We have felt a great pride
in the fact that Mr. Washington Hadley had the record of being the
oldest bank president in the United States, both in point of service and

230 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

age, and we desire that so unusual an event as his long, faithful and
efficient work, being, as it is, a most extraordinary term of service, re-
ceive the recognition it deserves.

"Resolved, That these resolutions be spread on our minutes and a
copy of the same presented to Mr. Washington Hadley."

In 1903 Mr. Hadley organized the Whittier Savings Bank, and of
this he served continuously as president from the beginning until he was
summoned from the scene of life's mortal endeavors. His son Albert
succeeded him as president of the First National Bank and retained this
position until his death, April 18, 1911. The latter's son Frederick is
cashier of this bank, and thus three generations of the family were rep-
resented on the official corps of the institution.

Ever appreciative of the finer ideals that make life worth the living,
it was but natural that Mr. Hadley should take a deep interest in religious
and educational affairs, in connection with which his influence was potent
and beneficent. Even before coming to California he had carefully con-
sidered the matter of devoting a portion of his ample fortune to aiding
in specific educational work, and in Whittier, where he established his per-
manent home in the year 1892, he found opportunity to extend his co-
operation along this line and in a most effective way. Here he became
one of the founders of Whittier College, and in the endowment of this
institution and the promotion of its interests he gave more than fifty thou-
sand dollars. He was the largest individual donor to the college and was
an active and valued member of its board of trustees from the beginning
until his death. The following excerpts from an article published at
the time of Mr. Hadley's celebration of his ninety-third birthday anni-
versary, on the 1 2th of December, 1910, are well worthy of perpetuation
in this volume, as the statements offer further data concerning his char-
acter and labors :

"In recalling the great financial panics that have swept over the country
at various times since his entrance into the field of banking, Mr. Hadley
spoke of the panic of 1873, which was brought about largely by the wild
speculations of Jay Cook, the great war financier. He declared that
money panics were not caused by lack of money but by lack of con-
fidence ; that fear was the beginning of most financial panics, and that
nothing is more contagious than fear. During this memorable time of
financial distress, when bank after bank suspended, the Bank of Law-
rence, of which Mr. Hadley was president, met every demand, and in
the money panic of 1873 the banks with which he was associated paid
every patron who demanded his deposit. Mr. Hadley says it is the
crowning glory of his career as a banker that no customer of any of the
various banks with which he has been associated has asked in vain for
money deposited; every demand has been met when presented.

"The banking business, while occupying a large place in Mr. Hadley's
life affairs, has not been his only interest, for he is a devoted church
member and has given largely to the noble religious organization, the
Society of Friends, of which he is a birthright member. The home life
of this venerable man is beautiful in its simplicity, and in the sacred pre-
cincts of home the plain language — the soft 'thee' and 'thou' — is still
used. Mr. Hadley is a zealous friend of education and is strong in the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 231

conviction that no nation can play a leading part in the world's affairs
and continue to play it except on the condition that it educates the whole
mass of the people. He has contributed largely and most liberally to
Whittier College. There have been times when but for his fortunate
aid the college would surely have suspended. He has made a noble use
of both his influence and his wealth. Both the college and the Hadley
athletic field attest his generosity and promise to convey the name of
Hadley to a later but no less appreciative posterity.

"Fortunate in his ancestors, blest in his parents, successful in his busi-
ness and happy in the tastes and pursuits of his declining years, he en-
joys uninterrupted welfare and the love and veneration of his relatives
and many friends. Washington Hadley is a type of a class of men
found nowhere more frequently than in this country, — men who are en-
dowed with something strongly akin to creative power, for in their hands
it appears that forces or materials unseen by others, of unmanageable
if seen, take no shape, system and precision of movement. What these
men really do is to construct channels through which business may oper-
ate."

Taking a broad and intelligent view of those conditions and agencies
that touch the general weal, Mr. Hadley was ever fortified in his opinions
as to matters of public polity. As a young man he was aligned as a
staunch supporter of the cause of the old-time Whig party, and as an
adherent of the same he cast his first presidential vote in support of Gen-
eral William Henry Harrison, in 1840. He identified himself with the
Republican party at the time of its organization and had the satisfaction
of voting for every presidential nominee of that party during the entire
period of its existence, including the election of President Taft in 1908.
He held membership in the Society of Friends, as do also the other mem-
bers of his family, and his kindly, gentle and noble life well exemplified
the beautiful and simple faith of that religious body. He was zealous
and influential in the work of his church, having been a birthright mem-
ber of the North Carolina yearly meeting of the same and later having
been prominently identified with the yearly meetings of Indiana and
Kansas, in each of which he served in official capacity. He was one of
the grand old men of a generation of which he was one of very few liv-
ing representatives, and when the gracious shadows of his life lengthened
far out from the sunset gates he could well look back on a career marked
by worthy thoughts and worthy deeds, and feel that his lines were cast
in pleasant places.

This review would not be consistent with itself were there failure to
note the earnest and effective service given by Mr. Hadley as a temper-
ance worker and uncompromising adversary of the liquor traffic. It was
a matter of enduring satisfaction to him that from his youth to venerable
age he waged war against this insidious evil, and his name merits a place
on the roll of the most earnest and devoted temperance workers of the
nation. He was an active member of the Washingtonian Society, one of
the early temperance organizations of America, and while a resident of
Kansas he gave most able service in the promotion of temperance work
and finally of state wide prohibition. He served two terms as mayor of
Lawrence, that state, and one of the noteworthy achievements of his ad-

232 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ministration was that within his regime the number of saloons in the city
was cut down from thirty-three to sixteen. He was one of the influ-
ential factors in securing the prohibition amendment to the constitu-
tion of Kansas.

While there can be no desire to lift the veil that guarded a home life
of ideal order, it is but consonant that brief data be given concerning the
domestic chapter in the life history of the honored subject of this memoir.
On the 28th of November. 1839, was solemnized the marriage of Air.
Hadley. to Miss Naomi Henley, of Richmond. Wayne county, Indiana,
where her parents were early settlers and representatives of the Society
of Friends, whose members were most prominent in the pioneer history
of that section of the Hoosier state. Mrs. Hadley was summoned to the
life eternal on the 2ist of November, 1901, after having been the devoted
companion and helpmate of her husband for more than sixty years, and
her memory is revered by all who came within the sphere of her gentle
and gracious influence. Of the children of this union six are living,
namely : Matilda, Almeda, Ella, Laura, Flora and Emilie. Concerning
the daughters it may be stated that Ella is the wife of Judge Charles
Monroe, who is presiding on the bench of the superior court in the city
of Los Angeles; Laura is the wife of T. E. Newlin. of the same city;
Flora is the wife of George E. Little, of Whittier; Matilda is the widow
of George Y. Johnson, of Whittier ; Almeda is the widow of A. D. Pick-
ering, of Detroit, Michigan; and Miss Emilie remains at the beautiful
family homestead in Whittier.

On the 28th of December. 1904, Mr. Hadley contracted a second
marriage, by his union with Mrs. Rebecca Morgan, of Wichita, Kansas,
who proved a gracious and devoted companion to him in his declining
years and who resides in Whittier.

In conclusion of this memorial are given the following earnest words
that appeared in a tribute to Mr. Hadley in the American Friend : "Wash-
ington Hadley lived well, loved much ; he gained the respect of intelligent
men and women and the love of little children ; he left the world better
than he found it. He said to the writer not long before his death, as a
smile lightened up his whole face, 'I have always looked for the best in
humanity, and have given the best I had.' His life has been an inspira-
tion to many, old and young, and his memory will be a benediction even
to many who never knew him."

A. M. DOUGLASS. With the discovery that the soil and climate of
the Imperial Valley, California, were surpassed only by those of the
valley of the Nile, and that in no other part of the United States has
Egyptian cotton been grown with any degree of success, a new industry
was opened up in this section, where there are five hundred thousand
acres opened for the production of cotton of the finest fibre and best
quality. The possibilities here presented, not to speak of the vast im-
portance of the business of dealing in cotton-seed oil, were quickly real-
ized by the citizens of the valley, and in 1911 they organized the Impe-
rial Oil and Cotton Company, which promises to become one of the
leading industries of this part of the state and of vast importance to the
large and small ranchers alike. The company started operations in Sep-

THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LFNOX
TILDEN FOUNDATION
R I-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 235

tember of the year of its organization, and the plant now covers five
acres, has a working force of fifty men and produces sixty tons of
ginned cotton daily, in addition to the oil and oil cake extracted there-
from.

A. M. Douglass, superintendent of the plant at El Centre, and a mem-
ber of the company, has had twenty years' experience in cotton ginning,
and is a man acquainted with all the minutiae of the business. He was
born March 25, 1870, in Texas, in which state he was reared and edu-
cated, and there learned the business of ginning cotton, which is raised
in abundance in that state. Thoroughly equipping himself in every
way and familiarizing himself with every detail of this interesting busi-
ness, Mr. Douglass was the logical choice for his present position when
the present company was formed, and a number of stockholders in the
concern are natives of the Lone Star state. His has been the alert, ac-
tive mind that has governed the business, and his practical knowledge of
conditions has been the chief factor in the development and growth of
its interests. Mr. Douglass has only associated himself in the past with
projects of a strictly legitimate nature, and his business record is with-
out a blemish. Realizing that the building up of the community will
benefit not only the country but also the company, and that each can
work in the other's interest, Mr. Douglass and the other members of
the firm have done all in their power to assist in forwarding movements
which have for their object the development of the Imperial Valley.
He has been too busy, however, to enter the political field, and his fra-
ternal connections have been confined to membership in the Masons.

In 1899 Mr. Douglass was married to Miss Nina Gardner, of Ten-
nessee, and to this union there were born two children : Joseph G. and
Andrew M. Mr. Douglass was the fourth in a family of ten children
born to A. H. and Eleanor Douglass, natives of Tennessee and Missouri,
respectively.

ISAAC W. LORD. The reminiscences of the pioneer are instructing
and diverting, for the past ever bears its lesson and incentive, whether
considered in the remote cycles of the time or from the standpoint of
those of the present day who are venerable in years and ripe in ex-
perience. What Isaac W. Lord could tell in regard to the early days
in California would fill a volume, and few there are who are more
capable of giving varied and interesting record along this line, as he
not only "has the goods," if we may indulge a colloquial metaphor, but
he also has distinctive facility in expression and marked literary ability.
Further than this, he has contributed materially to the civic and in-
dustrial development and upbuilding of the state to which he came in
the pioneer days, before he had attained to his legal majority, and in
which he has maintained his home during the greater part of the in-
tervening period. He is a big man in intellectual powers and sterling
attributes of character, and he has a host of friends and admirers, be-
cause he deserves them and has the personality to gain and retain them.
He stands today as one of the honored and essentially representative
citizens of the beautiful city of Los Angeles, and the publishers of this
work find special satisfaction in being able to present within its pages

230 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

a brief review of his career, the while they regret that there is not a
greater amplitude of data, for the securing of which he is one of the
most prolific of sources.

Isaac Wilson Lord is the only son of Dr. Israel S. P. Lord, an able
physician of his time, who removed to Chicago from Batavia, New
York, by means of a team and wagon, in the autumn of 1833, with his
young wife and there little daughter, then six months old. They were
delayed in southern Michigan for several weeks, while waiting for the
tamarack swamps to freeze over sufficiently to permit the traversing of
the same, and though duly and literally "agitated" by attacks of the all
prevailing ague, they arrived at their destination in the future metropolis
of the west about Christmastide. They found the reputed city merely
a squalid, straggling, muddy village of less than four thousand popula-
tion, including French traders and half-breed Indians. The Doctor was
at that time twenty-eight years of age and his wife, whose maiden name
was Mary G. Wilson, was twenty-two. She was a daughter of the Hon.
Isaac Wilson, who when a member of Congress was a close companion
and friend of the future President, James K. Polk. The sufferings the
little family endured that winter are not easily described. They lived
in a slab shanty of practically one room. No timber grew within thirty
miles and no one knew of coal beds in Illinois. Hunger, cold and ague
are a sorry combination. The horses and wagon were sold to supply
immediate needs.

In 1836 the little family moved twenty-five miles further west, in
search of a more healthful location, to the east bank of the so-called
DuPage river, which was little more than a creek, and there Isaac Wilson
Lord was born on the loth of June, 1836. Three other families located
there about the same time, and among these pioneer settlers was Colonel
Warren, a retired army officer who had come to the west from Boston.
A village was started and to the same was given the name of Warren-
ville, in honor of Colonel Warren, who assumed leadership in local af-
fairs. The Colonel built a saw mill, equipped with one vertical saw, and
when pressed to its capacity during the spring freshets the mill could
turn out nearly one thousand feet of boards a day. Without the aug-
mented water power supplied by the freshets the operation of the mill
was impossible, as it was out of commission when the creek was frozen
or during the period of low water in summer, but it managed to saw
all the timber in sight during two spring freshets, with the exception
of the plum and persimmon trees.

In 1839 the young physician sold his claim of one hundred and sixty
acres on the DuPage river, for a consideration of two hundred dollars,
and then removed to a point seven miles to the west and located on the
east bank of the Fox river, a very beautiful and considerable stream.
Here he had been preceded by only three or four families. He pur-
chased the claim of an Indian trader and horse-shoer named Paine and
paid one hundred dollars for the property, which comprised one hun-
dred acres of land and a large log house of four rooms. About this
time the remnant of the Sac and Fox Indian tribes was leaving Illinois
and moving west into Iowa, and Paine, with his numerous progeny of
half-breed children, went with the Indians. The next year several fam-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY 237

ilies arrived and to the little pioneer village Dr. Lord gave the name of
Batavia, in honor of his old home in the state of New York. The place
is now a thriving and beautiful little city of six thousand population.

From the foregoing statements it may readily be inferred that the
early educational advantages of Isaac \Y. Lord were limited in scope,
though he had the advantage of being reared by parents of education and
culture, the while he gained ample experience in connection with the
labors and interests of the pioneer community in which he was reared.
In 1853, when seventeen years of age, he made a journey on foot to a
point in Indiana about two hundred miles southeast of Chicago, and
there he entered the employ of cattle drovers. In this connection he
was one of eight persons assigned to the herculean task of driving three
hundred and sixteen head of cattle — mostly cows — from Shelbyville,
in eastern Illinois, to California. The journey consumed six months
and two days. No tents were provided and no horses or mules to ride.
Food was poor and scant. To drive all day and stand guard every
second night was the assignment given to the jaded drovers. Twice the
Indians stampeded the cattle and on each occasion a brisk skirmish en-
sued, but only three cows were lost. Hangtown, California, was reached
on the i6th of September, 1853. Gulch or placer mining was practic-
ally over and rock mining scarcely initiated ; no agriculture, no horticul-
ture, no manufacturing and little commerce. "What could a poor boy
do?" Everyone wished to get back to "God's country," as each des-
ignated the old home, and there was not enough money in the state to
pay for the return to the east of one-tenth of the number in California.
Young Lord put in the first seven weeks at the vocation of washing
dishes and "pot-slewing" in a hotel in Sacramento, and this demanded
fourteen hours a day of application, the while his compensation was
represented by his "grub" and the opportunity of sleeping in the hotel
barn. He "stayed with the job" until he had been advanced to the
dignified position of chief cook, with a salary of one hundred dollars
a month. Soon after this he wrestled vigorously with daily attacks of
ague, and the incidental physical vibrations and ensuing fever prompted
him to seek relief in the mountains. He proceeded to Johnson's canyon,
eight miles northeast of Hangtown, where he soon lost in placer-mining
all the money he had saved. He then turned "cow-puncher" and, with
twenty-nine others, mostly Mexicans, drove cattle from what is now
Bakersfield to Stockton. One trip took them to Cahuenga (pronounced
Kahwengah) valley, the present site of Hollywood, Los Angeles county,
where they secured thirteen hundred 'head of cattle.

Mr. Lord's province of activity was radically transformed about this
time, as he then contracted with certain members of the sporting fra-
ternity to exploit his prowess as a ten-mile foot racer, in which con-
nection he soon proved to be the best man on the coast in the covering
of a ten-mile course. Gildersleve was then brought from Sydney, Aus-
tralia, at a cost of ten thousand dollars, and won the great race at
Benicia. Seven entered in the contest and young Lord was one of the
number: Gildersleve finished first, Lord second, he receiving fifteen
hundred dollars, and Gildersleve ten thousand. "Come easy, go easy"
was promptly exemplified in the case of young Lord, who 'soon found

238 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

his money an unappreciable quantity. He then brought his musical
ability into requisition as a means of income, and his services were much
in requisition in playing the violin for dances. In the meanwhile he
began the study of medicine.

On the 3d of June, 1856, in the city of San Francisco, Mr. Lord
witnessed the hanging of the outlaws Casey and Cora, by the vigilance
committee headed by Coleman, and in many other lines he grew fam-
iliar with the scenes and incidents marking life on the frontier. Shortly
before going to San Francisco at the time of the execution just noted
he had received sad news from home, as his loved mother so mourned
his absence that her health had seriously declined. He had intended to
set sail from San Francisco and return home, but he found his funds
insufficient to pay for his passage on the steamship. Not to be balked
in his purpose, he decided to cross the plains. He returned at once to
Sacramento, where he purchased a broncho and saddle, a Spanish mule
and a pack saddle, and on the 6th of June, 1856, he sallied forth after
the manner of Don Quixote. He proved to be the first man to cross the
great American plains alone, and reached St. Joseph, Missouri, on the
8th of October, 1856. His journey was completed in quick time, con-
sidering the fact that he was captured en route by the Shoshone Indians,
by whom he was detained for twenty-one days. At St. Joseph he sold
his mule and after resting there for a week he proceeded to his old home
at Batavia, Illinois, where he arrived on the 2d of November. Two days
later he rode his Spanish mare thirty-five miles, to Chicago, where he
headed the mammoth parade in honor of Colonel Fremont, the "Path-
finder." Mr. Lord still lacked six months of being old enough to vote
for General Fremont, who was, in that year, the first nominee of the
Republican party for the office of president of the United States. It
may be noted incidentally that Mr. Lord has given his allegiance to the
"grand old party" from the year of its organization to the present time.

At Batavia Mr. Lord continued his medical studies and proved him-
self eventually elegible for the active work of his profession, but after
having been engaged in practice for two years he found the work not
to his liking, whereupon he accepted the position of bookkeeper for the
firm of Field & Leiter, in Chicago, — a concern from which was developed
the present great mercantile house of Marshall Field & Company. Eight
months later he entered the employ of James J. Hill, of the Great North-
ern Railroad, in the capacity of cashier and bookkeeper in the freight
department of this road, and this incumbency he retained about five
years. In the meanwhile he had married, and in March, 1872, in com-
pany with his wife and two little children, he returned to California.
He located at Los Angeles, where he at once engaged in the furniture
and carpet trade, as a member of the firm of Dotter & Lord. Although
always active, aggressive and successful in business, Mr. Lord ever
found time to stand abreast with what few "boomers" the city boasted
at that time. Judge Robert M. Widney, who was then on the bench
and who was the only judge required in the county, although the same
then embraced the present county of Orange, found time for local ex-
ploitation, and he collaborated with Mr. Lord in several noteworthy en-
terprises, among which was the promoting and building of the first street-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 239

car line on the coast south of San Francisco. This was known as the
Spring street line and it extended on Spring street from the Temple
block to Hill street, and along Fifth and Sixth streets to Grasshopper
street, which is now known as Figueroa street. It was a one-mule line,
-"electric" at one end of the mule; fifteen-pound iron rails were utilized
and the motive power was largely supplied by a blacksnake whip and
more or less delicate objurgations addressed to the dejected mule by
the driver of the car, who was also ex-officio conductor. Judge Widney
was president of the operating company and Air. Lord was its" secretary
and treasurer. Receipts almost proved sufficient to feed the motive
power, including the driver. Next was built the San Pedro street-car
line, from the Senator Jones Santa Monica railroad station to the river
station of the Southern Pacific Railroad, and this line rendered profits
of about as appreciable an amount as did the original line. Mr. Lord
was president of this line. After this evidence of their progressiveness
and public spirit Judge Widney and Mr. Lord turned their attention to
the propagation of eucalyptus trees, and in this connection they raised
the first grove of commercial importance in the United States, — two hun-
dred acres, near the San Gabriel river. The grove proved a success,
though it produced for a time more fuel than could be utilized by the
sparse population of this section at that period. Upon the organization
of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce Judge Widney became its
first president and Mr. Lord its secretary and treasurer, and through
the medium of this body Mr. Lord succeeded in publishing and distribut-
ing the first brochure in the way of advertising abroad the resources of
the county and the prospects of the city of Los Angeles. This was a
neatly bound, well edited and attractive little volume, and copies of the
same were placed in more than four thousand libraries and hotels through-
out the United States and Canada. By the publisher of the edition the
entire credit of the enterprise is accorded to Mr. Lord, in the preface of
the work. Later on a strenuous effort was made to procure the building
of a cable street-car line. At that time cable roads were used in only
two cities, — San Francisco and Chicago, and it was thought to be a
great card to establish such facilities in Los Angeles. The projectors
were San Francisco men, who demanded a bonus of twenty thousand
dollars in cash and land to the value of thirty thousand dollars. When
all hope had vanished, and the promoters were on their way to take
the train for San Francisco, Mr. Lord intercepted them, took the matter
up anew, and in less than two days secured the whole amount demanded,
with the result that the construction of the road was at once instituted.
Mr. Lord headed the subscription list with a cash donation of five thou-
sand dollars, which was at the time the largest amount ever given in
Los Angeles to a public enterprise. He borrowed the entire amount
from men who should have been the donors. Some men feel like giv-
ing ; Mr. Lord gives enough to fee I it !

In 1885 Mr. Lord retired from active business, moved into San Ber-
nardino county, and engaged in the propagation of oranges, olives and
other fruits. In 1887 he founded in Los Angeles county the town of
Lordsburg. which is now an attractive and prosperous little city. In
1890 he was elected supervisor in San Bernardino county, on the regular

240 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Republican ticket, and won a decisive victory at the polls in the face of
a large Democratic majority. Under his administration in this office
were erected a fine court house, a substantial jail and hospital, and seven-
teen bridges, besides which, during the first two years of his service,
there had been opened up in the county more miles of road than had been
thus improved during the entire forty years preceding.

In 1907 Mr. Lord returned with his family to Los Angeles, his "first
love," and here he is now living virtually retired from active business.
He has large capitalistic interests and his civic loyalty and progressive-
ness have suffered no atrophy with the passing years. Mr. Lord is a
poet as well as a writer of trenchant prose, but he says he is too modest
to exploit his literary talents and too lazy to pursue a course along this
line. — a conditions that is to be regretted in an objective sense. To quote
his own expression : "Old seventy-five is still alive, in nineteen hundred
'leven ; had he his way he'd rather stay right here than go to Heaven."
Data for the foregoing context were secured from various sources and
when submitted to Mr. Lord called forth from him the statement that
he was guilty of the whole thing and even worse.

Mr. Lord's mother died in Brooklyn, New York, in 1874, aged sixty-
three. His father came to Los Angeles the following year, at the sug-
gestion of his son. In 1877 he married Miss Mary Case, formerly
connected with Yassar College, and a most lovely character. She was
forty-five years younger than the Doctor. They lived a most happy
life in Pasadena for nineteen years. The Doctor continued to practice
his profession to the very last. He followed this vocation for seventy
years, and passed peacefully, though suddenly, away at ninety-one.
His widow survives him, and resides at present at Berkely, California.
Upon the death of his father Mr. Lord caused the remains of his mother
and two little sisters who died in childhood to be brought from the east
by express to Los Angeles and buried by the Doctor's side in Evergreen
Cemetery, on Boyle Heights. Mr. Lord's widowed sister, Mrs. Mary
L. Stevens, a landscape painter, resides in Hayward, California; another
sister, Mrs. Luckey. lives in Poughkeepsie, New York ; another sister,
Emma, married the Rev. Dr. Jeffries, a noted Baptist clergyman of New
York. She died some years since. Mr. Lord was married in 1883, in
San Francisco, to Mrs. Julia E. Scott, a niece of Mrs. Collis P. Hunting-
ton. She is a cousin of Mrs. H. E. Huntington. By her he has one
daughter, Mrs. Jay J. Yandergrift, of Los Angeles. By his former mar-
riage he had four children, three daughters and a son. The son, Isaac,
died at twenty-one and a daughter. Cornie. at twenty. Two widowed
daughters survive — Mrs. Hannah Randle. of San Francisco, and Mrs.
Brooks, of Los Angeles. Mrs. Lord's father was a prominent co-worker
in early days with William Lloyd Garrison, Joshua R. Giddings, Owen,
and Elijah Lovejoy, John B. Gough and many others in temperance and
anti-slavery work.

SAMUEL C. BROWN. The late Samuel Carr Brown, of Visalia, who
was one of the best known and honored pioneer citizens of Tulare
county at the time of his death, which occurred on the 3Oth of Decem-
ber, 1908. Large of spirit and large of heart, possessed of marked

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 241

business acumen, recognized as an able lawyer, he gained splendid suc-
cess in connection with the practical activities of life.

Samuel Carr Brown was born on a farm in Franklin county, Vermont,
August 17, 1826. He was a son of James and Sarah (Smith) Brown, the
former of whom was born in Massachusetts and the latter in Rhode
Island. The father became a large landholder and a successful merchant in
Vermont, whence he eventually removed with his family to St. Lawrence
county, New York, where both he and his wife passed the residue of
their lives. Mr. Brown was the youngest in a family of four sons and
three daughters. He was a boy at the time of the family removal to the
state of New York, and there he was afforded the advantages of the
common schools of the period. Later he attended Penn College, in the
Western Reserve of Ohio, to which section he went when a youth, and
in 1848 he was to be found a student in Oberlin College, that state. He
began the study of law under the preceptorship of Judge Wallace, of
St. Lawrence county, New York. In 1848 he went to the state of Illi-
nois, and as has been written, "Like many of the active and vigorous
young men of that age, he became obsessed with the California gold
fever and, joining a train of adventurers like himself, he started across
the plains of the new Eldorado. He arrived in California in the fall of
1849, and stopped for a while in the northern mines. Like all argo-
nauts of that time he sought the golden fleece by trying his hand at gold
mining. But he did not achieve much of a measure of success at min-
ing, and in the fall of 1850 he abandoned the mines and went to San
Francisco, where at that time there were many ships in harbor, and he
became seized with the desire to taste the life of a seafaring man, so, in
the spring of 1851, he took the position of steward on a government
ship and sailed down the coast as far south as the city of Valparaiso, in
the republic of Chili. When he returned to San Francisco, in the spring
of 1852, his desire for a seafaring life was fully satisfied." His service
in this connection covered a period of about six months, on the sailing
sloop "Yincennes."

In 1852 Mr. Brown made his advent in what is now Tulare county,
— a section of the state in which he was destined to maintain his home
for more than half a century and to be one of the prominent figures in
its development and upbuilding along civic and industrial lines. Con-
cerning the influence which first led him to this now favored section
of the great commonwealth of Calfornia the following statements have
been made : "At that time there were rife many reports concern-
ing the boundless fertility and the unlimited quantities of wild game in
what was then called the 'Four Creeks country,' embraced at that time
within the county of Mariposa. From these reports Mr. Brown re-
solved to try his fortune in the country of which he heard such glow-
ing accounts. Accordingly, in the fall of 1852, he and a few more white
men entered the so-called 'Four Creeks country' and camped on the
ground near which stands the present court house of Tulare county.
At the time he came here there was but one white man camped on the
ground now occupied as the town of Yisalia, and that man was Nathan
Vise, who was a hunter and frontiersman and for whom the town of
Visalia was named. There were many hostile Indians in the country

24-2 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and they looked upon the white man as an intrusion upon their rights.
But the souls of the pioneers were strangers to fear and they faced the
Indians with courage. This is not the time or place to enumerate the
man}' stirring events with which Mr. Brown was connected, but it is
sufficient to say that among that small band of men who came to this
county in 1852 and the year following he ranked with the bravest and
most intrepid." Soon after establishing his home in what is now Tulare
county Mr. Brown became associated with other settlers in building a
stockade for protection against the Indians, and it may well be said that
he lived up to the full tension of the trials, vicissitudes and dangers
which marked the pioneer epoch.

Information of pertinent and interesting order appeared in the
J'isalia Daily Times at the time of the death of Mr. Brown, and as the
same was a memorial issued by the members of the bar of Tulare county
there is eminent consistency in perpetuating extracts in this article,
with but slight change from the original text :

"Mr. Brown was a reading man in the broadest sense of the term.
He brought with him to this county a copy of Blackstone's Commenta-
ries, Chitty on Pleading, and Starkey on Evidence, together with a few
books of history, poetry and romance. These served as an equipment
for his legal and literary studies and constituted the only collection of
books in the county at that time. He renewed his study of the law, and
for a short time taught school. In 1853 the organization of Tulare
county was completed, and from that time on until the spring of 1891
the name of Samuel C. Brown was prominently connected with the rec-
ords of the administration of justice in this county. He possessed the
natural qualities necessary to make a competent and reliable lawyer.
His mind had a strong aptitude for mathematics, so that his close study
of the fundamental principles of the law developed in him a legal logic
which enabled him to handle questions of law and fact in a manner ap-
proaching the precision and certainty of a mathematical demonstration.
His mind was both analytical and synthetical. He could analyze an ar-
gument and expose all fallacies therein, and he could construct from the
facts of a given controversy a true theory upon which the controversy
ought to be decided. But his great and dominant traits were modest
and unassuming simplicity. He never arrogated to himself any claims
of superiority over others. He had a strong love for the beautiful in
nature and art. He delighted in the cultivation of flowers and all other
plant life. To many who know him but distantly he may have seemed
cold and reserved ; but to those who knew him best he always manifested
a genial and sunny disposition and distinctive enjoyment of cheerful
conversation. He had keen wit and readily recognized and appreciated
the humorous phases of human nature. He was kind and charitable,
but his benevolences — and they were many — were always bestowed with-
out any ostentation whatever.

"After he retired from the active practice of law, in 1891, he de-
voted his time and energies to the care of his property. By his industry,
economy and sturdy thrift he accumulated a large competency, by means
whereof he was able to bestow, and did generously bestow, upon his
family the highest order of comfort and many of the luxuries of life.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 243

In politics he placed patriotism and personal integrity above party, and
in local government he placed men above political affiliations. In re-
ligion he had no use for mere creeds, though he had the deepest rever-
ence for the spiritual verities. His mind was constructed upon that
broad philosophical basis which enabled him to appreciate and honor
the gospel of humanity. He did not undertake to solve the great prob-
lems of origin and destiny by the mere word of creed, but he had an
unfaltering trust that somewhere in the great scheme of an overruling
Providence the destiny of humanity beyond the grave would be well
cared for.

"In the fore part of December, 1908, Mr. Brown was stricken with
a disorder that inflicted upon him the most excruciating pain, but the
remnant of a strong constitution combined with a powerful will en-
abled him to bear the tortures of that pain without a murmur. He met
death, as he had met all the trials and vicissitudes of life, with bravery,
fortitude and resignation. He and his devoted wife lived to see their
family of five children reach' the estate of manhood and womanhood, so
that he was blessed with that which should accompany old age — 'love,
honor, obedience and troops of friends.' By his death the community
has lost an honorable, upright and useful citizen, and his family a de-
voted and affectionate protector.''

The memorial from which the foregoing excerpts were taken was
ordered to be spread on the records of the superior court of Tulare
county, and in the community was manifest a general sense of loss arid
bereavement when this honored pioneer and worthy citizen was sum-
moned to "that undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler
returns." Mr. Brown lived a "godly, righteous and sober life," and now
that he has passed from the scene of life's mortal endeavors there re-
mains to those nearest and dearest to him the priceless heritage of a
good name.

During the progress of the Civil war, though far remote from the
scenes of conflict, Mr. Brown was uncompromising in his advocacy
of the cause of the Union, and this fact created many local antago-
nisms, as in this section of California at the time the southern sympa-
thizers were in preponderance. On three different occasions attempts
were made to wreck the office of Mr. Brown, but order was restored
by the Federal troops here stationed until the close of the war. In the
practice of his profession Mr. Brown was for a number of years asso-
ciated with William G. Morris, and later he was senior member of the
law firm of Brown & Daggett, in which his valued and honored coadju-
tor and friend was Alfred Daggett, who is still one of the representa-
tive members of the bar of Tulare county. Mr. Brown had the pre-
science to discern the eventual appreciation in the value of lands in his
section of the state, and he made investments from time to time, as his
means justified, until he became one of the extensive landholders of this
locality, holdings whose substantial increase in value gave him even-
tually a position of financial independence. He was essentially pro-
gressive and public-spirited as a citizen, — always ready to lend tangible
aid in the support of measures and enterprises tending to advance the
social and material welfare of the community, and in this connection it

244 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

should be noted that he was prominently identified with the upbuilding
of many of the more important industrial and business enterprises of
his home city and county. He was the prime factor in effecting the or-
ganization of the Hank of Yisalia, was an interested principal in the es-
tablishing of the ice-manufacturing plant in Visalia, being a director of
the company owning the same and holding this position for a long pe-
riod ; and he was also a member of the board of directors of the Visalia
Steam Laundry Company, of which he was one of the founders. He
was a director of the Visalia Soda Works, and was one of the most
active and influential stockholders of the Tulare Irrigation Company.

Though never ambitious for public office Mr. Brown was ever ready
to assume such duties and responsibilities as fell to his portion in con-
nection with local affairs. In the early period of his residence in Tu-
lare county he served two years as district attorney; he was for three
terms a member of the council of Visalia ; and for two terms he held
the office of mayor, giving therein a most able and discriminating ad-
ministration of the affairs of the municipal government. In politics he
was in earlier years identified with the Free-soil party, but he trans-
ferred his allegiance to the republican party at the time when the la-
mented Lincoln became its candidate for the presidency.

In the year 1861 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Brown to
Miss Frances Kellenburg, who was born at Georgetown, D. C., some
sixty-eight years ago, and who still remains in the attractive homestead
in Visalia. She is a daughter of Francis J. and Mary E. (Hillery) Kellen-
burg.

Mr. and Mrs. Brown became the parents of nine children, five of
whom are living.

JOSEPH SCOTT. Strickland W. Gillilan, the famour humorist, now on
the Baltimore Sun, was doing newspaper work in Los Angeles, and re-
ferring to Mr. Scott, had the following characteristic comment to make :

"To arrive friendless in a strage land, to fail in finding newspaper
employment even though armed with a letter from John Boyle O'Reilly ;
to reach one's last $2.00 bill and take a job of hod-carrying, and to resign
the position as deputy hodman to accept a position as professor of Eng-
lish and rhetoric in a college — sounds romantic, doesn't it? Sounds as if
it were fiction rather than real life. But it isn't, and the man who had
this career, full of pluck, perseverance and pathos, lives in Los Angeles
today. You probably know him. He is a successful lawyer, and he is
called 'Joe Scott.'

"No matter how many years ago, he landed at New York. He was a
stocky, sturdy, athletic chap, twenty-one years old, a graduate of Ushaw
College in the north of England, and modestly bearing the honor of hav-
ing matriculated with a gold medal in London L'niversity. He had been
a leader in athletic sports in his college, had specialized in history and
literature, and had left with the idea that he would come to this country
and be a great journalist. He went to Boston soon after his arrival, and
there met John Boyle O'Reilly, the poet-refugee, who gave him letters
to the newspapers of the 'Hub.'

" 'The managing editors,' said Mr. Scott, 'to whom I presented this

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 247

raft of letters, all took my name and earnestly assured me that they
would let me know when there was an opening. I was so verdant I be-
lieved them. I said to myself, "It's coming; it's coming." They haven't
sent for me yet. O'Reilly then armed me with a letter to the New York
newspapers. He said, "We all came here as helpless as you. You are
sure to strike into the swim sometime." I met the newspaper moguls on
Park Row — The World, The Herald, The Sun. All took my address.
The managing editor of The World gave me same desultory work for a
little while. When the little work at The World was over, I had only
$2.00 left and was absolutely friendless.' >!

R. H. H. Chapman, formerly managing editor of The Herald, Los
Angeles, draws the following pen picture of Mr. Scott :

"That a sound mind is master of a sound body, is well evidenced by
the subject of this sketch. To the keenness with which he pursued ath-
letics in his youth, Joseph Scott attributes that physical vigor which to-
day enables him to get through a vast amount of work and preserve ex-
cellent health. Sturdy ancestors who feared God and loved their fel-
lows are responsible for this fine specimen of muscular Christianity. His
father's people have lived in Cumberland and for many generations, and
form a line of what is known as Border Scotch. His mother, Mary
Donnelly, is pure Irish, from the county of Wexford, of Vinegar Hill
stock. And judging not only by the distinctive Hibernian traits in Joseph
Scott's character, but also by a charming photograph of his mother, his
son and himself, which was taken during his trip to the old country
several years ago, he 'favors' his mother.

"When just twenty years of age, possessing only rugged health, an
excellent education, and a few letters of introduction, Mr. Scott sailed
for New York. Ambitious as he was, no toil was too lowly for him to
try, and for ten months his energies were spent in shoveling coal and
carrying a hod.

"At last his opportunity of deliverance came, and the transition was
as sudden as it was extraordinary. One Tuesday in February, 1890, he
was carrying a hod ; on the following Thursday he was instructing the
senior class of rhetoric at Allegany College. For three years he occupied
the chair of professor of rhetoric and English literature in that institu-
tion, pursuing his work with the same diligence and enthusiasm as he
had used in shoveling coal. In his spare moments he studied law, too,
and in June, 1893, came to California. Ten months later he was ad-
mitted to the bar by the supreme court, and commenced to practice his
profession in Los Angeles."

Joseph Scott has risen to a position, both in his profession and in
public affairs, of which any man might well be proud. He was born in
Penrith, Cumberland county. England, July 16, 1867. Mr. Scott is es-
sentially a self-made man, and his indomitable traits of character — hon-
esty and integrity — have made him one of the most prominent figures in
the state of California. At the time when Joseph Scott entered upon
his labors at the bar of Los Angeles, it comprised many of the ablest
lawyers of California, among whom was the late Stephen M. White; but
the young man rapidly fought his way to the front, for his honest coun-
tenance, straightforwardness of speech and forceful oratory made him a

248 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

power before a jury. He won his cases and grew in favor and popular-
ity until he stands today as one of the most successful practitioners at
the bar, for he has the reputation of being a lawyer whose presence in a
case means honesty and fair dealing. In his intercourse with his breth-
ren at the bar he is manly, mild and considerate, and before the court
he is modest and courteous, but marked by a dignity which makes him
a leader among men.

Withal, Joseph Scott is a man among men and is very much beloved
by his fellow-townsmen. He has been elected three times as a mem-
ber of the non-partisan Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles,
and is now serving his fifth year as president of the board. He has been
for five years a member of the board of directors of the Los Angeles
chamber of commerce, being its president during 1910-1911. when he
formed part of the famous California delegation that went back to Wash-
ington, D. C., and successfully fought to bring the International Expo-
sition to San Francisco in 1915. He has served on the board of direct-
ors of the Newman Club, California Club, Celtic Club, South-West
Museum and other similar organizations, and his oratorical abilities are
very much in demand, not only in Los Angeles, but throughout the state.

In spite of the large demands- upon his time for public duties, he is
essentially a man of domestic tastes, the participation of which consti-
tutes his principal recreation. Since his marriage to his wife. Bertha
Roth, who is a native daughter, eight children have been born to them,
seven of whom are living. Mr. Scott's greatest delight is in the bosom
of his family. He is a vigorous type of the Los Angeles "Booster," whose
name is legion, and whose 'activities have done so much to upbuild Los
Angeles and Southern California. He was urged to enter the race for
United States senatorship at the last primaries, but resisted all impor-
tunities in that regard, declining the honor.

ULYSSES SIGEL WEBB. The office of attorney general of the state
of California has increased in responsibility and importance with the
growth of the state. It now employs a force of ten attorneys, besides a
staff of clerks and stenographers. Many civil cases are tried each year,
most of them of great public importance and involving large amounts of
money. All criminal appeals from superior courts are briefed and argued
before the supreme and appellate courts. Official opinions rendered to
the various state officers, commissions, boards and district attorneys,
comprise a considerable portion of the work of the office, and are of
great importance, being generally acted upon as law until the questions
involved are decided by the courts. These opinions are carefully pre-
pared and preserved in the office for reference. As the machinery of
government increases in complexity the need of public investigations into
its operations naturally increases ; these investigations, when they in-
volve' the taking of testimony, are often referred to the attorney general's
office ; they usually require much time and care, with an end to righting
wrongs that were interfering with the functions of the government. As
supervisor of the administration of the criminal laws of the state, and as
adviser of district attorneys, the attorney general has frequent occasion
to assist or take charge of the prosecution of criminals in the lower courts.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 251

When, for any reason, district attorneys are unable to make an efficient
prosecution, the attorney general is ready to furnish skilled trial law-
yers to assist or take charge of cases. When this has been found advis-
able, the result has invariably justified the course ; but the rule of the
office is to refuse interference unless the necessity is apparent. A refer-
ence to the criminal statistics of the state, set forth in the biennial re-
ports of the attorney general, shows the remarkable efficiency of our
courts and prosecuting officers in the administration of our criminal laws.
It is believed that no state in the Union excels California in this respect
and that even the English courts show little superiority when statistics
are compared.

The foregoing statements indicate the capacity required in a man
to fill such an office and show that during Ulysses Sigel Webb's service
as attorney general the office has seen much growth in efficiency and in
breadth of accomplishment.

Ulysses Sigel Webb, the present attorney general, was born at Flem-
ington, West Virginia, September 29, 1864. In 1870 his parents, Cyrus
and Eliza Webb, moved to Kansas, settling in Sedgwick county, near
where the city of Wichita now stands. In the schools of that state Mr.
Webb received his education. In 1888 he came to California, settled in
Quincy, Plumas county, and in 1889 began the practice of law. In 1890
he was elected district attorney and held the office until September 15,
1902, when he resigned to accept the appointment from Governor Gage
of attorney general. He has held the office since that time, having been
elected for his third term in 1910, at which time he received a vote of
211,431, the highest vote ever obtained by any man in the state, who
had an opposing candidate.

CHARLES H. FROST. It is most pleasing to the publishers of this work
to accord recognition at this point to the career of Charles Henry Frost,
who has maintained his home in sunny California for the past quarter
of a century and who is a pioneer in high class goods for architectural
work. He started the manufacture of pressed brick in the City of Chi-
cago, in 1877, and has kept ahead of all competition in this particular line
of enterprise by introducing new colors, shapes, and designs in molded
and ornamental work. The product turned out by his company is recog-
nized as superior to anything of the kind in the United States. In 1886
Mr. Frost organized the Los Angeles Pressed Brick Company, which was
incorporated under the laws of the state and now has a capital stock
of five hundred thousand dollars, the official corps of the company being
as follows : Charles H. Frost, president ; W. C. Patterson, vice-presi-
dent; Howard Frost, second vice-president; and West Hughes, secretary.
This company, which enjoys the distinction of being the largest manufac-
turers of brick on the Pacific coast, has its main offices at 404 to 414
Frost Building, Los Angeles, California, and operates three extensive
plants, one at Alhambra and Date streets, Los Angeles, another at Santa
Monica, and a third at Point Richmond, California, across the bay from
San Francisco. The combined daily capacity of these three plants is
two hundred and fifty thousand bricks and the output embraces the finest
quality of pressed brick in all colors, glazed and enameled brick, fire-

252 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

proofing, roofing' tile, floor tile, faience tile, mantel tile, flue lining, fire
brick, paving brick and common brick.

Charles Henry Frost claims the old Empire state of the Union as
the place of his nativity as he was born at Ithaca, New York, on the
gth of June, 1844. He is a son of George P. and Eliza (Benjamin)
Frost, both of whom are now deceased. Mr. Frost was reared to the age
of fourteen years in his native place, to whose public and private
schools he is indebted for his preliminary educational discipline. In 1858
the Frost family removed west to the state of Illinois, where Charles
H. completed his education. 'When he had attained to years of discretion
he went to the city of Chicago, which at that time, 1861, had a population
of about two hundred and fifty thousand. After being identified with
various lines of enterprise in the western metropolis Mr. Frost erected,
in 1877, the first pressed-brick plant ever conducted in that city. For
about ten years he was closely connected with industrial projects in Chi-
cago and the distinctive success it became his to achieve in that place
was entirely the result of his own well directed endeavors. In 1886, how-
ever, he was impressed with the splendid opportunities offered for invest-
ment in Los Angeles and in that year he severed his business relations in
Chicago and journeyed to California. Shortly after his arrival in this
city he organized the Los Angeles Pressed Brick Company, as previously
noted, and the years have told the story of an eminently successful
career in the western business world. The product was no sooner placed
on the market than it created a demand which has been increased with the
passage of years until today, in 1910, the Los Angeles Pressed Brick Com-
pany control^ the western market. The company has agencies and show
rooms in San Francisco, Portland, Tacoma, Seattle and Vancouver,
British Columbia, and its market is steadily expanding. Shipments are
made not only to all parts of the Pacific coast and the inter-mountain
regions, but even across the border into British Columbia, in which
province of the Dominion of Canada, the company's products are in
demand by reason of their superior quality, in spite of the handicap of
heavy duties. There is absolutely nothing entering into brick construction
that the Los Angeles Pressed Brick Company is not prepared to contract
for in the largest quantities, laid down in any part of the territory men-
tioned at the shortest reasonable notice, and it may well be said to have
met all the varied requirements of modern architecture in brick and
kindred clay products.

Concerning the marvelous activity of this company an extract is here
incorporated from an article which appeared recently in one of the
local papers.

The plants of the company are located adjacent to inexhaustible de-
posits of clay of qualities from the burning and manipulation of which
very superior results are attainable as regards colors, texture, density
and durability in the bricks produced therefrom, and all the plants are
thoroughly complete in their equipment of all the latest improved machin-
ery known to the brick-making industry ; in fact, the company have suc-
ceeded in embodying distinct improvements in their machinery, which
are largely accountable for the superiority of their product.

The qualities of this company's brick in sespect to strength and non-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

absorptive properties have been demonstrated by their extensive use in
the construction of many of the costliest and finest structures on the
Pacific coast. As a mater of fact, this company's output in pressed brick
compares favorably with the very best of St. Louis and Philadelphia
brick, which are generally conceded to represent the highest standard
of excellence.

For facing buildings of a public or semi-public character, business
blocks, residences, hotels, apartment houses, office buildings, etc., the com-
pany's pressed brick, made in all colors, are unsurpassed. Their im-
pervious nature prevents discoloration by soot or dirt ; they show the
greatest density ; are close in texture, of solid and lasting color, uniform
in size, straight and parallel. The company also excels in the production
of glazed and enameled brick, their enameled brick being, in fact, the
finest produced in this country, and here it may be mentioned, incidentally,
that the company are furnishing one hundred and fifty thousand enam-
eled brick for the New Utah Hotel, in Salt Lake City, Utah, one of the
finest hotel building in the western country. They are also making
faience tile in polychrome colors for the grill room of this hotel, which
will be a most beautiful example of this rich work.

The company are prepared to furnish brick for arches of all shapes
and sizes, and ornamental and enriched bricks and special shapes in ac-
cordance with architect's specifications, and in addition thereto, plain or
common brick in any quantities desired and of a quality which cannot
be excelled. Their output in fire-proofing, roofing tile, floor tile, mantel
tile, flue lining, paving brick and fire brick should also be mentioned as
being very largely contributory to the magnitude of their business and the
prestige which they enjoy among contemporary concerns on the Pacific
coast.

The phenomenal activity of building operations in all the principal cities
on the Pacific coast has given a decided impetus to the business of this com-
pany and as evidence of their capacity for the prompt fulfilment of large
orders, it may be cited that they shipped to San Francisco, directly after
the great fire of 1906, three hundred and seventy-eight carloads of hollow
building tile.

They have recently furnished the face brick for the building of the
National Realty Company, at Tacoma, Washington, the tallest building
on the Pacific coast.

Among other notable buildings for which brick and kindred clay
products were furnished by this company may be mentioned : David
Hewes Building and Children's Hospital, San Francisco ; Berkeley Na-
tional Bank, Berkeley ; Central Building, Union Trust Building, Express
Building and Pacific Mutual Life Building, Los Angeles; The Times
Building, Victoria, British Columbia ; Taft-Penover Department Store,
Oakland. California ; Olympia Building, Tacoma, Washington ; Kinney
Building, Portland, Oregon ; Old Pueblo Club, Tucson, Arizona ; Pres-
cott National Bank, Prescott, Arizona ; Chamber of Commerce, Pasa-
dena, California ; and Chamber of Commerce, San Bernardino, Califor-
nia. The above are mentioned only as a few notable examples out of a
list, which might be extended almost indefinitely.

Aside from the brick business Mr. Frost has other important financial

254 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

interests in California. In Los Angeles and Pasadena his real-estate
holdings are of extensive order and in 1898 he erected the Frost building
which, with the ground, is worth $250,000, and which is one of the most
imposing structures in the city. He has been prominent in the organiza-
tion of the American Olive Company, through which the growers of large
orchards hope to market their crops, both in the form of olive oil and
canned or pickled olives, for which there is such a ready market, both
locally and in the east. In politics Mr. Frost accords a stalwart allegiance
to the principles and policies for which the Republican party stands
sponsor and though he has never manifested aught of ambition for the
honors or emoluments of public office he has ever done all in his power
to advance the general welfare of the community, to whose progress and
development he has contributed in most generous measure. When a young
man he was elected alderman of Davenport, Iowa, by unanimous vote,
but since that time his extensive business interests have demanded his
entire time and attention so that he has not been able to participate in
political affairs. He is a man of most extraordinary executive ability and
of unquestioned honesty and integrity. He is broad-minded and liberal
in thought and action, is charitable towards other's opinions and is ever
mindful of their rights and sensibilities. He is affiliated with various
fraternal and social organizations of representative character.

ALDEX Y\ . TACKSOX, of San Francisco, and one of California's rep-
resentative men, is a native of the state of Maine, born April 27, 1838.
The father of Mr. Jackson, Nathan M. Jackson, was also a native of
Maine, born April 29, 1816. By occupation he was a farmer and stock-
man, and resided in the state of his birth until his death, in 1905. The
mother of Mr. Jackson, Abigail (Williams) Jackson, was born in Maine
in 1812, aud died there in 1901.

Alden W. Jackson was reared on the old family homestead in Maine,
and in that state attended the public schools. In 1859 he came to Cali-
fornia, and until 1861 he spent his time at the mine, and in that year
(1861) he went to Washington, where he remained until 1862, when
he came to San Francisco, and this city has been his home since that
time. Since 1862 Mr. Jackson has been associated with the firm of
Pope & Talbott, lumber manufacturers and dealers. For some twelve
years he has been president of the Gray's Harbor Commercial Com-
pany, of which he was vice-president for twelve years, prior to his be-
coming president. Mr. Jackson is also identified, directly or indirectly,
with many other lumber interests throughout California.

In 1867 Mr. Jackson was married to Miss Lizzie Lemmon, who died
in 1869, and in 1870 he was married to Miss Ellen A. Lemmon, a sister
of his first wife. Mrs. Jackson died 1908. Of the four children born to
Alden W. and Ellen A. Jackson these three are living, viz. : Lizzie F.,
now Mrs. G. W. Fischer, of Seattle, Washington; Hattie G.. now Mrs.
John L. Deahl ; and Alice, now Mrs. Herbert S. Swanton, of San Jose.

Since 1862 Mr. Jackson has been identified with the lumber inter-
ests of the Pacific coast, and since 1880 he has been particularly prom-
inent in the manufacture and sale of lumber.

YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY

, LENOX
FOUNDATIONS

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 257

LESLIE R. HEWITT. Thoroughly exponent of that vitality and prog-
ressive spirit so characteristic of the west, Senator Hewitt has not only
gained prominence and distinction as one of the representative mem-
bers of the California bar, but he has also given most effective services
in offices of public trust. His record in the office of city attorney of
Los Angeles is one that proved of great value to the city in manifold
ways, besides which his able and discriminating services in that capacity
inured greatly to his professional prestige. He is now representative
of the Thirty-eighth senatorial district in the state senate, where he has
entered upon another broad field of usefulness. His official preferment
has afforded ample evidence of the confidence and esteem accorded him
by the people of southern California, and he has shown high civic ideals
and unqualified civic loyalty, thus proving a valued acquisition to the
professional, business and social circles of his home city of Los Angeles.

Leslie Randall Hewitt finds a due mede of satisfaction in reverting
to the golden west as the place of his nativity. He was born in the
old city of Olympia, Washington, on the I2th of September, 1867, an(i
his native town was then the capital of the territory, as it is now of the
state of Washington. He is a son of Randall H. and Ellen L. (Hewitt)
Hewitt, both of whom were born and reared in the state of New York.
Hon. Christopher C. Hewitt, grandfather of him whose name introduces
this review, was chief justice of Washington Territory from 1861 until
1869, and was prominently concerned in the development and upbuilding
of that great commonwealth.

When a lad of eight years Leslie R. Hewitt accompanied his parents
on their removal to Los Angeles, where they took up their abode on the
2 ist of March, 1876. To the public schools of Los Angeles he is in-
debted for his earlier educational discipline, which included a course in
the high school. In that institution he was graduated as a member of
the class of 1885, and in the following year he was matriculated in the
University of California, in which he was graduated in June. 1890,
with the degree of Bachelor of Letters. After leaving the university
Senator Hewitt returned to Los Angeles, where he initiated the study
of law in the office and under the effective preceptorship of Colonel G.
Wiley Wells. Later he continued his technical reading under the di-
rection of Judge Waldo M. York and the firm of Houghton, Silent &
Campbell, each of his preceptors having been a representative member
of the bar of Los Angeles county. The future senator was admitted to
the bar in 1893, and from 1894 to 1898 he was engaged in the general
practice of his profession in Los Angeles, where he brought to bear his
energies and professional talents with such potency that his novitiate
was of brief duration. From 1899 to 1900 he served as deputy in the
office of Walter F. Haas, who was at that time incumbent of the posi-
tion of city attorney, and from 1901 to 1906 he occupied a similar posi-
tion under the regime of William B. Matthews, who succeeded Mr. Haas
as city attorney. Thus Mr. Hewitt gained valuable experience and be-
came actively concerned with the various litigations in which the city
was involved. His effective service in this subordinate capacity marked
him as being specially eligible for higher official preferment, which was
accorded in his election to the office of city attorney, in 1906, when he

258 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

received nomination on both the non-partisan and the Democratic tickets.
In December, 1909, shortly before the expiration of his first term, he
was re-elected city attorney, and the acceptability of his administration
was demonstrated by the fact that he had practically no opposition in
this election. In August, 1910, however, he resigned the office and be-
came special counsel for the Los Angeles board of public works in mat-
ters pertaining to harbor improvements and litigation, besides which he
was made counsel also for the board of public utilities. In the primary
election of August 10, 1910, he was made the nominee on the Repub-
lican ticket for the office of state senator from the Thirty-eight sen-
atorial district, and at the regular election, on the 8th of November fol-
lowing, he succeeded in rolling up a most gratifying majority at the
polls. This was a well merited popular exposition of the confidence
reposed in him and also offered further attest of eligibility for posi-
tions of public trust and responsibility. His services in the senate are
certain to be marked by the same fidelity and discrimination that have
insured his professional success and his efficiency in other official con-
nections. Concerning his labors in behalf of his home city the following
pertinent statements have been made and are well worthy of perpetua-
tion in this review of his career, though slight paraphrase will be made
in the reproduction :

"During Mr. Hewitt's tenure of the position of city attorney the
office, either directly or under his supervision, handled several very im-
portant questions, some of which became the subject of litigation. In
the case of Fleming versus Hance it was decided that the powers of city
officers under the Los Angeles charter can not be abridged by acts of
the state legislature. The first step taken by the city toward the ac-
quisition of a harbor was the annexation of the so-called 'shoestring'
strip of territory, extending to the cities of San Pedro and Wilming-
ton, and the annexation proceedings were the subject of important litiga-
tion, which was finally decided by the supreme court of the state, in
favor of the city. The validity of the city ordinance establishing the
liquor-zone was upheld by the supreme court, in the case of Grumbach
versus Lelande. The power of the city to regulate telephone rates was
sustained by the supreme court of the United States, in the case of the
Home Telephone Company versus the City of Los Angeles. A most
important question arose regarding the construction of the Owens river
aqueduct, and the supreme court of California decided that the city had
the power to construct that work itself, without being required to let
contracts. It is probable that if this municipal prerogative had not ex-
isted the city should not have built the aqueduct with the estimate of
twenty-three million dollars.

"The consolidation of San Pedro and Wilmington with Los Angeles
was effected in 1909, and the proceedings therefor were under the .di-
rection of the city attorney's office, from which was required a great
deal of careful attention. The city had much other important litigation
within the regime of Senator Hewitt as city attorney, but the cases al-
ready mentioned are the most noteworthy of those that have been de-
cided by the courts.

"Senator Hewitt has taken more than an official interest in move-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 259

ments intended for the betterment of the general condition of the city
he has so ably represented. Under his guidance the office of city at-
torney was a powerful instrument in upholding the dignity and good
name of Los Angeles. In the troublous days attending the recall of
former Mayor Harper, his forceful opinion that the resignation of the
mayor did not put an end to the recall proceedings was a vital factor
in clearing up a complicated and difficult situation in the affairs of the
municipality."

Clear of mind and strong of heart, Senator Hewitt has never failed
to face bravely all emergencies and contingencies in public life or pri-
vate and professional affairs. His strength is that of personal integrity
and distinctive individuality, and the success he has won in his chosen
profession and in connection with matters of public administration in-
dicates the man as he is. Unfailing courtesy and genial personality
have won to him warm and enduring friendships, and he is essentially
a man of the people and for the people, — one not to be cajoled by flat-
tery or awed into silence by contending forces, no matter how powerful
or implacable. He is an ardent Republican and has given effective ser-
vice as an advocate of the principles and policies for which the "grand
old party" stands sponsor. He is actively identified with such rep-
resentative local organizations as the University Club, the Union League
Club and the City Club. In the time-honored Masonic fraternity he has
attained to the thirty-second degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish
Rite, besides which he is affiliated with the adjunct organization, Al
Malaikah Temple, Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mytic
Shrine, and with the Knights of Pythias.

On April 30, 1901, Mr. Hewitt was married to Miss Mable Eastwood
of Newcastle, California. She is a native of Seneca Falls, New York,
and a daughter of the late Asa B. Eastwood and Emma M. Eastwood.
Three children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Hewitt — Beatrice, Asa
R. and Emilen.

MILLARD F. PALMER. If those who claim that fortune has favored
certain individuals above others will but investigate the cause of success
and failure it will be found that the former is largely due to the im-
provement of opportunity, the latter to the neglect of it. Fortunate en-
vironments encompass nearly every man at some stage of his career, but
the strong man and the successful man is he who realizes that the proper
moment has come, that the present and not the future holds his oppor-
tunity. The man who makes use of the Now and not the To Be is the
one who passes on the highway of life others who started out ahead of
him, and reaches the goal of prosperity in advance of them. It is this
quality in Millard Fillmore Palmer that has made him a leader in the
business world and won him an enviable name in connection with bank-
ing and land interests in San Bernardino county, California, especially
in the vicinity of Upland, which place has long represented his home
He is cashier of the Commercial National Bank and of the Citizens'
Savings Bank, two of the most substantial financial institutions in this
section of the Golden state. In addition to his banking interests he is
secretary and general manager of the Magnolia Mutual Building & Loan

260 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Association. Millard Fillmore Palmer is descended from a brilliant and
distinguished ancestry, representatives of the name having served with
honor and valorous devotion in all the great wars which have racked
this country.

A native of the old Hawkeye state of the Union, Mr. Palmer was
born in Franklin township, Monroe county, Iowa, the date of his na-
tivity being the 26th of July, 1863. He is a son of Abraham and Nancy
(Potts) Palmer, the former of whom was born in Augusta county, Vir-
ginia, and the latter of whom claimed West 'Virginia as the place of her
birth. The genealogy of the Palmer family is traced back to four broth-
ers, of Scotch-Irish descent, who immigrated to America in the early
colonial days, one of their descendants having been William Palmer,
great-grandfather of him to whom this sketch is dedicated, and who
served in the war of the Revolution. William Palmer was a member of
one of the first families in Virginia in the early days and he was ex-
tensively engaged in charcoal-burning, the market for his product hav-
ing been Baltimore, Maryland. One of his sons, whose name was also
William Palmer and who was grandfather of Millard F. Palmer, be-
came a planter and charcoal-burner and passed his entire life on the old
homestead in Virginia, where he was a man of prominence and influ-
ence in all the relations of life. He reared to maturity a large family
consisting of nine boys and four girls, of whom five sons served in the
Confederate army, under General Lee, and three in the Federal army.
One of the sons was killed in battle and another was severely wounded.
The father of these boys was himself a gallant soldier in the war of
1812.

Abraham Palmer, father of him whose name forms the caption for
this review, was reared to adult age on the homestead farm in the Old
Dominion commonwealth, where he served an apprenticeship at the cap-
inet-maker's trade. In 1860 he removed from Virginia to the state of
Missouri, but on account of the Civil war he decided to move further
north and soon thereafter established the family home in Monroe county,
Iowa, where he was for a time engaged in the work of his trade. Sub-
sequently he enlisted as a soldier in Crocker's brigade, Thirteenth Iowa
Volunteer Infantry, the same having formed a part of General Sher-
man's Division. After the destruction of Crocker's brigade Mr. Abra-
ham Palmer was with Sherman on his ever memorable march to the sea,
serving as a private and also as chaplain. After the close of the war
he returned to his home in Iowa, where he engaged in farming until
1872, when he became a minister in the United Brethren Church, having
previously been presiding elder of the East Des Moines Conference for
a number of years. His health becoming impaired, however, he was
forced to give up his ministerial duties and seek a more salubrious cli-
mate. In 1890, then, he came to California, locating in Lake county,
where he was for some time prior to his death engaged in mission work.
In July. 1898, he located at Upland, in San Bernardino county, where
he was summoned to the life eternal in the year 1901, at the age of
sixty-eight years. His cherished and devoted wife survives him and
she now maintains her home at Upland. Mrs. Abraham Palmer is a
daughter of Jacob Potts, a native of West Virginia, who removed to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 261

Monroe county, Iowa, in the year 1848, there passing the remainder of
his life. Mrs. Palmer had four brothers, David, William, Jonathan and
Samuel, all of whom were soldiers in the Federal army in the Civil war
and two of them. William and Jonathan, were killed at Helena, Arkan-
sas. Mr. and Mrs. Abraham Palmer became the parents of six chil-
dren, of whom the following are living at the time of this writing, in
1911, namely, Millard F., the immediate subject of this review; Upland,
who is engaged in the banking business; W. S. Palmer, who resides at
Claremont; Frank F.. who is at Claremont; and C. Bertha, a teacher of
the piano at Upland.

Mr. Palmer, of this notice, was reared to the invigorating influences
of the old homestead farm in Monroe county, Iowa, in the work and
management of which he early became associated with his father. His
preliminary educational training consisted of such advantages as were
afforded in the locality and period and subsequently he attended the
Quaker Academy at Pleasant Plain, Iowa, for one year. At the early
age of fifteen years he began to clerk in a store at Allerton, Iowa, where
he managed to spend one year in high school. So studious was he that
he made rapid strides in the accumulation of an education and for two
years he was a popular and successful teacher in the public schools of
Wayne county. Later he obtained a position as bookkeeper, stock-
keeper and buyer in a general store at Allerton and he retained that po-
sition for a period of two years, at the expiration of which he entered
a bank there. In 1882 he went to Waukema, Kansas, where he was in
the employ of a large jobbing and provision house for a short time,
eventually returning to Iowa and locating at Pleasant Plain, where he
clerked in a store for one year, at the end of which he joined a brother
in a dry-goods and clothing enterprise at Hedrick, Iowa. Later he had
charge of a dry-goods and clothing establishment at Hedrick and he
then assumed the practical management of a stock farm owned by J. T.
Brooks. He had charge of the farm by day and passed his evenings
keeping books in the bank owned by Mr. Brooks, eventually becoming
the latters' assistant in the bank, where he remained for nine years. In
1898 Mr. Palmer came to California, where, in the same year, he was
elected cashier of the newly organized Commercial Bank, at Upland.

The Commercial Bank was organized as a state institution and
opened for business on the igth of July. 1898. the business men respon-
sible for its existence being the late Colonel Tames L. Paul, Charles E.
Harwood. A. P. Harwood, W. T. Burt, W. T.,Leeke, J. P. Robertson,
Charles Ruedy and B. A. Woodford. The first officers were: Colonel
J. L. Paul, president ; Charles E. Harwood, vice-president ; and M. F.
Palmer, cashier. The first board of directors consisted of Colonel
Paul, C. E. Harwood, Charles Ruedy, A. P. Harwood and W. T. Burt.
Colonel Paul continued as president of this eminently reliable monetary
institution for six years, at the expiration of which he was succeeded by
Charles Ruedy, who was the incumbent of that office for one year. At
the present time Charles E. Harwood is president and W. T. Leeke,
vice-president. The present board of directors consists of the presi-
dent, vice-president and cashier, together with Dr. A. Myers and A. P.
Harwood. On the gth of October, 1909, this bank was reorganized as

Vol. 1—14

•2G-2 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

the Commercial National Bank, the same being incorporated with a
capital stock of twenty-five thousand dollars. The surplus and undi-
vided profits amount to thirty-one thousand dollars; the deposits to
three hundred and eighty thousand dollars; and the loans and discounts
to two hundred and forty thousand dollars. The bank occupies a fine
modern brick structure, which was ready for occupancy at the time the
bank was started. This building has since been enlarged with a forty
foot addition to accommodate the Citizens' Savings Bank, which was
established on the nth of May, 1906, and which is in a very thriving
condition. The capital stock of the Citizens' Savings Bank amounts to
twenty-five thousand dollars, the surplus is fifteen hundred dollars, the
deposits seventy-five thousand dollars, and the loans and discounts,
eighty thousand dollars. Both institutions are equipped with modern
safety-lock vaults. The officers of the Citizens' Savings Bank are :
Charles E. Harwood, president; E. M. Dillman, vice-president; and M.
F. Palmer, cashier. The directors are as follows : Charles E. Harwood,
E. M. Dillman, F. L. Purvis, M. H. Bardwell, A. P. Harwood, M. F.
Palmer and Dr. A. Myers. The Savings Bank loans principally on
farm mortgages and pays four per cent annually on its deposits.

Considerable credit is due Millard F. Palmer for the admirable suc-
cess attained by the two banks of which he is cashier and active man-
ager. In 1901 Mr. Palmer, in company with W. H. Craig, P. E. Wai-
line, J. J. Atwood, Charles Ruedy and J. F. Anderson, organized the
Magnolia Mutual Building & Loan Association, a concern that has
achieved a marvelous success in the business world at Upland. This
building association has constructed about seventy-five per cent of the
buildings of Upland since the time of its organization and the popula-
tion of that place has risen in recent years from six hundred inhabi-
tants to twenty-nine hundred, the present population. It has an au-
thorized capital of five hundred thousand dollars, of which practically
fifty thousand dollars is paid up. It has never lost a dollar through bor-
rowers and has not foreclosed a single case in ten years, the period of
its existence. Mr. Palmer, of this review is secretary and manager of
the Magnolia Mutual Building & Loan Association ; Charles Ruedy "is
president ; and Dr. W. H. Craig, vice-president. From the foregoing
may be gathered the broad scope and importance of Mr. Palmer's inter-
ests at Upland, where he is recognized as one of the most capable busi-
ness men in the city. In politics he accords a stalwart allegiance to the
principles and policies promulgated by the republican party, in the local
councils of which he has long been an active and zealous factor. While
not a politician, strictly speaking, he has been honored by his fellow cit-
izens with election to the office of city treasurer and he has served with
the utmost efficiency in that capacity since the time of the incorporation
of the city in 1906. In fraternal circles he is affiliated with the time-
honored Masonic Order, the Modern Woodmen of America and the
Improved Order of Red Men. He is a Methodist, and is president of
the Board of Directors of the First Methodist Episcopal church of Up-
land. He is a man of broad mind and generous impulses, one whose
success in life is the more gratifying to contemplate inasmuch as it is
the direct result of his own well applied efforts. His entire business ca-
reer has been characterized by fair and honorable methods and he is

THE NEW YOBS
PUBLIC LIBRARY

\ ASTOK, LFNO.X ANt>
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 265

everywhere accorded the confidence and esteem of his fellow citizens.

At Hedrick, Iowa, in the year 1891, Mr. Palmer was united in mar-
riage to Aliss Charlotte Brooks, a native of Hedrick and a daughter of
John Brooks, who was an extensive farmer in Iowa, a great deal of his
land having been located in the vicinity of Hedrick, where he and his
wife passed the greater part of their lives and where his death oc-
curred. Mr. and Mrs. Palmer became the parents of one son, John
Brooks Palmer, whose death occurred at the age of eighteen months.
They have an adopted daughter, lone, whom they reared from child-
hood, and who is now seventeen years of age. She was graduated in
the Upland high school as a member of the class of 1911. In their re-
ligious faith the Palmer family are devout members of the Methodist
church, to whose good work they are liberal contributors of their time
and means. Their spacious and attractive home is recognized as a cen-
ter of refinement and most gracious hospitality and has been the scene
of many brilliant social functions.

SAMUEL IXHIIAM MERRILL is one of the strongest men in the west.
He is peculiarly typical of the progressiveness, the courage, the deter-
mination to succeed which people have come to feel as the dominant
force in western thought and character. His success has never been
at the expense of others, and most of his spare time has been given to
philanthropical projects or plans for the betterment of the civic wel-
fare. Arriving in California, utterly unknown, his own genius for busi-
ness and for the management of men and affairs, has placed him in his
honorable position as one of the leading business men of Los Angeles.
He is president and general manager of the California Industrial Com-
pany, and he has been closely connected with some of the most im-
portant enterprises in the city of Los Angeles.

The father of Samuel Ingham Merrill was Jerome Bonaparte Merrill,
and his mother was Jane (Hughes) Merrill. He, himself, was born
at Buffalo, New York, on the T5th of November, 1856. He received his
education in the public schools of F'.uffalo, New York, and in the high
school of that city. Financial conditions made it impossible for him
to remain in school after he was old enough to go to work, so at the age
of sixteen he became an office boy in the office of a Buffalo grain mer-
chant. Eager, ready and willing to work, quick to grasp ideas it was
not long before he gained promotion, and he continued to rise. How-
ever his plans were all destroyed before he was twenty. His younger
brother became an invalid, and taking the few hundred dollars which he
had scraped together, Air. Merrill obeyed the doctor's behest and removed
his brother and mother to California. They came to Oakland, where- it
was hoped the climate would prove beneficial, arriving on the nth of
September, 1876. Here he opened a modest little grocery store, and
above the store the two boys lived with their mother to keep house for
them. On the 2nd of January, 1877, he became bookkeeper for Hopkins
and Haley, bankers and brokers, in San Francisco. He quickly dem-
onstrated his ability to this firm, and they made him manager two years
later. Soon after this he was made an officer in several corporations
controlled by Mr. Hopkins, who placed the utmost confidence and trust

266 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

in his young assistant. On the 4th of December, 1881, he removed to
Los Angeles, where he entered the mercantile business, as a member of
the firm of Merrill and Babcock, hardware dealers. This is now the
well-known Cass-Smurr Hardware Company. Two years later he be-
came interested in the wholesale iron business under the firm name of
Percival and Merrill, but later sold his interest, the firm now being
known as the Percival Iron Company. In 1885 Mr. Merrill turned to a
new branch of the mercantile business and bought out a book and sta-
tionery business, in 1887 changing the firm name to Merrill and Cook.
In this business was shown in particular his power of initiative and his
fine business methods, for they were soon doing the largest business
in school supplies in southern California. In February of 1891 he sold
his interest to his partner and went into the gasoline and refined oil busi-
ness. For the next ten years he probably handled the largest business
of this kind in the world. The tank wagons of his company were known
all over the section, and they served thousands in twenty or more towns
and villages. Prosperity was now assured to Mr. Alerrill ; he could
now smile at the struggles of his boyhood.

In the fall of 1901 Mr. Merrill took up the manufacture of steel and
iron and their many products. Together with other capitalists he or-
ganized the California Industrial Company, which was capitalized at
$2,500,000. Mr. Merrill served as director and general manager and
the late Frederick H. Rindge was president. In 1908 Mr. Merrill was
elected chief executive, which office he has held up to the present time.
The corporation began as manufacturers of rolling bar-iron alone, but
Mr. Merrill has added departments for the manufacture of bolts, nuts,
cross-arm braces and other products of iron, twisted steel bars for con-
crete buildings, and a complete galvanizing plant. The plant is one of
the largest and is the best equipped of its kind on the Pacific coast.
Mr. Merrill is also a director in the Western Gas Engine Company, and
is an active and enthusiastic member of the Chamber of Commerce, doing
everything in his power to aid this organization in the work which they
are doing towards the growth and development of the city. In the fall
of 1908 all the Chambers of Commerce on the Pacific coast appointed
representatives to form the Honorary Commercial Commission, which
went to Japan in the interest of trade relations. Mr. Merrill was one
of the five representatives who went in behalf of the Los Angeles Cham-
ber of Commerce.

One of his leading interests is in religious and charitable work, and
he is well known for the activity he has shown along these lines. He
was one of the organizers of the Young Men's Christian Association in
Oakland, and was president of the organization when he removed to
Los Angeles. He had scarcely been in Los Angeles a month before he
was working for the organization of a Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion in the latter city. He succeeded in accomplishing this in February,
1882. and served as 'president of the association for the next four years.
In 1884 he was made chairman of the board of trustees and collector of
the building fund for the First Baptist church. As a result of his work-
Ac church building was dedicated free from debt. In 1885 he was
one of the men who founded the Baptist College. In 1891 he helped to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 267

found the Pacific Gospel Union, which is now known as the Union
Rescue Mission, and served as the president for the first four years.
The Good Samaritan Mission, which was founded in 1896, also owes its
existence in part to his efforts. He was one of the founders of the
McKinley Industrial Home, which has accomplished a great amount of
good in this section of the country. It is located near Gardena, and
here about one hundred homeless boys are cared for and educated. In
1905 he severed the ties which bound him to other churches in order to
concentrate all of his efforts towards the organization and successful
development of the First New Testament church of Los Angeles, which
is one of the most practical and aggressive missionary churches in the
United States. He is now chairman of the eldership and teacher of an
adult Bible class of fifty members.

Mr. Merrill was married on the 28th of February, 1888, at East Oak-
land, California, to Miss Sarah De Etta Dearborn. Three children have
been born to them, namely. Grace Edith (now Mrs. Jensen), Charles
Arthur and Wallace Dearborn.

ARTHUR E. HUNTINGTON. San Bernardino county, California, fig-
ures as one of the most attractive, progressive and prosperous divisions
of the state, justly claiming a high order of citizenship and a spirit of
enterprise which is certain to conserve consecutive development and
marked advancement in the material upbuilding of this section. The
county has been and is signally favored in the class of men who have
contributed to its development along commercial and financial lines, and
in the latter connection the subject of this review demands recognition,
as he has been actively engaged in banking operations at Upland for the
past four years. He is a citizen of intrinsic loyalty and public spirit
and his business methods demonstrate the power of activity and hon-
esty in the business world. Since March, 1907, Arthur Elon Hunting-
ton has been the popular and able incumbent of the office of cashier of
the First National Bank of Upland.

The First National Bank of Upland was incorporated under the
banking laws of the United States, in July, 1906, with a capital stock
of twenty-five thousand dollars, and its offices were immediately located
in the beautiful new banking building, which is thoroughly equipped
with all the most modern appointments. The business men instrumental
in the organization of the bank were : J. G. Mossin, then vice-president
of the American National Bank, of Los Angeles ; and George Chaffey,
of Los Angeles, one of the founders of the Ontario Colony. Mr. Mos-
sin was immediately elected president of the bank, but he died one year
after the organization of the bank and was succeeded in his office by
H. E. Bartlett. H. E. Swan was the first vice-president and he served
in that capacity until March, 1907. The First National has had an em-
inently successful career during the period of its existence. Its capital
stock remains the same as at the time of incorporation; the surplus
amounts to five thousand dollars ; the deposits, two hundred and eighty
thousand dollars ; and loans and discounts amount to one hundred and
ninety thousand dollars. The present officers of the bank are : Isaac C.
Baxter, president ; Charles D. Adarr-s. vice-president ; A. E. Hunting-
ton, cashier; and C. T. McCulloch, assistant cashier.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Arthur E. Huntington was born at Edgerton, Wisconsin, the date of
his nativity being the 8th of October, 1868. He is a son of George B.
and Jennie ( Smith j Huntington, the former a native of Vermont and
the latter a New Yorker by birth. The Huntington family is one of old
Colonial standing, the original progenitor of the name in America hav-
ing come hither from England. Samuel Huntington, an ancestor of
the subject of this review, was a signer of the Declaration of Inde-
pendence and a number of his relatives served in the war of the Revolu-
tion. Mr. and Mrs. George B. Huntington were united in marriage in
New York and subsequently they removed to Kalamazoo, Michigan,
where the family home was maintained for a number of years and
whence removal was made, in 1867, to Edgerton, Wisconsin, where the
father became an extensive and successful farmer. In 1885 removal
was made to Luverne, Minnesota, where the father died in 1897, at the
age of seventy-one years. The devoted wife was summoned to the life
eternal in Wisconsin in 1875, at the comparatively early age of thirty-
five years. Mr. and Mrs. Huntington became the parents of four chil-
dren, of whom three are living at the present time and of whom the
subject of this sketch was the youngest in order of birth.

Mr. Huntington, of this notice, was reared to the age of fifteen
years on the old homestead farm in Wisconsin and his preliminary ed-
ucational training consisted of such advantages as were afforded in the
neighboring district schools. After his father's removal to Luverne,
Minnesota, he attended high school in that place, being graduated as a
member of the class of 1889. Immediately thereafter he was matricu-
lated as a student in the University of Minnesota, at Minneapolis, in
which excellent institution he was graduated in 1893. During his va-
cations he was at home, working on the farm. After the completion of
his collegiate course he entered a bank at Ellsworth, Minnesota, where
he eventually became cashier and general manager of the bank of Brown
& Huntington. Later he was instrumental in the incorporation of the
German State Bank at Ellsworth, a monetary institution that has had a
most successful career and which is now doing a large and profitable
business. In 1898, Mr. Huntington disposed of some of his banking
interests and located at Luverne, his former home, where he became
a member of the firm of Huntington Brothers, extensive dealers in hard-
ware and farm implements. In 1900 this firm was dissolved and in that
year Mr. Huntington entered the law department of his alma mater,
being graduated in the same as a member of the class of 1903, with the
degree of Bachelor of Laws. He then entered the St. Paul National
Bank as receiving teller, serving therein until the fall of 1906. In the
following January he removed to California, where he began to look
for bank locations. In March, 1907, he purchased an interest in the
First National Bank at Upland and assumed the position of cashier
in the same, as previously noted. Inasmuch as a short resume of the
First National Bank has been given in the preceding paragraph, nothing
further need be said concerning that substantial concern at this point,
except to state that it has prospered greatly under Mr Huntington's
excellent management. In politics Mr. Huntington accords a stalwart
support to Republican principles and policies, believing that that or-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 271

ganization stands for the best possible government. In fraternal orders
he is a member of the blue lodge of the Masonic organization and his
religious faith is in harmony with the tenets of the Presbyterian church,
in the various departments of which he and his wife are most ardent
and earnest factors.

Mr. Huntington has been twice married. In 1894 he wedded Jessie
P. Smith, a native of Algona, Iowa. This union was prolific of one
child, Helenj whose birth occurred in 1897. Mrs. Huntington passed to
eternal rest in 1899, and in 1903 was solemnized the marriage of
Mr. Huntington to Miss Hattie T. Chittenden, a native of Wisconsin.
Mr. and Mrs. Huntington have one child, Winifred, born in 1906. Mr.
and Mrs. Huntington are popular factors in connection with the best
social activities of Upland, where they are held in high regard by all
with whom they have come in contact. Mr. Huntington is genial in
his associations, affable in his address, generous in his judgment of his
fellow men, and courteous to all. As a citizen and enthusiast of his
town, it is but just to say that communities will prosper and grow
in proportion as they put a premium on men of his mold.

MEICHEL H. DEYouNG. Any piece of biographical writing should
be both an impression and an interpretation, quite as much as a sum-
mary of facts. Facts, to be sure, are of use as a wholesome corrective
of prejudice or whimsey; but in the condensed narrative of a life there
is danger that they may tyrannize In studying a cleancut, sane, dis-
tinct character like that of Meichel H. de Young, proprietor of the San
Francisco Chronicle, interpretation follows fact in a straight line of de-
rivation. There is small need for indirection or puzzling. His char-
acter is the positive expression of a strong and loyal nature, and he has
given distinguished service in behalf of the city and state which have
represented his home since his boyhood days and in which he has pressed
forward to the mark of high and worthy accomplishment. As has well
been said by one specially familiar with his career: "He is one of the
best known men in California, and is not a stranger to the world when
he steps outside of the borders of his own state, as he has participated
in many activities that have brought him in contact with the best minds
of the nation." He has done much to further the civic and material
upbuilding of the fair city of the Golden Gate, both before and since
the ever memorable disaster that left her spent and stricken, and such
have been his life and labors as one of the world's great army of con-
structive workers that there is all of consistency in according him rep-
resentation in this publication.

Meichel H. de Young was born in the city of St. Louis, Missouri, on
the ist of October, 1849, and is a son of Meichel and Amelia de Young,
both natives of France. The father devoted the major portion of his
active career to banking and manufacture and he passed the closing
years of his life in Cincinnati, where he died in the year 1854; his
cherished and devoted wife was summoned to eternal rest in 1880. Of
their children one son and three daughters are now living. He whose
name initiates this review was a lad of five years at the time of the
family removal from Missouri to San Francisco, and in this city he was

272 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

reared to maturity, in the meanwhile duly availing himself of the ad-
vantages of the public schools. Concerning the details of his rise to the
status of one of the leading exponents of the newspaper business in the
country and to the position of one of the essentially representative citi-
zens of California, no better source of information could be found
than that afforded in an appreciative estimate given by the one from
whose article was taken the brief quotation appearing in the initial par-
agraph of this context, and but slight paraphrase is made in the repro-
duction.

When quite a youth Mr. deYoung and his brother Charles took very
kindly to amateur journalism, and one of their ventures in this field
developed into the Dramatic Chronicle, which, after a successful record
of a number of years, dropped its special characteristics and became the
leading daily paper in San Francisco. During the period of the publi-
cation of the Dramatic Chronicle the two brothers showed their enter-
prising disposition by transforming what was at first a mere theatrical
program into a real, live newspaper, which soon began to be looked for
by the patrons of places of amusement and entertainment. The latest
bit of live news was always to be found in its columns, and long before
it became a full-fledged morning paper, opinions upon matters touching
the public interest were printed on its editorial page, besides which it
was not an uncommon thing to find contributions signed with names
already well known in the literary world.

The transition to morning journalship hardly meant more than a
change of name and a subordination of certain specific features, but it
was followed by a rapid growth in popularity and circulation. It is
sometimes assumed that the very modern journal designated by the very
offensive appellation of "yellow" was the first to do things, but a glance
over the files of the Chronicle as far back as the '705 of the last cen-
tury disposes of that assumption. One of the chief functions of the
Chronicle of those days was that of investigating. It was continually
exposing abuses and compelling their rectification. Its exposures of
the "Federal Ring," in 1877, which resulted in the relegation to obscu-
rity of a lot of predatory politicians and a regeneration of the state,
brought about a succession of libel suits, from which it emerged trium-
phantly. It also made the fight single-handed for the adoption of the
state constitution of 1879, an instrument which has been more misrep-
resented and contains more attempts at reform than any other organic
law submitted to an American commonwealth.

On the death of Charles deYoung, in 1880, Meichel H. deYoung be-
came sole proprietor of the Chronicle. The increasing prosperity of
the paper, and his natural aptitude for big affairs, soon made him an im-
portant figure in the community. Mr. deYoung has the happy faculty
of assembling competent men about him, and this gave him the oppor-
tunity to broaden his field of enterprise. He has 'the constructive in-
stinct strongly developed, and it early asserted itself in the erection of
fine buildings. • The Chronicle building destroyed in the great confla-
gration incident to the earthquake of 1906 was the first steel-frame struc-
ture put up in San Francisco. Its erection was dubiously regarded by
the wise-heads who looked upon a ten-story structure as an invitation

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 273

to disaster, but Mr. de Young had the utmost confidence in that type of
construction, and it was justified by the event.

Mr. de Young's energy has at no time been confined to the promotion
of his own interests. It was not long after he felt himself in a position
to do a public service that he began to exhibit a tendency to throw him-
self with vigor into enterprises for the common benefit. The list of his
performances in this field is a long one, and indicates a life of extra-
ordinary activity. He was several times a delegate to national conven-
tions of the Republican party and has served as a member and as vice
chairman of the Republican national committee, being eight years on its
executive committee. He was vice-president of the World's Colum-
bian Exposition, in 1893, and one of the board of control of that great
exhibition, and he afterward took the liveliest sort of interest in inter-
national fairs.

It was while Mr. deYoung was acting as vice-president of the na-
tional commission of the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, in
1893, that he conceived the idea of promoting a midwinter International
Exposition in San Francisco. He was animated by a double purpose
in making the suggestion. At the time there were already indications
of the approaching depression, and he assumed that if San Francisco
could be actively enlisted in the work of preparing for a fair they might
become preoccupied enough in making the enterprise a success to avert
the disaster of dullness. He also advanced the suggestion that Cali-
fornia would be vastly benefited by showing the outsiders that when the
rest of the world was hibernating the Golden State invited to outdoor
exercise. San Francisco fell in with the suggestion, and her citizens
subscribed three hundred and sixty-five thousand dollars. Not a dollar
was received from the state or the municipality. With the amount of
voluntary subscriptions and the aid of the counties \vhich promptly took
advantage of the opportunity to exploit their resources, by erecting
buildings in which to make their special displays, Mr. deYoung, who was
promptly chosen as president and director general by his fellow citi-
zens, made a display which exposition connoisseurs say compared favor-
ably with and even surpassed several of those which were recipients of
government millions.

The midwinter fair was a success in every particular and was built
and opened in five months. At the time when the population of San
Francisco's metropolitan area did not equal half that of the present,
the attendance on some special days ran up to a hundred thousand, and
during the entire period the gate receipts surpassed expectations. Through
the energetic efforts and careful management of Mr. deYoung, who ab-
solutely abandoned his personal affairs, the midwinter exposition was a
financial success, and the rapidly growing museum which serves as a
memorial of the successful undertaking, and the most highly developed
part of Golden Gate park, which was reclaimed from a wilderness of
brush and sand hills to make a site for the buildings are the permanent
fruits of the profits of the remarkable enterprise, which served to ad-
vertise California as the land of sunshine, fruit and flowers in a fashion
never remotely approached before. Mr. deYoung was president of the
U. S. Commission to the Great Paris Exposition of 1900 — and was de-

274 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

corated by the French Governnfent with the Legion of Honor for
services there.

It is sometimes asserted by men who are associated with Mr. de-
Young in public enterprises that he is aggressive and not very placatory.
This is probably true, as he has a habit of insisting that an undertaking
in which the public is interested should be conducted precisely as a ca-
pable man would conduct his own business. Hence it has generally oc-
curred that when Mr. deYoung has actively identified himself with any
public enterprise there is never a financial deficit, but usually a surplus,
which is devoted to the further adornment or development of the city.

Mr. deYoung is fond of traveling, and is at home in the capitals of
the old world as well as at our national capital and in the metropolis of
New York City. He was a member of the directorate of the Associated
Press for more than a quarter of a century and he became as accustomed
to running across the continent as a commuter does in passing to and from
his home. Although he crowds so much of active effort into his life
he manages to extract a great deal of pleasure out of living. He is a
member of numerous clubs, and at present is president of the Union
League Club of San Francisco. He entertains with gracious hospitality
at his handsome residence, on California street, where at one time or
another many of the celebrities of the world have obtained an idea of
the social attractions and splendid hospitality of the Golden State.

The patent of nobility that rests its honors and distinction in the
person of Mr. deYoung comes from high authority, as it is based upon
fine character, marked ability and definite and worthy achievement along
practical, productive lines. His measures of success has been large,
and his career has been such as to advance the welfare of others as
well as himself, for he has to much of strength and principle to be self-
centered or self-conscious. Thus he views life in correct proportions
and places true values on men and affairs. Significantly free from osten-
tation or intellectual bigotry and intolerance, he has not been denied the
full measure of confidence and esteem which he so well deserves, as
emanating from the people of the city and state whose interests have
been so close to his heart.

GEORGE ALEXANDER. After he had passed the age when men ever
want to be honored with public office, George Alexander was chosen
mayor of Los Angeles. The nomination and election came to him un-
solicited ; in fact against his wishes. Yet the events that made him
mayor also made him an historical figure in the nation for he is the
first city executive to come into office as a result of the use of the
recall.

In the days when he was chosen, days when the public was hostile
to removing an official before his term ended, days when the success
of accepting a recall nomination was not promising, he consented after
a score of men of estimated capacity far in excess of his, had refused
to run. But somebody had to stand for decency ; somebody had to
give the decent voters a candidate. And when shown a patriotic duty,
George Alexander did not flinch, but braved the occasion. It was a
memorable struggle. The nation watched it. While it was in progress

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 275

the incumbent abdicated and left the field to "Uncle George" and a
socialist. The enemies of decency almost elected the socialist. Had
"Uncle George" not been sagacious enough to work for his own success,
Los Angeles history might have had a different chapter in her history.

Coming into office amidst sneers and malice, he 'waited for oppor-
tunities for usefulness. He sat at his desk from morning until night,
attentive only to his "job." His motto was, and is "Stay on the job."
He has been more faithful to this motto than any other official or
employe of the city. As a result he knows all that is going on, under-
stands everything and discriminates for the whole people all the time.
He does not make speeches; he does not write treatises; he does not
shine in society nor take rank in business. But he does more for his
position than all that. He gives it the simplicity of common sense and
a square deal. He gives it faithful attachment.

In his septuagenarian days he is what Macauley declared of another
lord to be "his venerable youth." His mind is vigorous and clear, his
ideas thoroughly modern and broad and his actions prompt and de-
cisive. Sometimes he is "gruff." Sometimes he is "uncouth." Much
is made of this by those who hate him and his meaning. Sometimes
his "length of limb and shambling gait" are travestied, along with his
white chin whiskers, much as Lincoln was in the days before the Civil
war.

But, suave or "gruff," attractive or "uncouth," he has in the two
years he has been mayor gained the respect of his enemies and the
love of his friends by his simplicity, sagacity and squareness. So many
times he has proved right on involved questions where the informed
floundered in conflict with each other ; so often has he seen error where
others found it not that his curt decisions have taken a wisdom all
their own in this community. He is the court of final appeal for the
people and there has not yet been a question of appeal, let alone one
of reversal.

"Uncle George" is past seventy-two, hale and mentally thirty years
less than his age. Born in Scotland and an addition to the cosmopolitan
population .of Chicago when a boy, he found out his wisdom both in
birth and boyhood's necessities, for he was required to begin the struggle
in his 'teens and sell papers. For over fifty years he has worked.
Whether on the farm in Iowa, in the warehouses where he handled the
grain he dealt in, or in his various occupations in Los Angeles in the
past twenty-four years, he has had to work hard always. And in all
these years he has not yet become rich. His home is on West Thirty-first
street, where he lives with his wife and daughter. He has lived a
plain life and is too old to change. And that life has been so honest
that the people feel safe ; no change is feared ; It is his recommendation
and as it ages, like wine it improves.

"Uncle George" has been a supervisor twice. He might have been
the third time, but the machine finally "got him." That is where the
machine made its mistake, for through "Uncle George" in the recall
election the people "got the machine."

The people pin their faith on this wise old savior and they are to

276 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

demonstrate it again by his re-election as mayor. And it will be the
third time in thirty months they have trusted to him.

ROBERT THACKERAY NELSON. As one of the representative expon-
ents of the great industry of orange culture in San Bernardino county
and as an honored and influential citizen of this favored section of the
state, Mr. Nelson is well entitled to recognition in this history.

Robert Thackeray Nelson was born in the city of Springfield. Clark
county, Ohio, on the 7th of March, 1852, and is a son of James H. and
Mary A. (Thackeray) Nelson, the former a native of the Shenandoah
valley of Virginia, and the latter of the vicinity of the city of Leeds,
England. William Nelson, grandfather of him whose name introduces
this article, was likewise a native of Virginia and was a representative
of one of the sterling families, of English lineage, that was founded
in the historic Old Dominion commonwealth in the colonial era. He be-
came the owner of a fine plantation in the Shenandoah valley, where he
continued to be actively identified with agricultural pursuits for many
years. He passed the gracious evening of his life at Springfield, Ohio,
where he died when about eighty years of age. He served as a member
of a Virginia regiment in the War of 1812, and representatives of the
family were found aligned as patriot soldiers in the War of the Revolu-
tion. Elizabeth, the wife of William Nelson, was likewise born and
reared in Virginia, and she passed the closing years of her life in Spring-
field, Ohio, where she died at an advanced age.

James H. Nelson was a boy at the time of his parents' removal to
Ohio, and he was reared to manhood in Clark county of that state,
where he received the advantages of the common schools of the period.
As a youth he secured employment in a manufactory of agricultural
implements in Springfield, that county, and in the same, by able and faith-
ful service, he finally rose to the responsible office of superintendent of
the plant. He continued to retain this office for the long period of
thirty years, and was known and honored as one of the representative
citizens of Springfield, where he continued to reside until his death,
at the age of sixty-five years. At the time of the Civil war, when Hon.
David Tod, governor of Ohio, called for volunteers for the one hundred
days' service, in the protection of this state against the raids of General
Morgan, James H. Nelson enlisted in a local militia company known
in history as the "Squirrel Hunters," and this gallant home guard gave
most effectual service in preventing the invasion of the famous Confed-
erate raider. His wife was twelve years of age at the time when she
came with her widowed mother from England to the L^nited States,
and the family home was established at Springfield, Ohio, where she was
reared to maturity and where she continued to reside until she was sum-
moned to the life eternal, when about sixty-five years of age. Her
father, Robert Thackeray, successfully operated a weaving mill in the
vicinity of Leeds, England, and there his death occurred, after which
his widow removed to America, as has already been noted. James H.
and Mary A. (Thackeray) Nelson became the parents of four sons and
one daughter, all of whom attained to years of maturity except one son
who died in infancy. James William, the eldest son, was a representative

^— -S \ f

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 279

physician and surgeon in Springfield, Ohio, at the time of his death,
when about forty years of age, and the other three children are living,
the subject of this review having been the second in order of birth.

Robert Thackeray Nelson, named in honor of his maternal grand-
father, was reared to adult age in his native city and after his gradua-
tion in the local high school he there entered Wittenberg College, a
Lutheran institution, in which he was graduated as a member of the
class of 1878. After the completion of his college course Mr. Nelson
identified himself with newspaper work in Springfield, where he served
as a reporter and later as an editorial writer. He continued in journal-
istic work until 1887, when he severed the ties that bound him to his
native state and came to California. He established his home in the
city of Los Angeles, and for the ensuing nine years he was a valued mem-
ber of the reportorial staff of the Evening Express, which was then the
leading evening newspaper of southern California. In 1895, when
the development of the petroleum industry was instituted in this
state, he became concerned with this line of enterprise, with which he
continued to be actively engaged identified for seven years, — in the lo-
cating, developing and selling of oil properties, — and he was notably
successful in his operations along this line. He was a prominent and
influential factor in the development of the great oil resources of the
state and after disposing of his interests in this connection he located
upon land which he had previously purchased in what was originally
known as the Ontario Colony, in San Bernardino county. Here he
now has, in the vicinity of the thriving little city of Upland, a finely im-
proved orange grove of fifty-five acres, and the place is recognized as be-
ing one of the best in this favored section of the state. Other members of
his family own an additional tract of one hundred and five acres, like-
wise devoted to the propagation of oranges and lemons, and thus
he gives a general supervision to the fine orchards covering a total of
one hundred and sixty acres. His beautiful home is located on Euclid
avenue at a point about two and one-half miles distant from the busi-
ness center of Upland, and this thoroughfare is known as one of the
most picturesque and most effectively improved in southern California.
Mr. Nelson has been especially active and zealous in promoting the in-
terests of the orange and lemon industry in the state and has been a
prominent factor in its development. He was one of the organizers of
the Upland Heights Orange Association, in 1909, and this association
now has an extensive packing house at Upland, the while it has done
much to bring about improvements in the methods of propagation and
in shipping facilities. The association controls about three hundred and
twenty-five acres of the best orange groves in this section and the
products of the same, under improved methods of growing and handling,
now command top prices in the markets of the country. It ships about
one hundred and fifty car loads of citrus fruit each year, and Mr.
Nelson, who has been a stockholder and director of the association from
the time of its inception, is serving as its president in 1911. He is
also a member of the directorate of the Upland Lemon Growers' Ex-
change, and for several years he was a director of the San Antonio Water
Company, which supplies water for the irrigation of the fruit district

280 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

in which he is interested. He has served several years as a member of
the board of trustees of Upland, and during one year was president of
the board, an office virtually the same as that of mayor. As a citizen he
is markedly vigorous, loyal and progressive, and while he has had no de-
sire for political preferment he is found aligned as a staunch supporter
of the cause of the Republican party.

In the year 1893 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Nelson to Mrs.
Marian (Parsons) Longstreet, widow of Dr. A. O. Longstreet, of
Springfield, Ohio. She was born at Vermilion, Erie county, Ohio,
where her father, the late Levi Parsons, was engaged in the lumber busi-
ness for many years. She received excellent educational advantages
and is a woman of most gracious personality as well as distinctive cul-
ture. Her artistic tastes and ability have been brought to bear most
effectively in connection with the development of the picturesque beauties
of the Upland district. It was principally due to her effective efforts
that solid cemented granite walls were adopted for the curbing of upper
Euclid avenue, as well as for the construction of driveways of private
residences. She has also been appealed to for suggestions in the de- ,
signing- and beautifying of many of the beautiful homes of Upland and
its vicinity, and is a prominent factor in connection with the best social
activities of the community. No children have been born of the mar-
riage of Mr. and Mrs. Nelson, but Mrs. Nelson has four daughters by
her first marriage, namely: Pierre Dola, Caroline L., Marie K. and Har-
riet.

ROBERT S. HAUPT. An executive officer who is ably aiding in main-
taining the high standard of the police department of the city of Los
Angeles and who is a well known and popular citizen of the beautiful
metropolis of southern California, is Captain Robert S. Haupt, who is
in charge of the central division of the metropolitan police service of
this city.

Captain Haupt is a scion of that sturdy, industrious and thrifty
German stock that early assumed a place of prominence in connection
with the development of the resources of the old Keystone state of the
Union, and he takes a due pride in claiming that fine commonwealth
as the place of his nativity. The Captain was born in Allegheny county,
Pennsylvania, on the 22d of January, 1863, and is the son of Jonathan
and Katherine ( Lankarcl) Haupt, both of whom were born and reared
in that state, where the respective families, of staunch German lineage,
were founded in the pioneer epoch. Soon after the birth of Captain
Haupt, the family removed to the west, and resided in turn in Illinois,
Iowa and Missouri, the father in the meanwhile devoting his attention
to agricultural pursuits, in connection with which he exemplified the
characteristic energy, circumspection and progressiveness of the "Penn-
sylvania Dutch" stock. He was a resident of Adair county, Missouri,
at the time of his death, in 1891, and the mother of Captain
Haupt died in Macon county, that state, in 1872. Of the children of
this union, two sons and one daughter are living.

Though a native of the old Keystone state, Captain Haupt was
reared in the Mississippi valley and is a thorough westerner in spirit.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 281

He early gained benignant fellowship with honest toil and endeavor,
and while thus learning the lessons of practical industry, he also availed
himself duly of the advantages of the public schools of the various places
in which the family resided after coming to the middle west. He was
graduated in the high school at East Des Moines, Iowa, as a member
of the class of 1882, and he then put his scholastic attainments to prac-
tical test by turning his attention to the pedagogic profession, in which
he was a successful and popular teacher in Iowa for two school years
and for five years in the public schools of Sullivan county, Missouri.

In the spring of 1886, as a young man of twenty-three years, Cap-
tain Haupt came to California, and after remaining for a brief interval
in San Francisco, he made his way to the great redwood forests of
Mendocino county, where he found employment in the lumber camps
during the summer of 1886. In the autumn of that year, he proceeded
south to the Sacramento valley, where he worked on a ranch during
the winter. In the summer of 1887 he secured employment as a car-
penter and assisted in the erection of the famous Hotel Del Coronado,
at Coronado Beach, San Diego county. In September of that year he
removed to Los Angeles, where he has since maintained his home, —
a period of nearly a quarter of a century, — and it has been a matter of
great satisfaction to him to witness the magnificent development and prog-
ress of the gem city of southern California, — a place dear to him through
many pleasing associations. For a time after his arrival in Los Angeles,
Captain Haupt here found employment at the carpenter's trade, and for
seven years thereafter he was in the employ of the Los Angeles Railway
Company, on the old cable line. Upon severing his association with this
company he identified himself with the city's police department, in which
he assumed the position of patrolman on the 22d of October, 1895. Faith-
ful and discriminating service marked his course and on the ist of Decem-
ber, 1903, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant. April i, 1909. marked
his advance to the rank of lieutenant, and on the ist of September, 1910,
further recognition of his efficiency and sterling personal character-
istics was given in his promotion to his present rank, that of captain.
He has been in charge of the central division of the police department
since January, 1911, and in this important post he has added new honors
to his record as a public official and able executive. He is a thorough
disciplinarian and yet his fairness and intrinsic kindliness have gained
and retained to him the confidence, high esteem and loyal co-operation
of those serving under his direction. Efficiency and honesty are his
watchwords in connection with the work of the police department, and
his efforts have aided in the conserving of peace and order, the while
he has the high regard of the people of the city that has so long repre-
sented his home. In a generic sense, where national and state issues
are involved. Captain Haupt is a staunch supporter of the cause of the
Republican party, but in local affairs he gives his vote for men and
measures meeting the approval of his judgment, irrespective of parti-
san lines. He was raised to the degree of Master Mason in Golden
State Lodge, No. 358, Free and Accepted Masons, in the year 1906,
and since that time he has advanced to the thirty-second degree of
the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite of Masonry, and in which he is

282 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

affiliated with Los Angeles Consistory No. 3, Al Malaikah Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. Mrs. Haupt
is a member of the First United Brethren church of Los Angeles and
is a popular factor in the social circles in which she moves.

On the 3 1st of July 1893, Captain Haupt was united in marriage
to Miss Nellie B. Dodson, who was born in the city of Elkhart, Indiana,
and who is a daughter of the late Samuel Dodson.

JAMES L. PAUL. In the death of Colonel James Lochry Paul, at
his home in Upland, San Bernardino county, on the 5th of April, 1911,
there passed away a man who had contributed much to the development
and civic prosperity of this favored section of the state, and also one whose
life was marked by large and worthy accomplishment along varied lines.
He was a gallant soldier in the great conflict through which the integrity
of our republic was perpetuated, and his distinguished ability was on
a parity with his sterling attributes of character. Generous and kindly,
dignified and affable, he ever commanded the unqualified confidence
and esteem of his fellow men and when he was summoned to the life
eternal, his passing was deeply mourned by a host of friends, both in
California and other sections of the Union.

James Lochry Paul was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania,
on the ~th of March, 1840, and was the seventh in order of birth of the
nine children of John and Sarah (Thompson) Paul. The lineage of
Colonel Paul shows a blending of staunch Scotch and Irish strains, and
the family was founded in America in the earl)- colonial epoch. Repre-
sentatives of the name attained to distinction in military and civic affairs
during the formative period of the nation's history, and in memoirs
prepared by Colonel Paul, several years prior to his demise, were written
the following significant statements : "Our forefathers passed through
scenes that tried their souls and called out the highest heroism and
self-sacrifice. They bore their part in the terrible war with Indian
savages, from 1775 to 1784. They shared in the toils and sufferings
and triumphs of the Revolutionary struggle that secured American In-
dependence. It was this class and character of people that constituted
for several generations the advance guard of American civilization."
These words, spoken specifically of his own ancestors, indicate Colonel
Paul's deep appreciation of their lives and labors and showed that he
recognized the debt that posterity ever owes to the past.

Samuel J. Paul, grandfather of him to whom this memoir is dedi-
cated, was one of the first men of Scotch-Irish descent to be chosen
a justice or magistrate in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, where
the greater number of'the settlers were of German extraction, and he was
a man of distinctive prominence and influence in his community. He
wedded Miss Jennie Porterfield and they became the parents of seven
children, of whom John, father of Colonel Paul, was born in Westmore-
land county, in the year 1803. He was there reared to years of maturity
and there was solmnized his marriage to Miss Sarah Thompson, daughter
of Samuel and Jane (Lochry) Thompson, of Washington township, that
county. John and Sarah Paul passed their entire lives in Westmoreland
countv and both were well advanced in vears at the time of their death.

THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX AND
TTLDFN FOUNDATIONS

R L

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 285

.Mrs. Paul \vas born in the year 1804, and was a granddaughter of Colonel
Lochry, who raised and commanded a company of Westmoreland county
militia that started forth to join the command of General George Rogers
Clark, the gallant little band being, however, cut off by the Indians, who
killed the members of the party with all of savage brutality. John Paul
was identified with the great basic industry of agriculture throughout
his entire active career and was one of the substantial and highly hon-
ored citizens of his native county at the time of his death.

Born and reared on the old homestead farm, the conditions and in-
fluences that compassed Colonel Paul during his boyhood and youth
were of benignant order, and he early learned to appreciate the dignity
and value of honest toil and endeavor. He was afforded the advantages
of the common schools of his native county and by self-discipline and wide
and varied experience he became a man of broad culture and well forti-
fied opinions. When the dark cloud of Civil war cast its pall over the
national horizon, he subordinated all other interests to go forth in de-
fence of the Union. In response to President Lincoln's first call for
troops he enlisted, on the ist of August, 1861, as a private in Company A,
Sixty-third Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, which was commanded by
Colonel Alexander Hays and which was assigned to General Phil Kear-
ney's division of the Third Army Corps of the Army of the Potomac. His
original enlistment was for a period of three years, and he participated
in many of the important engagements marking the early progress of
the great conflict between the north and south. On the loth of Decem-
ber, 1863, Colonel Paul re-enlisted, as a veteran volunteer, while in the
field in Virginia, and on the ist of the following August, at the expi-
ration of his original term of enlistment, he was transferred to Company
I, One Hundred and Fifth Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteer Infantry,
with which he continued in active service until the close of the war.
He endured to the full the hardships and perils of the great internecine
combat and well upheld the prestige of the family name for patriotism
and loyal service under arms. For gallant and long continued service,
and as a mark of high personal regard, Governor John W. Gear}-, of
Pennsylvania, before retiring from the gubernatorial chair, in January,
1873, gave to Colonel Paul commission to rank as brevet lieutenant
colonel, and the text of this commission is here reproduced, as a consis-
tent means of perpetuation :

Know ye that Tames L. Paul, having enlisted in the late war, in
August, 1861, as private in Company A, Sixty-third Regiment, Pennsyl-
vania Volunteers, and had promotion to corporal and from that to
sergeant, and re-enlisted in field as veteran volunteer, December 10, 1863,
and served for a period of five years and twenty-two days, not having
been discharged till August 2.2, 1866. That during his said service he
participated in engagements at Yorktown, Williamsburg, Fair Oaks, Or-
chard, Seven Days' battles, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Wapping Heights.
Auburn Mills, Mine Run and Petersburg; at the pursuit and capture of
the Confederate Army at Appotomattox. Know, then, I, John W. Geary,
governor aforesaid, in consideration of his gallant and meritorious ser-
vices during the said war to suppress the rebellion, do hereby promote

Vol. I— 15

286 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXU GENEALOGY

and commission the said [ames L. Paul to be a lieutenant colonel by bre-
vet, to rank as such from i8th of January, 1873.
By the Governor. FRAXCIS JOKDAX.

Secretary of the Commonwealth.

After the close uf the war. Colonel Paul was appointed to a position
in the war department, in the city of Washington, and he retained this in-
cumbency about one year, after which he passed a year at his old home
in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania. In November, 1868, Governor
Geary appointed him chief department clerk of the Pennsylvania soldiers'
orphans' school at Harrisburg, and he retained this position for eighteen
consecutive years, with offices in the state capitol.

In 1886, impaired health caused Colonel Paul to resign his office and
he soon afterward came to California and numbered himself among the
early settlers in the Ontario colony, in San Bernardino county. In the
immediate vicinity of the present attractive little city of Upland he se-
cured a tract of unimproved land, from which he cleared the sage brush
and instituted the development of an orange grove. He eventually became
one of the leading fruit growers of the county and acquired a large estate
through his well directed efforts. He contributed materially to the civic
and industrial development of this section and was specially interested in
the upbuilding of his home town of Upland. As a director of the Califor-
nia Fruit Exchange and as president of the Upland Citrus Association,
for a period of sixteen years, he became widely known throughout the
state, and his aid and influence were ever given unreservedly to the
fostering of enterprises and measures tending to advance the general
welfare of his home city, county and state, to which his loyalty was one
begotten of deep appreciation of attractions and opulent resources. He
was one of the organizers and original stockholders of the Commercial
Bank of Upland. He was elected president of the original institution
at the time of its incorporation and held this office for several year.-.
He was a member of the advisory board of the San Antonio Water
Company, and in that capacity gave effective service in the development
of the water power facilities that have so signally conserved the progress
and prosperity of San Bernardino county. He was also a member of the
directorates of the American Petroleum Company, the California Fruit
Exchange and the Los Angeles Hospital.

Colonel Paul identified himself with the Republican party upon attain-
ing to his legal majority and he ever afterward continued an uncompro-
mising supporter of its principles and policies, the while he gave effective
service in behalf of its cause. He was a delegate from California to the
Republican National convention of 1904, in Philadelphia, when Roosevelt
was made the party's standard bearer, and in 1908 he was a delegate to
the national convention in the city of Chicago, where he earnestly sup-
ported the nomination of President Taft. He was earnest and zealous
in connection with the manouevering of political forces in his home state
and took an active part in the various campaigns during the entire period
of his residence in California. He was affiliated with the Los Angeles Chap-
ter of the Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, was actively
identified with the Grand Army of the Republic for many years prior to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 2*7

his death, and lie also held membership in the Masonic fraternity.
Early in life Colonel Paul became a member of the Presbyterian church,
and his devotion to the work of the church was of the most insistent type,
the while he exemplified his abiding Christian faith in his daily life. He
contributed with much liberality to the various departments of church
work and especially to the upbuilding of new churches. He served as
elder in his church for many years and was one of its veritable pillars
of strength. Kindly and tolerant in judgment and appreciative of the
well-springs of human thought and action, he was ever ready to aid and
succor those in afflicion and distress, and while he would never compro-
mise with objective wrong or injustice, his heart was attuned to pity and
had no room for revenge or bigotry of view. True and constant and sin-
cere in all the relations of life, Colonel Paul was a man among men, and
he well merited the uniform confidence and esteem accorded him by all
with whom he came in contact.

At Sharon. Pennsylvania, on the eighteenth of October, 1871, was sol-
emnized the marriage of Colonel Paul to Miss Frances Mary Wheeler,
daughter of the late Hon. Earl A. Wheeler, who was for half a century
one of the leading manufacturers and most influential business men of
Pennsylvania, where he was long and permanently identified with the
iron industry, and where he served with distinction as a member of the
state legislature. He died at his old homestead in Sharon, Pennsylvania,
on the 2oth of August, 1905, at the age of seventy-seven years.

In the sacred precincts of his home the noble qualities of Colonel
Paul found their brightest lustre, and, while his death was an irreparable
loss to those nearest and dearest to him, there must ever be to them a
measure of consolation and compensation in the gracious memories of
their close and benignant association in the years that have passed.
Colonel Paul died at half past six on the evening of Wednesday. April 5.
1911, and his remains rest in the beautiful cemetery at Upland, where he
held the affectionate regard of all who had come within the sphere of
his influence. Mrs. Paul remains in the beautiful home at Upland, and the
same is endeared to her by the hallowed associations of the past. Of the
three children. Mary Hill, the firstborn, died in infancy : Alice is the
wife of Edward C. Harwood of Upland ; and Earl Wheeler remains with
his widowed mother.

ALFRED P. HARWOOD. Worthy of special recognition as one of those
who have been prominent and influential in connection with the develop-
ment of the splendid natural resources and incidental business interests
of southern California is this well known and highly honored citizen of
Upland, San Bernardino county, and here his capitalistic interests are
of wide scope and varied order. In numerous lines of enterprise he has
here been closely associated with his elder brother, Charles E. Harwood.
of whose career specific record is made on other pages of this work.

Alfred Perez Harwood claims the old Green Mountain state as the
place of his nativity and is a scion of old and honored families whose
names have been identified with the history of New England since the
early colonial era. Adequate data concerning the family history is given
in the sketch of the life of Charles E. Harwood, and thus it is not neces-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

sary to repeat the same in the article at hand. Mr. Harwood was born
un the old homestead farm of his father, near the city of Bennington,
Vermont, and the date of his nativity was November 19, 1838. He is the
tilth in order of birth of the six children of Hiram and Eliza (Haswell )
Harwood, both of whom passed the closing years of their lives in Upland,
California. Air. Harwood is indebted to the common schools of his native
county for his early educational discipline, and as he was the youngest of
the three sons, he remained on the home farm, to assist in its work and
management, the while his elder brothers and his three sisters attended
higher institutions of learning. He remained on the old home farm
until 1864, when he removed with his parents and other members of the
family to Crystal Lake, Mclienry county, Illinois, where his next older
brother, Rev. James H. Harwood, was pastor of a Congregational church.
In that county he continued to be actively identified with agricultural
pursuits for a period of about five years, and in the meanwhile he was
married. In 18(18, he removed with his wife to Springfield. Missouri,
and soon afterward he became land agent for what is now the St. Louis
and San Francisco Railroad. He retained this important office for a
period of fifteen years, within which he passed thousands of nights in
primitive cabins in the Ozark mountains. He sold to settlers more than
two hundred thousand acres in Missouri and Arkansas, and upon resign-
ing his position in the employ of the railroad company he engaged in the
real estate busness and in general farming near Springfield, Missouri,
where he became the owner of two well improved farms, devoted to di-
versified agriculture and to the raising of excellent grades of live stock.
In March, 1888, Mr. Harwood came to California and established his
permanent home in L'pland. San Bernardino county. In the preceding
year he had purchased land in and near this place and had erected a
substantial residence at the corner of Euclid avenue and Twenty-second
street. He forthwith planted an orange grove of thirty acres, and there
he continued to reside for eighteen years, within which he developed one
of the best fruit orchards in the county. He then retired from active
work in connection with this line of industry and has since occupied the
beautiful modern residence which he erected in Upland. Since coming to
San Bernardino county, Mr. Harwood has planted and developed one hun-
dred acres of fruit orchards, devoted to the propagation of citrus fruits,
and he held this property at the time of his retirement from active busi-
ness. He took an active part in. effecting the organization of the California
Fruit Exchange and represented the Ontario-Cucamonga Fruit Exchange
as a director in that organization for sixteen years. He was a director for
a like period of the board of the California Fruit Exchange which met
weekly at Los Angeles. In 1890 Mr. Harwood became one of the interested
principals in the organization and incorporation of the Citizen's Bank of
Ontario, the second banking institution founded in what was known as the
Ontario colony, and he was a member of the same for a period of about
twenty years. He also assisted in the organization of the Citizens' National
Bank of Upland, of which he has been a director from the time of the in-
corporation and of which his brother Charles E. is president. I^ater he was
concerned in the organization of the Citizens' Savings Bank of Upland, of
the directorate of which he has been continuously a member from the time

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY i'*'.i

of incorporation, his brother likewise being president of this popular in-
stitution. He was associated in the organization of the People's Mutual
Building and Loan Association, of Ontario, one of the most successful
corporations of the kind in the state and one that has exercised large and
benignant influence in the development and upbuilding of San Bernardino
county. He has been president of this association from the time of its
organization, — more than twenty years ago, — and it is largely due to his
effective administration that the corporation has exercised its functions
with such marked success. For fifteen years he gave his time and energies
to the work of this association without remuneration, and in many other
ways has he shown his civic loyalty and progressiveness. He has brought
to bear splendid energies and honorable methods in the furtherance of
the various enterprises with which he has here identified himself, and
his public spirit has been of the most insistent and helpful order. Through
the agency of the People's Mutual Building and Loan Association, have
been erected the greater number of the residences in the thriving little
cities of Upland and Ontario, and thus the citizens have been able to
secure good homes and positions of independence. Every measure anil
enterprise projected for the benefit of the community in general has re-
ceived the earnest support of Mr. Harwood, and at one time he was a
member of the directorate of each of eleven corporations for the pro-
motion of the industrial and social progress and well being of this section
of the state. He has now retired from active association with many of
these concerns, in order to enjoy the rewards of former years of earnest
endeavor along normal and productive lines of enterprise. He is asso-
ciated with his brother Charles in the holding of extensive oil interests
in Mexico, where their company purchased nearly five hundred thousand
acres of land and about ten thousand head of horses and cattle. Mr.
Harwood's early experience in connection with farming and live stock
interests has made his interposition of great value in extensive operations
along these lines in Mexico, where he has had active supervision of the
live-stock interests of the company in which he is a large stockholder.
He passes about four months each year on the great ranch in Mexico,
during the winter seasons, and much of this time he is found in the sad-
dle, making the rounds of the ranch and directing its affairs, with the
effective assistance of its general superintendent. This ranch lies in the
valley along the course of the Tamisee river for a distance of sixty-five
miles, and in connection with its oil and live-stock operations, employment
is given to fully seventeen hundred persons.

In politics, as might be expected of a son of sturdy New England,
that cradle of so much of our national history. Mr. Harwood is found ar-
rayed as an uncompromising advocate of the principles and policies for
which the Republican party stands sponsor, but he has manifested no
predilection for the honors or emoluments of public office, though em-
phatically loyal to all civic duties and responsibilities. He and his family
hold membership in the Congregational church and he and Mrs. Harwood
have long been zealous in the various departments of its work. \Yith the
exception of an interim of about three years he has been a deacon of the
church of this denomination in Ontario, and he is now senior deacon of the

L'90 AMKRICAX BIOGRAPHY AX1> GEXEALOGY

>ainc. The family is well known in San Bernardino county and it? mem-
bers enjoy the unequivocal esteem of all who know them.

On the 23cl of Xovember. 181.4. at Crystal Lake. Illinois, was solem-
nized the marriage of Mr. Harwood to .Miss Margaret J. Burton, who has
proved a most devoted companion and helpmeet during the long interven-
ing years. She was born at B Ian ford, Massachusetts, on the I4th of
November. 1842, and Is a daughter of Stephen and Elizabeth (Jackson)
Burton, the former of whom was born at Albany. Xe\v York, and the
latter in Massachusetts Mr. Burton \vas reared to maturity in the home
of an uncle, at Blanford. Massachusetts, and there he married Mi-s Eliza-
beth Jackson, a native of that place. They removed to Illinois and be-
came pioneer> of McIIenry county, where 'Mr. Burton became a pros-
u s farmer, near Crystal Lake, and where he passed the residue of
his life. Mr. and Mrs. Harwood became the parents of two sons and
rive daughters, one of the latter dying in infancy, and Lillian at the age
of seven years; Alfred James was sixteen years of age at the time of
his death, and concerning the three surviving children the following
brief data are given : Emma B. is the wife of Butler A. Woodford.
manager of the California Fruit Exchange at Los Angeles, but his place of
residence is Claremont. Los Angeles county ; Grace Margaret is the wife
of Ernest W. Thayer. secretary of the Upland Fruit Exchange; and
Frank F£. is manager of the lemon Exchange at San Dimas. Los Angeles
county.

JOHX B. TAYS. Of the functions assigned to this historical publi-
cation, one of the most important is that of according tributes to sterling
citizens who have left their impress upon the industrial and civic upbuild-
ing of the state of California and who have now passed to the life eternal.
Such an one was the late John Bernard Tays. who was one of the sterling
pioneers of San Bernardino county, where he became a settler in the old-
time Ontario colony and where he became prominently identified with
the development of the citrus-fruit industry. He was a man of energy,
abilitv and honor, and he so ordered his course in all the relations of life
as to merit and receive the implicit confidence and esteem of his fellow
men.

John B. Tays was born in the province of Xi >va So >tia. Canada, on the
6th of September. 184^. and was a son of John B. and Mary I Ellis") Tays.
both of whom were likewise natives of Xova Scotia. — the former having
been of Scotch-Irish and the latter of English lineage. The respective
families were founded in Xova Scotia at an early period in the history
of that sturdy maritime province, and there the parents of the subject
of this memoir continued to reside until their death. They became the
parents of five sons and two daughters, all of whom attained to years of
maturity. The eldest son. Rev. Joseph Tays. became a clergyman of the
Protestant Episcopal church and was one of its earliest representatives
in the state of Texas, where he established his home in the pioneer days.
before the construction of railroads in that section, and where he erected
the first church edifice of his denomination in El Paso. He was zealous in
his noble calling, in which he labored for many years, with all of earnest-
and consecration, and he was one of the foremost in the upbuilding

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ui the interests of the Episcopal church in the Lone Star commonwealth,
where he continued to reside until his death, in 1884, as the result of an
attack of smallpox. He owned the church property of the parish of
which he long served as rector, but deeded the same to the parish prior to
his demise. William, another of the sons went to Australia when a young
man and was drowned at sea while on the homeward voyage. The only
son now living is Alexander, a resident of the state of Oklahoma, and the
two daughters still maintain their home in Nova Scotia.

Of the seven children, John B. Tays was the sixth in order of birth,
and he was reared to adult age on the old homestead farm in his native
province, to whose common schools he was indebted for his early edu-
cational training. When about twenty years of age, in company with his
brother James, he went to British Columbia, where he was engaged in
mining for gold for several years, with indifferent success. He there-
after followed the same line of enterprise in Montana for two years, and
there both brothers were successful in their efforts. In 1872, they went
to Texas, making the entire journey on horseback, and located at El Paso.
There John B. Tays identified himself with railroad construction work,
by operating a boarding train between El Paso and points to which the
line progressed in Mexico. Later he engaged in farming near El Paso,
on land which is now included within the corporate limits of the city.
For a time he also conducted the Rio Grande hotel, at El Paso, one of
the leading frontier caravansaries of the locality. He served as a mem-
ber of the Texas Rangers at the period when the settlers along the border
were having more or less trouble with their Mexican neighbors. Judge-
Howard, one of the leading citizens of El Paso, was a member of the same
military band and in the first conflict with the Mexicans he was captured
by them, and was promptly shot and killed, as were also two others of
his command. In 1881-2, Mr. Tays further diversified the experiences
of his eventful career by engaging in the general merchandise business
in Mexico, to various points in which republic he transported his supplies
by pack trains. He brought to bear in his various undertakings much busi-
ness ability and indefatigable energy, and success attended his well di-
rected endeavors.

In 1883, Mr. Tays decided to seek a more desirable field of operations,
and he accordingly came to southern California, where he soon afterward
established his permanent home in the Ontario colony of San Bernardino
county. Here he purchased forty acres of land lying along the east side
of the present Euclid avenue, between Twelfth and Thirteenth streets, at
a point less than a mile distant from the present business center of the
thriving little city of Upland. He paid for the property at the rate of
three hundred dollars per acre, and at this time Upland was known as
Xorth Ontario. But little improvement had been made on the land in
this district and, with characteristic energy and discrimination, Mr. Tays
initiated the work of developing his property. He cleared the land of its
sage brush and other natural vegetable growths and planted the tract to
oranges, lemons, grapes, etc. For several years he operated a vineyard
of twenty acres and in connection with the same engaged in the manu-
facturing of wine. After his orange and lemon trees began bearing, he
replanted his vineyard to citrus fruit trees. His original orange grove

294 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

was one of the first planted in this district and it eventually became a
large producer. Mr. Tays finally sold his original tract of land for forty
thousand dollars. This transaction was made in 1892, and he had brought
about the improvement and development of fifty-five acres devoted tu
the propagation of citrus fruits. He was careful in its management and
utilized the best scientific methods, so that he wielded much influence
in connection with the progress of this favored section as one of the
best fruit-growing districts of the state.

As a citizen, Mr. Tays was essentially alert, progressive and public-
spirited, and no worthy enterprise projected for the general good of the
community failed to receive his earnest support. He was specially influ-
ential in the upbuilding of the original town of Ontario, where he erected
in the autumn of 1883, the second residence, without any claims to pre-
tentiousness. This building, which is still standing, is located on the
south side of G street, just west of Euclid avenue, and is now near the
business center of Ontario, which Mr. Tays aided in developing from a
straggling settlement into a thriving little city which now has a popula-
tion of about five thousand. After several years of residence in the home
mentioned, Mr. Tays removed to his fruit ranch, where he erected a
modern and attractive dwelling and where he continued to reside until
1892, when he sold the property and retired with a competency. He
thereupon purchased two acres of land at the head of Euclid avenue, on
the electric interurban line, where he erected the fine modern dwelling
which represented his home until his death. He took great interest in
the adorning of his home and its surroundings, and the place has m< »t
attractive landscape gardening, with fine ornamental and fruit trees,
shrubberies, flowers, etc., — all representing his taste and efforts. Mr. Tays
invented the so-called gravity street car which was used for several
years at Ontario. Mules or horses were used to draw the cars up grade
and the down trips the animals were carried on the cars, which ran down
grade by their own momentum, a distance of six miles. Mr. Tays was an
earnest supporter of educational and religious work and in the latter field
he contributed to the furtherance of the affairs of various church denom-
inations. He donated the lot on which was erected the first church
building of the Methodist Episcopal church in the Ontario colony, and
this little organization has developed into one of the strongest churches
in this section of the county.

In 1894 Mr. Tays went to South America, where he had become iden-
tified with mining interests, and he there remained for two years. He
passed the following year at his home in Upland, and then returned to
South America, where he was destined to lose his life in a most froward
and pitiable accident. On the 6th of May, 1900, he was one of one
hundred and fifty persons who were drowned at the Tumatumari falls of
the Rio Pataro. in South America. The accident occurred when the
launch "Mabel," with three smaller boats in tow, was drawn over the
falls, in whose tubulent waters the many victims were drowned. The
body of Mr. Tays was recovered and was interred at the point where he
met his death. The tragic termination of a life of such nobility and use-
fulness was a shock to the many friends of Mr. Tays, and entailed irre-
trievable loss to the cherished and loving wife, to whom his devotion had

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :_».ir.

been of the greatest. He was a man who stood "four-square to every
wind that blows," and he made his life count for good in all its relations.
In religious affairs Air. Tays was broad and tolerant in his views but had
the deepest reverence for the spiritual varieties and was ready to aid in
the support of religious work, without regard to denominational lines.
He attended the Episcopal church, while his widow has long been a zeal-
ous member of the Presbyterian church, and his well fortified opinions
in regard to matters of public import led him to identify himself with the
Republican party, though he had no ambition for the honors or emolu-
ments of public office.

On the ist of May, 1878, at El Paso, Texas, Mr. Tays was united in
marriage to Mrs. Amelia (Rohmann) St. Vrain, widow of Vincent St.
Vrain, who was for many years in the employ of the Mexican govern-
ment, for which his father, Colonel Cerau St. Vrain had been a large
contractor in the early days. Mr. St. Yrain is not survived by children
and Mr. and Mrs. Tays became the parents of none, though they reared
in their home two daughters of the latter's brother, and to these foster-
children they gave the best of educational advantages. Mrs. Tays was
born in Galena, Illinois, on the I3th of March, 1843, and few women
have had a more varied and eventful experience. She is a daughter of
Anton 1!. and Mary Ann (Swope) Rohmann, both natives of Germany.
The father was born in the kingdom of Bavaria, in 1802, and the mother
in Hanover, in June of 1809. Anton Bernard Rohmann came with an
elder brother to America when he was a boy, and after attaining to years
of maturity he was engaged in mercantile pursuits for several years, — at
St. Louis, Missouri, and Galena, Illinois. He was successful in his ef-
forts and in 1847 he sold his business and property at Galena, on account
of impaired health, and located at Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he con-
tinued in the mercantile business for some time. He then removed to
the southern part of that territory and finally established his residence in
El Paso. Texas, where he was a pioneer merchant and where he continued
to reside until his death, on the 2d of September, 1872. at the age of
seventy years. He established a flourishing trade on the frontier, and on
several occasions he met with the loss of goods which \vere stolen by the
Indians while the train of wagons was making its way across the plains to
El Paso. Mrs. Rohmann survived her husband by many years, and she
passed the gracious evening of her life in the home of her daughter, Mrs.
Tays, at Upland, where she died on the iSth of March, 1896, at the vener-
able age of eighty-seven years. This noble and versatile woman passed
the major part of her life on the frontier and endured the full tension of
the same. In January, 1854, she joined her husband in Juarez, Mexico,
whither she was accompanied by her daughter, Mrs. Tays, and by her
niece. Elizabeth Rohmann, both of whom were children at the time. Mrs.
Rohmann was the first white woman to cross the Rio Grande fiver into
the wilds of Mexico. \Yith her two young charges she made the trip by
boat from St. Louis to New Orleans, and thence voyaged across the gulf
of Mexico to Galveston. Texas, from which point she made her way
across the plains and over the mountains to her destination, which she
reached eighteen days later. Mrs. Tays likewise has had a broad ex-
perience in connection with frontier and pioneer life, and notwithstand-

-296 AMERICAN I'.IOGRAI'HY AXU GENEALOGY

ing the conditions and vicissitudes she has found opportunity to train her
mind most effectually and to become a woman of distinctive culture. She
is a valued and popular factor in the best social activities of her home
community, where her circle of friends is coincident with that of her
acquaintances, and she still occupies the beautiful home at Upland, where
she dispenses a refined hospitality.

Y Y. SIIOUP. One of the representative members of the Cali-
fornia bar and one of broad and exact professional attainments. Mr.
Shoup is now one of the prominent and valued members of the legal
department of the Southern Pacific Railway Company, with residence
and headquarters in San Francisco, where are established the general
offices of this corporation.

Mr. Shoup claims the Hawkeye state as the place of his nativity.
as he was born at Bedford, the judicial center of Taylor county, Iowa,
on the 7th of February, 1872. He is a son of Timothy Y. and Sarah
(Sumner) Shoup, and further reference to the family history is not
demanded in this connection, as a review of the career of the father
of Mr. Shoup appears on other pages of this publication, with adequate
incidental data concerning the genealogy in both the paternal and ma-
ternal lines. Guy Y. Shoup was a child of about two years at the time
of the family removal to California, and the home was established at
San Bernardino, where he was reared to adult age and where he duly
availed himself of the advantages of the well ordered public schools.
At the age of sixteen years he assumed a clerical position in the law
office of Hon. Byron Waters, of that city, and in addition to his duties
in this position he began the study of law under the effective and con-
siderate preceptorship of his employer. He thoroughly grounded him-
self in the science of jurisprudence under these auspicious conditions.
and in 1893 he was admitted to the bar, by the supreme court of the
state. Later he was admitted to practice in the United States circuit
courts of California, Nevada and Idaho, as well as in the supreme
courts of these states. From April, 1893. until the autumn of the fol-
lowing year he was associated with his former and honored preceptor
in the work of his profession. He then removed to Boise, the capital
of the state of Idaho, where he was engaged in active practice until
1896, when, at the request of Mr. Waters, who had in the meanwhile
become chief of the claims department of the Southern Pacific Railway
Company, he returned to California and became an attache of the same
department, in San Francisco. In 1901 there came definite recognition
of his valuable service in that he was promoted to the position of
assistant land attorney for the company, in which capacity he continued
to serve until 1907, when he was appointed attorney for the company
in the state of Nevada, with headquarters at Reno. There he remained
until the summer of 1909, when he was recalled to the general offices
of the corporation, in San Francisco, to become a member of its gen-
eral legal department, in which he has since continued to give most
effective service in the handling of legal matters of broad scope and
importance. He has gained reputation as one of the leading corporation
lawyer? of the state which has been his home during the major part of

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his life and to which his loyalty is of the most insistent and apprecia-
tive type. His success in his profession has been large and he has also
identified himself with various important corporations. He is a. mem-
ber of the directorate of each of the Associated Oil Company, the Central
Pacific Railroad Company, the Nevada & California Railway Company,
the California & Northeastern Railway Company, and the Coast Line
Railway Company.

In politics .Mr. Shoup gives a stalwart allegiance to the Republican
party and he takes a lively interest in the questions and issues of the
hour, as well as in all matters touching the welfare of his home state.
He is a popular member of the Transportation Club of San Francisco,
and he maintains his residence in the attractive suburb of Los Altos.
Mrs. Shoup holds membership in the Baptist church and is a popular
factor in the social activities of her home community.

In June, 1906, Mr. Shoup was united in marriage to Miss M. Adell
Colliver. daughter of Dr. Jefferson T. Colliver, a representative physi-
cian of San Bernardino, California, to which state the family removed
from Ohio, where Mrs. Shoup was born. Mr. and Mrs. Shoup have
a winsome little daughter, Frances Elizabeth, who was born December
2, iqo8.

THOMAS F. FINN. In these days of all too prevalent official mal-
feasance and "grafting" in the various departments of public service it
is gratifying and refreshing to review the salient points in the official
career of the present able and honored sheriff of the city and county
of San Francisco, for not only has he made a splendid record in his
present incumbency, but he has also served in both branches of the state
legislature, and in all of his association with public affairs his course has
been marked by impregnable integrity and by unquestioned fidelity. The
attributes indicate the man as he is. and it is but natural that he* should
have so strong a hold upon popular confidence and esteem in his native
city and county, where he has risen to prominence and influence through
appreciable merits and effective services in behalf of the general public.
A clean, able and praiseworthy record is his, and in his present office his
services have been of special value, as he has been fearless in the per-
formance of his onerous duties and has also proved a most efficient and
progressive executive.

Sheriff Finn comes of staunch old Irish stock and is £ member of a
family whose name has been identified with the state of California for
more than two score of years. He was born in San Francisco, on the j^d
of November, 1873. The incumbent of the shrievalty in 1911 was ac-
corded the advantages of the parochial and public schools of his native
city and initiated his active career in the modest capacity of teamster.
A few years later he became connected with the Lindauer Stable Com-
pany, which conducted an extensive business, and with which he con-
tinued to be identified for a number of years before his entrance into
public service.

A stalwart Republican in his political allegiance, Mr. Finn has been
an active worker in behalf of its cause, and his eligibility for official
preferment soon attracted attention, with the result that in 1902 he was

:-{(X) AMERICAN I'.IOGKAl'HY AND GENEALOGY

elected to represent the San Francisco district in the lower house of the
state legislature. He made an admirable record in the general assembly,
and in 1908 he was elected state senator from the Seventeenth senatorial
district. In the upper house he likewise proved a valuable working mem-
ber, both on the floor and in the deliberations of the committee room.
In all the positions of public trust to which he has been called he has
fully justified the confidence reposed in him and has brought to the dis-
charge of his duties a high order of intelligence and civic loyalty, together
with a fidelity from which no matter of personal expediency could cause
the slightest deviation. In 1903 he was elected a member of the board
of supervisors of San Francisco county, and in the same year was ap-
pointed a member of the city board of police commissioners, as well as
fire commissioner. In 1905, in the regime of Sheriff O'Neill. Mr. Finn
was appointed under sheriff, and in this position he became thoroughly
familiar with manifold responsibilities and duties of the shrievalty of a
metropolitan district. During the great conflagration following the ca-
lamitous earthquake which brought havoc to San Francisco in 1906, Mr.
Finn, in his capacity of under-sheriff, had charge of the prisoners of the
old Broadway jail, and during the extraordinary conditions that followed
in the wake of the ever memorable disaster he had personal supervision
of hundreds of prisoners. He individually had direct charge of their
transference to various points across the bay, and when order had been
measureably restored from chaos he returned them to San Francisco,
without the loss of a man.

His intrepid courage and excellent administrative powers while serv-
ing as under-sheriff marked Air. Finn as a logical candidate for the
office of sheriff, to which he was elected, by a gratifying majority, on the
2d of November, 1909, for the regular term of two years. In this office,
while laboring under many extraordinary difficulties, he has effected many
reforms and, through persistent effort, has secured legislation tending
to correct abuses that had long existed.

The report of the grand jury, under date of February 14, 1911, voices
in unequivocal terms the opinion of that body concerning Mr. Finn's
conduct of the office of sheriff, and the document, herewith reproduced,
is one of which any incumbent could justly feel proud: To the Foreman
and Members of the Grand jury of the City and County of San Francisco.
Gentlemen — Your committee, after its investigation into the affairs and
conditions of the sheriff's office, begs leave to report as follows :

The quarters occupied by the sheriff are small and poorly equipped
for the great amount of business transacted therein. We have made a
careful investigation of this office and have found that the system in
checking and keeping accounts is simple and very satisfactory. All of
the attaches of the office are well informed as to all the details and man-
agement of this office. Each day's transactions are posted promptly
and all accounts and entries are kept right up to date. During the past
year this office has handled a large amount of business. The number of
writs received during the year amounted to 11,209.

Mr. Dally, the expert accountant of the grand jury, reports that the
system of accounts in use in this office is the same as in most of the
other departments of the city government, and can hardly be improved

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 301

upon. He reports that all accounts of this office are in first-class condi-
tion, and a complete history given of each case.

\Ye have made special inquiries among attorneys and business men
as to their experience and dealings with the sheriff's office and we have
been informed that there has never been such efficiency and promptness
in handling the affairs of this office as is shown by those now in charge.
From our own observations and investigations we have found that the
general management of the sheriff's office has been greatly improved
upon, and at present it is conducted in a practical and businesslike manner.

(Signed) WILLIAM LANE, Chairman.

MAX SOMMER,
WILLIAM CROXAN.

Sheriff Finn is popular in both business and social circles in his na-
tive city, where his circle of friends is exceptionally wide and representa-
tive. He is affiliated with Rincon Parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden
West, the Fraternal Order of Eagles, the Loyal Order of Moose, the
Improved Order of Red Men, Foresters, the Woodmen of the World
and the Royal Arch.

L. SCATEXA. The career of the honored president of the Bank of
Italy, one of the staunch financial institutions of San Francisco, with
a branch in San Jose, well illustrates that success is the prerogative of
valiant souls. He came from his fair native land to America when a
mere boy and without financial resources of any kind. He made San
Francisco his destination and here found employment of lowly order.
The little Italian lad had courage, ambition, native talent and sterling
integrity of purpose, but even with this reinforcement there was little
to indicate at the time that he would eventually become one of the sub-
stantial capitalists, influential business men and prominent and honored
citizens of the city in which he had elected to establish his home. He
has risen by very appreciable merits and earnest application, and his
life record offers both lesson and incentive.

In the beautiful city of Florence, Italy, L. Scatena was born on the
loth of February, 1850, and he is a son of Frank and Florence Scatena,
who passed their entire lives in Italy, — folk of worthy character but in
most modest circumstances. He to whom this sketch is devoted, gained
his early education, which was necessarily limited in scope, in the schools
of his native city, and at the age of fourteen years he bravely severed
the home ties to set forth in search of better opportunities in America.
In the vessel that transported him to the land of promise, he necessarily
availed himself of the cheapest quarters, and in due course of time
he landed in the port of New York city, a veritable stranger in a strange
land. He did not long remain in the national metropolis but embarked
on a sailing vessel f or San Francisco. On this primitive boat he made
the long and weary journey to the Isthmus of Panama, and after cross-
ing the latter, he again embarked on a sailing vessel, which brought
him to his destination in San Francisco, where he disembarked on the
ist of February, 1864, the entire trip having consumed five months, —

:JU!> \.MKR1CAX muGR.U'HY AND GENEALOGY

from the time he left Italy until his arrival at the Golden Gate. His
meagre funds were entirely exhausted when he made his advent in
San Francisco and employment was a matter of immediate exigency.
Accordingly he found work on a farm in the vicinity of the city, and
that he made himself a valuable employe is evident from the fact that
he retained his position for two and one-half years, during which he
zealously saved his meagre earnings. The initative ability and ambition
of the youth were then shown by his engaging in the produce business
in San Francisco. He was not yet seventeen years of age and, as a
matter of course, was compelled to begin operations upon a most modest
scale. Hard work, close application and good management brought to
him cumulative success and with the passing of the years Mr. Scatena
became one of the leading produce merchants of the city. He continued
to be actively identified with this line of enterprise for nearly forty
years, and at the time of his withdrawal therefrom, the business done
showed the enormous aggregate of fully one and three-fourths millions
of dollars. This is, indeed a record of accomplishment that calls forth
admiration and respect for the man who compassed such results under
such conditions. The career of Mr. Scatena, both as a business man and
as a citizen, has been marked by scrupulous integrity and he has long
held secure place in the esteem of the people of his home city, the while
he has been guide, counselor and friends to those of his own race here
maintaining their home. He is generous and charitable and has aided
many worthy countrymen to success. He has gained independence
through hard work and thus has a supreme appreciation of the dignity
of honest toil and endeavor, with the result that slothfulness and lack
of ambition never fail to meet his sturdy and honest disapproval.
Though his close application to business has prevented any association
on his part with public affairs, he is loyal to all the duties of citizenship
and to the customs and institutions of the country in which his success
has been won. He is aligned as a staunch supporter of the cause of
the Republican party and he and his family are zealous communicants
of the Catholic church, to the support of whose various departments
of activity he is a liberal contributor. He is a member of the Olympic
Club, one of the representative social organizations of San Fran-
cisco, and is held in high esteem in the business circles of the city that
has so long been his home and in which he has won prominence and
definite prosperity.

In effecting the organization of the I'.ank of Italy in San Francisco,
in the year 1904, Mr. Scatena was the prime factor and he has been
president of the institution from the beginning. The bank is incorpo-
rated with a capital stock of one million dollars, fully paid in, and
within the comparatively brief period of its existence, it has gained
status as one of the strong and well managed financial institutions of
the state. It has membership in the Associated Savings Banks of
San Francisco and also the San Francisco Clearing House Association,
and it transacts a general commercial banking business, besides which
it has a splendid organized savings department. The growth of the
bank is admirably indicated by the statement that its assets on the 3ist
of December. 1904, were summed up in $258,436.97, while in the state-

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY ;;(>:,

ment issued by the institution on the 7th of June, 1911, the assets show
the noteworthy aggregate of $7,168,406.25. The head office of the bank-
is located at the southeast corner of Montgomery and Clay streets in
the fine modern building of nine stories erected and owned by the bank.
The Market street branch is located at the junction of Market, Turk
and Masons streets, and in the city of San Jose the institution owns
and occupies its own attractive and modern building at the corner of
Santa Clara and Lightston streets. A. P. and A. H. Giannini are vice-
presidents of the Bank of Italy; A. Pedrini is cashier; and A. J. Fer-
roggiaro is first assistant cashier. The directorate includes a number
of the most substantial and respected Italian business men of San
Francisco, as well as those in professional life, and in addition to these
are found as directors James J. Fagan, vice-president of the Crocker
National Bank, and Adolph Levy, president of the A. Levy & J. Zentner
Company. The administrative policies of the Bank of Italy are of the
most conservative order, and its president now devotes the major part
of his time and attention to the executive duties of his office, in which
he has gained prestige as one of the able financiers of San Francisco.
Before the ashes were cold after the disastrous fire of 1906, Mr. Scat-
ena had commenced to rebuild at the southeast corner of Washington
and Drum streets. The building known as the \Yashington Realty-
Company Building, has a frontage of one hundred forty-five feet and is
one hundred and twenty feet deep. He was one of the first men to
begin to rebuild after the fire.

In the year 1877 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Scatena to
Mrs. Virginia Giannini, who was born and reared in Italy and they have
three children, — Florence, who is now the wife of Dr. R. L. Sever,
of Los Angeles ; and Pearl and Henry, who remain at the parental home.

FRED YOCKI., who is engaged in the real estate business, was born in
Iowa and came to California in 1889. He is the son of John R. and
Matilda Yogel. He is a graduate of the California College of Pharmacy
at Berkeley. For the last seven years Mr. Yogel has been engaged in the
real estate business in Los Angeles. His home place, at the corner of
Vermont avenue and Santa Monica boulevard, which occupies nearly an
entire block, has been purchased at various times until now he owns
nearly the entire block. As soon as he secured a piece of property he
at once began its improvement, so that he now has one of the most beau-
tiful properties in Los Angeles, a place built for comfort and the enter-
tainment of his friends. In addition to the residence he has a private
club house completely appointed. An inveterate lover of flowers and
shrubbery, he has gathered choice flowers and shrubs until he now has
one of the most complete collections, in almose endless varieties in Los
Angeles. This has come to be known and recognized as one of the beauty
spots and show places of the city. The arrangement of the place is per-
fect. Neither money nor labor has been spared in the improvement of
the Yogel Villa.

His improvement of five blocks on Vermont avenue which was natur-
ally one of the worst sections, is now one of the best. Here again Mr.
Yogel spared nothing in the improvement of this frontage. This he also

:;<>r, AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

nuns, as well as a one-fourth interest in the Sullivan Tract (thirty-seven
and one-half acres) which is now ready for sub-division, the object is to
make this one of the finest of the many fine residence sections in Los
Angeles. He is also the owner of several large buildings in the business
center of Los Angeles. To Air. Yogel must be given the credit of the
extensive improvement of Vermont avenue near Santa Monica boule-
vard, a man alive to the best interest of the community. While in politics
he is a Republican and a member of the leading city clubs, his greatest
enjoyment and pleasure is found at his home, among his flowers and
shrubs.

ALBERT A. CALDWELL. There are many points of interest touching
the status of Mr. Caldwell. He is a native of the state and he has been
identified with various lines of business enterprise ; he has served as a
member of the state senate; he has been accorded distinguished office
in connection with the Masonic fraternity in California. He is a de-
scendent, in both paternal and maternal lines, of families founded in
New England, that cradle of so much of our national history, in the
earliest colonial times ; in fact, it may be stated that certain of his
ancestors were numbered among the sturdy Pilgrims who came to the
New World on the historic "Mayflower."

Albert A. Caldwell was born at Oakland. Alameda county, Cali-
fornia, on the 1 2th of January, 1869, and is a son of Edwin and Martha
A. (Hayt) Caldwell, both natives of Putnam county, New York, where
the former was born in 1827 and the latter in 1830. The parents were
reared and educated in the old empire state, where their marriage was
solemnized. Edwin Caldwell was not only a pioneer of California, but
also of Wisconsin, to which latter state he removed when a young man,
and there he had the distinction of building and operating the first
flour mill in the town of Barton, Washington county. In 1849 ne was
one of the intrepid band of argonauts who made the ever memorable
hegira from the various eastern states to seek fortune in the newly
discovered gold fields of California. He crossed the plains with an ox
team, and his experiences were similar to those of the many others who
thus made their weary and dangerous way, with slow-moving wagon
trains, across the continent to the Xew Eldorado. In the autumn of
1849 ne settled in Sacramento, and for twenty years he was closely and
prominently identified with the gold-mining industry in this state, in
which connection it should be recorded that he was superintendent of
the famous Yellow Jacket and Consolidated Virginia mines. In 1871
he removed to Riverside and became one of the pioneer settlers of that
favored section of the state, and he was among the foremost in ad-
vancing the industry of orange culture in southern California. He
was successfully identified with this line of enterprise for many years.
He was a staunch Republican in his political proclivities, and both he
and his wife held membership in the Congregational church. He con-
tinued to reside at Riverside until his death, in 1890, at the age of
sixty-three years, and his devoted and noble wife did not long survive
him, as she was summoned to the life eternal in 1893. Mrs. Caldwell
was a granddaughter of Stephen A. Hayt, who served for eight years

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TIUDEN FOUNDATIONS
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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :ioy

as a soldier in the 2(1 Continental during the war of the Revolution,
in which he went out as a drummer boy and in which he later served
in the ranks. His descendents still retain in their possession his dis-
:harge papers, which bear the signature of George Washington. Both
the Caldwell and the Hayt families as represented today are "May-
flower" descendents.

Albert A. Caldwell is a graduate of the law department of the
University of California, class of 1893. Other and insistent interests
of a business nature demanding his time and attention, he withdrew
from active practice, and has since found ample demands upon his time
in the supervision of his various business interests. Since 1904 he has
been actively concerned in the gas and electric light business. He is
also engaged in the construction and installation of gas plants, and in this
line of enterprise he has been specially successful. He is known as an
energetic and progressive business man of marked discrimination and
executive ability, and his success in his various ventures has been such
that he has no reason to regret his withdrawal from the work of his
profession, in which also he has shown excellent talent. His office is
located in the Stinson building, Los Angeles, and, the family is one of
prominence and distinctive popularity.

In politics Mr. Caldwell has pronounced himself an independent
Republican, and he has taken a lively interest in political and other
civic affairs in his native state. From 1900 to 1904, inclusive, he was
in the state senate, representing the senatorial district, comprising the
counties of Riverside, Orange and San Bernardino. In 1893 Mr.
Caldwell was raised to the sublime degree of Master Mason, in
Evergreen Lodge, No. 259, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at
Riverside. He is still in active affiliation with this body, as is he also
with Riverside Chapter, No. 67, Royal Arch Masons ; and Riverside
Commandery No. 28. Knights Templars. In 1904 he was appointed
a member of the California Grand Commandery of Knights Templars,
and in April, 1911, he had the distinction of being elected grand com-
mander of this fine organization, — an office of which he is incumbent at
the time of this writing. He is also identified with the various bodies
of Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite Masonry and with the adjunct orga-
nization, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.

In the year 1893 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Caldwell to
Miss Clara M. Keith, daughter of Walter E., and lanthe Keith, of River-
side, Mrs. Caldwell was born at Brocton, Massachusetts. She is a di-
rect descendant in the paternal line from the historic character. Peregrine
White, the first white child born in America. Mr. and Mrs. Caldwell
have one son. — Duncan Keith.

GENERAL lonx I.. BEVERIDGE. In the beautiful little city of Holly-
wood, Los Angeles county. California, were passed the closing years of
the life of this distinguished citizen and gallant officer of the Civil war.
and here he was summoned to eternal rest on Tuesday. May 3, 1910.
His career was marked by the variety and splendid compass of its achieve-
ment, and his character was the unequivocal index of a staunch, loyal
and noble nature. He left a definite impress upon the history of hi§

;J10 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

time, — as a distinguished soldier, as a member of Congress, as governor
of a great state and as a lawyer and statesman of distinctive ability.
His life was ordered upon a lofty plane of integrity and honor and was
prolonged to the patriarchal age of nearly eighty-six years, — benignant in
its influence in all relations and potent in its alignment with all that
touches the best interests of human thought and action. He was a res-
ident of California from "December, 1894, until his death, and here his
memory is revered, as it is also in the state of Illinois, which he served
in distinguished positions of public trust.

John Lourie Beveridge was born at Greenwich, Washington county,
Xew York, on the 6th of July, 1824, and was a son of George and Ann
(Hoy) Beveridge, both of whom passed the closing period of their lives
in DeKalb count}-, Illinois, where they established their home in the pio-
neer days and where the father became a citizen of prominence and in-
fluence. The lineage of the Beveridge family is traced back to the
staunchest of Scottish origin, and the first representative of the line in
America was Andrew Beveridge, who came from Scotland and num-
bered himself among the pioneer settlers of Washington county. Xew
York, where, in 1785, also settled James and Agnes (Robertson ) Hoy.
who were the maternal grandparents of General Beveridge and who like-
wise immigrated from Scotland.

General Beveridge gained his early education in the schools of his
native state and was in his eighteenth year at the time of the family re-
moval to DeKalb county, Illinois, a state which he was destined to dignify
and honor by his character and his distinguished services. He continued
his studies in turn in Granville Academy and Rock River Seminary, both
well ordered institutions in Illinois. In the latter school, located at
Mount Morris, he completed his academic studies in the autumn of 1X45.
and later he went to the state of Tennessee, where he became a success-
ful and popular representative of the pedagogic profession and where
he continued to teach for several years, in the meanwhile giving close
attention to the study of law, under effective private preceptorship. He
was admitted to the bar in Jackson county, Tennessee, in 1850. He
initiated the practice of his profession in that state, where he continued
his residence until 1854, when he removed to Evanston, Illinois, as one
of the pioneer settlers of that now beautiful suburb of the great western
metropolis. From that time onward he was engaged in the successful
practice of law in the city of Chicago until his loyalty and patriotism
prompted him to subordinate all personal interests to go forth in defense
of the nation's integrity. At the very inception of the Civil war he en-
listed as a private in the Eighth Illinois Cavalry, in which he became cap-
tain of Company F, which had been recruited by him and of which he
was elected captain. On the 28th of August, 1861, he was elected major
of this gallant cavalry regiment, and he was mustered in with this rank-
on the 1 8th of the following month. He proceeded with his command
to the front and his regiment became a part of the Army of the Potomac,
with which it participated in the active campaign of 1862-3. He was
in command of his forces in the battles of Williamsburg. Fair Oaks, the
Seven Days' tight around Richmond, Malvern Hill. Antietam, Fredericks-
•burg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. At the request of Hon. Richard

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 311

Yates, who was governor of Illinois, General Beveridge resigned his
commission in November, 1863, and was honorably mustered out on the
3d of that month, for the purpose of effecting the organization of the
Seventeenth Illinois Cavalry, of which he was commissioned Colonel, on
the 28th of January, 1864. He was assigned with his command to the
Department of Missouri and the regiment took part in the engagements
caused by Price's raid into Missouri. The remainder of his active mili-
tary service was in Missouri, Kansas and Arkansas. For some time after
his command was mustered out he was retained, by order of the secretary
of war, as president of the military commission at St. Louis, Missouri,
where, on the ist of May, 1865, he received brevet commission as briga-
dier general, in recognition of gallant and meritorious services. He was
finally mustered out and received his honorable discharge on the 6th of
February, 1866. \Yhile with the Army of the Potomac he participated
in about forty skirmishes and minor engagements, and his entire military
career was marked by signal fidelity, gallantry and ability.

After the close of the war General Beveridge returned to his home,
and in November, 1866, he was elected sheriff of Cook county, Illinois,
in which is situated the city of Chicago. Later he was elected a member
of the state senate, and in November, 1871, before his term in the senate
had expired, he was given further distinction, in that he was elected
congressman at large from Illinois. His ability and loyal service brought
to him still further recognition in the line of public preferment, for, in
November, 1872, he was elected lieutenant governor of Illinois. \Yhen
Governor Richard J. Oglesby was elected to the LTnited States senate, he
was succeeded in the gubernatorial office by his lieutenant, General Bever-
idge, who thus became governor of the state on the 2ist of January,
1873. He gave a most careful and admirable administration and retired
from office in 1877, after which he served four years as L'nited States
sub-treasurer in Chicago. Thereafter he continued to devote more or
less attention to the work of his profession, but his banking and other
capitalistic interests in Chicago claimed much of his time during the
remainder of his active career as one of the prominent and honored citi-
zens of the great western metropolis. He continued to maintain his home
in the suburban city of Evanston until December. 1894, when he came to
California, where, amid most gracious associations and environments, he
passed the residue of his long and useful life, virtually retired from active
affair?. He had a beautiful home at Hollywood and was known as one
of the liberal and public-spirited citizens of Los Angeles county, where
he continued to take a vital interest in public and general civic affairs
until the close of his life, the while he held the most impregnable place
in the confidence and high regard of all who knew him.

General Beveridge was unswerving in his allegiance to the cause of
the Republican party and was for many years an influential figure in its
councils. He was an appreciative and valued member of the Grand
Army of the Republic and on the 4th of October, 1882. he was elected
a companion of the first class in the Illinois Commandery of the Military
Order of the Loyal Legion of the Laiited States, with signia No. 2411.
On the TQth of October. 1896, he was transferred to the Commandery of

3.11' AMERICAN I ', I OGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

California, which issued a special memorial at the time of his death. I I is
church relations were with the Methodist denomination.

In December, 1847, in Chicago, was solemnized the marriage of Gen-
eral Ueveridge to Miss. Helen M. Judson, the nuptial ceremony having
been performed by her father. Rev. 1'hilo Judson. who was at that time
pastor of the old Clark street Methodist Episcopal church in that city.
•The death of Mrs. Beveridge occurred May 8. 1909, at Hollywood.
General and Mrs. lieveridge became the parents of two children. Alia
May, who is now the wife of Samuel 1!. Raymond, of Chicago, Illinois:
and Philo J.. who resides at Hollywood. California, where he is living
retired.

FKICD H. 'I'll \ T< IIKK. Among the efficient and popular corps of state
officials in the city of San Francisco is Fred H. Thatcher, who is state
chief deputy superintendent of hanks and who has been a resident of
California since 1889.

Mr. Thatcher was born in Van P>uren county. Iowa, on the 6th of
May, 1868, and is a son of Amos D. and Melissa ( Hartzell) Thatcher, the
former of whom was born in ( >hio and the latter in Indiana. The father
devoted the major part of his active career as a farmer and merchant
and is now living virtually retired, in Los Angeles county, California,
where his devoted wife died in 1902. He whose name initiates this
article is indebted tit the public schools of Iowa and Kansas for his early
educational discipline, which was supplemented by a course in Pond's
Business College, in the city of Topeka. Kansas. He has gained valu-
able training in the school of practical experience and has proved a capa-
ble business man and executive officer. From 1882 until 1889 Mr. That-
cher was employed in the treasurer's department of the Atchison. Topeka
& Santa Fe Railroad, at Topeka, and in the latter year he came to Cali-
fornia, remaining for a short period in San Diego and thence removing
to Pomona, Los Angeles county, where he was engaged in the packing
and shipping of fruit for the ensuing eight years. While a resident of
Pomona he also served one term as city treasurer and as tax collector.
In August. iXcjcj. Mr. Thatcher removed to Oxnarcl. Ventura county,
where he assumed a position in the Bank of Oxnard, and the Oxnard
Savings Bank, and was made cashier of both in January. 1901. This in-
cumbency he retained until June, 1908. when he went to Los Angeles,
where for a short time he was connected with the Los Angeles Trust &
Savings P.ank. This position he resigned in the spring of 1910. and
from March of that year until the iSth of February, 1911, he held the
office of assistant clearing-house examiner in Los Angeles. On the 2oth
of February, T(JTT, he was appointed to and duly qualified for the office
of chief deputy state superintendent of banks, and he thereupon estab-
lished his home in San Francisco, where he has since given his atten-
tion to his important official duties, his administration of which has been
marked by the same scrupulous care and efficiency that have character-
ized his course in all other executive positions held by him. lie is a
staunch supporter of the cause of the Republican party and is affiliated
with the Masonic fraternitv. A man of sterling character, marked busi-

AMERICAN mOGKAI'HY AND GENEALOGY :;ir.

ness acumen and pleasing personality, he has won staunch friends in his
adopted state, where he is held in high regard by all who know him.

On the 3oth of March, 1892, Mr. Thatcher was united in marriage
to Miss Jessie R. Parnell, of San Diego, and they have three daughters
and one son : Fred, Jr., Olive, Ruth and Helen.

FRANCIS MARION PUTTENGER, M. D. One of the leading representa-
tives of the medical profession in the state of California is Dr. Francis
Marion Pottenger, who resides at Monrovia, Los Angeles county. He is
the executive head of the Pottenger Sanatorium for Diseases of the
Lungs and Throat. Although living in Monrovia, he has maintained
offices in Los Angeles for many years. Dr. Pottenger has specialized in
diseases of the throat and chest, giving his entire attention to the pre-
vention and treatment of tuberculosis. Dr. Pottenger is an original in-
vestigator and has made most careful study of the clinical aspects of tu-
berculosis, and is recognized not only throughout the United States, but
throughout Europe as well, as being one of the leading authorities on this
subject. The institution of which he is founder and head is the largest
strictly private sanitarium in the United States and it is recognized as be-
ing one of the best conducted and most successful of such institutions.

Dr. Pottenger was born near New Baltimore, Hamilton county. Ohio,,
on the 27th day of September, 1869, and is a son of Thomas and Hannah
Ellen (Sater) Pottenger. who now maintain their home in Monrovia,
California. Both are representatives of sterling pioneer families of the
New Baltimore colony in Ohio, and the lineage of each is traced back to
staunch English origin, Mrs. Pottenger being a descendant of the great
dictator, Oliver Cromwell. The original progenitor of the Pottenger fam-
ily came from England and was a contemporary of Lord Cecil Calvert,
the first governor of the colony of Maryland. The family became one of
prominence and influence in the colony and its representatives were the
owners of a valuable estate in the vicinity of the present city of Balti-
more. In a later generation was established the Ohio branch of the fam-
ily. In the early history of the Buckeye commonwealth the Pottenger
and other families from Maryland became the founders of the Ohio col-
ony, to which they gave the name of New Baltimore, in honor of their
old home city in Maryland. The Pottengers settled in what is now Ham-
ilton county, Ohio, and the name has long been connected with the agri-
cultural industry in that state.

The parents of Dr. Pottenger were born and reared in the New Balti-
more district of Hamilton county, and the father was long numbered
among the prominent farmers and stock-growers of that country, where
he resided until he removed with his wife to California and retired from
active business. Thomas Pottenger was a soldier of the Union in the
Civil war, in which he served as a member of the One Hundred and
Twenty-ninth Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He is affiliated with the Grand
Army of the Republic and is a staunch supporter of the cause of the Re-
publican party.

Dr. Francis M. Pottenger passed his boyhood days on the old farm
and his rudimentary education was gained in the district schools. Later
he was matriculated in Oberlin University at Westerville, Ohio, in which

316 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

he was graduated in 1892, with the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy. In
accordance with well formulated plans for his future career he then en-
tered the -Medical College of Ohio, and graduated from the Cincinnati
College of Medicine and Surgery in the class of 1894, receiving the gold
medal, the highest honors of his class. He was later given the degree of
Master of Arts by his alma mater, Otterbein University, and in 1909 this
institution also conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of
Laws, in recognition of his valuable scientific work in his profession.
After his graduation in medicine Dr. Pottenger passed one year in post-
graduate work in leading hospitals in Vienna, Berlin, Munich and Lon-
don, but prior to going abroad he was united in marriage to Miss Carrie
Burtner, who had been his classmate at Otterbein, and who accompanied
him to Europe.

I'pon his return to the United States, Dr. Pottenger engaged in the
general practice of his profession at Norwood, one of the beautiful sub-
urbs of the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, and soon afterwards he was made
assistant to the chair of surgery in the Cincinnati College of Medicine and
Surgery. In 1895, by reason of the seriously impaired health of his wife,
Dr. Pottenger brought her to California, but they returned to Ohio eight-
een months later and located at Germantown, Montgomery county, the
childhood home of Mrs. Pottenger, whose death occurred there about two
years later. During this intervening period Dr. Pottenger practically
abandoned the practice of his profession in order to care for his wife and
also to give special study to tuberculosis, the disease which caused her
untimely death. After she had passed away he returned to California
and established himself in the practice of his profession at Monrovia.
He forthwith began to specialize in the treatment of the diseases of the
nose, throat and chest, and in his work since that time he has amply
demonstrated the wisdom of such concentration in the work of his exact-
ing calling. For the purpose of fortifying himself better for the work
he went to New York city where he pursued effective post-graduate study
and investigation and also availed himself of the advantages of the lead-
ing colleges and hospitals in other eastern cities. He then returned to
Monrovia in October. 1901. He also established an office in Los Angeles,
which he still maintains. At this time he limited his practice to the dis-
eases of the throat and chest, enjoying the distinction of being the first
ethical member of his profession on the Pacific coast to confine his ef-
forts exclusively to this specialty.

From the time Dr. Pottenger began to seriously study the tuberculosis
problem he felt that in order to do effective work and give his patients
the best chance of cure, the sanatorium was indispensable. In 1903 he
had the pleasure of seeing this desire consummated. LTpon a beautiful
site in the foothills of the Sierra Madre mountains, overlooking the city
of Monrovia, he built the Pottenger Sanatorium for Diseases of the
Lungs and Throat. This institution was opened for the reception of pa-
tients in i<>O3- At first the institution had accommodations for eleven
patients, but it was Dr. Pottenger's idea that it might, in four or five years,
reach the capacity of fifty, but the success of the institution far exceeded
Dr. Pottenger's most sanguine expectations and inside of three years
from the time it was built it? capacity had been increased to about seventy-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 317

tive. In March, 1905, in order to meet the ever increasing demands, Dr.
Pottenger incorporated the institution under the title of the Pottenger
Sanatorium for Diseases of the Lungs and Throat, he, himself taking
the presidency of the company and also the executive head of the pro-
fessional staff. In his work Dr. Pottenger has always tried to avoid be-
ing a faddist. He takes a broad view of tuberculosis and recognizes that
in coping with tuberculosis it is necessary to treat the patient as well as
the disease. Unlike many men of his professional standing, he does not
hold himself aloof but comes in close daily contact with his patients, al-
ways preferring to guide them himself rather than to entrust the work to
assistants. \Yhile this has made his work very difficult and exacting, at
the same time it has inspired the patients with the confidence and hope
that has told in the results obtained.

In 1905 Dr. Pottenger was commissioned a delegate from California
to the International Tuberculosis Congress which assembled in the city
of Paris, and while abroad on this mission he visited the principal cities
of Europe for the purpose of pursuing further investigation along the line
of his chosen specialty. His scientific research, wide and varied expe-
rience and valuable contributions to the professional and scientific litera-
ture bearing upon the prevention and treatment of tuberculosis have made
him a recognized authority upon diseases of the throat and lungs.

To Dr. Pottenger is due the honor of being'instrumental in establish-
ing the first society on the Pacific coast for the prevention of tuberculosis.
Through his efforts the Southern California Anti-Tuberculosis League
was established in 1903. This later became the California Society for the
Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis. He served as president of the
Southern California Anti-Tuberculosis League from its beginning until
1906, and has always been a staunch supporter, and has served as one of
its board of directors since its beginning.

Dr Pottenger has a strong scientific bent and has allied himself with
many of the best and most scientific societies of his profession, both na-
tional and international. He is a member of the following societies :
Los Angeles Clinical and Pathological Society, Southern California Medi-
cal Society, Medical Society of the State of California, American Medi-
cal Association, American Climatological Association. American Public
Health Association. American Therapeutic Society. Mississippi Valley
Medical Association, Los Angeles Association for the Study and Pre-
vention of Tuberculosis. California Society for the Study and Prevention
of Tuberculosis, Southern California Association for the Study and Pre-
vention of Tuberculosis, Xational Association for the Study and Preven-
tion of Tuberculosis. International Association for the Study and Pre-
vention of Tuberculosis, American Sanatorium Association. Los Ange-
les County Medical Society. Dr. Pottenger has served as president of the
Los Angeles County Medical Society, also on many important commit-
tees, as well as the. board of trustees of the California State Medical So-
ciety. He is also a member of the American Academy of Political and
Social Science, Archaeological Institute of America and the Xational
Geographic Society. He was also appointed by President Taft in 1911
first lieutenant of the Medical Reserve Corps of the LTnited States Army.

Dr. Pottenger is a frequent visitor to the clinics of Europe. He en-

318 AMERICAN KIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

joys the distinction of being personally acquainted with practically all of
the leading scientific men of the world who are doing . special work in
tuberculosis. He takes his vacations by visiting these various men and
learning from them.

It has always been a source of regret to Dr. Pottenger that he was
unable to take care of those with limited means in his institution, but for
these he has always maintained his city office, where he has been willing
to give them his valuable services free of charge if they are unable to pay.

In politics Dr. Pottenger is independent but progressive. One of
his hobbies, outside of tuberculosis, has been political and social science.
He has always tried to keep abreast of the best moves for civil benefit.
In religion he is a member of no church, although he is a Unitarian in
belief. He is very fond of music and art and has a very fine collection of
paintings by noted artists. He is one of the influential citizens of Mon-
rovia and here is a member of the directorate of the American National
Bank and is the director of a number of corporations.

On the 29th of August, 1900, Dr. Pottenger married Miss Adelaide
G. Babbitt, a graduate of the University of Vermont. Mrs. Pottenger
was born in Keeseville, Essex county, New York, and after her gradua-
tion from college came to southern California, where she was engaged in
teaching. •

To Doctor and Mrs. Pottenger have been born three children : Fran-
cis Marion, Jr., Robert Thomas and Adelaide Marie.

JAMES E. PEMBERTON. One of the essentially able and representa-
tive members of the California bar, Mr. Pemberton has been a resident
of the state from his childhood days and is a scion of one of its sterling
pioneer families. He has achieved more than local prestige in his pro-
fession, in the practice of which he has been actively engaged for a
quarter of a century, and he is a citizen whose loyalty to California is
of the most insistent order, the while his course has been so guided and
governed as to retain to him the high regard of his fellow men.

James Emmons Pemberton was born in Johnson county, Missouri,
on the 26th of July, 1861. and is a son of Bennett and Thurza (Emmons)
Pemberton, the former of whom was born in Kentucky, in 1833, a mem-
ber of an old and honored family of the Bluegrass state, and the latter
of whom was born in Lafayette county, Missouri, in 1837, her death oc-
curring in Mendocino county, California, in 1887. Of the children of
this union four sons and three daughters are now living. Bennett Pem-
berton was reared to maturity in the state of Missouri, to which his par-
ents removed when he was a boy, about the year 1847. In 1853 he
yielded to the lure of California, where the great discovery of gold had
been made only a few years previously, entailing the ever memorable
hegira from the eastern states to this section, and he made the weary and
hazardous journey across the plains to the New Eldorado when a vouth
of twenty years. Here he had his quota of experience in connection
with the search for the precious metal, and he was measurably success-
ful in his efforts. In 1860 he returned to Missouri, where his marriage
was soon afterward solemnized, and in 1865. in company with his fam-
ily, he crossed the great American desert with ox team and established

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 319

his permanent home in Mendocino county, California, becoming one of
the pioneers of that section of the state. Now venerable in years, he is
living virtually retired in that county, secure in the unqualified con-
fidence and esteem of the people of the county which has so long rep-
resented his home.

James E. Pemberton, whose career is here briefly outlined, maintains
his residence in Ukiah, the metropolis and judicial center of Mendocino
county, where he still has a law office, but much of his professional work
is now done from his San Francisco office, 322 Mills building. After a
few years' residence near Petaluma, following their arrival in this state,
the family moved northward in 1872 and his early experiences were
those gained under the invigorating and beneficent influences of the old
homestead farm in Mendocino county, where he was reared to adult age
and where he duly availed himself of the advantages of the public schools.
That he did not neglect his scholastic opportunities is assured by the fact
that for a period of seven years he devoted his attention to teaching in
the schools of his home county. In the meanwhile he formulated de-
finite plans for his future career and after a considerable amount of
private study along the line of his chosen profession he was matriculated
in Hastings Law College, in San Francisco, in which excellent institution
he completed the prescribed course and was graduated as a member of
the class of 1886, in which year he received his coveted degree of
Bachelor of Laws and was also admitted to the bar. He forthwith
opened an office in Mendocino City, removing in 1892 to Ukiah, the
county seat of Mendocino county, where he has since retained his resi-
dence and where his success in his profession has been on a parity with
his exceptional ability and close application, through which he has risen
to secure place among the strong, versatile and resourceful members of
the California bar. He established an office in San Francisco in 1909
and his practice is now of extensive and important order, in both the
state and federal courts. He is known as a skillful trial lawyer and has
won many decisive forensic victories in connection with important litiga-
tions, the while his broad and exact knowledge of law and precedent
has made him a safe and duly conservative counselor.

In politics Mr. Pemberton accords a staunch allegiance to the Demo-
cratic party and he is an effective exponent of its principles and policies
as well as a leader in its local councils. In 1892 he was elected district
attorney of Mendocino county, and he served the regular term of two
years, as defined by the law at that time in force. He was mayor of
Ukiah from 1902 to 1904 and through his careful and discriminating
administration of municipal affairs he manifested his generous public
spirit and deep interest in the community that has so long been his home.
In 1910 he was his party's nominee for the office of attorney general of
the state, and he made a thorough canvass of all sections of California,
thus gaining a wide acquaintance and a personal popularity that could
be secured in no other way. Though he made a spirited and able cam-
paign he was unable to overcome the normal Republican majority and
thus his defeat was compassed by not extraordinary political exigencies.
In a fraternal way Mr. Pemberton is affiliated with the Improved
Order of Red Men, the Woodmen of the World, and the Independent

320 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Urder of Foresters. He and his family are members of the Methodist
church. South, at L'kiah.

On the loth of July, 1886, shortly after his admission to the bar,
Mr. Pemberton was united in marriage to Miss Emogene Brayton,
who was born in Mendocino county but who was a resident of the
county of San Diego at the time of her marriage. She is a daughter
of the late Edwin Brayton, who was a representative citizen of San
Diego county at the time of his death. Mr. and Mrs. Pemberton have
three children. — Bennett Edwin. Pearl, and James Emmons, Jr.

WILLIAM R. WILLIAMS. Success is the prerogative of valiant souls,
and in contemplating the career of the present state superintendent of
kinks in California even a cursory review shows that he has won large
and definite success and precedence through his own ability and efforts
and that, farther than this, he deserves this success, as he has risen
by very appreciable merit. He is a native son of the west and has im-
bibed deeply of its progressive spirit. From modest association with
the practical activities of business he has pressed forward to the goal
i>f large achievement as a public official and as a citizen of marked
influence in the great state of California, of which he has served as
treasurer and in which his hold upon popular confidence and esteem is
of the most impregnable order. Genial and whole-souled, strong in
his convictions, which permit no compromise with wrong or injustice,
and ever insistent upon the "square deal" for the people, it is not strange
that he is known and honored of men or that he stands as one of the
essentially representative citizens of the state that has been his home
from his youth.

William R. Williams was born at Gold Hill, Storey county. Nevada,
"ii the 6th of November. 1870, and is a son of Richard and Elizabeth
I Cocking) Williams, both natives of England. The father was long
identified with mining enterprises in Nevada, but in California he en-
gaged in agricultural pursuits, although he is now practically retired,
residing at Fresno. The mother died at Fresno in March, 1911.

He whose name initiates this review is indebted to the public schools
of Fresno for his early educational discipline and was about nine years
of age at the time of the family removal to California, where he was
reared to manhood. Prior to entering public office he had been iden-
tified successfully with the drug business and other lines of mercantile
enterprise in the city -of Fresno, the judicial center of the county of the
same name, where he became known as a man of progressive ideas and
utmost civic loyalty. For four years. 1895-8, he served as deputy clerk
of Fresno county, which has become one of the important and opulent
integral divisions of the state, and after his retirement from this office
he assumed the position of chief accountant, at Fresno, of the California
Raisin Growers' Association, for which he later became receiver. He
was still actively identified with this organization at the time he re-
ceived, in 1906, the nomination for the office of state treasurer, as can-
didate on the Republican ticket. He made himself .known to the people
of the state through the ensuing and vigorous campaign, and the estim-
ate placed upon him was shown unequivocally in his election by a plur-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 321

alty about seventy thousand votes. His administration of the fiscal
affairs of the commonwealth was marked by scrupulous care and dis-
crimination in conserving the best interests of the state, and in 1910 he
was re-elected, by a pluralty of more than one hundred and one thou-
sand,— an effective popular voucher for the efficiency and acceptability
of his services in this important office. On the 2Oth of February, 1911,
however, he resigned this position to accept that of state superintendent
of banks, — an office for which his previous service as treasurer eminently
qualified him. He was appointed to this office by Governor Johnson
and entered upon the discharge of its duties on the 21 st of February,
1911, with characteristic vigor and with a determination to make the
office justify its title. The following pertinent and appreciative editorial
estimate appeared in the Fresno Morning Republican of February 7,
191 1, and is worthy of preservation in the more enduring vehicle of-
fered by this volume :

Fresno will be particularly delighted at the news that W. R. Wil-
liams, state treasurer, has been appointed to succeed Alden Anderson as
superintendent of banks. The fact that treasurer Williams is still
"Billy" Williams in Fresno, and that everybody knows him, will not
blind Fresno to the fact, which the whole state recognizes, that Mr.
Williams is one of the big men of California. Men are tested by the
way they rise to opportunities, and "Billy" Williams, by this test, has
"made good," both in his Fresno career and subsequently in the larger
responsibilities of state affairs. Elevated to the responsible but thereto-
fore perfunctory office of state treasurer, he has made of that office one
of the important links in the state government, and has established him-
self personally as about the best trusted and most constructively capable
man of two administrations. There is no man who understands more
clearly, if there is any other who understands so clearly, the administrative
problems of state government, and there is none who has rendered and is
to render more valuable service in the organization of the administrative
departments. He is the author of the present improved system of de-
posits of state funds, and in the administration of that system he has
been brought into large and intimate contact with banks and bankers.
This peculiar experience, added to his previous training as an account-
ant and business administrator, has made of treasurer Williams even
more of an expert for the specific work of his new office than similar
experience in a bank could have done. He has a wider personal ac-
quaintance with banking men and broader contact with banking prob-
lems than could possibly have been acquired of a single bank. He has
also acquired this knowledge from the proper angle, — the public and
governmental standpoint, instead of the merely private and money-
making view of the commercial banker. He is free from banking en-
tanglements and, while familiar with the factions among bankers and
knowing how to discount them, he belongs personally to none of them.
In ability, expert training, tested administrative capacity, sound and
conservative judgment, firmness, courage and the right point of view,
treasurer Williams is probably better fitted to this job than any other
man in California. It is a good appointment, and we predict for the
new bank commissioner a brilliant record.

3->-> AMERICAN UK n.KAI'HY AND GENEALOGY

in polities Air. Williams has always been arrayed with the progres-
sive wing of the Republican party and has ever been an ardent fighter
for clean politics. A man whose record is brilliant and without a bku
or tarnish, he has shown his determination to do the right, without
fear or favor, and such men are all too few in public office. He
is a member of the Lincoln-Roosevelt League of California and in other
connections has done effective service in behalf of the principles and
policies of the "grand old party" to which he gives allegiance. He is
affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks, is identified with various clubs and other civic or-
ganizations of representative order, and his circle of friends is coincident
with that of his acquaintances. He is one of the well known and best
liked men in California, where he is honored alike for his sterling char-
acter and for his able and loyal service as a public official. His ex-
ecutive headquarters for his present office are in San Francisco and his
residence is in Berkeley.

CLACDI-: I. PARKER. One of the able and popular government of-
ficials of California and one of the representative citizens of Los Angeles
is Claude I. Parker, who has the distinction of being the first incumbent
of the important office of collector of internal revenue for the newly
created Sixth district of California, and the territory under the juris-
diction comprises the ten southern counties of the state. Air. Parker
had gained strong vantage place in the confidence and esteem of the
people of this section of the state prior to his appointment to his present
position and he is known as a specially able executive and administra-
tive officer.

Claude I. Parker was born on a farm near Carmi. the judicial center
of White county, Illinois, on the 241!! of January, 1871, and is a scion
of one of the most honored pioneer families of the southern part of that
state. He is a son of Captain Theophilus and Lora (Bailey) Parker,
both of whom were born and reared in southern Illinois, and the father
was one of the best known and most highly esteemed citizens of that
section of the state until the close of his life. Captain Parker was
reared and educated in White county, Illinois, and was a youth at the
time of the inception of the Civil war. He promptly gave evidence of
his intrinsic loyalty and patriotism by tendering his services in defense
of the Union. In 1861, when seventeen years of age, he enlisted as a
private in the Thirty-first Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and a few months
later he was promoted to the office of captain of his company. He
proceeded with his regiment to the front and his service from the be-
ginning was active and arduous, involving participation in important
battles and skirmishes. Two of his brothers sacrificed their lives in the
cause of the Union, having been members of Illinois regiments, and he
himself was severely wounded in the battle of Shiloh, his injuries being
such that he was granted a furlough, which he passed at his home. As
soon as he had sufficiently recuperated his physical powers to make
such action possible he re-enlisted and was made captain of Company E
in the Thirteenth Illinois Volunteer Cavalry, with which he continued
in active service until the close of the war, at the expiration of which he

THE N'i'-V <i
PUBLIC LIBRARY

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TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :wr,

received his honorable discharge. He proved a faithful and gallant
soldier and officer and the history of the regiments with which he was
identified is virtually the record of his military career. He ever re-
tained a deep interest in his old comrades in arms and signified the same
by his affiliation with the Grand Army of the Republic. After the
close f the war he devoted his attention principally to agricultural pur-
suits until the close of his life, and his death, which occurred in March,
1894, was virtually the result of injuries which he received while serving
in the Civil war. He continued his residence in White county until his
demise, which occurred when he was forty-nine years of age. He had
a peculiarly strong hold upon the affectionate regard of the community
in which he lived and was a man of strong and noble character. His
political allegiance was given to the Republican party and in the "piping
times of peace" he manifested the same loyalty that had characterized
his course as a youthful soldier of the Union.

Claude I. Parker passed his boyhood and youth on the home farm
and after duly availing himself of the advantages of the public schools
of his native county he continued his studies in the Illinois State Nor-
mal School at Carmi. in which he was graduated as a member of the
class of 1887. hi August of the following year Mr. Parker assumed
a clerical position in the auditing department of the Atchison, Topeka
& Santa Fe Railroad, an incumbency which he retained until the fol-
lowing July. He then became a traveling salesman for a wholesale
portrait house in Chicago, and he continued to follow this line of en-
deavor until 1892, when he established his permanent home in Los
Angeles, California. Mr. Parker has here given effective service in
other positions of public trust than that of which he is now the in-
cumbent. He served under John H. Gish as deputy in the office of the
city tax collector, and also as deputy in the office of the auditor of Los
Angeles county, under H. G. Dow. In these positions his unfailing
courtesy in his official association with the local public gained to him
many friends of marked influence. When the rapid expansion of busi-
ness in the First internal-revenue district of California made impera-
tive a division of the same, a memorial was presented to the United
States congress requesting the creation of a new district for southern
California, and the result was the establishing of the present Sixth inter-
nal-revenue district, in 1902. In this connection the ability and popular-
ity of Mr. Parker found definite and well merited recognition, as a peti-
tion was prepared by the representative bankers and other business men
of Los Angeles and requested his appointment to the office of collector
of the new district. This petition was sent to Hon. Frank P. Flint,
then United States senator from California, and through his solicitation,
as reinforced by the popular endorsement noted, Mr. Parker received the
appointment. His discriminating and effective administration of the
affairs of this important office have fully justified the appointment, and
the business of his district is conceded to be handled with an efficiency
that can be claimed by few other internal-revenue districts in the United
States. The business has shown a splendid increase from year to year
since the establishing of the new district, and its annual transactions
now aggregate more than one million dollars. The district, as already

326 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

noted in this context, comprises ten counties of southern California,
namely : San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura, Los Angeles, Orange.
San Diego, Imperial, Kern, Riverside and San Bernardino.

In politics Air. Parker has ever been unwavering in his allegiance to
the Republican party, and he has given effective service in the promo-
tion of its cause, though his appointment to his present office had no
political significance, as the recommendations for his appointment came
from representative members of all political parties. While giving care-
ful attention to his work as deputy county auditor Mr. Parker devoted
his evenings to the study of law, and in January, 1909, he was admitted
to the bar. His knowledge of the science of jurisprudence proves of
great value to him in his present official position. He is affiliated with
the Masonic fraternity, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
and the Knights of the Modern Maccabees, besides which he holds mem-
bership in a number of representative clubs and other social organiza-
tions.

On the loth of April, 1898, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Parker to Miss Florence Billington, daughter of Elijah and Mary A.
Billington, of Santa Barbara, California, and they have one child, Stan-
ley T., who was born on the 8th of March, 1899.

SIDNEY A. BUTLER. It has been within the province of Sidney
Alcutt Butler to wield a distinctively beneficent influence in connection
with the material and civic development and advancement of the city
of Los Angeles, which has represented his home for nearly a quarter
of a century, and he has stood exponent of that high type of citizenship
which is ever indicatory of usefulness and subjective honor. His loyalty
to all that has touched the welfare of his home city and state has been of
the most insistent order and has been shown in his liberality and zeal in
the furtherance of measures and enterprises tending to advance the gen-
eral welfare of the community in which he has so long maintained his res-
idence. He is now incumbent of the office of supervisor of the Third
district of Los Angeles county, for which position he was nominated
in the primary election on the i6th of August, K)io. having been in-
sistently importuned to become a candidate while he was sojourning
with his family in Europe. He is one of the sterling citizens given to
California by the fine old Badger state, and his is the distinction of
having given loyal service in defense of the integrity of the L'nion dur-
ing the Civil war. besides which, in both the paternal and maternal lines.
he is a scion of families that were founded in America in the colonial
epoch of our national history. On the maternal side he is eligible for
membership in the Society of Colonial \Vars, and on the paternal, for
similar preferment in the Society of the Sons of the American Revolu-
tion. His paternal grandfather, Rev. D. D. Butler, was a distinguished
member of the clergy of the Protestant Episcopal church, in which con-
nection he was for many years rector of the church of his denomina-
tion in Troy, Xew York. Rev. Clement M. Butler, an uncle of him
whose name initiates this review, was for many years rector of Trinity
church, Protestant Episcopal, in the city of Washington, D. C., and in
the capital city he also served for a number of years as chaplain of the

AMERICAN [ilUGK Al'llV AXD GENEALOGY :;^T

United States senate ;, while incumbent of this position he conducted
the funeral services and delivered the mortuary sermon of that dis-
tinguished statesman, Henry Clay.

Sidney Alcutt Butler was born in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin,
on the loth of March, 1847, and is a son of T. D. and Mary Jane
( Alcutt I Duller, both of whom were born and reared in the state of
New York, where their marriage was solemnized. The father was
born in the year 1800 and he passed the closing years of his life in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, of which city he was an early settler and prom-
inent business man. There his death occurred in 1857, his wife having
there been summoned to the life eternal in 1850. T. D. Butler was a man
of fine mental powers and was an influential factor in public and busi-
ness affairs in Milwaukee, which was scarcely more than a village at
the time when he there established his home. He was originally a
Whig in his political allegiance, but joined the Republican party at
the time of its organization, casting his vote in support of its first pres-
idential candidate. General John C. Fremont, but passing to his reward
before the nomination of its second standard bearer, the martyred Pres-
ident Lincoln. Both he and his wife were devout communicants of the
Protestant Episcopal church.

Sidney A. Butler was afforded the advantages of the common schools
of Milwaukee and was but fourteen years of age at the time of the in-
ception of the war between the north and south, in the meanwhile hav-
ing been deprived of his father's care and guidance when he was a
lad of but ten years. In 1863, at the age of sixteen years, he gave
patent evidence of his intrinsic loyalty and patriotism by tendering his
services in defense of the Lmion. He enlisted as a private in Company
B, First Wisconsin Heavy Artillery, with which gallant command he
encountered his full quota of arduous and perilous service. He par-
ticipated in the battle of Cynthiana, Kentucky, where the famous Con-
federate raider, General John Morgan's command was captured, thus
eliminating the constant menace offered by the operations of that in-
trepid commander. Mr. Butler continued in active service until the
close of the war and received his honorable discharge in August, 1805.
He has continued to retain an active interest in his old comrades in
arms and signifies the same by his membership in the Grand Army <>f
the Republic.

In 1 866 Mr. Butler entered the employ of American Express Com-
pany, at La Crosse, Wisconsin, where he continued in this line of ser-
vice about three years, after which he was for a number of years iden-
tified with Railroad construction work in various states of the Union
and with navigation interests on the Mississippi river, with headquart-
ers in the city of Memphis, Tennessee. While engaged in railroad
construction he was concerned with operations in Colorado. New Mex-
ico, Arizona and Florida, and for a while he was engaged in the bank-
ing business, at Wells, Faribault county. Minnesota. He finally removed
to Kansas City. Missouri, where he became general agent for the
United States Express Company and the Pacific Express Company.
He continued incumbent of these positions about seven years, at the ex-
piration of which, c in account of the impaired health of one of the

328 A.MKR1CAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

member.-, of the family, he resigned his position and removed to Los
Angeles. California, where he has continuously maintained his home
during the intervening years. Soon after his arrival in this city he
was appointed general agent for the \\ells-Fargo Express Company and
he continued in the employ of this company for fourteen years. He
was finally promoted to the position of assistant superintendent and
general agent of the company, with headquarters in the city of San
Francisco, but in the meantime he continued to maintain his home in
Los Angeles. In January. 1904, after long and faithful service, as
one of the valued officials of the Wells-Fargo Company Mr. Butler re-
signed his important office and since that time he has lived virtually
retired from active business.

In politics Mr. Butler has ever accorded an unwavering allegiance
to the Republican party and he has given effective service in behalf of
its cause, especially since establishing his home in California. He was
the first chairman of the Los Angeles County Lincoln-Roosevelt Repub-
lican League and in this connection had much to do in manoeuvering
political affairs in the state at the time of the first presidential cam-
paign of President Taft. Mr. Butler has shown the deepest interest
in all that has tended to conserve the best interests of Los Angeles and
his interest has been one of definite and productive action. He was
president of the first consolidation commission which brought about
the annexation of what is locally designated as thfe "Shoe String Strip,"
giving to Los Angeles direct communication with the seaboard. This
annexation brought about the illumination of Ascot Park racing course
from the city and this result is now uniformly recognized as having
been of inestimable value to Los Angeles. Mr. Butler was also orig-
inally president of the Los Angeles county good roads association and
was chairman of its advisory committee. In this connection he was
influential in securing the necessary legislation making possible the im-
provements of the roads in Los Angeles count}', a work that has in-
nured greatly to the benefit of this section of the state. \Yhile Mr.
Butler and his wife were making a tour around the world, in 1910, he-
received, while in the city of Paris, France, in the summer of 1910,
so many insistent letters from his home city requesting him to permit
his name to be placed upon the Republican ticket for nomination as
supervisor of the Third district that he finally yielded to the overtures
made by his many friends with the result that on the ifith of August,
1910. he was made the nominee of his party for this office. He received
a most flattering endorsement at the primaries and at the general elec-
tion following, in November. 1910, he was chosen for this office by a
majority that amply testified to the high esteem in which he is held
in the community. Mr. 1 Hitler has ever maintained the highest civic
ideals and has given his influence in support of all measures that have
tended to forward the social and material welfare of Los Angeles. For
a number of years he was a member of the directorate of the chamber
of commerce and in Los Angeles he is identified with various fraternal
and social organizations of representative order.

On Christmas eve of the year 1869 was solemnized the marriage of
Mr. Butler to Miss Kittv Keller, who was born and reared in YViscon-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 331

sin and who was a resident of La Crosse, that state, at the time of her
marriage. She is a daughter of the late Daniel Keller, who was one
of the sterling pioneers of the Badger commonwealth. Mr. and Mrs.
Butler have one son, — Sidney T., who is now engaged in the Fire In-
surance business. Mr. and Mrs. Butler have long been prominent and
popular factors in connection with the best social activities of Los
Angeles and their attractive home is a recognized center of gracious
and generous hospitality. It may be stated that Mr. Butler has com-
pleted the circle of both the York and Scottish rites of the Masonic
fraternity, in which he has attained to the thirty-second degree, being
identified with the consistory in Los Angeles and having his maximum
York Rite affiliation with Los Angeles Commandery, No. 9, Knights
Templars, in Los Angeles.

NEWTOX \V. THOMPSON. Establishing his home in California
shortly before attaining to his legal majority, Hon. Newton Warner
Thompson has gained prestige in connection with financial and business
activities of important order and has become an influential factor in
connection with civic and political affairs. He is a valued member of
the state senate at the time of this writing, in 1911, and previously
served with marked ability in the lower house of the legislature. Both
by character and accomplishment, as well as through effective public
service, he is worthy of designation as one of the representative citizens
of the state with whose interests he has so closely and worthily iden-
tified himself. He maintains his home in the beautiful little city of
Alhambra, Los Angeles county, and is one of the popular and influential
citizens of southern California, his loyalty to the state of his adoption
being of the most unequivocal order.

Senator Thompson claims the old Empire state of the Union as the
place of his nativity and he is a scion of one of its honored pioneer
families. He was born at Pulaski, Oswego county, New York, on the
1 6th of September, 1865, and is a son of Newton M. and Ada A. (War-
ner) Thompson, both likewise natives of that state, where the former
was born in 1836 and the latter in 1837. Newton M. Thompson de-
voted the greater part of his active career to the great basic industry of
agriculture, of which he was an enterprising and successful exponent.
For a period of a few years he was engaged in the hardware business,
but he then resumed his active association with agricultural pursuits,
to which he continued to give his attention until his death, which oc-
curred in Pulaski county, on the loth of October, 1883. He was a man
of high principles and strong individuality and he ever commanded secure
place in the confidence and esteem of his fellow men. He was originally
an old-line Whig in politics, but upon the organization of the Republican
party he identified himself therewith, ever afterward continuing to
give a stanch support to its principles and policies. His religious faith
was that of the Congregational church, of which his widow likewise
has long been a devoted member. They became the parents of two
children, and the daughter died August 19, 1891. In 1887, a few years
after the death of her honored husband, the widowed mother came to
California and now venerable in years, she resides in the home of her

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332 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

son Newton W., to whom this sketch is dedicated and by whom she is
accorded the utmost filial care and solicitude.

Newton Warner Thompson, like many another who has achieved suc-
cess along other lines of endeavor, was reared to the sturdy discipline
of the farm, and after duly availing himself of the advantages of the
public schools of his native county he was for four years a student in
Pulaski Academy, an excellent institution located in the town in which
he was born. In 1885, at the age of twenty years. Senator Thompson
came to California, and since 1887 he has been actively engaged in the
title business, in which he has come to be recognized as an authority.
Upon the organization of the Title Insurance & Trust Company, of Los
Angeles, in 1894, he identified himself with this important corporation,
of which he has served as title officer since 1898. In his special field
his work has been marked by the utmost thoroughness and discrimina-
tion, and his competency is widely recognized. It is a well known fact
that no certificate of title is permitted to be issued by the company with
which he is connected until it is absolutely perfect and assured. Thus
it may be readily understood that much responsibility devolves upon him
in his important executive office with this stanch corporation, the func-
tions of which are of the most important and benignant order.

Well fortified in his opinions as to matters of civic and economic
import and according unqualified allegiance to the Republican party,
Senator Thompson has been a most zealous and effective advocate of the
principles and policies for which it stands sponsor, and thus he has be-
come one of its prominent and influential representatives in southern
California. In 1903 he was elected president of the board of trustees
of the city of Alhambra, and he retained this incumbency for five suc-
cessive years, his retirement from office occurring in 1908. In 1904 he
was elected representative of the Sixty-ninth district in the lower house
of the California legislature, in which the popular estimate placed upon
his services was shown by his election as his own successor, in 1906.
In 1908 he received the Republican nomination for representative of the
Thirty-fifth district in the state senate, and of this position he is now
in tenure. His work in both branches of the general assembly has been
marked by fidelity, progressiveness and effective service both on the
floor and in the deliberations of the committee room, so that his record
stands to his lasting credit as well as to that of the state which he has
thus served. He is active in the affairs of his party and has done much
to further its cause in the state. He is a member of the board of trus-
tees of Agricultural Park in the city of Los Angeles, having been ap-
pointed to this position by Governor Gillette.

Senator Thompson is an appreciative member of the time-honored
Masonic fraternity, in which he is affiliated with Alhambra Lodge, No.
322, Free and Accepted Masons, in his home city, and he is a past master
of this organization ; he is also a member of San Gabriel Valley Chapter,
No. 100, Royal Arch Masons ; Alhambra Commandery, No. 48, Knights
Templars; and Alhambra Lodge, No. 127, Knights of Pythias. In the
city of Los Angeles he holds membership in the Union League Club,
and he and his wife are zealous members of the Presbyterian church,
and he had the distinction of being a California representative in the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 333

general assembly of the church held at Atlantic City, New Jersey, in
1910. The Senator is a man of democratic ways and genial personality,
tolerant in his judgment but independent in his views. His sterling at-
tributes of character have gained to him a wide circle of friends in Cali-
fornia and he is known as an able business man, a loyal and public-
spirited citizen, and an efficient public official.

On the nth of November, 1891, was solemnized the marriage of
Senator Thompson to Miss M. Elizabeth Lloyd, of Pulaski, New York,
where she was born and reared, and they have four children, — Lloyd
W., Newton E., Margaret O. and Standish R.

JOHNSON W. SUMMERFIELD. An honored member of the bar of
the state that has represented his home since his boyhood days, and
now the incumbent of the office of justice of the peace, Mr. Summer-
field is one of the well known and highly esteemed citizens of Los
Angeles and is distinctively worthy of recognition in this publication.
The name which he bears has been identified with the annals of Amer-
ican history since the colonial epoch and the lineage is of patrician
order. The original progenitor of the family in this country came
from England and established a home in Virginia, with whose civic and
material activities the name was prominently linked for several genera-
tions.

Johnson Wyatt Summerfield was born at Vernon, Jennings county,
Indiana, and is a son of Johnson W. and Catherine Jane (McClasky)
Summerfield, the former of whom was born in Virginia and the latter
in Indiana. The father was a youth at the time of his removal from
the historic Old Dominion commonwealth to Indiana, where he en-
tered old Asbury University, now known as DePauw University, at
Greencastle, in which institution he was graduated. He was a man of
sterling character and marked ability, — one who ever commanded se-
cure place in popular confidence and esteem. He was for many years
clerk of the circuit court in Jennings county, Indiana, where he was
also editor of the Vernon Banner for some time. He rendered gallant
service in defense of the Union during the climacteric period of the
Civil war. He was a member of Company A, Twelfth Indiana Volun-
teer Infantry, and he did not long survive his strenuous army exper-
iences, as he died in 1870, shortly after the birth of his son Johnson
W., of this review, who was born on the 2Oth of November, 1869. His
devoted wife survived him by many years. She came with her chil-
dren to California in 1883 and here continued to reside until her death,
which occurred in the city of Pasadena, in 1906. Kennedy B. Summer-
field, the only brother of him whose name initiates this review, was post-
master at Santa Monica, this state, at the time of his death, which oc-
curred on the 5th of September. 1910.

Johnson W. Summerfield gained his rudimentary education in the
public schools of his native state and was a lad of thirteen years at the
time of accompanying his mother on her removal to California. The
family home was established in Los Angeles and here Mr. Summer-
field was enabled to avail himself of the advantages of the public schools,
in which he received the major part of his academic education. He

334 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

served as deputy coroner of Los Angeles county under the regime of
Dr. George W. Campbell and thereafter was variously engaged until
his matriculation in the law department of the University of Southern
California, in which he completed the prescribed course and was gradu-
ated as a member of the class of 1901. He duly received his degree of
Bachelor of Laws at this time, but had been admitted to the bar in April
of the preceding year, after careful study under private preceptorship.

After his graduation Air. Summerfield engaged in the general prac-
tice of law, in which he became associated with Benjamin S. Hunter,
and from 1903 to 1905 he served again as deputy county coroner. Upon
his retirement from this office he continued in the individual practice of
his profession until 1907, when the board of supervisors of Los Ange-
les county appointed him to the office of justice of the peace, to fill
a vacancy. In November. 1910, he was chosen as his own successor,
for a full term, at the regular election, and his fidelity, impartiality and
judicial acumen, as coupled with his excellent knowledge of the law,
have made him a most efficient magistrate. His rulings have invariably
been based upon equity and justice and in his administration of it's
affairs he has made his office justify its name, the while he has further
fortified himself in popular confidence and esteem in the city that has
so long been his home and to which his loyalty is of the most insistent
order. In politics he is unwavering in his adherence to the Republican
party, and he has given effective service in behalf of its cause. He is
affiliated with Hollenbeck Lodge, No. 319, Free and Accepted Masons,
and Los Angeles Lodge, No. 99, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, besides which he is a valued and popular member of the Jonathan
Club, one of the representative social organizations of his home city.

On the ^th of December, 1908, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Summerfield to Miss Phoebe F. Labory, who was born and reared in
Los Angeles and who is a daughter of Leonard and Jane Labory. The
home of Mr. and Airs. Summerfield is now brightened by the presence
of a winsome little daughter, Catheryne Jane, who was born on the
ist of July, 1911.

S. L. BRIGHT. This is an age that demands men of initiative power,
and those who possess this quality and direct it along normal and legiti-
mate channels of enterprise are they who aid materially in the advance-
ment of industrial and social progress. Among the resourceful, reliant
and progressive business men of California a place of no little promin-
ence must be accorded to S. L. Bright, president of the International
Mercantile & Bond Company, of San Francisco. He was the founder
of this corporation and the one who was the chief force in formulating
the policies along which it has moved to a position of great success as
one of the leading concerns of its kind in the United States. Mr. Bright
came from the east to San Francisco in the autumn of 1903, and soon
afterward, after due and consistent promotive work, he effected the
organization of the company just mentioned. Of the same he has been
president since 1906, and in thus entering vigorously and confidently
into a new field of enterprise he certainly has shown the initiative energy
to which reference is made in the initial sentence of this paragraph.

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The International Mercantile & Bond Company began business in
a small office in the Parrott building, and the office corps at the initia-
tion of operations comprised one clerk and one stenographer. There
has been no dearth of growth, no lack of expansion in the intervening
years, and the truth of this statement is amply verified in the condi-
tions that obtain in the office headquarters of the corporation, as they
now occupy nearly an entire floor in the First National Bank building,
with an incidental retention of employes and representatives to whom is
paid an aggregate of more than six hundred dollars a day. Branch
offices are maintained in Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, New York City,
Chicago, St. Louis, Denver and Salt Lake City, and thus it will be
seen that the business ramifications of the company extend throughout
all sections of the Union. This is a remarkable growth within a period
of less than a decade, and Mr. Bright has been the leading force in the
accomplishment of so remarkable results, the while he has had the
earnest colaboration of other business men of the best ability and highest
standing.

The specific province of the International Mercantile & Bond Com-
pany is to stand as intermediary between the jobbing houses and retail
merchants in all lines, and its records not only show conclusively that
its functions have not lacked for popular appreciation but also that the
financial lives of many of its clients have been not alone lengthened but
likewise saved. The company was incorporated on the 8th of January,
1904, and its official corps at the present time is as here indicated: S.
L. Bright, president; Colonel H. D. Loveland, vice president; and J. G.
Roberts, secretary and treasurer. Mr. Bright is known as an aggressive,
far-sighted and thoroughly reliable business man, and his standing in
the business circles of his adopted city and state and also throughout
the country is unassailable. His success represents the direct results
of his own efforts and he stands as a type of the best American citizen-
ship, with marked initiative and administrative ability. He is a stanch
supporter of the principles of the Republican party, is affiliated with
the Masonic fraternity, and is a member of the Union League and Com-
mercial Clubs of San Francisco.

In January, 1906, Mr. Bright was united in marriage to Miss Caro-
line S.'Ledden, of San Francisco, and they have two children, — Harry
L. and Edith L^.

WILLIAM T. LEEKE was born at Hamden, New Haven county, Con-
necticut, on the 23d of May, 1846, and is a son of Dana W. and Abigail
(Goodyear) Leeke, both of whom were likewise born and reared in
that place and both of whom were descendants of those of the respec-
tive names who were identified with the early settlement of the New
Haven colony. The original progenitor of the Leeke family in America
was Philip Leeke. who emmigrated from Staffordshire, England, in
1638, and he was a member of the Davenport colony that founded New
Haven, Connecticut, in that year. Thomas Leeke, grandfather of him
whose name initiates this sketch, was a boy at the time of the war of
the Revolution and he eventually became a prosperous farmer in the
vicinity of New Haven, where his entire life was passed. Dana Win-

338 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ton Leeke likewise passed his entire life in New Haven county, where
he resided on the ancestral homestead and held prestige as one of the
representative farmers of that section of the state. He was about
eighty-four years of age when he was summoned to the life eternal, and
the old homestead continued in the possession of the family from the
Colonial days until 1910, when the same was sold by William T. Leeke,
of this review, who thereupon effected a settlement of the estate. Mrs.
Abigail (Goodyear) Leeke died on the old homestead in 1882. She
was a daughter of Seymour Goodyear, a lineal descendant of Stephen
Goodyear, who likewise was a member of the Davenport party of col-
onists who came from England and founded the New Haven colony in
1638. Stephen Goodyear became acting governor of the colony and
later he was regularly elected governor. Dana W. and Abigail (Good-
year) Leeke became the parents of five sons and five daughters, all
of whom attained to years of maturity, and of the number William T.
was the seventh in order of birth. Only two others of the children are
now living.

The environment and labors of the old homestead farm just men-
tioned compassed the childhood and youth of William T. Leeke, and
those familiar with conditions on the New England farmsteads in the
early days will recognize the fact that he early had fellowship with ar-
duous toil. Under the incidental discipline he waxed strong in mind
and body, and after duly availing himself of the advantages of the com-
mon schools of the locality and period he entered Fort Edward Col-
legiate Institution, at Fort Edward, New York, in which he was gradu-
ated. He soon put his scholastic acquirements to practical use by adopt-
ing the pedagogic profession, in which he was a successful and popular
teacher from 1867 to 1889. In the year first mentioned, shortly before
reaching his legal majority, Mr. Leeke came to California, in company
with his brother Henry W., who died at Napa, this state, at the age of
thirty-four years. The brothers made the journey by way of the Is-
thmus of Panama, as this was before the day of the transcontinental
railroads, and soon after his arrival William T. Leeke began teaching in
the schools of California. He was engaged in this work for the en-
suing four years and also found requisition for his services as a pri-
vate tutor in certain branches of study. He devoted a year to normal
study in one of the leading institutions in San Francisco, and there-
after he was a valued instructor in Ashland College, at Ashland, Ore-
gon, where he remained thus engaged for a period of eight years. This
institution did admirable work in its various departments and was even-
tually merged into a state normal school. Mr. Leeke was made pres-
ident of the college during the latter part of his connection therewith,
and ably administrated its affairs along executive lines while continu-
ing his active services as an instructor. He also held the position of
supervising principal of the public schools of Ashland, Oregon, for one
year, and his name merits a place of honor on the roster of the able
and popular pioneer teachers on the Pacific coast.

In July, 1880, Mr. Leeke made a radical change in his field of labor
by entering the Indian service of the government, and in November,
1882, he was appointed superintendent of the Yainax Indian Training

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 339

School in Klamath county, Oregon. His work in this school was di-
rected with so much of discrimination and success that it became a model
for other institutions of the same order. In 1887 Mr. Leeke left the
government service and returned to California. He joined the Ontario
colony, in San Bernardino county, and located upon a tract of twenty
acres, adjoining his present beautiful home in the little city of Upland.
He was one of the pioneers of the colony and had purchased the land
mentioned in 1884. Here he planted one of the first orange groves in
this district, and here he took up his permanent abode in 1887, as has
already been intimated in this context. He has been specially influ-
ential in the development and upbuilding of this favored district along
both civic and industrial lines, and he has stood exemplar of the most
vital public spirit and the most progressive policies. His capital has
been gained largely through his active association with local enterprises
and he has at the present time many important investments in this sec-
tion of the state.

In July, 1891, under the administration of President Harrison, Mr.
Leeke re-entered the educational bureau of the Indian service, as he
was at that time appointed by the president to the office of supervisor
of Indian educational work for northern California and also for the
states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Nevada, and he did much to
systematize and render efficient the work thus assigned to him. He re-
tired from this service in the autumn of 1893 and again took up his
residence at North Ontario, San Bernardino county, — to which place
the name of Upland was applied later. He became one of the organiz-
ers of the Commercial State Bank at Upland, and when the same was
reorganized as the Commercial National Bank he continued as one of
the principal stockholders of the institution, of which he has been a
director and vice president for the past several years. He was also one
of the organizers and original stockholders of the Ontario-Cucamonga
Fruit Exchange, which has its headquarters in Upland, and he was vice-
president and a director of this institution for several years past. Mr.
Leeke was also one of the promoters of the Ontario Power Company,
and he was general manager of the same from 1902 to 1907. Power
was developed from the waters of San Antonio creek, in the canon of
the same name, and this power is not only utilized for irrigation pur-
poses but also for the supplying of electric power and lighting facil-
ities to Upland, Ontario and Cucamonga. The success of this import-
ant improvement has been in large measure due to the earnest and in-
defatigable efforts and effective administrative policies of Mr. Leeke.
In 1908 he promoted and organized the Palos Blancas Agricultural
Company, in which he is principal stockholder and which owns fifteen
hundred acres of land under concession from the Mexican government,
with a water supply of sixteen hundred inches from the Culican river.
The principal product on this extensive Mexican ranch at the present
time is corn, but the intention of the owners is to develop the same in
the propagation of sugar cane and Hennquin fiber. Mr. Leeke is pres-
ident of the company and passes considerable time each year on the
great plantation, in a section of country that is a veritable paradise for
the hunter and fisherman.

340 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Mr. Leeke has ever given an unequivocal allegiance to the Repub-
lican party and he is well fortified in his opinions as to matters of public
polity, as a man of broad intellectual ken and wide practical exper-
ience. In November, 1904, he was elected to represent the thirteenth
district in the state senate, to fill out two years of an unexpired term,
and while he made an admirable record in the senate he declined to be-
come a candidate for re-election, as his manifold business interests de-
manded his time and attention. He was a member of the senate at
the time when the special session of the legislature was called to make
provisions for the relief of San Francisco, after its devastation by earth-
quake and fire. He is identified with various civic organizations of
representative order and both he and his family are zealous members
of the Methodist Episcopal church.

In the year 1874, while a resident of Oregon, Mr. Leeke was united
in marriage to Miss Annie Farlow, daughter of Hiram Farlow, who was
a native of Illinois and who became one of the pioneer farmers of
Oregon, where he died several years ago. Mrs. Leeke did not long
survive her marriage, as she was summoned to the life eternal in 1876,
leaving no children. In 1878 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Leeke
to Miss Mary Quigley, who was born in Siskiyou county, California,
and who was a daughter of John Quigley, a native of Ohio and a pio-
neer of California. He was for many years engaged in the mercantile
business at Scott Valley, this state, and he died a number of years ago.
Mrs. Leeke proved a devoted wife and mother and the gracious at-
tributes of her character gained to her the affectionate regard of all
who came within the sphere of her influence. She passed to the life
eternal on the 7th of February, 1892, and is survived by three children,
— Ethel Frances remains at the paternal home and presides most gra-
ciously over the same"; Dana Winston was graduated in Pomona College,
at Pomona, this state, and thereafter in the Colorado School of Mines, at
Golden, and he is now mining engineer for the Utah Copper Company at
Garfield, Utah ; Frank Goodyear Leeke, the younger son, is at the present
time located on a sugar plantation near the city of Honolulu, Hawaii,
where he is perfecting himself in the practical details of the propagation
of sugar cane and the process of manufacturing sugar, with the pur-
pose of utilizing his knowledge in connection with the development of
the sugar industry on the lands of the Palos Blancos Agricultural Com-
pany in Mexico, of which he is assistant manager and of which his
father is the principal stockholder, as has already been stated in this
article.

WILLIAM S. BAIRD. This popular member of the Los Angeles bar
has wandered far from his native heath to establish a home and gain
prestige, which he has already done, as one of the able representatives
of his profession in southern California. It may be said without fear
of legitimate contradiction that there are few lawyers of his age in the
state whose claims for diversified and interesting experiences can equal
those of this sturdy son of the land of hills and heather. Mr. Baird
retired from the office of justice of the peace on the 2d of January,
1911, since which time he has been engaged in the practice of his pro-

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 343

fession in Los Angeles, where he is a senior member of the firm of
Baird & Gerecht, in which his coadjutor is E. F. Gerecht.

William Smyllie Baird was born in the city of Glasgow, Scotland,
on the I3th of November, 1873, and his lineage touches the staunchest of
old Scottish stock. He is a son of Robert and Elizabeth (Watson)
Baird, both of whom passed their entire lives in Scotland, where the
father was a prosperous iron and steel manufacturer in Glasgow, in which
city his death occurred in 1897, his noble and devoted wife having been
summoned to the life eternal in 1881. He whose name introduces this
article is indebted to the excellent public schools of his native city for
his early educational training, which was effectively supplemented by
a course in the medical department of the University of Glasgow, from
which he was graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. Con-
cerning this and other stages in the early carreer of Mr. Baird an inter-
esting account was published recently in the Los Angeles Times, and
the estimate is worthy of perpetuation irr this connection, with but slight
paraphrase :

"The story of the life of Mr. Baird, who is not yet forty years
of age, is of extraordinary interest. He has stored away the remem-
brances of hundreds of experiences in all parts of the world and these
are amusing and thrilling when he is in a mood to relate them. To
begin with, he is a son of a Scotch iron and steel master who was a bit
of a capitalist. As the old Scotchman saw to it that his workmen made
good iron and steel, he saw to everything else. When it came to a mat-
ter of educating his son he sought the best the world afforded. The
son's ideal was an uncle who was a member of parliament and in whose
honor he was named. When his common school education was finished,
in 1889, he entered the University of Glasgow. His physique was unex-
celled by that of any of his fellow students, and they were not long
in ascertaining that he was an expert at football. He was made captain
of the team. The university is quoted world-wide for the thoroughness
of its courses. Notwithstanding his dislike for medicines, anatomy and
physiology, Baird emerged from the institution with the degree of Doc-
tor of Medicine and with a record of having stood high in his class.

"The young physician had no notion of practicing and listened to the
wanderlust which was whispering to him. It lead him through England,
Ireland, Norway, and Sweden. Finishing his post-graduate course at
Heidelberg University he again heard the call of the wide, wide world,
having gained an idea of its greatness through the experiences of his
earlier travels. After a short visit to his home, he set off for regions
unknown. His thirst for new lands carried him to New Zealand, Aus-
tralia, Tasmania, Capetown, the wilds of South Africa, and Calcutta and
the East Indies. Once he threaded his way back home through conti-
nental Europe. In 1896 he landed in San Francisco and determined to
become a citizen of the United States. He located in Portland, Oregon,
and after various changes of abiding place finally established his home
in Los Angeles, in the year 1900. Here the old longing for politics
came to him and in a short time he was in the thick of political man-
oeuvers. In 1907 he was made clerk of the justice court, which was pre-
sided over by Justice Selph, who was succeeded by Justice Ling, upon
whose death Mr. Baird was appointed to fill the vacancy as justice of the

344 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

peace, an incumbency which he retained from July, 1910, until the close
of the term, on the 2d of January, 1911. Globe-trotter, athlete, doctor
and lawyer all combined in the officer who thus presided over the justice
court in an old building at Temple and New High streets. This stock-
ily-built, good-natured magistrate possesses those attainments which one
would scarcely expect to find in such a minor tribunal. Probably no magis-
trate in the state has gone through a more thorough mental training or
traveled more extensively than has this former justice of the peace. One
might expect to find the man possessing such a combination to be of an
eccentric disposition, but no one has yet discovered that the doctor, law-
yer and justice has any extraordinary idiosyncracies."

It may be said further that while serving in the justice court Mr.
Baird was not only gaining valuable experiences along technical lines
pertaining to the science of jurisprudence but he was also applying him-
self diligently to study of the law, with the result that he was admitted
to the bar of the state in July, 1909. In the meanwhile he had entered
the law department of the University of Southern California, in which
he prosecuted his studies while still serving as justice of the peace,
and in this institution he was graduated as a member of the class of
1910, duly receiving his well earned degree of Bachelor of Laws. Upon
his retirement from the office of justice of the peace he engaged in the
active practice of his profession in Los Angeles, and his ability, ster-
ling integrity of purpose, close application and personal popularity are
the mediums through which he is building up a substantial and representa-
tive practice. It may further be stated that upon the death of Justice
Ling he was chosen to fill the vacancy thus caused and that his appoint-
ment to the office of justice of the peace was made by the unanimous
vote of the board of supervisors of Los Angeles county. The offices of
the firm of Baird & Gerecht are located in the Fay building, on Third
street.

In politics Mr. Baird gives an uncompromising allegiance to the
Republican party and he has given yeoman service in behalf of its cause,
the while he is well fortified in his convictions as to matters of public
polity and is independent in his views. In the time honored Masonic
fraternity Mr. Baird has attained to the thirty-second degree of the An-
cient Accepted Scottish Rite and is identified with the adjunct organi-
zation, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.
He is a member of the Celtic Club, a representative organization in his
home city, and he and his wife are popular factors in the social activi-
ties of the community.

On the 28ih of May, 1910, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Baird
to Miss Clara Barton, who was born in the state of Tennessee and who
was a resident of Los Angeles at the time of their union. She is a
daughter of Mr. S. A. Barton, who is now a resident of Imperial Valley.

JAMES FRANKLIN BURNS has the enviable distinction of being the
oldest surviving pioneer of Los Angeles county, and he has been in-
timately identified with the development and progress of this most beau-
tiful section of California. Clean of soul and clear of vision, he is a

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 345

man of distinct personality and his life has been so governed by prin-
ciple as to retain to him at all times the esteem and confidence of his
fellow men. As one of the sterling citizens and honored pioneers of
Los Angeles he merits special consideration in this publication, and it
is a pleasure to the publishers that it is permitted at this juncture to
offer a brief review of his career.

James Franklin Burns was born at Clifton Springs, Ontario county,
New York, on the 27th of September, 1831, and is a son of John F.
and Eunice (Noyes) Burns, the former of whom was born in the city
of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1809, and the latter of whom was
born in New Hampshire, in 1810. John F. Burns was a manufacturer
of edged tools during the major portion of his active business career,
and he passed the closing years of his life in Kalamazoo, Michigan,
where he took up his abode in 1841 and where his death occurred in
1848. The Burns family lineage is traced back to staunch Scotch origin
and the name became identified with the annals of American history in
an early day. Mrs. Eunice (Noyes) Burns survived her husband by
nearly half a century and was a resident of Fremont, Nebraska at the
time when she was summoned to eternal rest, in 1895. She was a
daughter of Rev. James Noyes, who was one of the pioneer clergymen
of the Methodist Episcopal church and who was a resident of the state
of New York at the time of his demise. James F. and Eunice (Noyes)
Burns became the parents of five children, — James Franklin, Mary,
Mary E., Edward C. and John W. The first daughter to bear the name
of Mary died in infancy, and of the entire number of children the only
survivor is he whose name introduces this sketch.

J. Franklin Burns was a lad of about eleven years at the time of the
family removal to Kalamazoo county, Michigan, and there he was af-
forded the advantages of the common schools of the pioneer days, hav-
ing pursued his studies in a primitive log school house of the type com-
mon to the locality and period. This discipline was supplemented by a
course of study in Leoni Academy, in Jackson county, Michigan. That
he made good use of the opportunities afforded him is assured by the
fact that when nineteen years of age he proved himself eligible for
pedagogic honors. He began teaching in the schools of Coldwater,
Branch county, Michigan, in 1849, and after leaving that place he went
to Alleghany City, Pennsylvania, where he was employed as a teacher
for one school year. He then returned to Michigan, and for one term
taught school in St. Joseph county.

On the last day of February, 1853, Air. Burns left Michigan and set
forth upon the weary and hazardous journey across the plains to Cali-
fornia. The trip was made with an ox team and the immigrant train
with which he proceeded met its full share of dangers and hardships.
From Salt Lake City onward the party comprised one hundred and
nineteen persons, of whom nineteen were women. On the loth of No-
vember, 1853, Mr. Burns arrived in Los Angeles, which was then a
mere straggling village clustered around the old mission. During the
school year of 1854-5 Mr. Burns found requisition for his services as
teacher in a public school at the San Gabriel mission, and in 1856 h«
was elected superintendent of public schools for Los Angeles county.

3-16 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

To him is ascribed the distinction of having been the first incum-
bent of this office in the county, and he wielded much influence in COIIT
nection with educational affairs in this section in the early days, doing
all in his power to place the schools upon a proper basis and to bring
their work up to the highest possible standard of efficiency. He re-
tained the position of superintendent for two years, at the expiration
of which he purchased a general merchandise business at San Gabriel.
This enterprise he conducted for two years and he then disposed of the
same to Hon. Benjamin D. Wilson, who had taken up his residence in
Los Angeles county in 1841, and Dr. Henry Miles. It may be noted
in this connection that Dr. Miles was one of the unfortunate victims
who met death on the ill fated steam launch "Ada Hancock," the boiler
of which exploded in Wilmington harbor, on the 2ist of April, 1863.

In 1860 Mr. Burns established his residence in Los Angeles, where
for a time he had charge of the local office of the United States mar-
shal, James C. Penny, who maintained his home and general headquart-
ers in San Francisco. Mr. Burns was thus .engaged until the first ses-
sion of congress after the election of Abraham Lincoln to the presid-
ency, when congress consolidated the northern and southern districts of
California, thus retiring from office all those connected with the United
States marshal's office in the former southern district. In 1863 Mr.
Burns was elected city treasurer of Los Angeles, and he continued in-
cumbent of the position for three consecutive terms, — a fact indicative
of the unqualified esteem and confidence reposed in him in the com-
munity. In 1867 he was elected county sheriff, on the Republican ticket,
and in this connection he again became a figure of local historical in-
terest, as he was the first Republican to be chosen an official of this
county. In 1869 there came popular endorsement of his administration,
in that he was chosen as his own successor in the shrievalty, whose du-
ties at that time were most exacting and onerous. In 1873 Mr. Burns
was appointed domestic water-tax collector for the city and this position
he retained until 1877. In the following year he went to Fremont,
Dodge county, Nebraska, where he continued to reside until 1885. In
that state he also became marked for distinctive official honors. In
1879 he was elected to represent the Eighth district in the state senate,
and he served through the regular as well as a special session of the
legislature. In this connection he was specially influential in securing
effective legislation in regulation of the liquor traffic, and the laws which
he thus assisted in bringing to enactment, still remain on the statute
books of Nebraska.

In November of 1885 Mr. Burns returned to California and re-
sumed his residence in Los Angeles, where for the two ensuing years
he was engaged in the real-estate business. In 1888 he was appointed
chief of the police department of the city, and after giving an able and
discriminating administration for one term he was appointed general
claim agent for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, on its divi-
sion between Los Angeles and Albuquerque, New Mexico. He con-
tinued in tenure of this position until 1901, when he resigned. There-
upon he was appointed to a similar office in the service of the Los Angeles
Pacific electric railway. After serving four and one-half years as gen-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 349

eral claim agent he resigned the office and became special claim agent
and adjuster of personal damages, in which he is now engaged. His
business career has been one of varied and interesting order, and he is
known as a man of broad intellectuality and distinctive executive ability,
the while his course has been such as to give him inviolable place in popu-
lar confidence and respect.

In politics Mr. Burns has ever given an unswerving allegiance to
the cause of the Republican party, and he is an effective exponent of
its principles and policies. In 1862 Mr. Burns was raised to the sublime
degree of Master Mason, in Los Angeles Lodge, No. 42, Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, a member of Mount Tabor Commandery, No. 9, at
Mount Tabor, Nebraska. He is past national representative of Cali-
fornia in the Junior Order of United American Mechanics, in whose
supreme body he has been a member under these conditions on five dif-
ferent occasions. He is one of the charter members and most honored
and influential factors in the Los Angeles County Pioneer Society, of
which he served as president for three terms and in whose affairs he
retains a lively interest. His reminiscences of the pioneer days are
most graphic and interesting and are worthy of perpetuation in the
archives of the organization just noted. Mr. Burns is well known in
the state that has so long represented his home and no citizen has gained
popularity of more definite order.

On the 8th of August, 1889, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Burns to Mrs. Josephine (Hill) Carpenter, who was born in Los Ang-
eles in 1855 a daughter of F. J. and Ann Carpenter, both of whom were
residents of Los Angeles at the time of their death.

J. HARVEY MCCARTHY. To have over twenty large subdivisions and
the building of an entire new town to one's credit is sufficient to mark
any personality as a man of achievement. One of the most prominent and
successful realty men in California, whose name is well known throughout
the west, is J. Harvey McCarthy. In a decade's residence in Los Angeles
he has done as much, if not more, towards the upbuilding of the city than
many men who have unlimited means at their disposal. He is justly
proud of his constructive work in Los Angeles, but still more proud of
the establishment of a new town, called Planada, the "City Beautiful,"
a thriving community situated in the Santa Fe Railway, nine miles east
of Merced, the county seat of Merced county.

Mr. McCarthy is one of a great list of successful men who received
their early training in the practical school of journalism, following closely
in the footsteps of his father, D. O. McCarthy, a California pioneer and
also for many years engaged in the newspaper business. Mr. McCarty
comes of good old southern stock, his father being a native of North
Carolina, and his mother's birthplace being Mobile, Alabama. D. O.
McCarthy, the father, is a territorial pioneer, having been lured to the
Golden state in the early fifties, where he later married Miss Amanda
Anderson.

J. Harvey McCarthy is one of California's native sons, and was born
in the city of San Diego. Receiving his first instruction in the public
schools, he later attended the Laurel Hall Military Academy at San Ma-

350 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

teo. The age of eighteen years found him already started on his career
in the business world, actively conducting a mercantile establishment
at Siempre Viva, a town about twenty miles from San Diego. Following
four years of this work he founded in association with his father the
San Diego Morning I'idcttc, a popular and influential newspaper which
the Messrs. McCarthy continued to publish for seven years. At the
end of that period they sold their interests in this journal and moved
to Los Angeles, with which growing city they have ever since been iden-
tified.

In igoj Mr. McCarthy organized the Pioneer Investment & Trust
Company. Of this concern he is the president and owns a controlling
interest in the corporation. Since taking up his residence in Los Angeles
he has been extensively engaged in the real estate business, particularly
concerning himself with the development of new portions of the city
and handling numerous tracts and subdivisions. On January n, 1911,
he founded and incorporated the new town of Planada in Merced county,
truly a monument to his enterprise and progressive spirit. It cannot
but be interesting to have in the vivid words of this man, with his won-
derful gift of moulding his unique and daring ideas into splendid
realities, some account of this future city which shall have the immense
advantage of being properly planned from the beginning, and set in
the very lap of the granary of the Nation.

"My greatest pride is in my Planada project. I have never felt so en-
thusiastic about any of my ventures as I do over the wonderful re-
sources and possibilities of the lands in and around the new 'City Beau-
tiful.' I have spent and will spend large sums of money to carry out
my ideas in making this section one of the garden spots of California.
We have the climate, the best of soils, plenty of good water and splendid
transportation. Based on these fundamental advantages I am building
a city unique in beauty and unusual in every aspect. My confidence
in the character of the country has not been misplaced for the one hun-
dred and fifty people who went to Planada on my special train July 4th,
bought more than $65,000 worth of property, which is pretty conclusive
evidence that they were pleased with what they found.

"Many think I am too optimistic when I say that Planada will have
5,000 people in five years. It's not optimism ; it is just good hard sense,
and those who take my word for it will make money. Many are won-
dering why I am spending so much money in improvements at Planada,
when, from a realty point of view, I would make just as much with half
the expense. The answer is simply : I am building my own monumnt.
I intend Planada, the 'City Beautiful' shall stand as an enduring testi-
mony of my ideas and my ability as a city builder."

Planada is an interesting and unusual project. It is located in the
heart of the farming community, rich in resources of its soil, favored with
unusual climatic conditions ; with summers tempered by ocean breezes ;
its winters short and mild. It is in the heart of the richest agricultural
section in the state — the cream of California. It is situated on the Santa
Fe Railroad, nine miles east of Merced, the county seat and a prosperous
town in the heart of a fruit growing section, and is surrounded on all
sides by rich, level land, the choicest in the San Joaquin Valley. A

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 351

few miles east of it, in the foothills, are rich mining camps and a few
miles south is the newly located oil region. Roads from the mining
camps, the oil fields and the farming section lead through Planada to
Merced. It is indeed the logical location for a town. In addition to its
more practical benefits, the foothills afford a splendor of landscape beauty;
and good hunting and fishing grounds are within easy reach for recrea-
tion.

Planada is one hundred and fifty-nine miles southeast of San Fran-
cisco, eighty-seven miles from the Yosemite Valley, the great natural
wonderland and tourist resort, and forty-six miles north of Fresno, a pros-
perous, bustling city of 30,000 people. It has an elevation of one hun-
dred and seventy-one feet ; a dry and healthful climate, free from fogs ;
with three hundred and twenty-five days of sunshine every year. There
is no better climate anywhere. Outdoor life is possible the year 'round,
the temperature seldom falling; below 29 degrees in winter. Depressing
heat and insect pests are practically unknown. The changes from winter
to summer are so gradual as to be almost unnoticed. The first winter
rain brings out the green on the hillside ; the mornings and evenings are
cooler, but the flowers are not injured and roses bloom in January.
The winter season in central California corresponds to spring in the
east.

Perhaps never before in history has a town been so carefully plan-
ned from the beginning. It has been laid out exactly to meet the needs
of a growing prosperous community. Most towns are built in a haphaz-
ard manner, where a road crosses a stream, or two roads come to-
gether. In such cases a ferry, a trading post, or a camp grows out of
the necessity for its primitive being into a community. First comes
a post office, then a general store, a blacksmith shop, followed by the sub-
sequent gathering of miscellaneous stores and buildings put down in
a manner justified only by the hour's need and not with any idea of the
town's appearance. This is the ordinary way of building a city. Plan-
ada has been carefully planned to have its natural beauty preserved, to
have its logical center so located that, with the increase of population,
the direction of its buildings will be carefully guided, its stores properly
located, its warehouses and wholesale district segregated in one section
and the residence in another.

Mr. Wilbur David Cook, the well-known landscape architect of
Los Angeles, Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects,
prepared the plans for Planada. In it he has included all of the
much sought civic beauties, all of the careful planning which is
now being done in reconstructing old towns. He was given absolute
freedom in preparing his plans and he so used his privilege that Plan-
ada will represent an ideal of municipal beauty.

Mr. Cook has stated his suggestions for laying out the city and these
are given in part as follows :

"Owing to the fact that the main line of the Santa Fe Railroad
cuts the south-east corner of the property nearly at an angle of forty-
five degrees, it is determined to make the railroad station the focal
point of the main arteries of traffic. Ordinarily the railroad approaches
to our American cities are a disgrace and immense sums are being

352 A.XIKR1CAX BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

spent to remedy this result in haphazard growth and unwise location.
With this idea in mind, the entire right of way on the north side, for
a width of forty feet, has been reserved for a parkway, embellished
with shade trees and a sidewalk. That portion immediately adjoining
the track will be screened with a woven fence covered with roses.
Entrances thirty feet wide have been left at frequent intervals, oppo-
site all street intersections, to facilitate the access to the railroad siding
for hauling freight. The present station is to be beautified by the addi-
tion of pergolas running the full length of the station plaza. The
station will have cement stucco piers with overhead beams covered with
roses ; when lighted at night this will be a most attractive feature.

"Leading from the station plaza are the three main streets, or boule-
vards— long, splendid vistas of tree embowered roadways, with wide park-
ways and sidewalks. Broadway, the backbone of the town, is a splendid
avenue one hundred and seventy feet wide, with a seven-foot cement
sidewalk ; rolled, oiled and curbed, and brilliantly lighted with handsome
electroliers. It has a parkway down its center forty feet wide, leaving a
clear space of fifty feet between curbs on either side. The parkways
have a crossing between each block, giving ample turning space
for teams and automobiles every quarter of a block. This gives an
added advantage of splitting the traffic, thus avoiding congestion as the
town develops. This also affords a splendid parking feature for every
business house fronting on Broadway, largely eliminating the dust
problem and affording an efficient firebreak, thereby insuring this dis-
trict against any such disastrous conflagrations as wiped out San Fran-
cisco after the earthquake in April, 1906. The landscape features of the
plan have been arranged to distribute the value from a realty point
of view throughout the town. One point centers about the Station Plaza
Park, this being of great value for a business location on account of its
splendid outlook and easy accessability to the station. Another, about
the Civic Center, offers a splendid residential location, on account of the
municipal buildings. Another point of great value is the establishment
of an uniform building restriction of thirty-five feet on side streets.
The wholesale and warehouse district has been segregated from the town
proper by the railroad right of way. The townsite has been so planned that
it can be extended on the lines already laid down to accommodate an in-
creasing population. All future needs and requirements for the next
hundred years will be taken care of in so far as human ingenuity can
forecast future necessities. In short, the work of building a fine, clean
American town has been planned and carried out in a broad-gauged liberal
manner and nothing like it is to be found in this country. It is a model
town in every sense of the word."

Mr. McCarthy, the originator and leading spirit of this vast and
delightful enterprise, is not one whose abilities are yet to be proved, for
he has more than "given a taste of his quality'' in his past achievements.
He is typical of those men of optimism and keen foresight to whom the
growth of Los Angeles and its unexampled prosperity is so largely due.
He has subdivided and sold at least twenty large tracts around the city,
this being probably more than any other individual operator. Among
the subdivisions which he has prepared for the rapidly increasing popu-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 353

lation are the following: Cresta del Arroyo, Windemere Park, Univer-
sity Place, Glendale Place; Walnut Place, Orange Grove Place, Main
Street Cottage Place, Hollenbeck Heights Tract, Vista del Sierra Tract,
and Euclid Terrace Tract.

Politically Mr. McCarthy is a Democrat, having since earliest voting
days given heart and hand to the policies and principles of this- cause. In
fact, for a number of years he took an active part in state and national
affairs of the Democratic party and in 1904 was a delegate from Los
Angeles county to the National Democratic Convention in St. Louis, Mis-
souri. However, of recent years, his real estate operations have been of
such monumental character as to preclude activity in any other line.

Mr. McCarthy was happily married August 27, 1906, to Miss Mary
Louise Patterson, of Lexington, Kentucky, a daughter of William Pat-
terson, a prominent lawyer of that city. Mrs. McCarthy is a charming
young woman and active in the social and benevolent interests of the
city. She and her husband share their home, at 981 Elden avenue, with
one son, William Harvey, born August 2, 1908. The subject's fraternal
affiiliations are limited to membership in that popular and socially inclined
organization, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.

HENRY M. WILLIS. Bearing the full patronymic of his distinguished
father, the late Judge Henry M. Willis, he whose name introduces this
paragraph has gained for himself distinct prestige and success in a pro-
fession that was dignified by the life and services of his father, than
whom there have been few more prominently identified with the de-
velopment and progress of California along civic and material lines. As
a record of the life and achievements of Judge Willis appears in a pre-
ceding memoir of this work, together with adequate data concerning the
family history, it is not necessary to repeat the information in the sketch
at hand, which shall be devoted to offering a brief resume of the career
of the son, who is one of the representative members of the bar of his
native county and who is engaged in the active practice of his profes-
sion in the city of San Bernardino.

Henry Montague Willis was born on the fine old family homestead,
near San Bernardino, on the I2th of November, 1871. and is the only
surviving son of Judge Henry M. and Amelia (Benson) Willis. His
childhood and early youth were passed on the homestead mentioned and
his rudimentary education was secured in the district schools, in the old
town of San Bernardino. When he was about fifteen years of age his
parents established their home in the city of San Bernardino, and here
he continued his studies in the Sturges Academy. In the furtherance
of his higher academic education he finally was matriculated in the
University of California, in which he was graduated as a member of
the class of 1893 and from which he received the degree of Bachelor
of Philosophy. In the meanwhile he had also prosecuted with earnest-
ness and appreciation the study of law, and in January, 1894, he was
duly admitted to the bar of his native state, upon examination before
the supreme court. His initial work in his profession was done dur-
ing a partnership association with his father, and after this alliance
had continued about one year he removed to Phoenix, Arizona, where

354 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

he continued in active general practice until 1901 and where he gained
secure precedence as one of the strong and valued members of the bar
of that territory. In the year mentioned he returned to San Bernardino,
which has since continued to be the headquarters of his professional
work, with the exception of a period of one year passed in Los Angeles,
where he served as assistant United States district attorney for the
southern district of the state, in 1909. He is now senior member of the
law firm of Willis & Guthrie, which controls a large and substantial
business, and he has had to do with a number of the most important litiga-
tions presented in the courts of this section of the state since his return
to his native county. While a resident of Phoenix. Arizona, Mr. Willis
served at three different times as acting district attorney, and his incum-
bency of this office covered a period of three years. He also served
two years as assistant district attorney of San Bernardino county, and
he is known as a careful, conscientious and able advocate and well for-
tified counsellor.

In politics Mr. Willis is found arrayed as a veritable stalwart in
the camp of the Republican party and he has labored in season and out
in the promotion of the cause thereof. In November, 1906 he was
elected representative of the thirtieth district in the state senate, in
which he served one term, of four years, and in which he made an
admirable record for efficient and public-spirited devotion to the in-
terests of his constituency and the state at large. During the first ses-
sion of the legislature during his term of office he was chairman of
the code revision committee of the senate and in the second session he
had the distinction of being chosen chairman of the important judiciary
committee. He has served as chairman of the Republican county com-
mittee of San Bernardino county and he retained a similar position while
a resident of Arizona. Even the brief statements incorporated in this
review indicate clearly that Mr. Willis is able to get aside any applica-
tion in his case of the aphorism that "a prophet is not without honor
save in his own country," for his popularity in the county and state of
his birth is of the most unequivocal order. He is affiliated with the
Knights of Pythias, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and
the Native Sons of the Golden West, besides which he holds member-
ship in various clubs of representative character, including the Los
Angeles Country Club and the University Club at Redlands.

At Phoenix. Arizona, on the 8th of May, 1898, Mr. Willis was
united in marriage to Miss Mary A. Daly, a native of Limerick, Ire-
land, and whose home was at Mount Kisco, Westchester county, New
York, and who is a daughter of the late James W. Daly, a well known
railroad contractor of that state. Mr. and Mrs. Willis have two chil-
dren,— Henry Montague. Jr., and Margaret Amelia.

ALEXANDER R. FRASER. In this age the successful men are those
whose abilities and ambitions lead them into large undertakings and to
assume the responsibilities and labors of leaders in their respective fields
of endeavor. Few stories of achievement in connection with the annals
of California are more worthy of consideration or are pregnant with
greater interest than that which narrates, even briefly, the accomplish-

THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LFNO.X AND
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 357

merits of Alexander R. Eraser, who is distinctively "the man" of Ocean
Park, Los Angeles county, one of the most beautiful resorts of the Pa-
cific coast and one whose manifold attractions represent almost entirely
the concrete results of the enterprise, civic pride and constructive gen-
ius of Sm whose name initiates this paragraph. He has put forth an
enormous amount of vital strength and dynamic force in the development
of great enterprises, and perhaps the most noteworthy of these is the con
struction of the million-dollar pier at Ocean Park, an amusement pier
that bears his name and of whose operating company he is president.
This pier, opened on the ist of June, 1911, and constitutes one of the
magnificent agencies for popular entertainment in the state. Mr. Eraser
has been a resident of California for more than a quarter of a century
and no citizen has exemplified greater or more beneficent civic loyalty
and liberality, the results of which have inured to the benefit of various
communities and to the state at large. He is a man of large affairs
and large capacity for worthy accomplishment. He is steadfast and true
in all the relations of life and has those generous characteristics that
ever beget popular confidence and esteem. As one of the essentially
progressive, influential and representative men of California, he is entitled
to special recognition in this publication.

Alexander R. Eraser was born at St. Johns province of New Bruns-
wick, Canada, on the ist of February, 1856, and is a son of James I.
and Leah (Rosbrough) Eraser, the former a native of Scotland, and
the latter of Ireland. The genealogy in the agnatic line is traced back
to staunch Scottish origin and the family was founded in New Bruns-
wick in an early day. The father of Mr.- Eraser became a prominent
and influential citizen of that province, where he was an interested
principal in various lines of productive enterprise, and both he and his
wife were residents of Los Angeles at the time of their death. They
held membership in the Presbyterian church and were folk of fine char-
acter and patrician breeding. Of their children eight attained to years
of maturity, and of the number one son and five daughters are now living.

Alexander R. Eraser was five years of age at the time of his parents
removal from the Dominion of Canada to the state of Michigan, where
he was reared to maturity and where he was accorded excellent educa-
tional advantages, the family home having been maintained at Yale, that
state, during the major portion of his boyhood and youth. In 1885,
as a young man, Mr. Eraser came to California, and none can doubt
that lie has not only found ample scope for effective endeavor in con-
nection with the civic and material development and upbuilding of this
state during the intervening years, but also that the commonwealth
•has gained much through his interposition in this connection. In giving
a succinct account of his accomplishment during the years of his resi-
dence in California recourse is taken to an appreciative article recently
published, and as the same is subjected to considerable paraphrase in re-
production it is not deemed necessary to make the quotation one of for-
mal order.

Tourists the world over who have visited California know that
Ocean Park, the beautiful central seaside city of the Santa Monica bay
district, the popular resort of widest range of amusements nearest to

358 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

those in joyousness of Coney Island, Atlantic City and other pleasure
places of the coast beyond the Rockies, is far and away the most enter-
taining summer and winter town to be found on the Pacific coast if not in
the world.

At Ocean Park, which combines active commercial life with count-
less beautiful homes bordering model cement avenues and broad walks,
stretching from the broad strand back to the bluff? several miles dis-
tant, is recognized as the model beach city, and within the past few years
it has grown at a marvelous rate, outstripping many of ;s ambitious,
and perhaps jealous, rivals for public favor in its enterprises, in produc-
ing attractions and results which count and which prove a magnet of
tremendous drawing power. No feature of pleasurable seaside life is
overlooked at Ocean Park. Money has been expended with a lavish
hand in securing the cream of attractions, the chief aim of the leaders
in the enterprises of advancement being to place and keep Ocean Park
in the front rank of the popular playgrounds of the Placid Pacific.

What Henry E. Huntington has been to Los Angeles in the creation
of the most famous and perfect system of electric railways in the
world, Alexander R. Eraser has been to Ocean Park in lavish expenditure
of money and in the leadership of bringing the resort to its present high
state of perfection in all of the gigantic enterprises projected for the
upbuilding of the community commercially and socially. A man of
ample means and with the spirit of enterprise as one of the chief attri-
butes of his character, Mr. Eraser is recognized as the foremost citizen of
the coast region in the matter of producing ideal conditions and in do-
ing things which serve to advance values and draw people to Ocean
Park.

Long before he had revealed his far-reaching purposes in develop-
ment. Mr. Eraser visited all of the principal pleasure and seaside re-
sorts of the Atlantic coast, and on his various trips to the Atlantic cities
he made close observations, imbued with the purpose of making Ocean
Park not only the chief seaside resort of the Pacific but also a model
for eastern coast cities. Single-handed and alone, it might be truth-
fully stated, Mr. Eraser, by the untiring application of his energy and
the judicious use of his capital, has created and fashioned Ocean Park.
Early in the history of the coast towns Mr. Eraser acquired the hold-
ings of the Santa Fe and Santa Monica Railroads — in the year 1900.
The great railway corporations had made a complete failure in the pro-
per development of the favorite ocean-front town. Mr. Eraser saw that
there was demanded personal effort along new lines as well as the use
of large funds, and he also realized that to a certain extent the element
of chance was involved in bringing Ocean Park to the front, and under
these conditions all of his time and effort were concentrated in the work
for a few years. The result has been marvelous, as is evident to every
person who knew the town in the days of its infancy.

Many and important have been the achievements vitalized and
brought to successful fruition by Mr. Eraser. He built a ten-foot board
walk from Ocean Park Pier avenue to Santa Monica, and with his as-
sociates constructed the first large building on the beach, the old Casino,
at a coast of thirty-five thousand dollars. He was instrumental in

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 359

planning and building the two hundred thousand dollar bath house, and
to him belongs the sole credit for building the thirty-foot-wide cement
walk, one and one-fourth miles in length, from Ocean Park to Venice.
He financed and built the Masonic Temple, at a coast of forty-five thou-
sand dollars; the Horsehoe pier, at a coast of ninety-five thousand dol-
lars; the Decatur hotel, at a coast of seventy-five thousand dollars; the
twenty-five thousand dollar Eraser block, with foundations sufficiently
strong to support a seven-story building. He deeded to the city of
Ocean Park a beach frontage, which was accepted, the same frontage
now being worth four hundred dollars a front foot, and he and his as-
sociates built the only amusement piers ever constructed in the Pier ave-
nue section — at a cost of more than one hundred thousand dollars.
Mr. Eraser tendered to Santa Monica a perfect sewer system, but his
overtures did not meet with favorable response, with the result that
since that time Santa Monica has expended more than four hundred
thousand dollars to produce the sewer.

While Mr. Eraser has brought to fruition and popular use and ad-
miration all of the improvements just mentioned, he still has other big
undertakings to complete, and the same mean greater things for Ocean
Park and the entire bay district. It has been revealed that, without
taking the public into his confidence, Mr. Eraser has built since 1908
three amusement piers, and in this work he has expended ten thousand
dollars without making a constructive move. He has traveled up and
down the coast, experimenting with cement in salt water, resorting to
every conceivable test, and the result has been shown in his decision to
construct a pier which shall outrival all others in the world for space
and safety. After making his investigations, going into the most minute
details and computing the extent of the support possible to be secured
from the people seeking entertainment, Mr. Eraser perfected his plans
for the building of an amusement pier in the waters of the Pacific and
placing thereon all new attractions. Being a liberal man, Mr. Eraser
did not follow the example of captains of industry in the east, but
made the admission to the pier free, whereas a charge is demanded in
connection with every other amusement pier that has ever been con-
structed. He has more than hundreds of thousands of dollars invested
in the great pier that has been opened to the public in the summer of
1911, and hundreds of thousands of dollars have been invested by those
who have secured concessions for stores, booths, etc.

The efforts thus put forward are merely an earnest of greater things.
Mr. Eraser has drawn plans and specifications for the extension of the
pier by one thousand feet, and with this extension, to be completed in
the near future, the pier will be three hundred feet wide and two thou-
sand feet in length — three times the size of any other pier in the world.
For this addition options have been given to representative eastern amuse-
ment purveyors for more than seventy five per cent of the available space.
The construction of the gigantic pier was instituted on the ist of Sep-
tember, 1910, and it was opened to the public in June, 1911, as has already
been noted in this context. The pier represents a marvelous piece of
engineer skill and forms a splendid addition to the manifold attractions
of the Pacific coast.

360 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Mr. Eraser, who is, as may well be imagined, a man of great vigor
and most alert mentality, possesses a most genial and companionable
nature, is buoyant and optimistic, and has a circle of friends coincident
with that of his acquaintances. Though a man of large affairs and of
splendid initiative and constructive powers, he. finds time for the en-
joyment of the gracious amenities of social life, and his beautiful home
at Ocean Park is a center of most generous and gracious hospitality,
under the direction of its charming and popular chatelaine, Mrs. Fraser.
The family home was maintained in Los Angeles until 1900, and since
that time has been at Ocean Park, where the various interests of Mr.
Fraser are centered and where no citizen is more admired and honored.

Though well fortified in his opinions as to matters of public polity,
Mr. Fraser has had no inclination to enter the arena of political turmoil.
In the Masonic fraternity he has received the thirty-second degree of the
Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite and is identified with the Ancient Arabic
Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. In the adjunct organization,
the Order of the Eastern Star, he has served in the office of worthy
grand patron of the Grand Chapter of California. He is also affiliated
with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Independent
Order of Foresters, and the Knights of the Maccabees. He holds mem-
bership in the Los Angeles Country Club and the Jonathan Club of Los
Angeles and the Breakers Club of Ocean Park, where he was also presi-
dent of the Community League for a period of three years, during
which the city made its greatest record in progress. He also served
for some time as president of the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce,
which has exerted potent influence in the foster of high civic ideals and
municipal progress. He has marked the passing years with very ap-
preciable accomplishment, and what he has done in furtherance of the
best interests of his home state entitles him to lasting honor within its
gracious borders.

On the ijth of July. 1877, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Fra-
ser to Miss Appolona Wedge, who was born at Yale, Michigan, and
who is a gentlewoman of most gracious personality — a popular and
influential factor in connection with the best social activities of the
community in which she lives. Mrs. Fraser is a daughter of the late
John Wedge, who was one of the honored and influential citizens of
Yale, Michigan, at the time of his death. Mr. and Mrs. Fraser have
two children. Ethel Fraser is now the wife of Edward L. Prentiss,
of Denver, Colorado, one of the leading business men of Colorado, be-
ing president of the Routt County Coal Company, also president of the
Steamboat Bank of Routt County, and president of the Routt County
Railroad. Earl A. Fraser is superintendent of Ocean Park Bath house,
of which his father is the principal owner. He has made two trips
around the world, and on one of them he met and married Miss Lillian
Forthing. a member of one of the old and prominent families of Sydney,
.Australia. The wedding took place July i, 1906.

HENRY M. \Yn.us. SR. With all of distinction and worthiness did
the late Henry Montague Willis leave definite impress upon the history
of California, and his career is specially notable -by reason of the great

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 361

scope and variety of his experiences and achievements. As a youth he
followed a seafaring life, and in this connection he came incidentally,
in company with his father, to California in the year 1849, on one of
the first vessels bringing to the state the vanguard of the great army of
goldseekers. In California and other states of the Pacific coast he lived
up to the full tension of the strenuous pioneer days and his energies
were directed along different lines of enterprise. He finally prepared
himself for the practice of law, and he gained precedence as one of the
leading legists and jurists of California. He did most effective work
in furthering the industrial and social development of the state that so
long represented his home and which accorded him distinguished honors.
He was in the military service of the Union during the Civil war and
later held high office in the California National Guard. He long main-
tained his home in San Bernardino county and was one of its most in-
fluential pioneers. He was ever enthusiastically loyal to the state to
whose development and upbuilding he contributes along many avenues
of productive activity, and here he continued to reside until his death,
in the fulness of years and well earned honors. Such are the men that
justify the compilation of publications of this order, and it is most grati-
fying, as well as in justice due, to be able to present within the pages of
this work a tribute to the memory and a brief record of the services of
Judge Willis, — a pioneer of pioneers and a man whose life was char-
acterized by the loftiest integrity as well as by large and worthy ac-
complishment.

Judge Henry Montague Willis was born in the city of Baltimore,
Maryland, on the 2ist of September, 1831, and his ancestors were num-
bered among the earliest of the English settlers in the colonies of Mary-
land and Virginia. He was a son of Henry Howard Willis and Matilda
D. (Harrod) Willis, the former of whom was born in Maryland, in
1806, and the latter of whom was a native of Harrodsburg, Kentucky ;
she was a granddaughter of James Harrod, who was associated with
about forty others in effecting the first permanent settlement, in the
order of a colony, in what is now Mercer county, Kentucky. James
Harrod was the leader of these valiant colonists who thus penetrated
the wilds of central Kentucky, and on the i6th of June, 1774, they
founded the town of Harrodsburg, which was named in honor of their
leader. This 'was the first settlement of importance made in the state,
and soon after the colonists had thus established homes in the wilderness
the Indians made a vigorous assualt upon the little colony. Only one
man was killed, but the other members of the colony became panic-
stricken and abandoned their homes, some making their escape through
the dense forests to the Mississippi river and thence to New Orleans,
while others returned to Virginia. In the following year a number of
the original settlers returned and refounded their frontier village under
the protection of the colony of Boonesboro. which was founded by
Daniel Boone in 1775.

Henry Howard Willis, the only son of his father's first marriage,
was reared to adult age in Maryland, and in his youth he began to follow
the sea, initiating his service as a sailor before the mast, and with this
line of hazardous enterprise he continued to be identified throughout

362 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

his active career. His marriage to Matilda D. Harrod was solemnized
in the city of Baltimore, and they became the parents of two sons, the
elder of whom was Henry Montague, the subject of this memoir. Edwin
A., the younger son, died at the age of thirty-one years, in May, 1871,
in San Bernardino county, California. The father had a wide and
eventful experience in connection with the "merciful, merciless sea."
He virtually circumnavigated the world and visited all important for-
eign ports. For many years he was captain on merchant vessels, and in
this connection he finally came to the Pacific coast. He died in San
Francisco, at the age of forty-nine years, and in the old pioneer cemetery
in that city his remains were laid to rest in a leaden casket. Twenty
years later, in excavating for the erection of a modern building, the
casket was uncovered, whereupon his kinsfolk were notified and re-
moved the casket to the cemetery at San Bernardino. After the death
of Captain Willis his widow erected a large two-story building in San-
Francisco, and in the same she conducted a dry-goods business for
several years. Finally, in 1857, she removed to property which she
had previously purchased in what is now the central business 'portion
of San Bernardino, and here she continued to maintain her home until
her death, in 1867, as the result of poisoning received while she was
making wax flowers. She was of artistic temperament and tastes and
found much pleasure in the manufacturing of the wax flowers, through
the agency of which her life was brought to a close. She was kindly
and generous, of refined tastes and of much business acumen, — a woman
in many ways remarkable and one who was held in affectionate regard
by all who came within the sphere of her gracious influence.

Judge Henry M. Willis had made a number of voyages with his
father before he had attained to the age of twelve years, and these ex-
periences were varied by his attendance in the common schools of his
native state. As a youth he naturally turned to the vocation followed
by his father, and within a period of six years' identification with the
merchant-marine service he visited the various Mediterranean ports, as
well as those of England, France. Rio de Janeiro, Montevidio, Buenos
Ayres, Pernambuco, Valparaiso, and other points in South America.
He gained promotion to the position of full or able seaman and finally
was made, an officer on a merchant vessel. While in Rio de Janeiro,
in 1848, as second mate of the barque "Helen M. Fielder," a fleet of
clippers arrived in that port with first passengers seeking the gold fields
of California by the sea route, and thus he first learned of the dis-
covery of gold in the state in which he was destined to become a prom-
inent and influential citizen. One of the ships of this fleet was disabled
and his vessel was chartered to transport a portion of its passengers to
California. After loading the "Helen M. Fielder" with a cargo most
consistent with the demands of the San Francisco market, the bark set
forth on its voyage to the Golden Gate. It arrived in the harbor of
San Francisco on the 28th of June, 1849, after having touched inter-
mediately only the port of Valparaiso, to secure needed supplies. Soon
after his arrival in San Francisco the young mariner purchased an in-
terest in a pilot boat, the "Eclipse," and with his associates he ran the
vessel up the Sacramento river, with a company of passengers and a

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 363

cargo of freight. He was soon attacked with the all too prevalent
malady of "chills and fever," and under these conditions he withdrew
from the enterprise with which he had identified himself and assumed
the position of first mate on the vessel that had borne him to San Fran-
cisco and that had now been chartered for a voyage to Oregon. The
vessel arrived in Portland after a voyage of about twenty days, and
there took on a cargo of lumber. On the return trip the captain, father
of him to whom this memoir is dedicated, became ill and the entire
command of the vessel devolved upon the son. He brought the boat
safely into the harbor of San Francisco, where he discharged his cargo
of lumber in February, 1850, his father dying in that city in the fol-
lowing May.

The gold fever at this time was at its most virulent stage, and
young Willis succumbed to the same, with the result that he set forth,
via Stockton, for the Mokelumne Hill mines, in Calaveras county. He
initiated his labors as a seeker for the precious metal, but when the
rainy season came on the floods carried away his dams and rilled his
diggings, under which depressing conditions he returned to Stockton,
where he was engaged in house painting until he was stricken with
typhoid fever. Through the effective nursing and devoted attention
of his mother he recovered from this attack, and. as his finances were
now at low ebb, he attempted to recoup his losses by investing his
entire remaining capital in the new town of Pacific City, on Baker's
Bay, Washington, which state was then a part of the territory of Ore-
gon. The results of this venture were disastrous, and as he and his
partner, C. W. C. Russell, found little to employ their time save in hunting
and fishing they made an exploration of Shoalwater bay, where they
made the first discovery of the oyster beds that have since made that
bay famous and that have brought fortunes to others. The two dis-
coverers secured a sufficient quantity of the bivalves to fill sixteen sacks,
and they employed Indians to carry the oysters across portage to
Baker's bay, whence they shipped the product to San Francisco. The
oysters found an eager market in San Francisco, and there a vessel was
soon chartered and sent to Shoalwater bay for a cargo of the most
popular of all sea foods. Thus the sending in of the original sixteen
sacks laid the foundation of the oyster trade between that bay and
San Francisco. His business interests in San Francisco now became
such as to demand his attention, and Judge Willis remained in that city
from 1851 to 1854, in the meanwhile leaving to his partner the super-
vision of the oyster trade at Shoalwater bay. During the period men-
tioned he was engaged in the dry-goods business on Sacramento street,
and within these years his ambition and natural predilection for study
prompted him- to devote every possible moment to the furthering of his
education through self-application. By this means he prepared himself
for entrance to college, with the definite purpose of entering the legal pro-
fession. In 1854, in company with his friend Hinto Rowan Helper,
who was studying with the same end in view, he left for the east. — he
for the purpose of entering college, and Helper for the purpose of ef-
fecting the publication of his first book, "The Land of Gold," which
eventually attracted wide attention. Judge Willis entered the law de-

364 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

partment of the University of North Carolina, at Chapel Hill, where he
had as his preceptors judge Battel, then a member of the supreme court
of the state, and Hon. Samuel F. Phillips. He made rapid progress in
his assimilation of the science of jurisprudence and also broadened his
academic education by careful study. On the ist of January, 1856, he
was admitted to the bar of North Carolina, by the supreme court of
the state, and he then went to New York city, where he passed six
months in the law office of Chauncey Sharpe, for the purpose of giving
special study to codes. He then returned to San Francisco; where he
arrived in June, 1856, soon after the hanging of Casey and Cora by the
vigilance committee. In the autumn of the same year Judge Willis
was tendered the appointment of prosecuting attorney of San Francisco
county, and his acceptance of this office virtually signified his adjustment
of a dilemma that had confronted him at the outset of his professional
career. He had already attained to more than local reputation as a
newspaper contributor and soon after his return to California he re-
ceived a tempting offer to assume the position of official chronicler for a
three years' cruising expedition in the south seas. Under these condi-
tions he was for a time undecided whether to make literature or law
his profession, but he finally indicated his final decision by accepting the
office of prosecuting attorney, as noted. However, he continued for
several years thereafter to make frequent and valuable contributions as
a newspaper writer. — principally for the San Francisco Evening Bul-
letin. He held the office of prosecuting attorney about two years, and
within this time gained a high reputation as a strong and forceful
advocate.

In 1858 Judge Willis removed to San Bernardino, to attend to litiga-
tions growing out of the purchase of lands in that county in which his
mother was interested. He ably protected the interests of the estate of
his mother and in the meanwhile turned his attention to farming and
fruit-growing in this beautiful section of the state. In 1861 he was
elected district attorney of San Bernardino county, but he resigned this
office a few months later. He rapidly rose to a position of prominence
in his profession, especially in the legal matters pertaining to land titles
and water rights. He won the first water suit in San Bernardino county,
the same being known as the Cram right, and the precedent which he
thus succeeded in establishing had immeasurable influence in insuring
the prosperity of the settlers. In 1872 he was elected judge of the
county court, and he continued to preside on this bench for eight con-
secutive years. His record was marked by the utmost impartiality and
by a clear and decisive appreciation of justice and equity, so that his
rulings, further fortified by his broad and accurate knowledge of the
law, met with very few reversals by courts of higher jurisdiction. He
retired from the bench only when the office of county judge was abol-
ished by the provisions of the new state constitution, and he then re-
sumed the active work of his profession, in which he had gained a repu-
tation that far transcended mere local limitations. In the autumn of
1886 he was elected to the bench of the suprior court, upon which he
served two years and in connection with which he added materially to
his laurels as a man of splendid judicial mind. Resuming the active

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 365

practice of law in San Bernardino, he became senior member of the
firm of Willis & Cole, which was later succeeded by that of Willis &
Willis, in which his coadjutor was his only surviving son. In 1894 he
retired from active practice and removed to the city of Oceanside, San
Diego county, where he died in September of the following year, at
the age of sixty-four years.

At the time of the Civil war there was organized a company known
as the San Bernardino Rangers, and this was assigned to the First Bri-
gade of the First Division of the state troops. Judge Willis was one
of the most influential factors in effecting the organization of this
militia company, and on the loth of October, 1861, he was appointed
second lieutenant of the same, by Governor John G. Downey. The
principal object of the organization was to guard mountain passes, in-
cidental to resisting invasions from Texas, in an effort to have Califor-
nia secede from the Union and espouse the cause of the Confederacy.
The company continued its existence throughout the entire period of
the war and it was at all times ready for duty along the lines noted, as
well as for other service. On the 8th of May, 1876, Judge Willis ^was
appointed major and judge advocate general commanding the First
Brigade of the California National Guard, and he held this office for a
period of four years, during which he did much to further the best in-
terests and efficiency of the militia of the state.

In the early days none was more prominent in ambitious and well
directed efforts in furthering the industrial and civic development of
the state, and to him San Bernardino county in particular owes a last-
ing debt to gratitude. He brought into this section of the state the first
tools for boring wells, and he also here introduced the first horse hay-
rake, the first gang plow and many other improved devices for the ad-
vancement of agricultural and fruit-growing interests. He was asso-
ciated with the late John Brown, Sr., in securing, in 1861, the franchise
for the first toll road over Canyon Pass, and the road was by them con-
structed, with the result that it proved a most valuable highway, es-
pecially during the time of the placer-mining excitement on Lytle creek.
In 1868 Judge Willis instituted the improvement of what was known
as the Willis homestead, in old San Bernardino, — the same having been
property purchased by .his mother. Confident that artesian water could
be secured in this valley, he imported from France the first drilling
tools brought into this section and sunk the first artesian well in San
Bernardino county. Within a short period thereafter many artesian
wells were bored by him and his associate and were pouring their graci-
ous streams of pure water within the limits of the present city of San
Bernardino. He later made a similar trial for water on his farm and
was again successful. In May, 1887, he disposed of the old homestead,
and thereafter he resided in San Bernardino until a short period before
his death, which occurred at Oceanside, as has already been stated.

Judge Willis was associated with a few others in forming the first
lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows in San Bernardino
county, and he thus became one of the charter members of San Ber-
nardino Lodge, No. 146. He was also a charter member of Valley

366 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Lodge, No. 27, Knights of Pythias. Ever an enthusiast in research con-
cerning the early history of California, under Spanish dominion and in
the later pioneer epoch, he was prominently concerned in the organiza-
tion of the San P.cniardino County Pioneer Society, of which he long
served as corresponding secretary, besides which he was also identi-
fied with the state pioneer association. In the days prior to the Civil
war Judge Willis was a staunch Douglas Democrat, but, as already in-
timated, he was unswerving in his devotion to the cause of the L'nion
during that climacteric period whose struggles perpetuated the integrity
of the nation. A firm advocate of the generic principles for which the
Democratic party has stood sponsor, he resumed his affiliation there-
with after the close of the war, and he was one of its valued counselors
in the state. His entire life was guided and governed by the highest
principles of integrity and honor, and he would never compromise for
the sake of personal expediency. Though strong in his convictions and
a man of broad intellectual ken, he was kindly and tolerant in his judg-
ment, and his fine qualities of mind and heart won to. him friends in
all classes, so that his loss was widely mourned when he was sum-
moned to the life eternal.

The home life of Judge Willis was of ideal order, and those thus
associated with him could best know the great heart and soul which
made him a man among men. On the ist of January, 1861, was solem-
nized his marriage to Miss Amelia Benson, who was born at Bloom-
ington, Illinois, and who was a daughter of Jerome M. Benson. Mr.
Benson, in company with his wife, one son and seven daughters, set
forth in 1856, with ox teams, to make the weary and hazardous journey
across the plains to California. The mother was drowned while crossing
the Provo river, in Utah, and her body was never recovered. The other
members of the sorrowing family continued their journey, as part of a
large wagon train, until they reached their destination in San Bernar-
dino county. Mrs. Willis was a child of eleven years at the time of
this memorable journey, and she was reared to maturity in San Ber-
nardino county, where her father passed the residue of his life and
where she continued to reside from the time of her marriage, at the
age of sixteen years, until her death, which occurred in August, 1889.
Of the twelve children of Judge and Mrs. Willis seven attained to years
of maturity and survived the loved and devoted mother. Concerning
them the following brief record is given in conclusion of this sketch:
Matilda P. is the wife of Charles H. Condee, of Los Angeles ; Amelia
is the wife of Charles R. Hudson, vice-president and general manager of
the Mexican Central Railroad, with residence in the city of Mexico ;
Mary Caroline is the widow of Charles E. Payne and resides in Los
Angeles; Henry Montague (II) is one of the representative members
of the bar of San Bernardino county, and is individually mentioned on
following pages ; Jennie C. is the wife of Joseph E. Morrison, United
States attorney for the territory of Arizona ; Miss Elizabeth, who is a
successful and popular teacher in the public schools of Pasadena, re-
sides in the city of Los Angeles ; and Louise is the wife of Frederick
W. Wodsworth. of Leavemvorth, Kansas.

THE NEW YOftf
PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LFNOX AND
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 369

EDWARD R. MONK. The career of Judge Monk, who is now one
of the representative members of the bar of southern California and
who is engaged in the practice of his profession in the city of Los
Angeles, has been one of distinctively eventful order, and his experiences
have touched many phases of life in many places. He is a man
of high intellectual and professional attainments and yet he has known
the exigencies and conditions of life on the western frontier; he has
been identified with large industrial undertakings ; he has served with
ability and discretion in an exacting judicial office; he has been con-
cerned with affairs or broad scope and importance; he has traveled ex-
tensively in America and Europe and has profited greatly from this
valuable source of culture ; he is a man of broad views and well for-
tified opinions; and he has achieved marked success in connection with
the temporal affairs of life, this success being the direct result of his
own efforts. The steadfastness and honor that indicate the strong, true
and loyal nature have characterized his course in all the relations of
life, and he has not been denied the fullest measure of popular con-
fidence and esteem. His status as one of the prominent lawyers and
representative citizens of Los Angeles renders specially consonant the
specific recognition accorded him in this publication.

Edward Roseberry Monk claims the fine old Buckeye state as the
place of his nativity, as he was born in Columbiana county, Ohio, on the
3ist of January, 1851. He was the third son in a family of four sons
and two daughters born to Jacob and Maria (Rosenbergher) Monk, the
former a native of Stuttgart, Germany, and the latter of Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania. The father devoted the major portion of his active
career to the vocation of a book publisher and farmer, and both he and
his wife were residents of Alliance, Ohio, at the time of their deaths.
They were folk of sterling character and were zealous members of the
Methodist Episcopal church. A few years after the birth of Judge Monk
his parents removed to Alliance, Stark county, Ohio, and there he received
his preliminary educational discipline in the public schools. At the age
of twenty-one years he was matriculated in Mount LTnion College, in his
home county, and concerning his career as an undergraduate the fol-
lowing pertinent statements have been written : "During the time re-
quired to complete a classical course at college he taught school, at
various places, each winter term, in order to obtain the requisite funds
to enable him to defray his expenses during the remaining terms of
the college year. Notwithstanding the time thus taken from his college
work by his intervals of pedagogic application, the ambition and de-
termined application of the young _ student were such that he completed
the prescribed curriculum of four academic years in the short period
of three years. This result was accomplished by his applying himself
closely to study at night while he was engaged in teaching and by long
hours' of study while in college. With the handicap thus implied by
periodical absence from college he yet completed the classical course in
one year less time than those whose studies were carried forward in
the college without interruption."

Judge Monk was graduated in Mount Union College in July, 1872,
and duly received his well earned degree of Bachelor of Arts. After

370 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

passing a two months' vacation in the eastern states Judge Monk en-
tered the law department of the celebrated University of Michigan, at
Ann Arbor, in October, 1872. Later he pursued post-graduate courses
in law and the sciences in his alma mater, which conferred upon him,
in 1877, the supplemental degree of Master of Arts. After pursuing his
studies in this institution for some time he found his financial resources
at so low an ebb as to render it impossible for him to complete the
technical course. Under these conditions he entered the law office of
Judge Kent, one of the distinguished members of the bar of the city
of Detroit, Michigan, and ex judge of the supreme court, in order to
prepare himself for the ensuing annual examination to be held at the
April term of the supreme court of Michigan. He even increased his
hours of nocturnal study, which had become almost a habit, and by
this means he was able to attain to the desired goal. On the 2gth of
April, 1873, upon examination before the supreme court of Michigan,
he passed a most satisfactory examination and was duly admitted to
the bar of the Wolverine state. The following pertinent statements
anent Judge Monk's achievement at this time are worthy of reproduc-
tion, as the supreme court of Michigan at that time was one of special
distinction in its personnel : "Mr. Monk was duly congratulated by the
august body of eminent men who then composed the Michigan supreme
court, its members complimenting him for his excellent standing in con-
nection with the rigid examination and thereupon ordering to be issued
to him a license to practice in all the courts of the state, as an attorney,
solicitor and counselor. He received this license just seven months sub-
sequent to the time when he had matriculated in the law department of
the University of Michigan and there initiated his technical study."

The ambitious young barrister found himself well fortified in knowl-
edge of the science of jurisprudence but the plethora of his financial
resources was of distinctively negative order. Realizing that a pro-
fessional novitiate, no matter how well equipped he might be, would re-
quire a reserve fund of money sufficient to meet temporal needs during
the irregular visitations of clients, the future jurist assumed the posi-
tion of superintendent of the public schools at Nevada, Iowa, a position
that had been most opportunely tendered to him. He retained this in-
cumbency for the regular school years and his work in the connection
was specially successful and objectively satisfactory. With the funds
secured through this effective service Mr. Monk felt justified in taking
up the active work of the profession for which he had prepared himself.
He accordingly opened a law office in the city of Des Moines, Iowa,
where he soon built up a substantial practice, in connection with which
he successfully conducted a number of important suits in various courts
of the state. He reverts with a feeling of special appreciation to the
encouragement and support he there received from Hon. C. C. Cole,
who was then chief justice of the Iowa supreme court, and from the
officrs of the Citizens' National Bank, as well as other representative
clients.

In 1877 Judge Monk decided to avail himself of an opportunity for
securing a broader field of professional activity, and, in association with
his younger brother, W. C. Monk, he opened an office in the city of St.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 371

Louis, Missouri, their object being to make a specialty of corporation
and real-estate law. This alliance continued, with much attendant suc-
cess, until 1882, when Judge Monk found that he had too greatly en-
croached on his physical powers by too close application. It became
imperative for him to find less sedentary occupation for a time at least,
and at the advice of his physician he decided to avail himself of the
milder climate of Arizona and to gain there the benignant and revitaliz-
ing influence of "all out-doors." An adequate relation of his expe-
riences in Arizona could not be given within the compass of so circum-
scribed a sketch as the one at hand, but the following brief data will be
found interesting and measurably sufficient:

Arriving in southern Arizona, Mr. Monk at once saw an opening
for the gaining of his desired object. In co-operation with his two
brothers, W. C. and J. A., he gained the control of a large body of
government land, by locating upon the same, building cabins and stock-
ing the ranch with cattle and horses. At the same time the broth-
ers located and instituted the development of all water facilities, con-
sisting of the various springs to be found on the land. By this means
they eventually gained control of a tract about twenty miles square,
the same being located near the railroad, so that adequate trans-
portation facilities were assured. Though the brothers experienced
considerable trouble with maurauding Indians and white "rustlers," or
cattle thieves, the business venture proved a success from the begining.
During the period from 1882 to 1884 the Apache Indians, under com-
mand of that implacable and bloodthirsty leader, Geronimo, made a num-
ber of raids from San Carlos reservation into southeastern Arizona and
on into Mexico, bringing consternation to the settlers and on more than
one occasion passing near or through the ranch of the Monk brothers,
near Bowie. General Crook had made fruitless efforts to stop these
Apache raids, which invariably were accompanied by the massacreing
of many ranchmen, miners and cowboys living in Arizona territory. It
will be recalled that General Miles, who succeeded General Crook, finally
succeeded in the capture of Geronimo and his followers, who were trans-
ported to other reservations and brought under proper subjection. With
the removal of these Indians the troubles of the ranch owners in Arizona
were not ended, and the Monk brothers had their full quota of exper-
ience with the bands of cattle and horse thieves, commonly designated
as rustlers, who infested the border and whose depredations were those
of the most consummate outlaws and desperadoes. History well records
their depredations, murders, train robberies, etc., and they caused a vir-
tual reign of terror. During the years from 1884 to 1886, inclusive,
the crimes committed in that border country by these intrepid rustlers
became so numerous and atrocious that the ranchmen, miners and
freighters determined to institute a long needed reform in the admini-
stration of the laws. To accomplish this object the citizens of Cochise
county determined to nominate a reform ticket, at the head of which
appeared the name of Edward R. Monk, as candidate for the office of
county judge, the while prominent cattle men were also nominated re-
spectively for the important offices of sheriff and prosecuting attorney.
After a most picturesque and exciting canvass and election, the opposi-

372 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

tion ticket met with signal defeat, and the "cowboy judge" and his cow-
boy friends were elected by large majorities.

From time that Judge Monk entered upon the discharge of his official
duties in the roughest and toughest section of southern Arizona the rust-
lers and other outlaws received "all that was coming to them.'' Some
were killed by the sheriff and his deputies ; some were hanged by the
vigilance committee and some were sent to the penitentiary, with the re-
sult that law and order were soon established in that section of the
territory. The aggressive policy of Judge Monk had much to do with
the accomplishment of this result and the one great menace to prosperity
in that section was removed. His record on the bench met with un-
qualified approval on the part of respectable citizens, as was shown by
the fact that on the expiration of his first term he was elected as his
own successor, by a gratifying majority. At the expiration of his sec-
ond term the town of Tombstone and the entire county of Cochise were
as peaceful and orderly as any section in the eastern states.

In 1893 Judge Monk was appointed receiver of the United States
land office at Tucson, Arizona, this preferment having come through
President Cleveland. He continued in tenure of this important posi-
tion for a term of four years, and his administration was most credit-
able both to himself and the government. Within his regime in this of-
fice many of the government reservations from which various army posts
had been withdrawn were opened for settlement, the lands being offered
both at public auction and at private sale. These public sales were
sometimes conducted under adverse circumstances, and as an instance of
this kind may be given the following record concerning the old Fort
Grant reservation, where the sale of lands was under the supervision of
Judge Monk, as a government official :

"The Fort Grant reservation is located on both banks of the San
Pedro river, and on account of heavy and continued rains the river
overflowed its banks and washed away all the bridges crossing it for a
distance of many miles in each direction from the old fort. When the
sale of lands was instituted under these conditions it was, of course, im-
possible for those who were on the opposite side of the river from the
point where Judge Monk was to receive bids to make oral signification
of their bids. The difficulty was overcome by permitting such pros-
pective purchasers to write their bids on paper, which was attached to a
weight and a cord and thrown across the river. By means of the cord
all other bids were transported in this manner and the allotments were
duly awarded to the highest bidder in each case. Though this method
of procedure entailed much delay and proved tedious, most of the old
reservation was disposed of before the close of the sale."

Judge Monk entered vigorously and with utmost loyalty into all un-
dertakings tending to advance the material and civic development and
prosperity of Arizona, and his influence was one of potent order. In
1896 Governor Hughes appointed him a regent of the University of
Arizona, an institution that was still in its incipiency and not very suc-
cessful, even according to the standard of its somewhat meager facili-
ties. Judge Monk and his confreres on the board of regents inaugu-
rated a vigorous and progressive policy for the administration of the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 373

affairs of the university, and within a few years it so rapidly expanded
in efficiency and in enrollment of students that it was found possible
to establish many new departments, to erect new and substantial build-
ings, and to provide a fund sufficient to insure the continued growth and
success of the institution.

By the commissioner of the United States land office Judge Monk
was appointed disbursing agent for the Arizona office : the government
also made him civil service examiner for the territory ; he gave much
time to his official duties as a regent of the university; and he still con-
tinued to devote proper attention to the large ranch interests in which
he was associated with his brothers. In fact, it seems that he has a
special aptitude for consecutive and earnest application and that, in the
words of Victor Hugo, he can "toil terribly." Nature places limita-
tions on every man and her revolt in one against which no protest can
safely be made. His assiduous labors had again brought an impaired
condition of health to the frontier jurist and ranchman, and he de-
termined to make another change of residence, in order to find less
exacting demands upon him. It may be said, however, that he still has
large and important business and property interests in Arizona, in whose
future greatness he is a firm believer.

After visiting various sections of the west Judge Monk showed his
excellent judgment and his appreciation by deciding to establish his
permanent home in Los Angeles. Before taking this action, however,
the bachelor judge, having no domestic ties, determined to indulge him-
self in foreign travel. Accordingly, in June, 1900, he embarked on the
"Fuerst Bismarck," of the Hamburg-American line, and sailed from
New York, to Cherbourg, France. After landing at the latter port he
passed a few days in visiting the great exposition in Paris, after which
he toured to Switzerland, Italy and Germany, visiting the principal
points of scenic and historic interest and availing himself of the privi-
lege of attending the great passion play at Oberammergau. In Vienna
he was present on the occasion of the annual celebration of the em-
peror's birthday, and thereafter he made an extended tour, in which he
visited the principal cities of the great empire of Germany, voyaged
down the Rhine and finally proceeded to Stuttgart, the capital of the king-
dom of \Yurtemberg, where his honored father was born. His primary
object in making this last mentioned visit was to discover such data as
possible concerning his paternal ancestry. His investigations led him
to the conclusion that his great-grandfather immigrated from England
to Germany, where the English orthography of the name, Monk, was
changed to the German form, Miink, in which the umlaut vowel im-
plies the nearest possible similarity in the pronunciation of the two
forms. Acting upon the knowledge thus obtained, he, as well as other
members of the family, adopted the English orthography of the name.

Judge Monk returned to America in 1901, after having compassed
not only an extensive tour of the European continent but. also one of
England, Scotland and Ireland, and he then came to Los Angeles, where
he "has since maintained his residence. In the following year, how-
ever, he again yielded to the wanderlust, by passing the winter in a tour
in Mexico. The following summer found him investigating the sights of

Vol. I— 1 9

374 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Alaska, where he had many interesting experiences, and since that time
he has curbed his ambition for travel to incidental trips to the Yellow-
stone Park, Yosemite Valley and the Grand Canon of the Colorado,
these excursions into the wilds having afforded him the rest and recrea-
tion demanded for the preservation of his health. With energy and
strength renewed, Judge Monk opened an office in Los Angeles, in 1901,
and here he has gained a representative clientage, the demands of which
keep him well employed in the work of his profession.

In politics Judge Monk gives a stalwart allegiance to the Democratic
party and he has given effective service in the promotion of its cause.
His religious faith is that of the Protestant Episcopal church, of which
he is a zealous communicant, and he now holds membership in Christ
church, Los Angeles. He is affiliated with the various York Rite bodies
of the time-honored Masonic fraternity, in which his membership at
the present time includes Los Angeles Commandery, No. 9, Knights
Templars, and he is also a member of the adjunct organization of Mas-
onry, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, in
which he is now identified with Al Malaikah Temple, in his home city.
Denied during his residence in Arizona those more ideal social privil-
eges for which a man of his distinctive culture and genial attributes
must ever long, Judge Monk has found in Los Angeles ample oppor-
tunities for the forming of most pleasing associations along this line.
He holds membership in such representative organizations as the Los
Angeles Country Club, the California Club and the Jonathan Club, and
in the beautiful club rooms of these organizations he comes in contact
with men of allied interests and ideals and the environments of the best
of culture and refinement. His appreciation is the deeper from the fact
that, as a bachelor, he can not have recourse to the more domestic feli-
cities, for which he apparently has shown no special predilection. Upon
the reorganization of the California Eclectic Medical College and the
removal of the same to Los Angeles after the great earthquake and at-
tending fire in San Francisco, where it had previously been located.
Judge Monk was elected to the chair of medical jurisprudence in this
institution, a position of which he has since continued the incumbent.
He is also a member of the Los Angeles Stock Exchange. A man of
fine social qualities, broad and varied experience, buoyant and optimistic
nature and sterling integrity of character, Judge Monk has gained a
wide circle of friends in the beautiful city in which he has elected to
establish his home and whose manifold attractions he is fully appre-
ciative.

HENRY GOODCELL. A representative of a family whose name has been
prominently and worthily identified with the annals of San Bernardino
county for more than half a century, Henry Goodcell, who is engaged
in the active practice of his profession in the city of San Bernardino,
is recognized as one of the leading members of the bar of this section
of the state and as a citizen of high standing in the community. He
has been a resident of this county since his boyhood days and has well
upheld the prestige of the family name, which has stood exponent of
loyalty, progressiveness and worthy co-operation in connection with

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY :J7.'

the civic and material development of the favored county which has
so long represented his home.

Henry Goodcell was born in Dover, England, on the 23d of No-
vember, '1848, and he is the eldest of the six children born to Henry
and Harriet (Birch) Goodcell, the former of whom was born at Non-
ington, a parish ten miles north of the city of Dover, in Kent county,
England, on the 26th of September, 1823, and the latter of whom was
born at Swingfield, in the same county. Henry Goodcell, Sr.. was the
youngest of the eight children of Thomas Goodcell, who passed his
entire life in the vicinity of the city of Dover and who was a member
of one of the sterling old families of Kentshire.

Henry Goodcell, Sr., passed the days of his boyhood and early
youth in his native parish, where he was afforded the advantages of
the common schools, and at the age of sixteen years he was appren-
ticed to a sea captain, under whose direction he served as a sailor
before the mast for the ensuing two years. Later he held for six
years the office of mate on the same vessel, and he gained wide and
valuable experience as a navigator, in connection with which he be-
came skilled in the making of maps and charts, besides which his
study and experience enabled him to tell the hour accurately at any
time of night when the stars were visible as a guide. In 1847 he
married Miss Harriet Birch, who was the eldest of the eleven chil-
dren of William Birch, a small farmer in Kent county, where her
parents continued to reside until their death. Through the influence of
emissaries sent to England by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints, of Mormons, Mr. Goodcell was converted to this faith,
and in 1853, he immigrated with his family to America, to join the
Mormon colonists in Utah. There he soon discovered that the rep-
resentations made by the English missionaries of the church were
false in many particulars, both in matters of doctrine and practice,
and he decided to become apostate and to sever his connection with the
church at the earliest possible moment. Those in the least familiar
with the history of Mormonism will understand that in taking this
course he encountered many obstacles and stern opposition, but he
was determined in his plans when he found his views and ideals so
greatly at variance with the tenets and customs of the church. All
his property had been turned into the community fund of the church
and he was thus practically destitute of financial resources. Owing
to crop failures on his land it required three years and the most rigorous
economy for him to save sufficient money to purchase teams and other
necessaries demanded to accomplish migration from the colony. In
the spring of 1857 he joined a train of ten wagons and set forth for
California, in spite of great opposition on the part of the Mormon
authorities. The party camped for a few days at Mountain Meadows,
and theirs was the last train to make such a stop at that point prior
to the historic Mormon massacre, which there took place and which
brought further odium upon the church. The wagon train arrived
in San Bernardino in May, 1857, and in this beautiful valley Mr. Good-
cell purchased a tract of land, on which he planted an orchard and
vinevard. A series of misfortunes attended the family during the

376 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

earlier years of residence in San Bernardino county. One son was
permanently crippled, another was accidentally killed, and the floods
of 1861-2 destroyed the greater part of the improvements that had
been made on the farm, on which was wrought general havoc and dev-
astation. Finally, however, Mr. Goodcell developed a fine ranch prop-
erty, devoted to the cultivation of alfalfa and to orange and other fruits.
Thus generous prosperity eventually rewarded the earnest and honest
endeavors of one who had experienced the severe buffeting of adverse
fortune and one whose entire life was guided and governed by the
highest principles of integrity and honor. In 1867 Mr. Goodcell es-
tablished a brick yard on his ranch, and for many years thereafter he
supplied large quantities of brick used in the construction of build-
ings in San Bernardino and other parts of the county. He accumu-
lated a competency through his energy and well directed efforts, and
he passed the later years of his life in well earned retirement. He
died, in the city of San Bernardino, on the nth of March, 1902, at
the age of seventy-eight years and six months, and his name merits
unduring place on the roll of the honored pioneers of San Bernardino
county, where he ever commanded secure place in popular confidence
and esteem. In politics he originally gave his support to the Repub-
lican party, and in this connection he voted for Abraham Lincoln at
the time of both his first and second elections to the presidency. Later
he espoused the cause of the Democratic party, under whose banner
he continued to be aligned until his death. He was a man of strong
mind and well fortified opinions, and his character was the positive
expression of a loyal and noble nature. His cherished and devoted
wife was summoned to the life eternal on the 23d of December, 1885.
at the age of sixty-seven years, and of the six children, two sons and
two daughters are now living.

Henry Goodcell, Jr., the immediate subject of this review, was nine
years of age at the time of the family removal from Utah to California,
and he was reared to maturity in San Bernardino county, to whose
common schools he is indebted for his earlier educational training,
which was effectively supplemented by higher academic study in a pri-
vate school conducted by J. P. C. Allsop. That he made good use of the
scholastic opportunities thus afforded him is indicated by the fact that
he became a successful and popular teacher in the schools of his home
county. He initiated his pedagogic endeavors in 1866, and he continued
to teach at intervals for several years. In the meanwhile his ambition
for broader education found definite exemplification, as he entered
the California State Normal School at San Jose, in which he was
graduated in the spring of 1873, and in this connection he had the dis-
tinction of being the first student from San Bernardino county to be
graduated in this institution.

Mr. Goodcell's effective work as a teacher gained to him distinc-
tive recognition in the autumn of 1873, when he was elected superin-
tendent of schools for his home county. He retained this office two
years, within which he did much to advance the standard of the schools
in the county and also held during the entire period, the position of
principal of the city schools in San Bernardino. The manifold duties

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 377

and labors devolving upon him in these connections did not exhaust
his ambition or powers, as he simultaneously prosecuted the study of
law, under effective preceptorship. His close application and tine re-
ceptive powers enabled him to make such rapid and substantial ad-
vancement in his technical studies that he was admited to the bar in 1875,
in which year he retired from the offices of county superintendent of
schools and principal of the city schools. ' He entered into a professional
partnership with Andrew B. Paris, and soon gained prestige and success
as a well-informed and versatile attorney and counselor. Later he served
as deputy county clerk and deputy clerk of the county courts, after which
he was incumbent of the office of assistant district attorney. In 1880. he
was appointed district attorney to fill a vacancy, and in this, as in other
official positions, he gave most effective administration. In this con-
nection it is pleasing to record that his son Rex B., is at the present time,
incumbent of the office of district attorney.

In 1887. Mr. Goodcell, accompanied his father to England, where they
visited the old family home, and they passed several months in travel,
incidental to which they visited Paris and other continental cities. Soon
after his return to San Bernardino, Mr. Goodcell formed a partnership
with Frank A. Leonard, with whom he continued to be associated in the
general practice of law. under the firm name of Goodcell & Leonard,
until i8</>. in which year he removed with his family to Oakland, this
state, where he was engaged in successful practice until 1901, when the
attractions and gracious associations of the old home drew him back to
San Bernardino, where he is now engaged in active practice as a member
of the well known firm of Waters & Goodcell, in which his coadjutor is
Byron Waters.

In politics, Mr. Goodcell gave his allegiance to the Democratic party
until 1896, and he was an active and efficient worker in behalf of its
cause. In the year mentioned, he found his opinions at variance with the
policies of the party's presidential nominee, William J. Bryan, and with
the courage of his convictions he gave his support to the Republican party
in the election of that year. He has since maintained his affiliation, but
has, in later years, retired from active participation in political affairs
in order to give his undivided attention to the demands of his profession,
in which he has a large and important practice and in connection with
which he has been identified with much of the leading litigation in the
courts of this section of the state. He has been identified with the inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows since 1875, and he has held various official
chairs in the same, including that of noble grand, of which he was in-
cumbent for five terms. Since 1908 he has also been affiliated with the
local lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Mr. 'Good-
cell has continued to take a lively and helpful interest in educational
matters, and served four years as a member of the board of education
of San Bernardino, during the last two years of which period he was
president of the board. Within his administration in this office, was es-
tablished the local high school and its fine building was erected.

On the 22d of June, 1875, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Good-
cell to Miss Minnie A. Bennett, who was born in Eldorado county, Cali-
fornia, and whose acquaintance he formed while both were students in

378 AMKRICAX BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

the State Xormal School at San Jose, in which institution she likewise
was graduated. For several years after her marriage, Mrs. Goodcell was
engaged in teaching in the public schools, and she thus aided her husband
materially while he was establishing himself in the practice of law, his
adoption of the profession having been largely due to the suggestion and
influence of his devoted wife, to whom he attributes much of his early
success. She was summoned to the life eternal on the nth of October,
1886, and her memory is revered by all who came within the compass
of her gracious influence. She was a daughter of David Bennett, who
\\as one of the sterling pioneers of California, to which state he came
from Illinois in 1850. shortly after the discovery of gold that caused the
great exodus of argonauts from the east. He was engaged in mining for
several years and then turned his attention to agricultural pursuits, in
cc mnection with which he became one of the representative exponents
of this great basic industry in Eldorado county, where he gained definite
success and prosperity, lie passed the closing years of his life in San
Bernardino and his wife preceded him to eternal rest by several years.
Henry and Minnie A. ( Bennett ) Goodcell became the parents of four
children, concerning whom the following brief record is entered: Harry,
the first born, died at the age of two years ; Roscoe A., who was graduated
in the University of California, and who later completed a post-graduate
course in the University of Syracuse, New York, passed ten years in
China, where he was a teacher in the public schools for four years and for
the remaining six years a member of the faculty of the Imperial Uni-
versity, at Chantung, and he is at the present time a teacher in the San
Bernardino high school; Rex B., the present district attorney of San
Bernardino county is individually mentioned on other pages of this work;
and Frederick, who has done successful work in connection with news-
papers in various California cities, is now a member of the reportorial staff
of a leading paper in Sacramento. All of the sons are married and have
children.

On the jd of July, 1889. Mr. Goodcell contracted a second marriage,
by wedding Miss Mary H. Bennett, a sister of his first wife. She was
born in Illinois, in 1849, and thus was an infant at the time of the family
removal to California. She was reared in Eldorado county, this state.
where she was afforded the advantages of the public schools and where
she became a successful and popular teacher. Later she became principal
of the public schools of Folsom City, Sacramento county, and in 1876
she became a teacher in the public schools of San Bernardino, where she
continued her earnest and effective labors in this capacity until the time
of her marriage. She began teaching when a girl of but fourteen
years, and when twenty-four years of age she had the distinction of re-
ceiving a life certificate at the earliest age at which such certificate was ever
issued by the state board of education. This was given her in recognition
of her special efficiency in educational work and her name still stands
on record as that of the youngest person ever accorded such recognition
in California. Xo children were born of the second marriage, ami Mrs.
Goodcell. who had been a most devoted mother to the children of her
sister, passed to the "land of the leal" on the iSth of Xovember. 1009,
secure in the loving regard of all who knew her.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 379

On June 28, 1911, Mr. Goodcell \vas united in marriage to Mrs. Marion
L. Matthews, of Hemet, California. Mrs. Goodcell is a native of Wor-
cester, Massachusetts and is a graduate of Smith College, Massachusetts.
She came to California in 1905.

REX 13. GOODCELL. Any specific application of the scriptural aphorism
that "a prophet is not without honor save in his own country" certainly
can not be made in connection with Mr. Goodcell, as he is not only one
of the representative members of the bar of his native county, but is also
incumbent of the office of district attorney. In the profession followed
by his honored father, he has achieved distinctive success and prestige
and he is a scion of one of the oldest and best known families of San
Bernardino county, which has been his home from the time of his birth.
On other pages of this work is entered a review of the career of his father,
Henry Goodcell, who is still engaged in the active practice of law at
San Bernardino, and the data incorporated in said article are such as to
render unnecessary further consideration of the family history in the
sketch at hand.

Rex Bennett Goodcell was born in the city of San Bernardino, Cali-
fornia on the 1 5th of September, 1880, and here he was afforded the ad-
vantages of the excellent public schools, including a course of two years
in the high school. He acknowledges with marked appreciation, that much
of his early education was gained under the effective instruction imparted
in practically an incidental way, by his parents, both of whom are persons
of distinctive culture and intellectuality, so that the conversation and in-
fluence of the home circle had marked bearing in expanding the mental
horizon of the son. During his early youth. Mr. Goodcell gave his atten-
tion to various lines of work, and he was at all times energetic and am-
bitious, ever ready to seize opportunities presented and constantly striv-
ing to make definite advancement. In the meanwhile he began the study
of law under the able preceptorship of his father, on the I5th of October,
1901, and such were his powers of absorption and assimilation that he
made rapid progress in his acquirement of knowledge of the science of
jurisprudence, with the result that within a period of two years he proved
himself eligible for and was admitted to the bar of his native state. In
the practice of his profession he was associated with his father from
1905 to 1910, and he proved to the latter an able and valued coadjutor
in the handling of the work of a large and representative professional
business. His efficient work as an advocate brought to him. in December,
1908, appointment to the position of assistant district attorney of San
Bernardino county, and he thus served until November, 1910, when there
came further and emphatic popular recognition of his ability and services
in his election to the office of district attorney, for a term of four years.
His administration has amply justified the popular choice and he has
shown characteristic energy in handling the work of his important office,
in connection with which he has added materially to his excellent repu-
tation as a resourceful trial lawyer and as one of broad and exact knowl-
edge of the law. He takes a lively interest in all that touches the well-
being of his home city and county and his loyalty to his native state is of
the most insistent type. He is uncompromising in his allegiance to the

380 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Republican party and became active in advocating its cause when but
eighteen years of age. He is well fortified in his opinions as to matters
of public polity and even before he had attained to his legal majority,
with incidental right of franchise, he had given effective service in the
promotion of the principles and policies for which the "grand old party"
stands sponsor. In 1901 he was employed in a clerical capacity at the
session of the state senate, and in this connection he formed the acquain-
tance of many of the representative men of the state. Mr. Goodcell
enjoys unequivocal popularity in the county that has ever been his home,
and he has been influential in connection with public affairs in his home
city. He is a charter member of San Bernardino Aerie, Fraternal Order
of Eagles, and has represented the same at five different sessions of the
Grand Aerie of the state, of which he served as president for one term.
He is also identified with the Benevolent and Protective Or'der of Elks,
and the Native Sons of the Golden West.

On the loth of January, 1905, Mr. Goodcell was united in marriage
to Miss Helen Harmon Knappe, who likewise was born and reared in
San Bernardino. She is a daughter of Dexter Knappe, who was for many
years engaged in business near Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Mr. and Mrs.
Goodcell have one son, Reginald Harmon. Mr. Goodcell holds member-
ship in the Unitarian church at Oakland. Both he and his wife are popu-
lar factors in connection with the best social activities of the community.

WILLIAM M. ABBOTT. No slight precedence is that held by Wil-
liam M. Abbott as one of the essentially representative members of the
California bar and as one of the valued and influential citizens of San
Francisco, where he has been actively identified with the work of his
profession since 1893 and where his individual popularity and definite
prestige in his chosen calling are such as to well indicate "both his char-
acter and his ability. He has a broad and exact knowledge of the
science of jurisprudence and his power of practical application has been
effectively shown in connection with many important victories gained by
him in the various courts, including the supreme court of the United
States. As one whose character and services are conserving the high
standard of the bar of his native state he is well entitled to recognition
in this publication. In addition to other representative professional
connections Mr. Abbott is the general attorney for the United Railroads
of San Francisco.

William M. Abbott was born in San Francisco, on the i/th of March.
1872. and is a son of William and Annebell (Casselman) Abbott, both
of whom were born and reared in the Dominion of Canada, whence they
came to California shortly after their marriage, in 1866, the family lineage
showing a blending of Irish and English strains. The father was an
earnest Christian gentleman and was very prominent in the founding of
Methodist churches in California. For thirty years he was manager of
the Methodist I look Concern of San Francisco. He was burn in Kings-
ton, Ontaria, Canada, November 26. 1843. and died January 18, 1908.
in San Francisco. The mother was born in Ontaria, Canada, December
14, 1849, ancl died December II, 1902. Upon coming to California.
William Abbott established his home in San Francisco, and in thi^ citv

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 383

the subject of this review \vas reared to manhood. He was afforded
the advantages of the public schools and, with characteristic independ-
ence and ambition, he early formulated definite plans for his future career.
With a distinctive predilection for the law and for dialectics, he de-
cided to prepare himself for the profession in which it has been his to
gain so much of success and prestige. With this end in view he en-
tered the Hastings Law College, in which he was graduated with high
honors as a member of the class of 1893 and from which he received
his gree of Bachelor of Laws. While thus prosecuting his technical
studies in the law school he was effectively supplementing this work
by further application, including much practical work in the law office
of Hon. Charles W. Cross, to whose generous counsel and instruction
he attributes much of his success, which has fully justified his choice
of vocation and the promises given in the earlier period of his work
therein. It has consistently been said that he is today "one of the
busiest lawyers on the coast."

Admitted to the California bar upon his graduation in Hastings Law
College, he has practiced in both the federal and state courts within the
borders of this commonwealth and in the supreme court of the United
States. Upon his admission to the bar Air. Abbott forthwith began to
devote himself with all of his energy and earnestness to the work of
his profession, in which his novitiate was of notably brief duration, as
he soon approved his powers in no uncertain way. In 1895 he became
associated with his old friend and preceptor. Senator Cross, and with
Tirey L. Ford, of San Francisco, and Frank P. Kelly, of Los Angeles,
under the firm name of Cross, Ford, Kelly and Abbott, and this be-
came one of the most successful and popular law firms on the entire
Pacific coast. \Vhen Tirey L. Ford, of the firm, was elected attorney
general of the state, in 1898, his initial act in an official way was to
appoint Mr. Abbott his deputy from San Francisco, with assignment to
opinion work, for which he showed a remarkable aptitude and in which
connection he gave evidence not only of his profound knowledge of law
and precedent but also of his logical and judicial mind. He has ap-
peared in connection with much important litigation in the various
courts, and in his work before the supreme court of the United States
it may be stated that one of his notable achievements was his argument
in the celebrated Atlantic & Pacific Railroad Company tax cases.

Mr. Abbott is recognized as one of the most versatile and resource-
ful of advocates, is emphatically a hard worker, and he never presents
a case before court or jury without most scruplous preparation, so that
he is able to marshal his force with masterful skill and to detect the
weak points in the arguments of his opponents. He is most careful in
his observance of the highest professional ethics, and thus commands
the confidence and respect of his confreres at the bar. Though he has
found his profession well worthy of his undivided allegiance and has
had no desire for political preferment, he accords a staunch support to
the cause of the Republican party and is especially well fortified in his
convictions to matter of public import. He is broad-minded and
progressive as a citizen, is a man of fine social instincts and appreciation
and is identified with representative fraternal and other civic organiza-

;;*4 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

lions in his home city. Air. Abbott is a member of the Bohemian and
Union League Club; of California Lodge No. i, F. & A. M.; California
Chapter. No. 5, R. A. M. ; California Commandery, No. I, K. T. ; Islam
Temple. A. A' O. N. M. S. of San Francisco; Lodge No. 3, B'. P. O. E.
of which he is a Past Exalted Ruler, and a member of the Stanford
Parlor, No. 76, X. S. G. \Y.

In 1895 Mr. Abbott was married to Miss Anne Josephine MacVean,
daughter of D. Malcolm MacYean and Celia D. (Lindley) MacVean,
both of whom are now deceased. Mrs. MacYean was the sister of S.
K. Lindley. John H. Lindley. Mrs. George King and Mrs. Annie M.
Moore, wife of Brigadier General James M. Moore of the U. S. Army,
all of Los Angeles. Mr. and Mrs. Abbott are the parents of two children,
namely: William Lindley Abbott, born January 24. 1897. and Tirey
Casselman Abbott, born February 4. 1900.

HIRAM A. UXKUII. \Yorthy of classification among those strong and
loyal men who have been the upbuilders of California, this well known
citizen of California has wielded much influence in the state of his adop-
tion and has had to do with affairs of broad scope and importance, in-
cluding those that touch the public welfare and material progress and
prosperity. He has the sturdy character of his German forebears and his
character has been matured and strengthened through the varied ex-
periences of a long and useful career as one of the world's great army
of productive workers. Sure in his stewardship, broad in his mental
ken. highly intellectual but with naught of intellectual bigotry, honest
in thought and action and modest in all things, Hiram A. Unruh has
not sought notoriety, but his influence has extended in many directions
and ever in a benignant way. He has been essentially the "power be-
hind the throne" in the handling of the affairs and great estate of the late
Elias T- Baldwin, best known to the world as "Lucky" Baldwin, and he
was guide, counselor and friend to this erratic capitalist. Of Mr. Unruh's
close association with Baldwin it will not be possible to enter into much
of detail in a circumscribed sketch, such as the one here presented, but
enough may be said to give an idea of his accomplishment in this and
other important connections.

In a recent newspaper article relative to the life and labors of Mr.
Unruh appeared the following well taken statements: "Behind each
great worldly success are usually two strong men. One man plans, the
other executes. Each man has his limitations, but the two, working to-
gether, are invincible. The achievements of the one are not possible with-
out the co-operation of the other. Older Californians, who know the
inside history of affairs, say that were it not for the executive qualities
of H. A. Unruh, the E. J. Baldwin millions would have vanished in thin
air. years ago.

"Phe luckiest thing in the history of "Lucky"' Baldwin came to pass the
day Unruh became Baldwin's man of affairs, executing Baldwin's poli-
cies, legal, financial and administrative. More than once H. A. Unruh
saved the great estate from going to the wall. If Baldwin might be
compared to the machine itself, then Unruh certainly was the balance
wheel. He would not admit this himself. His German sense of con-

A A 1 1 • K I C A X J '- 1 OCR A PH Y AND GE X E ALOG V 387

sciousness is too great. But the success of his stewardship is known
to financial men up and down the Pacific coast and in some of the great
New York banks. Behind it all is an interesting human-nature story
that thus far has never seen the light, nor will it for some time to come,
for Unruh's lips are closed. His German modesty stands in the way.
He merely says he did his duty as he saw it, and as he would expect
another to do by him." It may be said incidentally that the associa-
tion of Baldwin and Unruh had its inception in 1879 and tnat 'l con~
tinued until the death of the great turf king, after whose demise the
integrity of the estate was maintained almost solely by the admirable
administration of Mr. Unruh. whose loyalty is one of his most pro-
nounced characteristics.

Hiram A. Unruh was born in Valparaiso, Indiana, on the ist of No-
vember, 1845, and he is a son of Joseph and Abigail (Bowman) Unruh,
his mother being of a Quaker family. Both his father and mother were
born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The great-grandfather of our sub-
ject came from Germany in 1692. Mr. Unruh's mother died in Val-
paraiso, Indiana, in 1852. and his father in Sherman, Texas, in 1876.
His early educational training was gained in the Carly Institute at Val-
paraiso, which institution he left to enlist in the 2Oth Indiana Volunteer
Infantry in May, 1861. Mr. Unruh came to the Pacific coast, via the
Isthmus of Panama, as a member of an expedition bound for Alaska,
called the Russian-American Telegraphed Expedition, which had for its
object the survey of a line in the frozen north. He left the expedition,
however, at San Francisco, and entered the service of the Western Union
Telegraph Company as operator and acted as agent for Wells, Fargo &
Company for a few months and then becoming identified with the Cen-
tral Pacific Railroad then building. His energies and powers could not
long continue thus circumscribed and thus he was found building the
original telegraph line for the Central Pacific railroad, from Sacramento
to Truckee, and he later re-built the line. After important and effective
service in the upbuilding of the Central and Southern Pacific railroads he
resigned his position in August, 1874, and the work he had held together
by his own ability and force, with a large corps of assistants, was con-
sidered too large for one man. and was divided under five separate
heads. For two years thereafter he was employed as cashier and corre-
spondent for one of the largest wholesale tobacco houses in San Fran-
cisco, from which position he resigned on account of ill-health and lived
in Lake county until his recovery, when he went to Eureka, Nevada,
as agent for the Eureka & Palisade railroad from which place he accepted
an offer of Mr. Baldwin.

From the article from which an earlier quotation has been made
are taken the following extracts: "No greater compliment could be paid
to Unruh's business capacity than to cite the foregoing plain outline facts
on his sterling executive powers. Such was his mental equipment and
business dicipline when he met Baldwin, whom he had known many years
previously, when the latter was living on the old homestead near the
Michigan-Indiana state line, and he agreed to take charge of the specula-
tor's tangled business affairs. H. A. Unruh is a tall, scholarly German,
with a shrewd head for planning and carrying things out. He is at once a

388 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

patient plodder as well as a man of great enterprise. He is not only
temperamentally Baldwin's foil in every respect, but he could also do what
Baldwin never could — look far into the future and rest content with
the slow turning of the clock of time. Baldwin, impatient for results,
always mistrusted a plan in proportion as it took years to fulfill. But,
somehow, Baldwin trusted absolutely Unruh's native sagacity and de-
ferred to his judgment of the trend of events.

"II. A. Unruh when he became Baldwin's confidential man, had to
develop rapidly or go to the wall. His former training had been largely
with the freight departments of western railroads, and suddenly he was
called upon to show adaptability in emergencies of all sorts, legal, finan-
cial and administrative. He had to take charge of a stock farm of two
hundred and fifty thoroughbreds, and during the years of Baldwin's activ-
ity on the turf Unruh was the responsible man of business — the one who
looked after a thousand and one practical details. During twenty-five years
of racing, Unruh was the silent manager behind Baldwin in every emer-
gency, and these kept coming in mountain loads. Baldwin was the only
racing and breeding proprietor of his time who quit the sport of kings
a cool quarter of a million dollars ahead of expense account. That
Baldwin could have done this without Unruh's cool directing head were
impossible. To the general public Unruh was unknown, and he pre-
ferred to remain quietly on the ranch or in his business office, directing
policies wide enough to control the destiny of a state in our Union.
Unruh developed rapidly a keen knowledge of agriculture. He studied
the wine and brandy industry. He built suburban roads, explored for
water, studied soils, sought out all manner of scientific resources to in-
crease the fruitfulness of the Baldwin fields. Incidentally a world of law
business was thrown on his shoulders, and although he is not a graduate
of a legal school, in the opinion of experts his legal foundation surpasses
that of many men who have gained wide success in practice. Unruh
was the man who had to front the somewhat eccentric policy of Baldwin
and provide the sinews of war to keep things moving. The financial
genius required speaks for itself. In finance he had to adopt and 'fol-
low unswerving policies that would hold oft" impatient creditors, soothing
men whose accounts were long overdue, urging and obtaining extension
of time on a mere promise to pay; and in the meanwhile there was the
practical management of the many Baldwin ranches, the selection of the
best crops, the harvesting and the problems of labor. In San Francisco
was also a world of difficulty in stock ventures gone wrong and in law-
suits that had to be battled to a finish in Baldwin's name. More than
once, in fierce verbal wars with grafters and blackmailers, Unruh's life
was threatened, bullets flew and it seems only a miracle that he escaped
unharmed.

"Desperate situations, critical moments in law. finance and managerial
policies, kept coming up for years, and Unruh was always the man of
the moment, — an honorable, efficient steward, handling the Baldwin mil-
lions as he expected, in his conscientious way, others would do for him.
Such is his thorough-going way, simple, earnest, honest to the core. H.
A. Unruh carefully studied every piece of Baldwin property in southern
California, and in course of time brought each to a high degree of pros-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 389

perity. To do this he had to create values and force development. It
was largely the appeal of his genial, conciliatory personality that made
much possible. He is the type of leader around whom men rally and
svhoni they are willing to trust with time and money, because they be-
lieve him absolutely honest. He helped develop the Baldwin ranches
until Baldwin was known as one of America's greatest ranchers. Dur-
ing his thirty years' association with the great turfman not a cross word
\vas ever exchanged, and Baldwin learned more and more as time passed,
to rely on I nruh for policies, improvements and management. The scale
of operation was immense, the personal confidence unbroken to the last.
During Unruh's time Baldwin paid at the various banks the enormous
sum of four million dollars in interest alone, to say nothing of the aggre-
gate of various gigantic loans. Behind all this, Unruh, the man of busi-
ness, was often all but swamped with debts and the added losses of an
occasional drought or unproductive season. At last, through years of
ceaseless effort, he carried all to a successful conclusion, although the
complete result did not come until after Baldwin's death. H. A. Unruh
will have the satisfaction of knowing that his name goes on record with
those of the other great financial men who have helped to upbuild south-
ern California.

"H. A. Unruh's practical side is very strong; his vision goes far be-
yond that of the average successful man. The story of the great devasta-
tion of California by white scale some years ago shows his wonderful
qualities in an emergency. The scale threatened to kill every growing
piece of vegetation in southern California and was rapidly undermining
the prosperity of the coast. When the government finally found the Aus-
tralian parasite that conquered the scale, of all such parasites imported
only one hundred and twenty-five reached Los Angeles, and Mr. Unruh
was one of the most active men ; he had been studying the successful ex-
termination of the parasite by the counter Australian parasite, in Wolf-
skill orchard. Later he saw to it that other localities were cared for. En-
couraged by these practical results, the movement has since carried its
campaign along the line of fighting the pest with pest to wonderful re-
sults, and today it has a corps of explorers for parasites in all parts of
the globe. In this Mr. Unruh has had a large and important share. He
believes implicitly in the future of California. It was his individual work
with Collis P. Huntington that ended in bringing the trolley system to
southern California. The story is long and interesting and some other
men are to be credited also, but to H. A. Unruh is due the larger credit
for the original stimulating influences brought to bear upon Mr. Hunt-
ington, to whom and his associates he was always very close. The great
capitalists and railroad builders have great confidence in the business
sagacity of Mr. Unruh. In the growth of cotton, in iron and steel, in home
places, in the suburbs, in San Pedro harbor, in the opening of the Panama
canal, and, above all, in the exceptional character of the men and women
buying lands and homes in and about Los Angeles, Mr. Unruh bases his
confidence in the future. He has passed through many disappointments in
the past, but to him the future, for himself as well as for Los Angeies
and the state, is now without a cloud."

Mr. Unruh is a Civil war veteran, having passed his sixteenth birth-

390 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY A.XU GENEALOGY

day as a prisoner of war in Libby prison, Richmond, and was for lour
months in a cell as one of one hundred and fifty hostages for rebel priva-
teers in Columbia, South Carolina. He has always been a Republican in
politics ; is a Mason and an Odd Fellow.

Mr. Unruh was married to Miss Jane A. Dunn, a native of New York
state, in Placer county, California, in 1869. Two sons were born to
them : Joseph A. and David S., both of whom are well known socially
and professionally. Mrs. Unruh is a member of the Episcopalian church.

JEFFERSON T. COLLIVER, .M. D. Numbered among the able and popu-
lar representatives of the medical profession in southern California, is Dr.
Jefferson Thomas Colliver, who has been engaged in successful general
practice in the city of San Bernardino for nearly a quarter of a century
and who here controls a large and representative business, based alike on
his marked professional ability and his sterling and genial personality.

Dr. Colliver claims the fine old Bluegrass state as the place of his
nativity, and he reverts with due gratification to the fact that both his
paternal and maternal ancestors were numbered among the pioneers of
that favored commonwealth. He was born on a farm near Mount Ster-
ling Montgomery county, Kentucky, on the igth of January, 1841, and
is a son of Dr. John and Matilda (Robinson) Colliver, both of whom were
likewise natives of Kentucky. The father was a son of Richard Colliver.
who was born and reared in Scotland, and who immigrated to America
when a young man. He settled in Bourbon county, Kentucky, shortly
after the close of the war of the Revolution, and became one of the ex-
tensive planters and influential citizens of that section of the state, where
he continued to reside until his death, at a venerable age. He was thrice
married and became the father of thirteen sons and three daughters,
and Dr. John Colliver was a son of the second marriage. Richard Colli-
ver had the sterling characteristics common to the sturdy Scotchman and
his influence was ever extended in behalf of those things that represent
the best in the scheme of human life. In politics he was a staunch ad-
vocate of the principles of the Whig party of the old line, and he was
implacable in his opposition to the institution of human slavery, as were
also all of his descendents, none of the family having ever consented to
hold such bondsmen.

Dr. John Colliver was born and reared in Bourbon county, Kentucky,
where his marriage was solemnized. He studied medicine under effective
preceptorship. and for a score of years he was engaged in the active
practice of his profession, in Champaign and Madison counties, Ohio.
His zeal and self-abnegation were of the most insistent order and he was
one of the pioneer representatives of the Eclectic school of medicine in
Ohio. He was indefatigable in ministering to those in affliction and dis-
tress and the exposures and hard labors which he endured in connection
with the work of his profession under pioneer conditions virtually caused
his death, which occurred at West Jefferson, Ohio, in 1865. He was a
man of fine intellectuality and broad culture, was a close and appreciative
student of his profession, and he so ordered his life in all its relations
as to merit and command the unqualified confidence and esteem of all who
knew him. He united with the Republican party at the time of its organi-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :;>)!

zation and was well fortified in his convictions as to matters of public
polity, as was shown by his ability in the discussion of political subjects.
Both he and his wife were earnest and zealous members of the Christian
church. The father was a great debater and was opposed to Mormonism
and he took an active part in speeches in driving that element out of Ohio.
Airs. Colliver survived her honored husband by many years and was
summoned to the life eternal in 1886, at the venerable age of eighty-
eight years. She was a woman of most gracious personality and held the
affectionate regard of all who came within the sphere of her gentle and
kindly influence. She was a daughter of John M. Robinson, who was of
Irish descent, and who became a prosperous planter and stock-grower in
Kentucky, where he also conducted an old-time inn or tavern on his plan-
tation. Dr. John and Matilda ( Robinson) Colliver became the parents
of three sons and nine daughters, of whom one son and four daughters
are now living, two daughters residing in Ohio and two in California, the
subject of this review having been the fifth in order of birth.

Dr. Jefferson T. Colliver was an infant at the time of the family re-
moval from Kentucky to Ohio, and in Champaign county, Ohio, he was
reared to adult age, in the meanwhile having duly availed himself of the
advantages of the common schools of the locality and period, besides
which he had the benignant surroundings of a home of distinctive cul-
ture and refinement. As a youth he began the study of medicine
under the able direction of his honored father, and he was finally
matriculated in the Eclectic Medical Institute, at Cincinnati. Ohio, in
which he was the youngest member of the student body and in which he
was graduated as a member of the class of 1865, with the well earned de-
gree of Doctor of Medicine. He had engaged in active practice in 1862,
in association with his father, and after the death of the latter he suc-
ceeded to the well established practice of the father, with residence and
professional headquarters at West Jefferson, Ohio. He well upheld the
prestige of the name in connection with the work of his chosen calling,
and he there controlled a very large and successful practice, to the de-
mands of which he continued to give his attention until 1887. He prac-
tised his profession over four or five counties, often making long rides
with no expectation of pecuniary reimbursement, as it was his chief aim
to do good aside from any thought of remuneration. In 1887 he came to
California, as before stated, and established his home in San Bernardino,
where he has since successfully continued in the active work of his pro-
fession and where he holds secure vantage place as one of the able and
honored physicians and surgeons of this favored section of the state.
Dr. Colliver is a member of the National Eclectic Medical Association,
and is also one of the valued members of the California State Eclectic
Medical Society.

In the year 1874, Dr. Colliver was raised to the sublime degrees of
Master Mason, in Madison Lodge, No. 221, Free and Accepted Masons,
at West Jefferson. Ohio, and from the same he was dimitted to San
Bernardino Lodge, No. 178, with which he has since been affiliated. In
politics he accords allegiance to the Democratic party and he has ever
shown a loyal interest in all that touches the general welfare of the com-
munity. He has been specially active in the promotion of educational

AMERICAN I'.IOGRAL'HY AND GENEALOGY

•

interests and has served as a member of the board of education of West
Jefferson, Ohio, and was for five years on the same board in San Bernar-
dino, California. He has been identified with the development of the oil
industry in southern California, as well as with mining operations, and he
has valuable interests in mining properties at the present time. He is
essentially progressive and public-spirited as a citizen and is influential
in civic affairs in his home city, where his circle of friends is coincident
with that of his acquaintances. He is a member of the Baptist church,
as was also his cherished and devoted wife, whose memory is revered by
all who knew her.

In the year 1868, at South Charleston, Ohio, was solemnized the
marriage of Dr. Colliver to Miss Frances Elizabeth Adams, who was
born and reared in that state and whose father, the late Dr. William D.
Adams, studied medicine under the preceptorship of Dr. John Colliver,
father of him to whom this sketch is dedicated. Dr. Adams was suc-
cessfully engaged in the practice of his profession at Clinton, DeWitt
county, Illinois for a quarter of a century and there he continued to re-
side until his demise. Dr. and Mrs. Colliver have two sons and two
daughters, concerning whom brief record is given in the concluding para-
graph of this context, the loved and devoted wife and mother having
been summoned to the "land of the leal" in December, 1898, aged fifty-
three years.

Dr. John Adams Colliver, the eldest of the four children is one of the
representative physicians and surgeons of Los Angeles, this state, where
he is also an instructor in the southern California Medical College; M.
Adelle is the wife of Guy Y. Shoup, who is engaged in the practice of
law in the city of San Francisco and who is one of the leading counselors
of the Southern Pacific Railroad Company ; Simeon Robinson Colliver
maintains his home at Seattle, Washington, and is incumbent of the po-
sition of timber inspector for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad
Company ; and Miss Lydia remains with her father, in charge of the do-
mestic economies and social activities of the attractive home.

JOSEPH A. MUNK, M. D. This distinguished representative of the
medical profession in California is one of the favored mortals whom na-
ture has launched into the world with the heritage of a sturdy ancestry,
a splendid physique, a masterful mind, and energy enough for many men.
Added to these attributes are exceptional intellectual attainments and the
useful lessons of a wide and varied experience. Such a man could not ob-
scure himself if he would. Many men excel in achievements along some
given course, but to few is it permitted to follow several lines of en-
deavor and stand well to the front in each. Such accomplishment has
been given striking illustration in the career of Dr. Munk. who is one
of the leading exponents of the Eclectic school of medicine in the state
of California, and who is engaged in the practice of his profession in
the city of Los Angeles, where he is also treasurer of the board of trus-
tees and dean of the California Eclectic Medical college. From an appre-
ciative sketch of his career published in the California Eclectic Medi-
cal Journal, in its issue of September, 1910, the following prefatory
statements are taken, as indicating the consistency of the foregoing re-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 395

mark of his versatility : "Eclectic medicine in America can boast of many
men who are not only leaders in medicine and medical policy but who have
also achieved distinction in lines not directly associated with their voca-
tions. A few have entered the literary circle and written books that
rank with the best. Among this number is the talented author of 'Ari-
zona Sketches.' a relightful and fascinating series of descriptive essays,
depicting that marvel of wonders, the Arizona country — all as seen
through the eyes of a devoted lover of nature and man of science. Phy-
sician, naturalist, bibliophile, antiquarian, ethnologist, musician, author,
and promoter of Eclectic interests, Dr. Joseph A. Munk, of Los Angeles.
California, is first and last a man of interesting and versatile parts.''

Joseph Amasa Munk, M. D.. finds a due measure of satisfaction in
claiming the fine old Buckeye state as the place of his nativity. He was
born on a farm in Columbiana county, Ohio, on the gth of November,
1847, and is a son of Jacob and Marie (Rosenberry) Munk, the former
of whom was born in < Germany, and the latter of whom was a native of
Pennsylvania, and a representative of the staunch Dutch stock that has
figured so prominently in the development and upbuilding of that fine com-
monwealth. The ancestry in the agnatic line is traced back to remote
English origin and the forebears of the American family fled from
England in Cromwell's time, to escape religious persecution. They
found refuge in Germany and from that empire came the progeni-
tors of the American line. Jacob Munk, a man of sterling char-
acter and strong mentality, devoted the major portion of his active
life to the great basic industry of agriculture and he was numbered among
the honored pioneers of Columbiana county, Ohio. Both he and his
wife passed the closing years of their long and useful lives in Alliance,
that state, and both were devout members of the Methodist Episcopal
church. Jacob Munk was seventy-six years of age at the time of his
death and his cherished and devoted wife was summoned to eternal rest
at the age of sixty-seven years. They became the parents of six chil-
dren, of whom four sons and one daughter are now living.

When Mr. Munk was five years of age his parents removed to the
village of Salem, Columbiana county, Ohio, and four years later they
established their home on a farm near the village of Mount Union.
Stark county, that state, where the future physician was reared to adult
age. He early learned the lessons of practical industry, as he began
to assist in the work of the farm when a mere boy, and in the meanwhile
he duly availed himself of the advantages of the common schools of
the locality and period. For some time he prosecuted his studies in the
schools of Alliance, now one of the thriving cities of Stark count}-. Dr.
Munk was a lad of about fourteen years when the dark cloud of the
Civil war cast its pall over the national firmament, and his youthful pa-
triotism and ardor were aroused in no uncertain way. He and his com-
panions organized a company for military drill, and he was elected its
captain. He was not denied specific martial experience, as, in the summer
of 1864, when but sixteen years of age, he gained his father's consent
to enter the ranks of the gallant "boys in blue." He enlisted as a private
in Company I, One Hundred and Seventy-eighth Ohio Volunteer Infan-
try, and with this command he saw active service in the field of conflict.

396 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

He took part in several campaigns, both in the east and west, and partici-
pated in a number of spirited engagements, his command having been
a part of the Army of the Cumberland during the major portion of his
term of service. He continued with his regiment until victory had
crowned the Union arms and was honorably discharged and mustered out
in June, 1865. about five months prior to his eighteenth birthday anni-
versary. Dr. Munk has ever retained a deep interest in his old com-
rades in arms and he vitalizes the more gracious memories and associa-
tions of his military service through his membership in the < irand Army
of the Republic.

After the close of the war Dr. Munk returned to the parental home
and soon afterward he entered Mount Union College, at Alliance, Ohio,
where he continued his studies about one year. In 1866, he began the
study of medicine under the effective preceptorship of Dr. David H.
Rosenberg, of Bettsville, Seneca county, Ohio, and in the following year
he was duly matriculated in Eclectic Medical Institute, in the city of
Cincinnati, in which institution he completed the prescribed technical
course and in which he was graduated as a member of the class of 1869.
with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. Concerning further stages in his
professional career the following record has been given in a leading
medical journal and the same is reproduced with such paraphrase as
seems expendient.

After his graduation Dr. Munk engaged in the practice of his pro-
fession in the village of Lindsey, Sandusky county, Ohio, where he
remained until 1871. He soon decided that the west offered a better
field, and in the year last mentioned he removed to Chillicothe, Missouri.
in which state he continued in the practice of medicine for the ensuing
decade, at the expiration of which, in 1881, he removed to the city of
Topeka, Kansas, where he entered into a professional partnership with
Dr. Phineas I. Mulvane, with whom he continued to be most agreeably
associated during a period of ten years, within which was built up a large
and representative practice. In 1891 the firm of Mulvane & Munk was
dissolved by Mutual consent, and in the following year Dr. Munk came
to California and established his home in Los Angeles, where he has
since continued in active general practice and where he has gained dis-
tinctive success and prestige as one of the representative physicians and
surgeons of southern California, and as one of the foremost and must
influential exponents of the beneficent Eclectic school of medicine.

Dr. Munk's career has been marked by energy, devotion and close
application to the work of his exacting profession and his accomplish-
ment and success have been on a parity with his earnestness and ability.
Fully believing that no man knows what he can do until he tries, he early
in practice applied himself to self-imposed tasks. His love of nature and
the natural sciences led him often to the fields and woods. He studied
taxidermy, and many mounted birds and small animals prepared by him-
self ornamented his offices. Being devoted to music, he composed a num-
ber of songs, which were published in sheet form by the John Church
Company, of Cincinnati, and he contributed glees, choruses and anthems
to books edited by the celebrated Professor H. S. Perkins and published
by Lyon & Healy, of Chicago. After leaving Chillicothe, Missouri, Dr.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 397

Munk discontinued the writing of music, as his time became fully occu-
pied by the exigent demands of his profession. Feeling that a physician
should have some diversion, he joined the Modoc Club, a representa-
tive musical organization of Topeka Kansas. Its membership was con-
fined to men and was limited to thirty persons. This club was organized
in 1876, and under the management of its permanent president, Major
Thomas J. Anderson, it achieved high reputation. It is still in active
service and is in great demand at gatherings of the Grand Army of the
Republic and other public assemblies, in which connection it has trav-
eled and sung from Boston to San Francisco.

Soon after settling in Topeka Dr. Munk became interested with his
brothers in the range cattle business near Willcox, Cochise county, Ari-
zona, where they became associated in the establishing of a ranch in the
year 1883. In 1884 he made his first trip to Arizona, and so greatly was
he impressed with what he saw that he sought all that had been written
about that then mystical frontier region. Procuring a copy of Hinton's
"Handbook of Arizona," he found therein a list of a dozen or more
books on Arizona, and he forthwith purchased a copy of each of these.
This was the nucleus of his great collection of Arizona to which he is
constantly adding. In 1900 Dr. Munk published his "Arizona Biblio-
graphy.'' containing nearly one thousand titles. During the past few
years he has more than doubled his collection, and he in 1908 published
a second and enlarged edition, which includes more than two thousand
titles. During the past twenty years Dr. Munk has spent his vacations
in Arizona and other sections of the great southwest, and he regards
Arizona as the greatest wonderland in America. He has visited and
studied its natural wonders and prehistoric ruins, is familiar with its na-
tives and their customs, as well as with its ranch life, and has studied its
fauna and flora, its geology and its wonderful climate, with the sagacity
of the scientist and the ardor of a naturalist. A series of articles upon
these topics has been contributed by him to many publications, and in
1906 he published his "Arizona Sketches," beautifully illustrated and
revealing alike his keen powers of observation and his skill as a writer.
The doctor is a recognized authority in regard to Arizona and his con-
tribution to historic literature concerning that wonderful section of our
national domain must prove of great and cumulative value. His literary
style is marked by clarity, effective diction and marked imaginative
power, with special facility in description. For more than thirty years
he has been' a valued contributor to current medical literature, and to
local newspapers he has given many well timed and effective articles
pertaining to hygiene, sanitation, etc. He was one of the founders of
the California Eclectic Medical Journal, and to this excellent periodical,
which is issued monthly, he has been not only a frequent contributor
but he has also had much to do with the administration of its affairs in
such a way as to gain to it noteworthy prestige.

Dr. Munk has always been zealous and active in the work of his
chosen school of practice and has taken a leading part in the affairs of
the Eclectic medical societies of the states in which he has resided. In
1876 he served as vice president of the National Eclectic Medical Asso-
ciation, and in TQTO-TT as president of the same; in 1908-9 he was pres-

!98 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

idem of the Eclectic .Medical Society of the state of California. He
has long been a member of the Southwest Society of the American In-
stitute of Archaeology, and is a member of its executive committee. He
is also a director of the Southwest Museum, at Los Angeles, an insti-
tution which should prove of enduring and most interesting order. He
uas one of the founders of the Los Angeles Eclectic Policlinic, and is
its dean a^ well as incumbent of its chair of Climatology. The Cali-
fornia Eclectic Medical College was laid low by the great earthquake
and fire which compassed the downfall of the city of San Francisco in
iijo6, and upon the re-establishing of the institution, in Los Angeles, in
the late summer of that year, Dr. Munk was one of the most active and
influential factors in placing the college upon a firm and otherwise
adequate foundation. He was elected treasurer of its board of trus-
tees and dean of its faculty, and he has been indefatigable in his labors
in behalf of the college, both as an administrative officer and as incum-
bent of its chair of hygiene and climatology.

Notwithstanding the exactions of his varied professional interests
and extraneous work. Dr. Munk is essentially liberal, progressive and
public-spirited as a citizen, and he is ever found ready to give his in-
fluence and co-operation in the promotion and carrying forward of
measures and enterprises projected for the general good of his home
city and state. He has given a stalwart allegiance to the Republican
party from the time of attaining to his legal majority and is well forti-
fied in hi.- opinions as to matters of public polity, though he has had no
predilection for political office. Both he and his wife are members of
the \Yest Lake Methodist Episcopal church of Los Angeles, and their
attractive home is a center of gracious hospitality.

In January. 1873, was solemnized the marriage of Dr. Munk to Miss
Emma Beazell, who was at that time a resident of Webster. Westmore-
land county, Pennsylvania, in which state she was born and reared. She
is a daughter of Benjamin E. and Sarah Beazell. who passed the closing-
years of their lives in Pennsylvania, the father having devoted the major
part of his active career in agricultural pursuits. Dr. Munk is a mem-
ber of the Grand Army of the Republic. Staunton Post Xo. 55.

ALOIS POHKASMK. llis beautiful home in the Piedmont district of
San Bernardino county must measurably suggest to this honored and in-
fluential citizen of Upland the scenes of his native place, at the foot of
the Carpathians, — the mountain chain lying along the border between
Moravia and Hungary, and well may he recall the significant quotation,
which typifies the attitude of those born in such districts. "My moun-
tains still are free : they hurl oppression back : they keep the boon of
liberty." Mr. 1'odrasnik has been prominently identified with the orange
and lemon industry in San Bernardino county and has otherwise given
substantial aid in the promotion of the best interests of this favored
section of the state, where his capitalistic investments are of large and
important order. He is now living virtually retired from active business
and. secure in the high regard of the community in which he has estab-
lished bis home, he may well feel that his "lines are cast in pleasant
places."

AMHR1CAX I'.IUGRAI'IIV AXD GENEALOGY 399

Alois Podrasnik was born in the town of Bystritz. Moravia, and the
date of his nativity was October 7, 1845. He is a son of Joseph and
Barbara (Tomacek) Podrasnik, who were likewise born and reared in
that same district, where the respective families have resided for many
generations. The ancestral homestead of the Podrasnik family has been
held in the possession of the family for hundreds of years, and the pic-
turesque and sturdy old house in which the subject of this review was
born and of which he has in his present home an excellent picture, is a
large stone structure of one story, with courts and attractive facilities,
though it was erected centuries ago. It is still in the possession of rep-
resentatives of this old and influential Austrian family, and incidentally
it may be said that the ancestral history of Air. Podrasnik is one in which
he may well take pride. His grandfather, Joseph Podrasnik, as the eldest
son, inherited the old family estate, and there he continued to be actively
engaged in agricultural pursuits for many years. He remained on the an-
cestral homestead until his death, at the patriarchal age of ninety-three
years, and he was influential in the affairs of his community. He was
a man of small stature but retained his mental and physical alert-
ness in a wonderful degree to the end of his exceptionally long life.
In his family of two sons and one daughter, was Joseph, who was the
eldest and who bore the full patronymic. To the eldest son the family
estate came by inheritance under the virtual system of entailment. and
he was ever a man of exceptional energy and industry, the while he
gained a liberal education through self-application. Early in life he left
the parental home and thereafter he followed various lines of enterprise.
While engaged in the wholesale tobacco trade he became a government
representative of this line of enterprise, with which he continued to be
successfully identified for many years, with residence and headquarters
at Xikolsburg, in the province of Moravia, Austria. There he was also
a wholesale dealer in wines, of which he was an expert judge, and through
his various business operations he accumulated a competency. His estate
passed to his eldest son, Joseph, and the latter is still identified with the
same lines of enterprise, at Waidhofen, near the city of Vienna. Joseph
Podrasnik. Sr., father of him whose name initiates this article, was born
in 1810, and died in 1887. His wife was summoned to the life eternal
in 1869, at the age of fifty-seven years. He was a member of the National
Militia of Austria during the revolutionary uprising of 1848, at which
time the present venerable emperor assumed the throne. Of the seven
children, the subject of this sketch is the youngest, and of the other
children, one son is now living in his native land.

Alois Podrasnik remained at the old family homestead until he had
attained to the age of twelve years, and in the meanwhile he had made
good use of the educational advantages afforded him. His father wished
him to devote a few years to seeing the various parts of the world, and at
the early age noted the youthful adventurer severed the gracious home
ties to set forth in the quest of experience. A ticket of passage to the
United States was secured for him at Bremen, where he bade farewell
to his father and where he embarked on the steamer "Hudson," which
was making its initial and only voyage to America, as it was destroyed by
fire on the return trip. After a period of fourteen days on the ocean, Mr.

400 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Podrasnik landed in the port of New York city, whence he forthwith
proceeded to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. There he remained in the homes
of friends of his father for the ensuing two years. He then began to
depend on his own resources, and applied himself vigorously to such
employment as he could secure. When he was sixteen years of age his
father sent him money and requested that he return home, but the youth
had become impressed with the advantages and attractions of the great
American republic, and was anxious to remain and make his own way
in the world. Although his financial resources were at a low ebb at the
time, he sent the money given by his father to his brother, who was at
that time located in Chicago, and virtually refused to return to his native
land.

About this time the Civil war was precipitated on a divided nation,
and, loyal to the land of his adoption, young Podrasnik was eager to
tender his services in defense of the Union. He accordingly went to
the recruiting office in Chicago in the City Hall park, but he was not
permitted to enlist, by reason of his youth and his small stature. In the
winter of 1863-4, however, he realized his ambition, by enlisting, in the
city of Chicago, as a private in Company A, One Hundred and Forty-sec-
ond Illinois Volunteer Infantry. He was advanced to the office of cor-
poral, and as such received his honorable discharge after a faithful ser-
vice of about five months, his enlistment having been for a period of
one hundred days. After his discharge he promptly re-enlisted, as a
private in Company C, One Hundred and Fifty-sixth Illinois Volunteer
Infantry, and soon afterward he was assigned to detail duty at Camp
Fry, Chicago, where he became a clerk at the camp headquarters. Later
he was detailed as color sergeant of his regiment and he continued to serve
in this capacity until the second battle of Nashville. He was then detailed
as clerk at brigade headquarters at Chattanooga, and he continued in this
service after the headquarters had been removed to Columbus, Tennessee,
under Colonel Alfred T. Smith, who had been a member of the regular
army prior to the war. and in the command of his father, John E. Smith,
who held the office of major general. Colonel Alfred T. Smith was a
strict disciplinarian and compelled thirteen officers of his regiment to
resign, under penalty of discharge for incompetency. After these officers
had tendered their resignations he found difficulty in filling their places,
and under these conditions he made complaint to Colonel LaFavre, the
brigade commander, who said at the time, "Take my boy. He is thorough
in drilling and well posted in military papers." He then pointed to Mr.
Podrasnik as the object of his recommendation, and the latter was there-
after submitted to tactical examination with the result that he was rec-
ommended for promotion to the office of first lieutenant. To this position
he was finally appointed, in Company K, One Hundred and Fifty-sixth
Illinois Volunteer Infantry. In the meanwhile the brigade had been dis-
solved and his regiment was ordered to Memphis to assume provost-
guard duty. Upon its arrival in that city, Mr. Podrasnik was appointed
sergeant major of his regiment, and after the arrival of his regular com-
mission he was mustered in as first lieutenant of Company K, in which
capacity he continued to serve until the close of the war. He was mustered
out with his regiment on the mth of September, 1865, at Springfield, the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 401

capital of Illinois. While a member of the One Hundred and Forty-
second Illinois regiment, in a skirmish at White's Station, Tennessee, Mr.
Podrasnik received, from a spent bullet, a slight wound below his right
knee, but otherwise he practically went unscathed through the various
engagements in which he took part.

After the close of his loyal and meritorious service as a soldier of the
Union, Air. Podrasnik returned to the city of Chicago, and in April, 1866,
he assumed the position of mail carrier, under the administration of post-
master Samuel Hoard. He continued to be thus engaged for nearly five
years, and he then was advanced to a position at the letter case in the
postoffice. After the great Chicago fire of 1871, in recognition of his
faithful and effective service, he was appointed foreman for the western
division of the city, and he retained this incumbency until April i, 1875,
when he resigned and engaged in the wall-paper and blank-book business
on a modest scale, at 16 West Randolph street. Through careful methods
and enterprising policies the business rapidly expanded, and finally Mr.
Podrasnik formed a partnership with a valued friend, William C. C.
Lartz, and opened a wall-paper jobbing house at 263-5 Wabash avenue.
The rapid growth in the enterprise eventually led to the securing of
larger quarters, at 43-47 Randolph street, near the present imposing
Masonic Temple, where operations were successfully continued from
1887 to 1893, when the firm sold its extensive jobbing business and Mr.
Podrasnik returned to his old quarters on Randolph street, where he had
retained a third interest in the original business established by him. In
1895 ne engaged in business in an individual way, at 216-18 Randolph
street, and in the meanwhile he had purchased the building and ground
at 75-7 Lake street, to which location he removed his business after the
former leases had expired. There he continued to conduct a large and
representative enterprise in the handling of wall-paper, paints and oils
at wholesale and retail, until October 15, njoG. when he sold out and
retired from active business. In the meanwhile, after having asquired a
substantial fortune through his own ability and well directed efforts, Mr.
Podrasnik had purchased a third interest in a third manufacturing busi-
ness at Newark, Delaware, where he became president of the oper-
ating company. He sold his interest in this business also in 1902, but he
still retains in his possession the valuable property on Lake street, in the
heart of the city of Chicago, together with the property at 107-9 that street.

After his retirement from active business. Mr. Podrasnik adopted the
plan of passing the winter seasons in Los Angeles. California, and while
here he noticed in a local paper an advertisement offering for sale prop-
erty at Mountain Home, by the owner. William E. Toerpe, to whom he
immediately dispatched a letter asking if Mr. Toerpe had not previously
been engaged in business on Ogden avenue, Chicago, and whether he had
not been a former customer of the writer. Mr. Podrasnik soon received
an affirmative reply to his queries and incidentally an invitation to visit
the home of Mr. Toerpe, at Upland, San Bernardino county. He made
this visit in company with his wife and when they started for their home
they missed the last electric interurban car and were compelled to pass
the night at Upland. On the following morning he was accompanied by
Mrs. Podrasnik in a pleasing stroll along Mountain avenue, and they

402 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

chanced to see at this time the property which is now their home. Mr.
Poclrasnik purchased the land, comprising ten acres, from his friend, Mr.
Toerpe, for thirty-five hundred dollars, as he had been most favorably im-
pressed with the beautiful location. On the tract had been planted a
few orange trees and the remainder of the property was covered with
granite boulders. The purchase price included ten shares of the stock
of the San Antonio Water Company, and the accident of missing his car
had further significance than in causing him to secure and develop his fine
home at Upland, for it had been his intention to proceed to San Francisco,
where he would have been at the time of the great earthquake and fire,
had not the loss of his car caused his detention in Upland. He had secured
passage for himself and family and made all other arrangements for a
tour of Europe but matters pertaining to the purchase of the property
at Upland delayed his departure as well as averted his being in San
Francisco at the time when the city was visited by its great disaster.
He would have arrived in that city on the ijth of April, 1906, and had
secured hotel accommodations for that night. It will be remembered
that the earthquake occurred shortly after 5 o'clock the following morning,
and a great city fell in ruin from this disaster and its dread companion,
fire. While Mr. Podrasnik and his family were in Europe, he and his
wife decided to establish their permanent home at the foot of the moun-
tain on Mountain avenue, in Upland, San Bernardino county, and upon
their return to America, he sold his fine residence property in Chicago,
at a sacrifice of ten thousand dollars. He has since developed one of
the most beautiful home properties in southern California and has had
no regret for the decision that caused him to establish his permanent
residence at Upland. His spacious and beautiful residence is one of the
finest in this section of the state, and its site is most attractive, as from
the same is commanded a view of the beautiful San Bernardino valley,
as well as of the ocean and Santa Catalina islands, on clear days. The
home of Mr. Podrasnik is located at the foothills about five miles dis-
tant from the business center of Upland, which is made accessible by a
fine electric railway. The home is modern in all equipments and facili-
ties and is one of the show places of this favored section of the state.

Though he has retired from active business Mr. Podrasnik has been
ever ready to lend his influence and co-operation in the furtherance of
measures and enterprises tending to foster the best civic and material in-
terests of his home community, and as a citizen he is distinctively liberal
and public-spirited. He was one of the five organizers of the Upland
Heights' Orange Association, which has an extensive packinghouse at
Upland and which, in its effective policies and system, has served as a
model for other concerns of similar functions. He has been a director
of this association from its inception, served for a time as its president,
and is now its vice-president. He is also president of the San Antonio
Water Company, which furnished water for the irrigation of six thousand
acres of land in what has long been known as the Ontario colony, in the
San Bernardino valley, and which likewise supplies water for domestic
purposes. He is vice-president of the Ontario Power Company, which
furnishes electric light and power for the entire Ontario colony and its
suburbs. It will thus be seen that Mr. Podrasnik has thoroughly iden-

/

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 405

titied himself with the varied interests of his home community and that he
has been a liberal supporter of enterprises that have done much to fur-
ther the development and upbuilding of this section of the state. He is
a member of the directorate of the Page Wire Fence Company, of Mon-
essen, Pennsylvania, the largest concern of its kind in the United States.
He has been for seven years a member of the financial committee of this
corporation, whose original manufactory was located at Adrain, Michigan.

In politics Mr. Podrasnik is a staunch adherent of the Republican
party and he is well fortified in his views regarding matters of public
polity. Through self-discipline and broad experience he has become a
man of distinctive culture and strong intellectuality, and his success in
connection with the productive activities of life has been significantly
pronounced, the while it stands as the direct result of his own efforts.
He is an appreciative and valued member of both the Grand Army of
the Republic and the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United
States.

Mr. Podrasnik has been thrice wedded. On the 3d of September,
1869, was solemnized his marriage to Miss Minnie Grebe, who was born
in the kingdom of Hanover, Germany, and whose father, the late Wil-
liam Grebe, was for many years one of the representative German-
American men of the city of Chicago. Mrs. Podrasnik passed to the
life eternal in 1873, and both of her children, sons, died in infancy.
On the 23d of September, 1876, Mr. Podrasnik wedded Miss Anna H.
Klapperich, who was born in the city of Chicago, in 1857, and who was
a daughter( of John N. Klapperich. She passed to the "land of the
leal" on the' 3Oth of September, 1902 and is survived by two children, —
Joseph X., who is a director of the Page Wire Fence Company and who
resides at Monessen, Pennsylvania ; and Marie Antoinette, who remains
at the paternal home and is attending the high school of the neighboring
city of Ontario. On the ist of October, 1904, was solemnized the mar-
riage of Mr. Podrasnik to Mrs. Magdalena ( Schiess) Boppe, who was
born at Watertown, Wisconsin, on the 8th of September, 1864, and
whose father, the late Louis Schiess, was a native of south Germany,
whence he came to America when young; he served as a soldier in the
Civil war, as a member of a Wisconsin regiment. Mrs. Podrasnik pre-
sides most graciously over the beautiful home and is a popular factor
in the social activities of the community.

MARK G. JONES. The president of the Merchants' P.ank & Trust
Company of Los Angeles is a native son of California, a scion of one
of its distinguished pioneer families, and a business man who has
marked his course by large and worthy accomplishment along normal
lines of enterprise. He has been prominently concerned with the civic
and material development and upbuilding of the beautiful city of Los
Angeles, and as one of its most loyal, progressive and influential citi-
zens he is distinctively eligible for representation in this publication,
devoted to California and its people.

Mark Gordon Jones was born in the city of San Francisco. Cali-
fornia, on the 22d of December, 1859, and is a son of John and Doria
( Deighton ) Jones, both born and reared in England." John Jones

406

AMKKICAX I'.IOt.RAl'UY AXD tiF.XEALOGY

went from his native land to Australia, where he remained until 1850,
when he came to California. \\ hither he brought a shipload of merchan-
dise. He landed at Monterey and became one of the pioneer merchants
of the state after the ever memorable discovery of gold, in 1849. He
was a man of prominence and influence in connection with business and
public affairs in the early days, held a secure place in popular con-

MKS. DORIA TONES

fidence and esteem and both he and his wife passed the closing years
of their lives in Los Angeles. They are survived by one son and two
daughters.

He whose name initiates this review was about three years of age
at the time of the family removal to Los Angeles, from San Francisco,
and here his educational discipline was secured in the public schools,
including a course in the old high school that occupied the site of the
present court house of the county. Later he continued in higher aca-
demic studies in St. Augustine's College, at Benecia. this state, in which

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 407

institution he was graduated as a member of the class of 1879. After
his graduation Mr. Jones returned to Los Angeles and assumed the
active management of the large estate of his widowed mother, and
the supervision of the same claimed the major part of his time and at-
tention until his cherished and devoted mother was summoned to
the life eternal in March, 1908, her husband having passed away in
December, 1879. Since the death of his mother Mr. Jones has served
as administrator of the estate, and concerning the same and his con-
nection with its supervision the following pertinent statements have
been made : "As the Jones estate interests are represented over most
of California, Air. Jones had every inducement offered him to make
his headquarters elsewhere, but his unbounded faith in the great future
of Los Angeles long ago determined him to remain here, and he is
now actively endeavoring to bring to and center all the estate and per-
sonal interests in this city."

A man of utmost sincerity and uprightness in all the relations of
life, Mr. Jones has gained and retained to a noteworthy degree the un-
equivocal confidence and esteem of the people of Los Angeles and the
county of the same name. In 1889 he was elected county treasurer, and
upon the expiration of his first term he was chosen as his own successor.
By consecutive re-elections he continued incumbent of this important
office until January, 1907, and this fact affords ample attestation to the
efficiency and acceptability of his administration of the fiscal affairs of
one of the most important of the integral division of the state.

Mr. Jones has been unswerving in his loyalty to his home city and
has ever stood ready to give his influence and tangible co-operation in
the promotion of those measures that have conserved the best interests
of the community. In 1906 he figured as the prime factor in effecting
the organization of the Inglewood Park Cemetery Association, of which
he has since continued to serve as president and treasurer. He was
one of the organizers of the Merchants' Bank & Trust Company, a
development of the Merchants' Trust Company and now holding status
as one of the important and staunch financial institutions of the state.
He was elected president of the company at the time of its incorpora-
tion under the present title and has since continued the executive head
of the concern, a position for which he has proved himself distinctively
eligible, by reason of his wide experience in connection with financial
affairs as well as on account of his conservatism and broad ken as an
administrative officer. In connection with this institution he is also
president of the Merchants' Building Company. He is known as a
man of strong initiative, of marked resourcefulness and of vigorous
and attractive personality. Democratic and unostentatious in his bear-
ing, he places true values on men and affairs, is well fortified in his
opinions and is large of spirit and of heart.

In politics Mr. Jones is found arrayed as a staunch supporter of
the cause of the Republican party, in so far as national and state issues
are involved, but in local affairs he is not constrained by strict partisan
lines, as he gives his support to means and measures meeting the ap-
proval of his judgment. He is a prominent figure in the business

to- AMERICAN' BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

circles uf Los Angeles and his social relations are of most gracious
order. In the time-honored Masonic fraternity he is affiliated with
N.uthern California Lodge, Xo. 278, Free & Accepted Masons; Signet
Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Los Angeles Commandery, Xo. 9, Knights
Templar; and Al Malaikah Temple of the Ancient Arabic Order of
the Xobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also identified with Ramona
Parlor, Native Sons of the Golden West.

On February n, 1885, Mr. Jones married Blanch E. McDonald of
Toronto, Canada, a daughter of the late Senator Donald McDonald of
Canada, of whom brief mention will be found at the close of this
biography. They have three children, Deighton G., Mark MacD. and
Frances M. MacD.

In sketching the life of Hon. Donald MacDonald is shown at its
best the Highland Scotch character derived from ancestors living in a
mountainous country, speaking their own language, with customs dif-
ferent from the rest of the British Islands, and belonging to a church
that largely moulded the individual and national character. The true
Highland Scotsman of the past with his fine physique, indomitable will
and high sense of honor was indeed fortunate. While eulogizing those
who are gone we do not believe that their virtues have died with them.

In the Mackenzie rebellion Mr. MacDonald was in the militia en-
gaged in the defense of York, now Toronto, and on the 8th of Decem-
ber, 1837, he was in the fight at Montgomery's, which ended in the de-
feat of Mackenzie's followers. He first entered public life in 1858.
having been elected for Tecumseh division in the Legislative council
of Canada. His constituency, which he represented till Confedera-
tion, formed part of the counties of Huron and Perth, and was largely
settled by Highland Scotch, and it used to be said that his name was
enough to get their votes. He was called to the Senate by Royal Proc-
lamation on the ist of July. 1867. remaining a member of that body
till his death. Elected originally as a Liberal, after Confederation he
generally supported the measures of the Liberal-Conservative party.
He strongly advocated the building of the Canadian Pacific railway.
He was connected with many financial institutions, and was vice-pres-
ident of the Royal Canadian Bank. He was a trustee of Queen's Uni-
versity, Kingston.

In' religion he was a Presbyterian, and a life-long member of St.
Andrew's church, Toronto, in which city he resided. Though inclined
to sternness, yet in private life he was genial and kind. He was a fine
type of man physically, his straight nose, clear-cut mouth and chin in-
dicating the well-balanced disposition within. He married Frances
MacDonald by whom he had ten children, some of whom live in Tor-
onto, and others in Los Angeles, California, in which city Mrs. Mac-
Donald has resided for some years past. Donald MacDonald died on
the 2Oth of January, 1879.

"Still in our ashes live their wonted fires," and we believe that their
descendants, though removed from their native soil and living among
different conditions, will show themselves not unworthy of an illustri-
ous ancestry.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 409

ROBERT U. PRICE. One of the many beautiful homes of the L'pland
district of San Bernardino county is that owned and occupied by -Mr.
Price, on Euclid avenue. Here he has several orange and lemon
groves and is actively engaged in the growing as well as the packing of
citrus fruits. His career has been one of diversified and effective
endeavor along normal lines of enterprise, and he has gained through
such medium a success that has given him prestige as a man of affairs.

Robert Osburn Price was born at White Hill, his grandfather's es-
tate, near Hillsboro, Loudoun county, Virginia, on the i_|th of Decem-
ber, i860, and is a son of Joseph and Mary Anna (Osburn) Price, both
of whom were born and reared in that county. The original progenit-
ors of the Price family in America came from England in the early
colonial days and settled in Baltimore, Maryland, where representa-
tives of the name became wealth}- merchants and influential citizens.
The original orthograph of the name was Pryce, and the present, spelling
was adopted by members of the American branch. A son of one of
the Price's of Baltimore removed, after his marriage, to Washington,
D. C, and one of his sons, John Price, was born in the capital city of
the nation, on the 2Oth of April, 1809, and about three years later, in 1812,
when the British troops were approaching Washington, in connection
with early campaign manoeuvers of the war of 1812, his mother sought
safety by proceeding from the national capital to a point near Harper's
Ferry, in Loudoun count)'. Virginia, where she was accompanied by
her two little sons, the elder of whom, Samuel, attained to advanced
age and continued his residence in Loudoun county until his death. A
number of his descendants still reside in Page and Loudoun counties of
that state. The parents of Samuel and John Price were separated and
the two sons were reared under the careful guidance of the mother,
who was a member of the well known Daily family, which has long
been one of prominence in the national capital.

John Price was reared to maturity on the old homestead near Har-
per's Ferry, and he eventually became a successful merchant in the
little city mentioned. After the historic raid of John Brown on that
section, just before the outbreak of the Civil war, his property was de-
stroyed by Union forces, and he suffered other severe reverses such as
loss of slaves during the great conflict between the north and south.
He retired to his estate in Loudoun county, and there he continued to
maintain his home until his death, in 1891. at the age of seventy-four
years. The old homestead, near the village of Xeersville. was the birth-
place of the children of John Price and the maiden name of his wife
was Ruth Elizabeth Russell. She was a representative of one of the
old and honored families of Loudoun county, where many of the name
still reside. Mrs. Price was born in Loudoun county on the 6th of June,
1817, and her mother, Elizabeth (Walfortin) Russell, was* a daughter
of Hon. John and Barbara Walfortin, the latter of whom was of staunch
German descent.

Joseph Price, son of John and Ruth Elizabeth ( Russell ) I 'rice, was
born on the old homestead near Xeersville. Loudoun county. Virginia,
on the 5th of September. 1836. and there he was reared to adult age.
For several years he was in business with his father at Harper's Ferry.

410 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and in 1858 he went west and located in the new town of Napoleon,
near Kansas City, Missouri, where he continued in the same line of en-
terprise until the outbreak of the civil war, when he abandoned his store
and business and returned to his native state. All other interests were
subordinated to his loyal devotion to the cause of the Confederacy.
Soon after his return to Virginia he there enlisted in White's bat-
talion of cavalry, the brigade of General Rosser. From the rank of
private he was advanced to the office of assistant quartermaster,
with the rank of captain, and he thus served until 1864, when he was
captured by a party of Union soldiers dressed in Confederate uniform?,
and was taken to the city of Washington, whence he was soon after-
ward transferred to Fort Warren, in Boston harbor. He and his fel-
low prisoners were compelled to march in fetters through the streets
of Boston, and suffered other uncalled-for indignities. He was held in
captivity until the close of the war, when he was paroled. He lived
up to the full tension of the great internecine conflict and was with his
command in all its engagements, — principally in the Shenandoah and
Loudoun valleys of Virginia, and in West Virginia and Maryland.

After the close of the war Joseph Price returned to the old home in
Loudoun county, Virginia, and for a few years thereafter he was en-
gaged in the mercantile business at Woodgrove, that county. He then
removed his stock of goods to Castleman's Ferry, Clarke county, on the
Shenandoah river, where he continued his mercantile business and also
operated a mill and farms for a period of about six years, at the expira-
tion of which he disposed of his interests in these lines and located on
the fine homestead farm on the Shenandoah, in Clarke county, which
is still his home. He is still active in the supervision of his business
affairs and is one of the prominent and influential citizens of his count}-,
where he holds commanding place in the confidence and regard of all
who know him. He is a staunch supporter of the cause of the Demo-
cratic party, and is a valued comrade of the United Confederate Veter-
ans' Association.

In March, 1866. was solemnized the marriage of Captain Joseph
Price to Miss Mary Anna Osburn, who was born in Loudoun county, Vir-
ginia, in October, 1844, and who is a daughter of Bushrod and Mary
Vandevanter (Clowes) Osburn, both of whom were likewise natives
of Loudoun county and both of whom were representatives of families
founded in the Old Dominion in the colonial epoch. Bushrod Osburn
was a son of John and Anna (Carr) Osburn, and the lineage of the
Osburn family is traced back to staunch English origin. The father
of Mrs. Anna (Carr) Osburn was a native of Scotland, where he was
born in the year 1712, and became a colonel in the English army. John
Osburn was a son of Abner Osburn, who came from England and be-
came the founder of the well known Loudoun family of that name.
Mary Vandevanter (Clowes) Osburn was born in Loudoun county and
was a daughter of Joseph Clowes.

Joseph and Mary Anna (Osburn) Price became the parents of
eleven sons, two of whom died in infancy. Of the nine who attained
to years of maturity seven are now living, and the firstborn of the chil-
dren was Robert O.. who figures as the immediate subject of this review.

AMERICAN BIUGRAI'HY AND GEXEALUGY 411

Robert Osburn Price was reared in Loudoun and Clarke counties,
Virginia, and after duly availing himself of the advantages of the local
academies he entered, in September, 1884. the historic old University of
Virginia, at Charlottesville, where he continued his higher academic
studies for the ensuing three years. He left this institution in 1888
and during the following year was engaged as a tutor on an extensive
plantation at Spring Hill, Tennessee. There he formed the acquaint-
ance of Tazewell A. Steele, and together they went to Kansas City, Mis-
souri, where they founded the University School, a boys college prep-
aratory school. After conducting the school successfully for six years
they sold the same, and in 1895 Air. Price went to Mexico. He located
on the isthmus of Tehuantepec, in the state of Yera Cruz, where he es-
tablished a number of extensive coffee plantations for a company in
which he was and still continues to be interested. He was a pioneer in
the development of the coffee industry in that section of Mexico, where
he remained for twelve years, as general manager of the interests of the
company — the Solo-Suchil Plantation Company — in which he is still a
large stockholder. "While a resident of Mexico Mr. Price acquired a
thorough knowledge of the Spanish language, which he speaks fluently.
He gained the confidence and good will of the Mexicans and had no
trouble with them in connection with his various operations. By reason
of the impaired health of his wife Mr. Price found it imperative to
leave Mexico, and in 1907 he came to California and established his
home at Upland, San Bernardino county, where he purchased a fine
orange and lemon grove, at the head of Euclid avenue. His orchards
give large annual yields and he finds much pleasure and profit in the
supervision of the same. Surrounded by the most gracious natural en-
vironments in one of the most progressive communities in southern
California, Mr. Price takes a lively interest in all that tends to promote
the best interests of this section of the state, and here he and his wife
are held in high esteem, the while they are prominent factors in the best
social activities of a refined and cultured community. During their
residence in Kansas City they held membership in the Central Presby-
terian church, and since establishing their home in San Bernardino
county they have been zealous and liberal members of Westminster
Presbyterian church, in the city of Ontario, which lies adjacent to Up-
land.

At Kansas City, Missouri, on the 22d of June, 1904, was solemnized
the marriage of Mr. Price to Miss Jessie Keith, who was born at
Leavenworth, Kansas, and who is a daughter of Robert and Nancy
Adeline (McGee) Keith, the former a native of Lexington, Missouri,
and the latter of Richmond, that state. Mrs. Keith was summoned to
the life eternal at the age of forty-five years. Her parents, who were
natives of Virginia, were numbered among the pioneers of Missouri,
where her mother passed the residue of her life. Her father was one
of the California argonauts of 1849 and he died within a short time
after his arrival in this state. Robert Keith is the founder and owner
of the extensive wholesale and retail business conducted, in Kansas
City, Missouri, under the title of the Robert Keith Furniture & Carpet
Company. He engaged in this line of enterprise at Leavenworth. Kan-

-Hi AMKK1CAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

sas, when a young man, and from a modest inception he has built up the
large and flourishing business in Kansas City, where he has maintained
his home for more than thirty years and where he is a prominent and
influential citizen. The Keith family is of sterling Scotch origin and
was established in America in Fauquier county, Virginia, prior to the
war of the Revolution, having long been one of the prominent families
of the Old Dominion commonwealth. Mr. and .Mrs. I 'rice have no
children.

LEWIS K. \YOKKS. Holding precedence as one of the essentially rep-
resentative members of the California bar, Mr. Works is engaged in
the active practice of his profession in the city of Los Angeles, where
his large and important clientage offers the best evidence of his tech-
nical ability as well as of the popular confidence and esteem reposed
in him. He is known as a specially strong trial lawyer and has been
concerned in much important litigation in the state and federal courts,
where he has won decisive victories in contest with some of the ablest
members of the bar of the state. He has served as a member of the
legislature of California, is an influential factor in connection with the
political activities of the state, and as a citizen he is liberal, loyal and
progressive.

Lewis Reed Works was born at Yevay. Switzerland county, Indiana,
on the 28th of December, 1869, and is a son of Judge John D. and Alice
( Ranta) Works, who are now living in Los Angeles. Judge John
•Downey Works was born in the state of Indiana ami he became one of
the representative members of the Indiana bar, as did he later of that
of California. Lewis R. Works gained his early educational discipline
in the public schools of his native state, and was about thirteen years
of age at the time of the family removal to California, in 1883. He
continued his studies in the public schools of San Diego and the city
of San Francisco, and in 1887 he completed a course in the San Diego
Commercial College. In preparation for the work of his chosen pro-
fession Mr. Works began reading law under the able preceptorship of
his father, and on the 4th of April, 1892, he was admitted to the bar
of the state, upon examination before the supreme court. He forth-
with engaged in practice at San Diego, where he continued his profes-
sional work until 1901, when he removed to Los Angeles, which city
has since represented his home and professional headquarters. In Jan-
uary, 1907, he was appointed assistant city attorney of Los Angeles, an
office of which he continued incumbent until January I, 1909. He bad
previously gained prestige as one of the most able and versatile trial
lawyers at the Los Angeles bar, and the recognition of his powers in
this direction was shown when he was urged by Leslie R. Hewitt, then
city attorney, to assume the office noted. He yielded to the request after
be had received assurance that he was to handle all of the city litiga-
tion during the time he was in office — a period of two years. This plan
was carried out and he had exclusive control of the litigations in which
the city was involved during his official term, and his chief appeared
in court only a few times during the entire interval. Many important
cases were successfully handled bv Mr. Works and during his incum-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 415

bency of the position of assistant city attorney only three or four deci-
sions adverse to the city were rendered in litigated causes. His splendid
record in this office materially heightened the professional reputation
of Mr. Works, and the result has been that his interposition has been
secured in connection with a large amount of important litigation in
the various courts since he retired from office.

While engaged in the practice of his profession in San Diego Mr.
Works appeared as counsel in the celebrated San Diego and National
City water-rate cases, some of which were eventually carried to the su-
preme court of the United States. Another cause celebre in which Mr.
Works appeared as counsel was that in connection with the disposition of
the estate of Charles Hill — litigation in this matter having been known as
the Driggs case. Mr. Works has a broad and accurate knowledge of
law and precedent, and is specially resourceful in mustering his forces
and bringing to bear potent argument before the court, so that he well
merits the fine reputation which he enjoys as a strong trial lawyer.

In politics Mr. Works is found arrayed as an uncompromising ad-
vocate of the principles and policies for which the Republican party
stands sponsor, and he has been an effective worker in behalf of its
cause. He represented San Diego county in the lower house of the
state legislature from January, 1899, to January, 1901, and he proved
a valuable consecutive worker and counsellor 'in the deliberations of
both the floor and the committee room. He was a charter member of
Company A, California Naval Militia, at San Diego, the first organi-
zation of its kind in the state, and he served as a member of the same
until the expiration of his term of three years, when he received his
honorable discharge. He is an appreciative member of the Benevolent
tv 1 'rotective Order of Elks, in which he is past exalted ruler of San
Diego Lodge, No. 168. Mr. Works has one son, Pierce, who was born
in the year 1896, and who is now a student in the Harvard School, a
military academy in Los Angeles. Mr. Works is a forceful writer and
a frequent contributor to law journals and magazines.

JACOB P. WEDEL. Most diverse sections of the civilized world have
contributed to the citizenship of the great state of California, where all
have found opportunity for productive effort along normal lines of en-
terprise. One of the sterling citizens of foreign birth who has here
achieved distinctive success in connection with the great industry of fruit
culture and who is one of the representative orange-growers in the Up-
land district of San Bernardino county is Jacob Peter Wedel, and his
loyalty, progressive spirit and upright character have given him secure
place in the esteem of the community in which he maintains his home.

Jacob Peter Wedel was born in one of the western provinces of Rus-
sia, on the 5th of October, 1861, and is a son of John and Marie (Prie-
heim') Wedel, both of whom were born in Germany, whence they re-
moved with their respective parents to Russia when they were children.
John Wedel became one of the industrious exponents of the agricultural
industry in western Russia, where he continued to reside until 1874,
when he decided to seek a more attractive 'field of endeavor in Amer-
ica, where he felt assured of better opportunities for the gaining of in-

Vrtl T O 1 O O

Vol. I— 21

416 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

dependence and for the proper rearing of his children. In the year
mentioned he immigrated with his wife and their nine children to the
United States and he forthwith made his way to Kansas and there be-
came one of the pioneer settlers of McPherson county. He secured
from the government a homestead claim of one hundred and sixty acres
and in the course of time he developed the same into a productive farm,
the while he gradually added to the area of his landed estate and became
one of the prosperous agriculturists of that section of the Sunflower
state. The town of Mound Ridge now occupies his entire original farm
and he contributed his quota to the development and upbuilding of his
home county, where he ever commanded the unqualified esteem of those
who knew him. His cherished and devoted wife died within a few years
after their immigration to America, as she was summoned to the life
eternal in the year 1878. He himself continued to reside in McPherson
county until his death, in 1900, at the age of sixty-seven years. Of the
ten children one died in Russia and two soon after the family home was
established in the United States. One son, Benjamin, died in 1886, at
the age of twelve years, and Marie, who became the wife of John C.
Goering, died in March, 1907. Three sons and two daughters are still
living, and of the entire ten the subject of this review was the third in
order of birth.

Jacob P. Wedel gained his rudimentary education in his native land
and was a lad of thirteen years at the time of the family immigration to
America. He was reared to maturity under the sturdy discipline of the
pioneer farm of his father, in McPherson county, Kansas, and in the
meanwhile he attended the common schools of the locality at intervals.
He continued to be associated in the work and management of the home
farm until he had attained to the age of twenty-three years, and then
rented and worked the homestead one year, after which he initiated his
independent career by engaging in the buying and shipping of grain, in
which connection he finally became the owner of a well equipped grain
elevator at Mount Rich, Kansas, which he operated successfully for a
period of fourteen years. In 1900 he again turned his attention to agri-
cultural pursuits, and for the ensuing five years he owned and operated
a well improved farm in Reno county, Kansas. He then disposed of the
property and came to California, early in November, of 1905. After
passing a few month in the city of Los Angeles Mr. Wedel purchased
an orange grove of five acres at Upland, San Bernardino county, and
later he sold this property to expand his field of operation by the pur-
chase of his present fine orange grove of thirty acres, located at the
corner of Euclid avenue and Twenty-first street, LTpland. His success
has been of the most unequivocal order and he is now the owner of an
estate of about one hundred acres in this district. All of this land is
devoted to the propagation of citrus fruits and Mr. Wedel has shown
indefatigable energy, with concomitant enterprise and good manage-
ment, in the furthering of his busines operations, through which he has
gained prestige as one of the substantial and representative fruit-grow-
ers of this favored section of the state. He ships his fruit in an indi-
vidual or independent way, without recourse to the facilities of the fruit
exchanges, and his long experience as a buyer and shipper of grain,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 419

while a resident of Kansas, has proved of inestimable value to him in
connection with his operations in California.

Mr. Wedel is ever ready to lend his co-operation in the furtherance
of measures and enterprises projected for the general good of the com-
munity, and as a citizen he is thus essentially loyal and progressive.
His political support is given to the Democratic party and he is fully
appreciative of the advantages and institutions of the great nation that
has been his home since his boyhood days and in which it has been given
him to achieve definite success and independence through his own well
directed efforts. He and his family are members of the Mennonite
church and he has been active and liberal in the support of the various
departments of its work.

In the year 1884 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Wedel to
Miss Marie Stucky, who, like himself, was born in Russia and who was
a child at the time when her parents established their home in Kansas,
where she was reared and educated and where she continued to reside
until her death, which occurred in 1888, — about four years after her
marriage. The only surviving child of this union is Benjamin, who is
now a resident of Upland, where he is engaged in orange culture. Two
other sons died in infancy. In the year 1890 Mr. Wedel contracted a
second marriage, as he then wedded his present wife and helpmeet,
whose maiden name was Lena Goering and who was born in Russia,
whence the family came to America when she was an infant. iM?. and
Mrs. Wedel have nine children, namely: Marie, Martha, Philip, Eliza-
beth. Freda, Anna, Bertha, Paul and Wilbert.

JOHN H. BARTLE. Among the leading figures in financial and busi-
ness circles in the state of California stands John H. Bartle, whose in-
terests are varied and important and who is a type of the steadfast,
noble and upright business man and loyal and public-spirited citizen.
He has been in the most significant sense the architect of his own for-
tunes, having been dependent upon his own resources from his boy-
hood days, and he has lifted himself to the plane of high accomplish-
ment through his own well directed energies. His career has been em-
phatically characterized by courage, confidence, progressiveness and im-
pregnable integrity of purpose. While he has coveted and gained much
success he has won advancement through normal and legitimate means
and there is no blemish or evidence of injustice on his record as one
of the world's noble army of workers. He has shown much construc-
tive ability in connection with banking enterprises of broad scope and
importance and maintains his home in the beautiful little city of Mon-
rovia, Los Angeles county, where he is president of both the First Na-
tional Bank and the Monrovia Savings Bank.

John H. Bartle claims the old Wolverine state as the place of his
nativity as he was born at Eagle Harbor, Keweenaw county, in the ex-
treme northern part of the northern peninsula of Michigan, on the
22nd of July, 1855. He is a son of John and Thirza (Reynolds) Bar-
tie, who were numbered among the sterling pioneers of that section
of Michigan. His father, who was born in England, in 1825, emigrated
to America, in 1844, and for a period of about sixty-five years he main-

420 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

tained his residence in Michigan. Now venerable in years, he resides in
the home of his son, John H., of this review, where he receives the
utmost filial care and solicitude. His cherished and devoted wife was
born and reared in Michigan and there she continued to reside until her
death, which occurred in 1905.

John H. Bartle received but limited educational advantages in his
youth as he was able to attend the public schools of Michigan only until
he had attained to the age of thirteen years, when he initiated his inde-
pendent career as clerk in a general merchandise store at Negaunee, Mich-
gan. He was thus engaged for four years, .at the expiration of which,
when seventeen years of age, he began trading with the Chippewa In-
dians in northern Michigan. In this connection he gained a thorough
knowledge of the dialect of this tribe, which he still speaks fluently. He
continued as Indian trader for five years and then established himself in
the dry-goods business at Port Arthur, Canada, on Lake Superior. Here
was virtually laid the foundation of his large success as a business man
as in the first year his transactions aggregated thirty-three thousand
dollars, through which status the enterprise was advanced to a business
aggregating fully one hundred thousand dollars eight years later when,
in 1887, he disposed of his interests in that section and came to Cali-
fornia. He forthwith established his home in Monrovia, where he has
continued to reside during the intervening period of nearly a quarter of a
century and where he gained precedence as one of the able financiers of
southern California. On the I3th of April, 1888, he assumed the position
of collection clerk in the First National Bank of Monrovia and before the
close of the year he was advanced to the position of assistant cashier, of
which he continued incumbent until 1890, when he was chosen cashier.
In February, 1894, he was elected president of the bank, in which office
he succeeded Isais W. Hellman, long known as one of the great finan-
ciers of the Pacific coast. The first National Bank of Monrovia was
organized in July, 1887, by Joseph F. Sartori, who was its first cashier
and who has been vice-president from the time of organization to the
present. The bank bases its operations upon a capital stock of one
hundred thousand dollars and its surplus and undivided profits now
aggregate fully one hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars. Its de-
posits are about five hundred and fifty thousand dollars and its loans
and discounts are in excess of four hundred thousand dollars. The
bank has a beautiful modern building erected for its use and completed
in 1908. From statements issued by the bank in a pamphlet are made the
following quotations : "A strong and progressive bank may wield a pow-
erful influence in the affairs of a community. This bank opened its
doors for business in July, 1887, and for twenty-three years under one
management it has given encouragement to civic progress and served as
a stalwart protector of the deposits of the people and the property of its
shareholders. It is gratifying to know that the aims and efforts of its
officers and directors are so generally understood and so thoroughly ap-
preciated by the people of Monrovia and vicinity."

The bank has a safe deposit department equipped with modern steel-
lined, burglar-proof vaults, provided with an electric alarm system, which
was installed by the American Bank Protection Company, William A.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 4iM

Chess, cashier of the bank, has been identified with the institution for
twenty-two years and he served as assistant cashier prior to his promotion
to his present office. The institution has the capitalistic support of business
men of the highest standing and its executive corps is such as to insure
careful and conservative management of its affairs. Mr. Bartle is also
president of the Monrovia Savings Bank, which was organized and in-
corporated in 1903, and of which William A. Chess is vice-president,
and Kirk E. Lawrence, cashier. This bank has a capital of thirty thou-
sand dollars, a surplus aggregating about five thousand dollars and de-
posits to the amount of three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Mr.
Bartle is also president of the First National Bank of El Monte, Los
Angeles county, which was organized in 1903, and his distinctive ability
as a financier has come into potent play in the upbuilding of each of these
substantial and popular institutions.

As a citizen Mr. Bartle is distinctively liberal and public-spirited and
he is ever ready to lend his influence and co-operation in the support of
measures and enterprises tending to advance the welfare of his home city
and state. He has served two terms as mayor of Monrovia and as chief
executive of the municipal government he did splendid work in advancing
public improvements and in giving an economical administration. He
is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and his pleasing social qualities,
as combined with his sterling character, have gained to him distinctive
popularity in the community that has represented his home so many years
and to which his loyalty is of the most insistent type.

In August, 1885, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Bartle to Miss
Amelia Bowerman, of Port Arthur, province of Ontario, Canada. She
was born and reared in that province and she is a woman of most gracious
personality, taking an active part in the best social life of Monrovia and
presiding most graciously in the beautiful family home. Mr. and Mrs.
Bartle have three children, Stanley H., Gerald F. and Kathleen.

It is necessary to say that the career of Mr. Bartle offers both les-
son and incentive for he has pressed steadily forward toward the goal of
accomplishment and has made of success not an accident but a logical
result, the while his course has been guided and governed by those high
principles of integrity and honor that ever beget objective confidence and
esteem.

CHARLES PRANKISH. When recognition is taken of those who have
been primarily influential in the development and upbuilding of the
beautiful section of San Bernardino county commonly designated as
the Ontario colony, to none should greater tribute be paid than to Mr.
Frankish. whose splendid energies have been given to the promotion of
the interests of this section and whose influence in this line has been un-
doubtedly greater and more prolific in results than that of any other one
man. Here he has maintained his home for a quarter of a century and
here he commands the unqualified confidence and esteem of the entire
community. He has been the dominating force in the Ontario Land &
Improvement Company, which originally held title to virtually all real
estate in the Ontario colony, which now includes the thriving little cities
of Ontario, Upland and San Antonio, and it has been the medium through

422 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

which this district has been developed from a sparsely settled and unpro-
ductive section into one of the most important of the many fine fruit-
growing districts of southern California, — adorned with beautiful mod-
ern homes and recognized as a center of industrial thrift and prosperity.
Practically the entire stock of the Ontario Land & Improvement Com-
pany is now held by the Prankish family, and he whose name initiates
this review is president of the corporation. He has also given his in-
fluence and financial and executive co-operation in the support of all
measures and enterprises that have otherwise conserved the develop-
ment and progress of the Ontario colony, and no citizen has shown
greater energy, liberality and public spirit.

Charles Prankish is a scion of the staunchest of English stock, and
the family name has been identified with the history of the "right little,
tight little isle" since the twelfth century, when its original representa-
tives went from their native land, France, into England with William
the Conqueror. Thus it is to be taken as assured that the lineage traces
back to sterling Norman origin. The family were residents of York-
shire, England, for six or more centuries, and near Bridlington Quay,
in that sturdy old English county, was the homestead of Richard Prank-
ish, grandfather of him whose name initiates this article. This was the
family home for many years, and those bearing the name have been in-
fluential in that section for generations.

In the quaint old town of Bridlington Quay, Yorkshire, Charles
Prankish was ushered into the world on the 1st of July, 1849, and he
is a son of John and Charlotte (Boradbent) Prankish, both of whom
were born and reared in that same section of Yorkshire. John Prank-
ish was reared and educated in his native land, and there he gave his
attention principally to mercantile interests until 1866, when he came
with his family to America and located in the city of Toronto, Canada,
where he was similarly engaged for a long term of years and where his
cherished and devoted wife was summoned to eternal rest at the age of
seventy-nine years. He himself lived to attain to the venerable age of
eighty-five years and the gracious evening of his life was passed in
the home of his son Charles, of this review, at Ontario, California. He
came to this state in 1885 and here his death occurred in 1894. Of the
nine children two sons died in childhood, and of the seven who reached
maturity one son and two daughters are now living, Charles being the
youngest child. The parents were devout believers in the doctrines of
truth revealed by Emmanuel Swedenborg and were folk of strong char-
acter and sterling worth, ever commanding the high regard of all with
whom they came in contact.

Charles Prankish gained his early educational discipline in the ex-
cellent schools of his native place and was a lad of about seventeen
years at the time of the family immigration to Toronto, Canada. There
he gained his initial experience in connection with the practical responsi-
bilities of life and there he eventually became a prominent and successful
factor in connection with real-estate operations, though his principal
field of enterprise was for a number of years in the publication of law
books and the handling of the various supplies used by members of the
legal profesion. In this enterprise he was associated with his brother-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 423

in-law, Robert Carswell, under the title of the Carswell Company, Lim-
ited, and the business also included the publication of the Canadian Law
Times, the leading legal periodical of the province of Ontario. With this
concern Mr. Prankish was actively identified from 1876 until 1884, and
in the meanwhile he had been one of the prime factors in the platting
and developing of Parkdale, lying adjacent to Toronto, on the shore of
Lake Ontario. He was known as the "father" of this beautiful suburb,
which is now an integral part of the city of Toronto, and his effective
laying out of streets and providing for the beautifying of Parkdale can
not fail of local appreciation for all time. He maintained his resi-
dence in this suburban village and served for several years as its reeve,
or mayor.

In 1885 Mr. Prankish disposed of the greater part of his interests in
Canada and came to California. He passed the first year at Riverside
and in 1886 established his permanent home at Ontario. San Bernardino
county, where he has since resided. Here he immediately identified him-
self with the development of the section along civic and industrial lines,
and none has wielded greater influence in making this one of the best
districts in the state in connection with the effective propagation of the
citrus fruits that have gained to southern California a worldwide reputa-
tion. The Ontario colony had been platted by the Chaffee brothers, but,
owing to complications that arose about the time that Mr. Prankish here
established his home, the Chaffee brothers transferred their interests in
the property to others and went to Meldura, Australia, where, it may
be noted incidentally, they promoted and carried through with great suc-
cess a gigantic irrigation proposition. Mr. Prankish was one of the or-
ganizers, in 1886, of the Ontario Land & Improvement Company, which
was formed for the purpose of purchasing and developing all of the un-
sold lands held by the original Ontario company, said lands comprising
nearly seven thousand acres, to which two thousand acres were added by
later purchase. The company was incorporated under the laws of the
state in 1887, with a capital stock of five hundred thousand dollars, and
it forthwith acquired the property mentioned. The greater part of its
large land holdings has now been effectively developed into orchards of
oranges and lemons, and the majority of the groves are now giving large
annual yields, with the result that this formerly semi-barren district is
now one of the most beautiful and opulent in the southern part of the
state. About four thousand cars of oranges and lemons were packed
and shipped from this district in the season of 1911, and this statement
bears its own significance.

Mr. Prankish became the general manager of the busines of the On-
tario Land & Improvement Company at the time of its organization, and
in the same he has also filled with great ability the offices of vice-presi-
dent and president, of which latter he is incumbent at the present time.
He has maintained his offices at Ontario from the beginning and still
occupies quarters in the same building in which he initiated his campaign
of development. In the second year of his administration as general
manager, on the nth of May, 1887, after due preliminary exploitation,
was held a big sale of lots in the town of Ontario, and the transactions
during the four hours of this sale, represented a total of fifty- four thou-

4i'4 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

sand dollars. The same night a burglar broke into his office and blew
open the safe, but secured nothing for his pains, as Mr. Prankish had
taken with him to his room about fourteen thousand dollars, representing
the first payments, in gold and silver, on the sale of lots. This was the
initiation of the magnificent and substantial development and progress
of the district, and the indefatigable efforts of Mr. Prankish, as coupled
with his effective policies and liberal ideas, have been the solid founda-
tion on which has rested much of this splendid upbuilding and normal
advancement. From the opening sale of lots until December 31, 1887,
lands held by the company had been sold to an aggregate valuation
of $606,395.84. The corporation still has valuable holdings on its origi-
nal tracts and also conducts a general real-estate business of large
proportions, the while its best asset has ever been its reputation for fair
and honorable dealings. As before stated the stock of the company is
no\v held almost entirely by representatives of the Prankish family.

Mr. Prankish has been alert in the promotion of every enterprise
tending to advance the general welfare of the community, and his lib-
erality has been prodigal in one sense but ever dictated by mature judg-
ment and due conservatism. He was one of the principal organizers of
the Ontario State Bank, in 1887, this being the first banking institution
in the colony and its operations having been originally based on a cap-
ital stock of fifty thousand dollars. He served as secretary of the bank
in the earlier period of its operation and later as vice-president and pres-
ident. Operations were continued successfully for a number of years
and then the institution was merged with the newly organized First
National Bank, in which Mr. Prankish became largely interested. In
1887 he built, in the interests of the Ontario Land & Improvement Com-
pany, the car line through the beautiful Euclid avenue to the mountains,
six and one-half miles distant to the north, where the present terminus
is Twenty-fourth street. The line was operated by mules until 1895,
and it is worthy of note in the connection that on the down trips these
solemn animals were given transportation on the cars themselves, which
ran down the grade on their own momentum. This provision attracted
attention throughout the country at the time and the sight was one of
amusing order. On the i6th of February, 1895, was incorporated the
Ontario Electric Company, which assumed control of the line mentioned
and equipped the same with electric trolley cars, besides furnishing light
and power for the towns along the line. Mr. Prankish was one of the
original stockholders and directors of this company, of which he served
for a time as vice-president and later as president. He was president of
the company until its property and franchise was sold to Henry E. Hunt-
ington, in 1901, and the line has since been extended to Claremont and
Pomona, in Los Angeles county. Mr. Prankish was for a number of
years a member of the directorate of the San Antonio Water Company,
and he has also been from the time of organization a director of the Peo-
ple's Mutual Building & Loan Association, of which he was one of the
organizers, in 1887, and of which he is now vice-president. This is the
first and only association of the sort in Ontario and it has been the
vehicle through which have been erected many of the fine homes in this
section. Essentially a business man and with insistent demands upon his

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 427

time and attention, Mr. Prankish has had no desire to enter the turmoil
of practical politics and is non-partisan in his attitude. He is a charter
member of the Masonic lodge in his home city of Ontario, and he and
his family hold membership in the Swedenborgian church.

In 1876 Mr. Prankish wedded Miss Ruth Mary Goodwin, who was
born and reared in the province of Ontario, Canada. She was sum-
moned to the life eternal in the year 1902, at the age of fifty-two years,
and of the five children all are living except one son that died in in-
fancy. Charles Goodwin is engaged in the electrical business at Onta-
rio; Ruth Evelyn is the wife of Emil F. Strohl, a resident of Bryn
Athyn, a suburb of the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ; Leonard John
is assistant editor of the Ontario Republican ; and Hugh Harris is sec-
retary of the Ontario Land & Improvement Company, in which he is an
able assitant to his father. On August 3, 1903, Mr. Prankish was mar-
ried to Eliza Buffet, widow of Dr. Louis Buffet, formerly of Cleveland,
Ohio, but later of the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

FREDERICK FISCHER. The great empire of Germany has contributed
a most valuable element to the composite social fabric of our American
republic, which has had much to gain and nothing to lose from this
source. Among those of German birth and ancestry who have attained
to large and worthy success iff connection with the great commercial
activities of the LTnited States and who exemplified the highest principles
of integrity and honor in all the relations of life was the late Frederick
Fischer, who was one of the great "captains of industry'' in Chicago, tiie
wonderful metropolis of the west, with whose civic and business activ-
ities he was long and prominently identified, and who was one of those
deeply appreciative of the manifold attractions of southern California,
where he elected to establish his home after his retirement from active
business and where he continued to reside until the close of his long and
useful life. In his beautiful home in the city of Los Angeles his death
occurred on the 6th of August, 1910, and such was his status in this
community and such his prestige as one of the distinguished representa-
tives of the world's noble army of productive workers, that there is all
of consonance in incorporating in this publication a brief review of his
career. He was in the most significant sense the architect of his own
fortunes and that he accomplished much is evident when is made the
mere statement that he was long numbered among the leading represen-
tatives of the wholesale grocery trade in the city of Chicago, with the
extension of whose magnificent industrial prestige he was prominently
concerned.

Frederick Fischer was born at Dochendorf, Mechlenburg Schwerin,
a province of the northern part of Germany, and the date of his nativity
was April 4, 1821. He was a scion of one of the sterling old families
of that section of the empire and there he was reared to maturity, in
the meanwhile being afforded the advantages of the excellent schools of
his native place. In 1845, when twenty-four years of age, Mr. Fischer
severed the ties which bound him to home and fatherland and set forth
to seek his fortunes in America, where he felt assured better opportuni-
ties were afforded for the gaining of success and independence through

428 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

individual effort. It may well be said that he never had cause to regret
his decision, though in the earlier stages of his career in America he
naturally encountered obstacles and other adverse circumstances. Such
was the innate strength and determination of the man, however, that he
faced all emergencies and contigencies and pressed courageously along
the line to the goal of a definite and worthy purpose. He was a son of
John Gottlieb Christian and Sophia Barbara Fischer, both of whom are
now deceased. The parents came to the United States from Germany,
in 1853, but while en route the mother became seriously ill and she died
as the vessel was entering port at Galveston, Texas, on the 29th of No-
vember, 1853. The father was born in Germany in 1789 and he was
summoned to the life eternal, in Chicago, Illinois, in 1870, at which time
he was eighty-one years of age. The only surviving member of the
family is George Fischer, a brother, who maintains his home at Holly-
wood, California.

Upon coming to the United States Mr. Fischer, of this sketch, landed
in Galveston, Texas, where he soon secured employment in a general
merchandise establishment. He continued his residence in Galveston
until 1847, when he went to Cincinnati, Ohio, from which city he removed
to Chicago in the following year. That city was then such as to offer
few auguries for its advancement to the position of one of the great
metropolitan centers of the world and in a sense he was one of its
pioneers, while it may be said that he had the prescience to there avail
himself of the opportunities presented, and thus to lay the foundation
for a remarkably successful life work. Soon after his arrival in Chicago
Mr. Fischer became a clerk in the wholesale grocery house of Satterley
& Cook, and, as has been consistently written, "after four years of honest
and conscientious toil with this firm, there was given a marked apprecia-
tion of his distinctive ability, in that he was admitted to partnership in
the business, which was thereafter conducted under the title of Satterley,
Cook & Company." After the retirement of Mr. Satterley the enter-
prise was continued under the firm name of G. C. Cook & Company for
many years. In 1857 Mr. Fischer severed his connection with this firm
and became one of the founders of the firm of Reid, Murdock & Fischer,
which concern continued to do business for more than thirty years,
within which time it assumed and maintained a position as one of the
greatest of the wholesale grocery houses of Chicago. It kept pace with
the magnificent progress of the great metropolis after it rose from the
ashes of the great fire of 1871, in which the firm lost its entire plant and
stock, though business was soon resumed 'with that characteristic cour-
age and determination exemplified so uniformly by the business men of
the stricken city. Through his identification with the splendid commer-
cial enterprise, which is still continued under the title of Reid, Murdock
& Company, Mr. Fischer represented one of the dominating forces in
the upbuilding of the great business enterprise that contributed its quota
to the commercial supremacy of Chicago. The life of no man has ever
been guided and governed by loftier principles of integrity and honor,
and better praise than this can never be offered. He played a large part
in the business life of the western metropolis and as a citizen he was dis-
tinctively progressive and public-spirited, ever appreciative of the great

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 429

country in which he had found it possible to gain so large a measure of
success. On the loth of November, 1888, after more than forty years
of earnest and noteworthy endeavor, Mr. Fischer retired from the firm
of which he had so long been a member, and he thereafter invested the
major portion of his substantial fortune in Chicago real estate, through
the appreciation in the value of which he added materially to the fortune
previously gained.

For a number of years Mr. Fischer maintained his home at Highland
Park, a beautiful north shore suburb in the city of Chicago, and in 1901
he came to Los Angeles, California, where he had been spending his
winters since 1890. He located at 945 Bonnie Brae street, where he
continued to reside for the ensuing eight years, at the expiration of which
he removed to his beautiful residence on Andrews boulevard. He was
not long permitted to enjoy the attractions of this delightful home, as his
death occurred within the same year, on the 6th of August, 1910, as has
already been stated in this context. He was eighty-nine years of age at
the time when he was thus summoned to the life eternal, and upon no
stage of his especially long and earnest career rests a shadow of wrong or
injustice, so that he left the priceless heritage of a good name. From an
appreciative estimate published at the time of the death of Mr. Fischer
are taken, with but minor paraphrase, the following statements: "Dur-
ing the entire business life of Mr. Fischer his name was a synonym for
honesty and uprightness, and his wonderful ability as a merchant crowned
his life with success. He attended the Highland Park Presbyterian
church but was a member of the Park Avenue Methodist Episcopal church
of Chicago, and upon his arrival in Los Angeles his church letter was
transferred to the Westlake Methodist Episcopal church of this city.
Mr. Fischer's religion was a very part of himself. He was a man of
retiring disposition, despising outward show but continually seeking in
a quiet and unostentatious way to help and aid the poor and needy, in
which connection it may well be said that he 'remembered those who
were forgotten.' The last twenty years of his life were devoted almost
exclusively to religious and charitable work, in which the beautiful sim-
plicity of his character and innate nobility of his mind exerted a won-
derful influence for good on all those with whom he came in contact.
While his benevolences were never exceedingly large to any particular
charity, yet his head, his hand, his heart were ever at the service of all
things worthy, and man}' a struggling church and cause and invididual
person received from him generous and timely aid." Essentially a busi-
ness man and a lover of home and family, the turbulent stream of politics
had no allurement for Mr. Fischer, though he was ever mindful of every
civic duty and a staunch supporter of the cause of the Republican party.

The entire domestic life of Mr. Fischer was one of significantly ideal
order, and there can be no wish to invade the sacred precincts of the
home, though it is but fitting that brief data be given concerning his first
and second marriages and his children. On the 3Oth of October, 1856,
Mr. Fischer was united in marriage to Miss Wilhelmina Marie Henrietta
Luetge, and her death occurred on the I7th of January, 1881, at High-
land Park, Illinois, where the family home was maintained after the
Chicago fire of 1871. Concerning the five children of this union the

480 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

following brief data are given: Emma, who was born January 19, 1858,
died on the nth of October, 1893; Johanna Matilda, who was born De-
cember 29, 1859, now resides at Pasadena, California; Mary Louisa, who
was born December n, 1861, is the widow of James Reid MacDonald,
of Seattle, Washington; George W., who was born July 31, 1864, and
Thomas Frederick, who was born June 24, 1867, are associated in the
wholesale grocery business in Seattle, under the firm name of Fischer
Brothers.

On the loth of October, 1888, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Fischer to Mrs* Mary F. (Wood) Powers, daughter of Judge Enoch
Wood and widow of Henry Clay Powers, of Chicago. Mrs. Fischer,
who still resides in Los Angeles, has one daughter by her first marriage,
Mrs. Pearl Powers.

The remains of Mr. Fischer were taken back to Chicago for inter-
ment and were laid to rest in Rose Hill cemetery, in the old Fischer fam-
ily burying ground, on the I4th of August, 1910.

MORTON LYALL. Every line of business in every section of the coun-
try has its leaders, — men who by reason of superior mind and attainments
have risen above their fellows in the struggle for supremacy, and who are
recognized as having succeeded in reaching success. The activities of
such men serve as a stimulus to others, creating a desire to emulate their
example, and thus the community at large gains a great deal of benefit.
As a leader in matters agricultural, Morton Lyall take a prominent posi-
tion among the farmers of the Imperial Valley. He is the owner of more
than 600 acres of land located two and one-half miles south of Brawley,
this being devoted to barley, of which he shipped thirteen car loads in
1911. He is the owner also of a combined reaping threshing and sacking
machine, which cost $6,357, and which with six men, and a team to haul
water and oil, reaps, threshes and sacks forty acres a day. During 1912
Mr. Lyall expects to ship forty car-loads.

Mr. Lyall was born in Riley county, Kansas, in 1866, and is a son of
George and Amanda Lyall, natives of Scotland and Illinois, respectively.
Five of their twelve children are living, and in addition to Morton, one
son, Thomas, resides in the Imperial Valley. Morton Lyall, who was the
fifth child in order of birth, was reared and educated in his native state,
and was there taught the secrets of successful farming by his father, who
was himself a well-to-do agriculturist. He fanned in Kansas until the
year 1888, at which time he came to California, and on February 28th
began operations at Fresno. There he continued successfully until 1898,
then moving to Yuma, where he continued until 1905, the year that saw
Mr. LyalFs advent in the Imperial Valley. He has not had a chance to
regret his choice, for his operations have proven uniformly successful,
and he has risen to a place of prominence in his community. Progressive
in all things, he has used only the latest and best improved machinery, and
his ranch is one of the most highly cultivated in the region of Brawley.
Public-spirited and patriotic, he has supported all movements for the bet-
terments of his section or state, and he is regarded as one of the solid,
reliable men of the valley.

In 1891 Mr. Lyall was united in marriage with Miss Rachel Hamilton,
who was born in 1870, daughter of Samuel and Cynthia Hamilton, of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 431

Illinois. Three children have been born to this union : Allen N., Leslie
F. and Ada, the last-named being deceased.

A. L. WEAVER. A native of the state of Georgia, wheTe he was born
October II, 1861, a descendant of a house long established in that good
old commonwealth and with an honorable record in her history both in
peace and war, A. L. Weaver had all the incentives to good citizenship
and useful industry that can come from birth and training. Consequently,
when he came to the Imperial Valley as a pioneer in 1902 he readily
found a place for himself among the early settlers who were striving in
spite of hardships and discouragements to establish a commercial and
agricultural center in the desert, and today he stands foremost among its
representative ranchmen.

Mr. Weaver is a son of Henry H. and Nancy (Partin) Weaver, the
former of whom was a prosperous contractor and builder in his state, and
whose children were six in number. A. L. received a good education in
the common schools, and as a youth learned the trade of mason and brick
layer, following this business in the employ of his father until 1880. At
that time he connected himself with a grocery establishment, and during
the next two years acted as a salesman, but in 1882 returned to his trade,
went to Idaho, and for twelve years followed contracting. At that time
Mr. Weaver decided to try his fortune as a prospector and miner, but his
early training had been along such different lines that the new venture
proved anything but a success, and finally, somewhat discouraged, he re-
turned to his old home. In 1902 he again came west, determined to make
a success in whatever field he found himself, and having heard of the
great opportunities to be found in the Imperial Valley journeyed hither
and filed on 220 acres of desert land, his wife filing on a tract of 320
acres. The first property is now in a state of cultivation, although it has
not been brought to its present desirable state without great labor and
infinite patience on the part of its owner. He first devoted himself to the
dairy business, but, feeling that he could better himself by following
other lines of farming, planted his land in alfalfa, in the growing of which
he has met with unqualified success. He has also realized a large profit
from hog raising, and at the present time is handling about 500 head an-
nually. Jn Mr. Weaver's case it has only been a matter of finding the
occupation for which he was best fitted and the proper field in which to
carry on his operations. He is possessed of more than the average busi-
ness acumen, and has his full share of energy and perseverance. The suc-
cess that has attended his efforts is only the merited reward for long years
of conscientious effort, and as a man who has been the architect of his
own fortunes he possesses the universal respect and esteem of his fellow
townsmen. His comfortable home is situated in No. 8 Brawley, and he
and his wife are numbered among this locality's first settlers.

In 1896 Mr. Weaver was united in marriage with Miss Annie Martin,
a native of North Carolina, and a lady who has loyally and cheerfully
assisted her husband in his undertakings. Much of the success that has
come to him may be accredited to her never-failing support and encourage-
ment. They have three children, namely : Pearl, Don and Opal. While
his business has demanded the greater part of his attention, Mr. Weaver

432 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

has found time to interest himself in fraternal work, and he is a popular
member of the Masons and the Woodmen of the World.

F. M. WISE. An excellent example of the progressive agricultural
class which is making the Imperial Valley one of the great industrial cen-
ters of the west is found in F. M. Wise, whose many years of experience
as a farmer, dairyman and cattle raiser entitle him to a position of im-
portance among the representative agriculturists of his section.
Thoroughly conversant with the latest and most approved methods and
completely in sympathy with anything that his judgment tells him will be
of benefit to the community, his position as a skilled agriculturist is as-
sured and his worth as a citizen recognized. Mr. Wise, like many of the
residents of the valley, is a native of the Lone Star state, having been born
February 3, 1855, a son of Nimrod and Jane (Galloway) Wise, natives,
respectively, of Virginia and Missouri. They had nine children, and F.
M. was the second in order of birth.

Air. Wise was still a child when his parents removed to the state of
Arkansas, and there he was reared and secured a public school education.
He was brought up to agricultiiral pursuits, his father being a farmer and
stock raiser, and from his parents he early learned lessons of industry and
integrity that has been characteristic of him all of his life. In 1883 he
decided that his field of endeavor in Arkansas was too restricted, and he
accordingly set out for Oregon, where he took up a tract of 160 acres and
established himself in the stock raising business, and continued success-
fully therein until 1895, in that year moving to Idaho. By this time he had
increased his capital considerably, and he was able to purchase 520 acres
of good land, on which he engaged in stock raising on an extensive scale.
The year 1908 saw his advent in the Imperial Valley, where he has since
devoted his energies to dairying. He has 1 10 acres of well improved land
situated not far from Calexico, and here he has made excellent improve-
ments, having large, substantial buildings, modern in every way, and im-
proved with the most up-to-date equipment connected with the business
of dairying. While his herd consists of mixed breeds, the animals are fine
milkers and average a fair quantity of butter fat, and he generally keeps
on an average of forty cows. Mr. Wise has not only demonstrated that he
is a skilled and experienced dairy man, but also that he is possessed of far
more than the average business ability. He has personally looked after
every detail of his steadily-growing enterprise, thus assuring his cus-
tomers of having the best of service and the finest article of goods. In
his dairy buildings he has recognized the necessity for cleanliness and hy-
gienic conditions, and as a consequence his barns and other structures are
models in their line. Mr. Wise has not cared to enter politics, but takes
an active interest in anything that promises to advance his community in
any way.

In 1878 Mr. Wise was united in marriage with Miss Sarah ]". Moore,
who is a native of the state of Missouri, and to this union there have been
born two children, namely : Charles H. and Annie V. The family is well
and favorably known and has a number of friends throughout the valley.

EARL A. BAGBY. Engaged in the practice of his profession in the city
of Visalia, the judicial center and metropolis of Tulare county, where he

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 435

is also incumbent of t^ : office of justice of the peace, Mr. Bagby merits
recognition in this publication as one of the leading attorneys of the
younger generation in the county that has been his home from child-
hood, and in which he has won professional success and marked per-
sonal popularity through his well directed efforts and his sterling char-
acteristics.

Mr. Bagby claims the Sunflower state as the place of his nativity. He
was born in Clay county, Kansas, on the 8th of January, 1887, and is a
son of R. J. and Elizabeth (Hughes) Bagby, the former of whom was
born in the state of North Carolina, and the latter in England. The
father started his business career in the humble capacity of hod-carrier,
and served a thorough apprenticeship at the trade of stone and brick
mason. Energy, thrift and ambition dominated his course and he has
attained to definite success as a business man, the while he has ever
commanded the unqualified confidence and esteem of those with whom
he has come in contact in the various relations of life. He removed with
his family to California in 1888 and shortly afterward established his
permanent residence in Yisalia, where he and his wife have since main-
tained their home and where he is now a prosperous cpntractor and
builder as well as a contractor for cement and concrete work for archi-
tectural and other purposes. He is one of the leading representatives of
this line of enterprise in Tulare county and that his ability and sterling
integrity have not lacked objective appreciation in the community is
shown by the fact that he has been called upon to serve as inspector and
superintendent in connection with many important municipal works. He
is a Democrat in his political proclivities and both he and his wife hold
membership in the Christian church.

Earl A. Bagby was a child of about one year at the time of the family
removal to California and in interests, enthusiastic loyalty and apprecia-
tion of its manifold attractions, he is essentially "to the manner born"
so far as his relations to the magnificent commonwealth of California
are concerned. He is indebted to the public schools of Visalia for his
early educational discipline, which included the curriculum of both the
grammar and high schools, in the latter of which he was graduated as
a member of the class of 1904, duly receiving his diploma and being but
seventeen years of age at the time. During the progress of his school
work his ambition had been one of definite purpose and active resource-
fulness, as from the age of eight years onward he employed himself
earnestly in connection with the fruit-growing industry in his home
county during his vacations and carefully horded his earnings for the
purpose of securing a college education. He finally formulated definite
plans and determined to prepare himself for the legal profession. In
this connection he had the good judgment to avail himself of splendid
advantages of the law department of the great and celebrated University
of Michigan, at Ann Arbor, but, owing to the fact that the requirements
of the institution demand that a student must be at least eighteen years
of age to be eligible for matriculation, he was unable to enter the uni-
versity, on this score, until one year after his graduation in the high
school. At the age of twenty-one, after encountering the vicissitudes
and financial difficulties which are the portion of those who endeavor
to complete a collegiate course on limited capitalistic reinforcement, he

436 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

realized the next stage in progress toward the goal of his ambition, as
he was graduated in the law department as a member of the class of
1908 and duly received his well earned degree of Bachelor of Laws. He
was simultaneously admitted to the bar of the state of Michigan and
forthwith returned to California, whither he brought, among other col-
legiate trophies a Jeffersonian diploma of merit, the same having been
conferred upon him by the Jeffersonian Society of his alma mater — an
organization that was incorporated in 1862. Comparatively few have
earned and received this mark of scholastic recognition, and the diploma,
awarded to him on the ist of May, 1908, is justly prized by Mr. Bagby,
who is fully appreciative of the works of praise and commendation there-
upon inscribed. As he himself has facetiously stated, Mr. Bagby "bumped
about from one law office to another while braving the starvation noviti-
ate of the young professional man," and during this period he received
valuable experience through his association with Stanton L. Carter, of
Fresno, who was one of California's most able and best known attorneys.

On the ist of July, 1909, he opened the professional fight single-
handed in his present offices, which are located in the First National
Bank building in Visalia, and he has already proved the wisdom of his
choice of vocation, as he is gradually building up a substantial and rep-
resentative practice, based upon his excellent natural and acquired ability
and his earnest devotion to the work of his profession, to which he sub-
ordinates all other interests. On the 8th of November, 1910, he was
elected justice of the peace of Visalia township, and he assumed the
duties of the office on the 2d of January, 1911. In the primary election
he secured not only the nomination on the Democratic ticket, that of the
party to which he accords allegiance, but he was also given the distinc-
tion of being made the nominee on the Republican ticket, so that his
election was practically compassed without opposition. From an article
appearing in a local newspaper at the time of his candidacy for the office
of which he is now incumbent are taken the following pertinent state-
ments : "Mr. Bagby was honored this year by being elected secretary of
the Democratic county central committee, a position that carries with it
more extensive duties than the uniniated might suppose, and he per-
formed those duties with great satisfaction. Mr. Bagby is a rustler and
a hustler every minute, and he personally attended to the preliminary ar-
rangements for the Democratic rallies and meetings of the campaign."
Mr. Bagby is undoubtedly one of the youngest magistrates in the state
and is certain to give most effective service as justice of the peace.

He has been an earnest and indefatigable worker as a member of the
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and Animals, of which
he is a legal advisor and the active representative in his home city. He
has been both secretary and legal advisor of the Tulare county organiza-
tion of this society since July, 1909. He is identified with a number of
representative fraternal orders, including Visalia Camp, No. 320, Wood-
men of the World, of which he is counsul commander at the time of this
writing, besides which he is chaplain of Visalia Aerie, No. 1081, Frater-
nal Order of Eagles.

JOSIAH B. MOORES. In the thriving little city of Ontario, San Ber-
nardino county, Mr. Moores is an effective representative of an import-
ant line of enterprise, and through his well directed efforts in the same

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 437

he has contributed materially to the industrial and civic progress of
this favored section of the state. He is engaged in the real-estate busi-
ness, in which his operations have been of wide scope, and he is known
as one of the most progressive and of those alert and loyal citizens who
are furthering the continued advancement of San Bernardino county,
where he has so ordered his course as to gain and retain secure place
in popular confidence and esteem.

Josiah Box Moores is a scion of staunch old southern stock and a
member of a family, of Irish lineage, that was founded in America in
the colonial epoch of our national history, representatives of the name
having been numbered among the pioneers of the state of Alabama,
where they became the owners of large plantations and many slaves and
where members of the family became prominent in connection with
public affairs. In other states of the fair southland have been found
many distinguished representatives of the Moores family, and the name
has ever stood exponent of sterling character and the highest loyalty.
The paternal grandfather of him whose name initiates this review was
born in either North or South Carolina, and removed to Tennessee,
where he became an extensive planter. When well advanced in years
he removed to Arkansas, where he passed the residue of his life. Josiah
B. Moores was born in Columbia county, Arkansas, on the 2Oth of No-
vember, 1851, and is a son of Rev. William and Maria (Greening)
Moores, who were numbered among the sterling pioneers of that state.
The father was born in Tennessee, on the iSth of January, 1808, and
the mother was a native of Alabama. William Moores was reared on
the old homestead plantation in Tennessee and received a liberal edu-
cation. He was a man of most alert mentality, applied himself to read-
ing and study and gained a broad fund of information, with the result
that he was known as a man of fine intellectuality, even as he was one
of the highest ideals. Even as a boy he manifested his desire to enter
the Christian ministry and as a young man he was ordained a clergy-
man of the Methodist Episcopal church, in Tennessee, where he held
pastoral charges, as did he later in Alabama, Arkansas and California.
He continued in the active work of the ministry for many years and
labored with all of zeal and consecrated devotion for the aiding and
uplifting of. his fellow men. He was for many years presiding elder
and was prominent in connection with the gene'ral work of his denomi-
nation, the while his ability, tolerance of spirit and gracious personality
gained to him the affectionate regard of those who came within the
sphere of his benign influence. At the time of the division of the Meth-
odist church in the north and south, owing to a difference in opinion as
to the institution of human slavery, he naturally identified himself with
the branch designated as the Methodist Episcopal church, South. In
1870 he came to California and established his home in Los Angeles
county, where he passed the residue of his long, noble and signally use-
ful life. After devoting more than half a century to the active work of
the ministry he retired and was placed on the roll of superannuated
clergymen of the denomination in which he had served so long and
faithfully. He was not only an eloquent and convincing speaker, his
every utterance bearing the mark of sincerity and earnest conviction,
but he also manifested much executive and constructive ability, — es-

Vol. 1—22

43B AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

pecially in the founding of many pioneer churches in the various states
in which he labored, particularly Arkansas, where he was a prominent
and honored figure in his church for many years. He was summoned
to the life eternal at the venerable age of eighty-three years, secure in
the reverent regard of all who knew him, and known as one of the pio-
neer clergymen of his denomination in California. His cherished and
devoted wife, a woman of gentle and noble character, preceded him to
eternal rest by about one year and was sixty-four years of age at the
time of her death. Of the twelve children the subject of this review
was the fifth in order of birth and all of the number survive the hon-
ored parents except one daughter, who died in infancy. Of the sons
it may be noted that Owen and Charles were valiant soldiers of the Con-
federacy in the Civil war, in which they served under General Price.
They were mere lads at the time of their enlistment, in the later part
of the war, and they continued in active service until its close.

Josiah B. Moores was reared to adult age in his native state, and,
owing largely to the disrupted conditions in Arkansas in his boyhood
days, as a result of its being a stage of activity between the contending
forces in the Civil war, his early educational advantages were very
limited. He has in later years effectually made good this handicap, and •
after coming to California, at the age of seventeen years, he was en-
abled to attend a private school for some time. He was favored, more-
over, in having been reared in a home of distinctive culture and refine-
ment. Soon after his arrival in California he became identified with
ranching operations near the site of the present village of Pico. Los
Angeles county, and he later, in 1873, planted one of the first orange
groves in the vicinity of Downey, also in that county. He paid two and
one-half dollars apiece for his trees and planted a tract of twenty acres.
The ground and trees proved worthless for propagation purposes and
thus Mr. Moores' first independent business project matured in success
of distinctly negative order. Under these conditions he turned his at-
tention to sheep growing, in which he initiated operations by the pur-
chase of a small flock from Father Bott, one of the good fathers of
the San Gabriel mission. He rented a tract of land near the present
town of Whittier, Los Angeles county, and in 1878 he removed his sheep
to San Diego county, where he rented a large area of range land and
extended materially the scope of his operations. In the autumn of iSSi
there was special demand for sheep, which commanded three dollars a
head, but Mr. Moores refused to dispose of his stock, with the result
that disaster again became his portion. In the terrible drought of the
following season he met with severe loss, as out of his band of five
thousand head of sheep more than three thousand died, while for those
remaining he received only one dollar per head. After he had liquidated
his various obligations he found his cash capital summed up in twenty
dollars, and thus he had the privilage of knowing that he had gained
experience but also that he had to make an entirely new start. It is
characteristic of Mr. Moores that his courage, determination and ambi-
tion never flag, and in the autumn of 1883 -he removed to the Ontario
colony, in San Bernardino county, — a section that was at that time a
veritable desert, though the district had been platted and the work of
development instituted. He consulted ways and means and finallv

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 439

opened a small livery stable, and in this connection he transported trees
for planting along the course of the present Euclid avenue, from Ontario
to the foothills on the north, — an avenue that is now conceded to be
one of the finest in the state. In those early days of development of
this now beautiful and prosperous fruit-growing district Mr. Moores did
a large amount of teaming work, in connection with which he hauled
lumber for the erection of many of the early buildings here erected.
He turned his hand to any line of enterprise that offered returns, and
in this connection it may be noted that he contracted for the construction
of irrigation ditches and that he aided in the completion of the first
stone-head ditch in the colony. He has continued to maintain his home
in Ontario during the long intervening years and has been a valued
factor in the development and upbuilding of this beautiful and thriving
community, which is now one of the most important of those devoted
to the culture of citrus fruits in the entire state. Since 1887 Mr.
M cores has been successfully engaged in the real-estate business, in
which he has handled many valuable properties and done much to ex-
ploit the attractions and further the progress of this section. His suc-
cess has been on a parity with his indefatigable and well directed efforts,
and it is gratifying to note that he has gained a competency.

No citizen of the Ontario colony has shown more loyalty and public
spirit than has Mr. Moores, and his influence and tangible co-operation
have been freely given in support of measures and enterprises tending
to conserve the best interests of the community. In politics he gave
unswerving allegiance to the Democratic party until recent years, and is
now a staunch Prohibitionist. During the first administration of Pres-
ident Cleveland he served as postmaster of Ontario, an office which he
retained for four years, his postoffice had but recently been estab-
lished and the aquipment which he purchased and installed continued to
be utilized until a few years ago. During his incumbency the office did
not pay out the amount of money he used in conducting the same, but
he spared neither pains nor expense, as he considered the office an index
of the increasing prosperity of the colony and wished to maintain the
same at the highest possible standard. Mr. Moores was the first to
serve as deputy sheriff in the Ontario colony, and he gave a most effec-
tive administration.

In the later years Mr. Moores has given his attention specially to
the buying and selling of orange groves and alfalfa ranches, and he
has the distinction of having sold during his career in the business more
real-estate than has any other dealer in the original Ontario colony. A
man of independent views, progressive ideas and sterling integrity, he
commands secure place in the confidence and esteem of the community
whose upbuilding he has signally aided in advancing, and he is one of
the popular and representative citizens of Ontario. He and his wife
are members of the Pentecostal religious denomination, in which they
are charter members of the Church of the Nazarene. in their home city.
They are zealous and liberal in the support of the various departments
of the church work and in the social activities of the community they
are popular factors.

In the year 1877 Mr. Moores wedded Miss Edith Smith, who was
born in Amador county, this state, and their onlv son. William, has for

440 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

a number of years yielded pleasingly to the wanderlust, which has com-
passed for him broad travels through the western states and in Mexico,
where he indulges his love for mountain camps and exploitations.

On the 7th of August, 1901, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Moores to Miss Nettie Simmons, who was born and reared at Salem,
Oregon. They have no children.

CHESTER B. WALSWORTH. Dr. Walsworth and his wife are num-
bered among the most effective exponents of the profession of osteopathy
in California and are engaged in active practice in the city of Los Angeles,
where they have most successfully demonstrated the efficiency of this
benignant system in connection with the treatment of disorders properly
within its field. He is also largely interested in mining, oil and other in-
dustrial enterprises, is aggressive and enterprising as a business man, has
gained success through his own well directed efforts, and has so ordered
his life in its various relations as to merit and receive the high regard of
his fellow men. Further than this, he is also a scion of a family that
was founded in America in the early colonial epoch and that is a dis-
tinguished English origin.

It is practically assured that all of those in the United States who
bear the name of Walsworth are direct descendants of William Wals-
worth, who emigrated from the vicinity of London, England, and who
established his home on Fisher's Island, in Long Island Sound, and a
part of Suffolk county, New York, at the present time. At the time
when he came to the new world the trails of the Pequot Indians were still
fresh on the island mentioned, and their deserted forts and wigwams were
still standing among the hills of Groton, just across on the mainland, in
Connecticut. This William Walsworth, of Fisher's Island, was undoubt-
edly the progenitor of all those who have borne the name in America.
He claimed, and his assertion is amply authenticated, to have been de-
scended from Sir William Walsworth, who was lord mayor of London
at the time of the rebellion of "Hilliard, the tyler," in the region of
Richard II. Sir William Walsworth died in 1383 and was buried in the
church of St. Michael, on Crooked Lane, London. The site of his man-
sion house, in Thames street, that parish, is now occupied by Fishmong-
ers' hall. His name has been perpetuated in that of the suburban vil-
lage of Walsworth, which gave him birth and in which he later had his
country seat. This suburb is near the historic London Bridge, in one of
the most densely populated sections of the world's greatest metropolis.
The ancestral seat of the family in America should be given as the state
of New York. In 1690, shortly after his arrival in America, William
Walsworth married Mary Seaton, a young English woman, who was
born in 1669 and who came to this country on the same vessel and at
the same time that he did. The Walsworth home was maintained on
Fisher's Island for a period of about nine years, during which they were
comparatively immune from danger of attack by the Indians.

The family divides practically into three branches — through descent
from the three sons of William and Mary (Seaton) Walsworth. The
eldest son, who bore the full patronymic and was known as William II,
left a numerous line ; and the other two branches are those headed by
the younger sons, John, of Groton, Connecticut, and Thomas, whose

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 443

home was established in Fisher's Island. While William Walsworth,
the founder of the family, was residing on Fisher's Island, a series of
invasions were made by the French of Canada and the colonists of New
England. These raids began about 1687, and the Indians frequently
took part in the same, as shown by history's record of many Indian mas-
sacres in this connection. It may incidentally be recalled that in 1689
occurred the massacre of La Chien, near Montreal, Canada. This mas-
sacre was perpetrated by savage Iroquois who had been instigated to
the action by the Dutch settlers along the Hudson, who supplied the
Indians with firearms. On this occasion were killed fully two hundred
of the Canadian settlers — men, women and children. William Wals-
worth and his wife, like nearly all of the members of the New London
colony, on the mainland nearest to Fisher's Island, were of deeply re-
ligious nature and both were members of the Congregational church.
Both were baptized in the old meeting house at New London, Connecti-
cut, on the 24th of January, 1691. At the time of the death of William
Walsworth, in 1703, his estate was extensive, and the same was left in
charge of his wife, upon whom also devolved the responsibility of caring
for their seven children. The records show that the sons all accumulated
good estates and that the daughters married men of means and good
standing.

Chester Byron Walsworth, whose name initiates this review, was
born at Richmond, Ray county, Missouri, on the 3d of August, 1869, and
is a son of Henry T. and Jennie B. (Clark) Walsworth, the former of
whom was born in New York city, on the I7th of March, 1832, and the
latter was a native of Richmond, Missouri. The father was identified
with mining operations in Missouri, where he maintained his home until
1872, when he came with his family to California and established his
residence in Sonoma county. There he remained six years, at the ex-
piration of which he removed to Washington and located at Renton,
King county, not far distant from the city of Seattle. He there became
prominently identified with the dairy business and also became the owner
of a large landed estate, upon which he made the best of improvements.
He was influential in public and industrial affairs and was one of the
sterling pioneers of the great state of Washington, where he continued
to reside until his death, which occurred on December 26, 1894, in Seat-
tle, Washington.

Chester B. Walsworth was three years of age at the time of the fam-
ily removal to California, and was a lad df nine when removal was made
to the state of Washington, where he was reared to maturity and where
he was afforded the advantages of the public schools of Seattle, which
was then a small city. He supplemented this by a partial course in the
University of Washington and after leaving this institution he was en-
gaged in the grocery business for three years, at Seattle. For the ensu-
ing five years he gave his attention principally to the real estate and ab-
stract business, but his alert mentality and indefatigable energy have ever
prompted him to take advantage of opportunities and to make definite
progress. In 1886 he left Seattle and became interested in mining oper-
ations in Colorado, where he remained several years. He developed
himself into a practical mining engineer and assayer, and finally became
chemist for the McArthur & Forrest cyanide plant at Cripple Creek, that

444 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

state, this being the first plant established for the handling of telluride
ores.

In 1902 Dr. Walsworth began the study of osteopathy in Des Moines,
Iowa, and in 1905 he was graduated in the S. S. Still College of Osteo-
pathy, in that city. His wife was graduated as a member of the same
class, and August ijth of that year they came to Los Angeles, California,
where they have since continued in the active and successful practice of
their profession, of which they are recognized as leading representatives
in this state. Both are persons of most attractive social qualities and
they are popular in connection with the best activities along this line in
their home city. In his profession Dr. Walsworth has made an admir-
able record, and he is known as a man of sterling character — true, honest
and earnest in all the relations of life, quiet and unassuming in demeanor,
and enterprising and progressive both as a citizen and as a business man.
He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, the Knights of Pythias, the
Modern National Reserve, the Brotherhood of American Yeomen, the
Modern Woodmen of America, the Knights of the Round Table, the
American Nobles, and the Royal Neighbors. He is a stalwart in the
camp of the Republican party and while a resident of Seattle was an
active worker in its ranks. He and his wife are members of the First
Church of United Brethren in Los Angeles and give active support to
the various departments of its work. He is vice-president of the Se-
quoia Club, one of the representative political organizations of Los
Angeles.

By natural preditection and well developed powers Dr. Walsworth
has proved himself a valuable factor in connection with the promoting
and upbuilding of business enterprises of broad scope. He is an in-
terested principal in the Midway and Ventura Oil Companies, and is
president of the Consolidated Midway Chief Oil Company, as well as
several other companies. He is a director in various other corporations
engaged in the development of the oil resources of California ; is a
stockholder in large mining companies at Pioneer, Nevada, and in San
Bernardino county, California; and is principal owner of one of the larg-
est iron deposits on the Pacific coast, the same being located near Acton,
Los Angeles county. He has the majority control of nearly eighteen
hundred acres of oil land in California; is the owner of a fine orange
grove of twenty acres, near Monrovia, this state; and in Los Angeles
he owns eleven residence properties of the better order.

Dr. Walsworth has been twice married, and the two daughters of
the first union are: Juanita M., who is the wife of Peter Nichols, of
Tremonton, Utah ; and Mae L., who is the wife of John J. Rohde, of the
same place. On the 3Oth of July, 1901, at Ouray, Colorado, was sol-
emnized the marriage of Dr. Walsworth to Miss Zula Mae Bailey, of
Indianola. Iowa, and the two children of this union are Henry Theodore,
born May 3, 1902; and Clark Bailey, born June 17, 1906.

ISAAC W. WHITAKER. It is no slight distinction that rests upon this
honored citizen of the beautiful and thriving little city of Ontario, San
Bernardino county, by reason of his being a pioneer of pioneers in this
district, to which was given the name of the Ontario Colony at the time
of the inception of its development. He was the first to make perma-
nent settlement in the colony and erected the first house in the same.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 445

He has been prominently identified with the development and upbuilding
of this section, which was but little more than an untrammeled desert
when he here took up his abode and which is now one of the finest of
the fruit-growing districts of southern California. A wonderful meta-
morphosis has been wrought during the years of his residence here,
and it is a matter of pride and satisfaction to him that he has been able
to do his part in the accomplishing of such a notable change in conditions
and environment. He has been successful as one of the leading ex-
ponents of the industrial activities of the colony and is now living vir-
tually retired in his beautiful home in the city of Ontario.

In New England, that cradle of so much of our national history,
the Whitaker family was founded in the early colonial era, and the
name has been worthily linked with the annals of the country during the
long intervening period. Isaac Whitaker, great-grandfather of him
whose name initiates this review, came from England to America prior
to the war of the Revolution and was accompanied from his native land
by his brothers, John and David. Isaac established a home in Maine,
John in New Hampshire, and David in New York, and the three
branches have to-day many representatives in divers sections of the
Union. Isaac Whitaker was busily engaged in following the plow on his
pioneer farm in the old Pine Tree state at the time when he received
news of the beginning of the Revolution, and he forthwith unyoked his
team of oxen, left his plow in the field and made his^ way to a place
where he could enlist for service in defense of the cause of independ-
ence. He was enrolled as a soldier of the Continental line and continued
in active service for a considerable period. Upon his return home he
found his plow in the field where he had left it, and his first work was
to bring forth his oxen and resume the work where he had left it upon
responding to the call of higher duty. He continued to maintain his
home in Maine until his death, — one of the sturdy, upright and worthy
pioneer farmers of that commonwealth. In the early days in New Eng-
land the Biblical names were much in evidence, and thus this worthy
pioneer gave to one of his sons the name which he himself bore. — Isaac.
This son figures as the grandfather of Isaac W. Whitaker of Califor-
nia, who bears the full patronymic. Isaac Whitaker (II) was the eldest
in a family of six children, all of whom were sons except one. He like-
wise became one of the sturdy representatives of the great basic indus-
try of agriculture in Maine and continued to reside on his old homestead,
in Kennebec county, until his death. He was thrice married and became
the father of five sons and one daughter, all born of one wife. Of these
the eldest was James, father of the subject of this review. James Whit-
aker was reared on the old homestead and became eventually one of the
prosperous farmers of his native county. In later years he placed the
practical affairs of his farm in the hands of his children and became an
extensive trader, with proverbial New England thrift and shrewdness.
He was a man of independence and well fortified opinions and was in-
fluential in public affairs of a local nature. He was adamantine in his
stand as a supporter of the cause of the Democratic party and was
called upon to serve in various offices of local trust. He served eight
years as justice of the peace and for twelve years was a member of the

446 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

board of selectmen of his town. He represented Kennebec county in the
state legislature for one term and was a man whose inviolable integrity,
mature judgment and broad views made him a power in the community.
He read widely and appreciatively and his mind was a veritable store-
house of valuable information. He was a birthright member of the noble
Society of Friends and well exemplified the kindly and God-fearing
faith of his ancestors. His devoted wife likewise was an earnest and
zealous member of the same fine religious body, and her life was gentle
and gracious in all its relations, typifying strong and noble woman-
hood. He was born on the 27th of April, 1807, and was summoned to
his reward on the i6th of March, 1886, in the fullness of years and hon-
ors. His wife, whose maiden name was Dorcas Mitchell, was, like him-
self, a native of Kennebec county, Maine, where she was born on the
3Oth of November, 1811, and she was summoned to the life eternal on
the 6th of March, 1886, only ten days prior to the demise of her hus-
band, so that in death they were not long divided. Their companionship
had been of the most idyllic order during the long years of their wedded
life and those who knew them best believe that the loss of his cherished
wife was the cause of the death of Mr. Whitaker, whose every interest in
life seemed to wane after she had been laid at rest. Mrs. Whitaker was
a daughter of Joseph .Mitchell, another sterling representative of one of
the old colonial families of the Pine Tree state. James and Dorcas
Whitaker became the parents of six sons and three daughters, of whom
the subject of this sketch was the fourth in order of birth. Nearly all
of the children eventually returned to the old home county and estab-
lished residence in the locality in which they were reared, one of the sons
having remained for more than forty years on the old homestead farm.
Of the children four sons and two daughters are now living.

Isaac Whitaker Whitaker, in whose cognomen the family name is re-
peated, was born on the old homestead in the town of Albia, Kennebec
county, Maine, on the iQth of February, 1841, and he passed his boy-
hood days at home, though he soon secured employment on neighboring
farms, as the home circle was large and the family revenues small. He
was thus employed at farm work during the summer seasons and in the
winters he attended the subscriptions schools, the while he worked for
his board. He thus gained the rudiments of an English education and
his alert and receptive mind enabled him to broaden most effectively his
intellectual ken with the passing of the year. At the age of nineteen
years he secured employment in connection with the operation of a saw-
mill on the Penobscot river, and he was thus engaged during one season,
after which he followed various lines of occupation, in the meanwhile
continuing to attend school during the winter terms.

When the Civil war was precipitated upon a divided nation the
youthful patriotism of Mr. Whitaker was roused to responsive protest,
and on the loth of August. 1862, soon after reaching his legal majority.
he tendered his services in defense of the Union. He enlisted as a pri-
vate in Company G, Twenty-fourth Maine Volunteer Infantry, for a
term of nine months, and E. Lewis Sturtevant was captain of the com-
pany. He continued in service until the 25th of August, 1863, when he
received his honorable discharge, at Augusta. Maine. His command had

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 447

received tactical drill and instruction first in Maine and later on Long
Island, New York, and the regiment then embarked on a sailing vessel
which forthwith set forth for New Orleans, — a trip ordinarily com-
passed in fourteen days. The enlisted men were all quartered on the
lower deck and off Cape Hatteras a teriffic storm caused the vessel to
drift far out at sea. The hatches were closed down over the lower
deck and for three days and three nights the enlisted men thus immured
went without food or sufficient water. Many of the men became ill
and before the boat arrived at New Orleans eight of the number had
been buried at sea. The storm so delayed the vessel that from the time
of leaving New York thirty-five days elapsed before the jaded passeng-
ers disembarked in New Orleans. The vessel narrowly escaped com-
plete wreck on several occasions, and the voyage was one that none of
who participated in the same could ever forget. Upon arrival in New
Orleans Mr. Whitaker was in serious physical condition and was taken
with others to a local hospital, where he was given place in a ward, from
which he was soon afterward removed to the death ward. He was un-
conscious the greater part of the time for two weeks, but his strong
constitution brought him through the ordeal. Many of his comrades
succumbed and, in fact, a report had been sent to his home that he him-
self had passed away. He was released from the hospital at the expi-
ration of a month and a few days later, while he was slowly convales-
cing, occurred a heavy battle on the Red river. Many of the wounded
were brought to the hospital in New Orleans. The general commanding
the Union forces gave orders that every soldier who was able to stand
on his feet should appear for duty, to aid in supplying reinforcements.
Weak and emaciated, Mr. Whitaker was one of the number notified to
tender such service, but though the hospital surgeon urged that his con-
dition was such that it was impossible for him to go forth on duty, the
commanding general tore up the message thus sent by the physician and
ordered Mr. Whitaker to report for duty. The result was that a few
days later he was again taken to the hospital, where he suffered a serious
relapse and was confined for several weeks. Upon partially recuperat-
ing his strength he joined his regiment, with which he took part in the
siege of Port Hudson, after having been confined a short time in a hos-
pital at Baton Rouge, while en route. He was identified with the siege
of Port Hudson for forty days and after the capitulation of the same
he accompanied his command to Vicksburg, which had surrendered a
short time before. This terminated his active service as a soldier, and
so rapidly did he gain strength and vigor after rejoining his regiment
that he was on active duty on several occasions for forty-eight consecu-
tive hours.

After the close of his military career Mr. Whitaker remained at the
parental home until November, 1863, when he set forth for California,
to join two of his brothers. He made the journey by way of the isthmus
of Panama and from that point came by steamer to San Francisco, where
one of his brothers was engaged in work at the carpenters' trade. Later
he visited his other brother, who was living on a ranch near Grass Val-
ley, Nevada county. In the following year he took up his residence in
San Francisco, which was at that time a point of great activity. Here he

448 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

conducted a lodging house for a time and thereafter was associated with
his brother at carpenter work, in which line he soon initiated independent
contracting, from which he received large returns, as money was plenti-
ful and high prices were paid, — invariably in gold. Prior to coming to
the coast Mr. Whitaker had purchased a farm in his native county, and
by exchanging his gold for greenbacks, at the ratio of one dollar in gold
for two and one-half in the paper currency, he was soon enabled to clear
the indebtedness on his Maine farm. This thrift in availing himself of
opportunities offered in California in those early days of prosperity was
the foundation of the very appreciable competency which he now enjoys.
He continued his residence in San Francisco for fifteen years, and for
a considerable period he successfully controlled one of the newspaper
routes of the San Francisco Chronicle, — a venture that proved excep-
tionally profitable. In November, 1882, in search of relief from asthma,
from which he suffered severely, Mr. Whitaker came to southern Cali-
fornia, and in the following month he purchased ten acres of land in
what is now Fifth street in the city of Ontario. He was among the first
to secure property in the new colony and he took up his abode on his
land on the I2th of January, 1883, where, three days later, he initiated
the erection of the first house in the colony, having occupied a tent until
the modest dwelling was completed. The surroundings of his new domi-
cile at that time were not specially attractive, as the plain was covered
with no other vegetation than cacti and sage brush. A desert without
habitations soon began to transform itself into a fruiful and pleasant dis-
trict, with the incoming of settlers and the institution of proper irriga-
tion facilities. Mr. Whitaker has been a witness of the transmogrifica-
tion of the Ontario Colony into one of the most gracious and beautiful
districts in southern California, the desert having given place to fine
orange and lemon orchards, stately homes, with beautiful landscape
gardening effects and a wealth of the finest semi-tropical foliage, and
the whole giving evidence of thrift and prosperity on every hand.
Thousands of car loads of citrus fruits are now shipped annually from
a section where the desert formerly reigned supreme, and Ontario has
grown into a thriving little city of six thousand inhabitants, with the
most modern facilities and unrivaled attractions as a place of homes.
Mr. Whitaker has been prominently concerned with this magnificent de-
velopment and progress, has been liberal and public-spirited as a citizen,
and through his well directed endeavors he gained a competency that
has enabled him to retire from active labors and enjoy peace and pros-
perity beneath his own "vine and fig tree." He paid one hundred and
twenty-five dollars an acre for his original plat of ten acres, as the first
settler, the regular price being one hundred and fifty dollars, upon which
he developed a fine citrus orchard, the property being now valued at two
thousand dollars an acre. He added to his landed holdings and through
the improvement and sale of various properties he has contributed much
to the advancement of the colony along both material and social lines.
He is held in high esteem in the community that has so long represented
his home and is one of its substantial and valued citizens.

Mr. W'hitaker cast his first presidential vote, in San Francisco, in
1864, for President Lincoln, who was then elected for a second term, and

THE NEW YORK
PUBIIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX AN'P

TILDEK FOUNDATIONS

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 451

he has ever since continued unswerving in his support of the generic
principles of the Republican party, though in local affairs he maintains
an independent attitude and subordinates partisanship to men and meas-
ures. He is a charter member of Ontario Post, No. 124, Grand Army
of the Republic, and has been one of its most appreciative and valued
comrades. He has held official position in the post from the time of its
organization, and was its commander for one term. He has been its
adjutant since 1907. He is also a charter member of Ontario Lodge, No.
301, Free and Accepted Masons, of which he was one of the organizers
and in the affairs of which he has taken a most active interest, the while
he has passed various official chairs in the same. Both he and his wife
hold membership in the Baptist church in their home city.

In his native state, at the age of twenty years, Mr. Whitaker was
united in marriage to Miss Dora Groton, who there died about 1868 and
who is survived by one daughter, Fannie E., who is now the wife of
Charles A. Goodwin, of Skowhegan, that state. In the city of San Fran-
cisco the marriage of Mr. Whitaker to Miss Hattie A. Swarts was sol-
emnized in April, 1881, and she came with him to the new home in the
Ontario Colony, where she passed the residue of her life and where she
was summoned to eternal rest on the 28th of May, 1895, being survived
by no children. On January 8, 1896, Mr. Whitaker contracted a third
marriage, by his union with Miss Sarah L. Hartsel, who was born in
Huron county, Ohio, and reared in the state of Michigan, and who pre-
sides most graciously over their attractive home. No children have been
born of this union. Mrs. Whitaker came to California in 1884.

WILLIS E. WILSIE. The duties devolving upon the county horticul-
tural commissioner are of such a nature as to make the office a most
important one, and more especially so in a new country where much of
the land is still in the experimental stage. Consequently those who have
been chosen to act in this capacity have been men who have made the
sciences of agriculture and horticulture the subject of deep and lifelong
study and whose knowledge of soil and climatic conditions is intimate
and thorough. This, however, is not all, as the work entails also a neces-
sity for knowledge as to the habits, nature and customs of the various
forms of animal and insect life. The name of W. E. Wilsie, county
horticultural commissioner, is one that is known over the breadth and
width of the Imperial Valley, and since accepting his present office, in
August, 1907, when the county was first formed, he has made visits
yearly to the ranches within its limits, in addition to carrying on opera-
tions on a finely-cultivated tract of six hundred and forty acres, re-
claimed from the desert through his industry and ability. Mr. Wilsie
is a product of the state of Wisconsin, where he was born April 18, 1858,
and was there reared and educated.

After spending some years in teaching, Mr. Wilsie decided to enter
agricultural pursuits, and in 1888 came to California, where he became
interested in the culture of citrous fruits. Coming to the Imperial Val-
ley as a pioneer in 1901, he and Mrs. Wilsie took up six hundred and
forty acres of desert land, which they have transformed into a produc-
tive, flourishing farm, and here he has been engaged in raising large

452 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

crops of cotton, and also engaged in dairying and in raising cattle and
hogs. For some years Mr. Wilsie had acted as deputy quarantine of-
ficer, a position which he still holds, and when Imperial county was
ready for a horticultural commissioner his excellent work in guarding
against the importation if any disease in the animal or vegetable king-
dom made him the logical choice for the office. That no mistake was
made in appointing him to this high position will be readily testified to
by the ranchers of this fertile section, who regard him as the protector
of their fields from the ravages of destructive insect life. Mr. 'Wilsie
has always given to his duties the same conscientious, enthusiastic atten-
tion that has made his private interests so successful. Jealous of the
health of every plant, vine and flower under his care, he has labored
faithfully to keep his territory clear of pests that imperil the life of his
charges, and the ranchmen of the Imperial Valley are to be congratulated
that they are protected by such an able and conscientious public official.
His work has, naturally, given him a wide circle of acquaintances, and
through his sincerity and earnest endeavor he has won many friends.
In December, 1887, just prior to his removal to California. Mr. Wilsie
was united in marriage with Miss Florence J. Stilwell, daughter of
Hiram and Elizabeth Stilwell, of Wisconsin, and to this union there have
been born seven children : Wayne S., Ross M., Gladys E., Florence F..
Elva W., Ralph and Jeanie. In politics Mr. Wilsie is a Republican, and
the family are members of the Methodist Episcopal church.

GEORGE R. HOLBROOK. Much of credit is to be attributed to this
sterling citizen of Ontario, San Bernardino county, for the effective ef-
forts put forth by him in connection with the development and upbuild-
ing of the fine Ontario Colony, of which he may well be termed a pioneer,
as he here took up his abode over a quarter of a century ago, when this
now beautiful and productive district was virtually a desert of cacti and
sage-brush. He has contributed in especially generous measure to the
material and civic advancement of his home city of Ontario, where his
activities have been broad and varied and where he is now living vir-
tually retired, with a secure place in the regard of the community that
has so long represented his home.

George Robert Holbrook is a scion of staunch old Xew England
stock and the lineage on both the paternal and maternal sides is traced
back to English origin, the progenitors of the Holbrook family in Amer-
ica having come from England in the early part of the eighteenth century
and having numbered themselves among the pioneer settlers of Ver-
mont, where the name became prominently identified with the develop-
ment of the great basic industry of agriculture. The paternal great-
grandfather of him whose name introduces this article was found en-
rolled as a valiant soldier in the Continental line in the war of the Rev-
olution, in which he was a member of a Vermont volunteer regiment, and
his son Isaac, grandfather of George R. Holbrook, upheld the military
prestige of the name by gallant service as a soldier in the War of 1812,
his death having occurred at his home in the old Green Mountain state
in 1816. He married Ruth Sanders, who was born at Halifax, Ver-
mont, a representative of one of the prominent old families of that com-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 453

momvealth, and she survived her husband by many years, as her death
occurred in 1853, in Bronson, Michigan.

George R. Holbrook was born at Ashfield, Franklin county, Mas-
sachusetts, on the 1 7th of June, 1851, and is a son of Amasa Carlisle
Holbrook and Lucretia (demons) Holbrook, the former of whom was
born at Halifax, Windham county, Vermont, in 1811, and the latter of
whom was born at Charlemont, Franklin county, Massachusetts, in 1813.
Amasa C. Holbrook was reared to adult age in his native state and his
educational training was secured almost entirely through his own ef-
forts, even as was his success in temporal affairs the result of his own
well directed endeavors. As a boy he attended the common schools dur-
ing the winter terms and he was but four years of age at the time of his
father's death. He was reared among his kinsfolk and early became de-
pendent upon his own resources. He was an appreciative student and
reader, a fine penman and accountant, and became a man of broad in-
tellectuality. He had natural mechanical ability and as a young man he
invented the first pod-bit, in the manufacture of which he was engaged
for a number of years. He had none of the attributes of the pococu-
rante, for his life was one of signal earnestness and productive activity,
and he accumulated an appreciable property at Buckland, Massachu-
setts, where he established his home soon after his marriage. He event-
ually lost much of his property through becoming security in a finan-
cial way for friends, a number of whom violated his confidence and kind-
ness. He thus retired from the manufacturing business and turned his
attention to agricultural pursuits, with which he continued to be iden-
tified, near Buckland, Franklin county, Massachusetts, until his death
and through which he again gained definite prosperity. He died on his
old homestead farm, on the I7th of September, 1863, secure in the con-
fidence and esteem of all who knew him. At Buckland, Massachusetts,
in February, 1835, was solemnized the marriage of Amasa C.
Holbrook to Miss Lucretia demons, a daughter of Joseph demons,
the maiden name of whose wife was Steele. The latter was born at
Shelburne Falls, Franklin county, and was a representative of a family
whose name has been identified with the history of that locality for
many generations. Mrs. Lucretia Holbrook, a woman of noble char-
acter and gentle presence, long survived her husband and she attained
to notably venerable age. She was summoned to the life eternal, at
Shelburne Falls, on the I4th of February, 1907, only eight days before
she would have celebrated her ninety-fourth birthday anniversary. Of
the five children — two sons and three daughters — George R., of this
sketch, is the youngest. The elder son. Horace, served about one year
as a soldier in the Civil war, having enlisted, for nine months, in the
Fifty-second Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and he was in the com-
mand of General Banks, in Louisiana, where he was confined in hos-
pitals for some time on account of illness. He is now a resident of
South Deerfield, Massachusetts. The two elder daughters, Emily and
Elvira, married and reared children and both are now deceased. Eliza-
beth, the youngest daughter, is the widow of Jerome Thompson and re-
sides at Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts.

When George R. Holbrook was three years of age his parents re-

454 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

moved to Buckland, Massachusetts, and there he gained his rudimen-
tary education. He was twelve years of age at the time of the death
of his honored father and soon afterward he accompanied his mother
to Plainfield, that state, where he was reared to maturity and where he
was afforded the advantages of the public schools, including the high
school. He remained with his widowed mother until he was sixteen
years of age and after teaching one term of district school he gave his
attention principally to clerking in mercantile establishments. He con-
tinued his residence in his native state for four years after his marriage
and in 1880 he removed to Boulder county, Colorado, where he in-
stalled machinery in a mine, to the operation of which he thereafter gave
his attention for a period of about one year. He then came to Califor-
nia and located at Riverside, which was at an early time in San Bernar-
dino county but which is now the county seat of Riverside county. There
he became a successful contractor in the grading of lands and streets
and he was in this line closely identified with the original work of de-
veloping the beautiful public parks of that beautiful district. There was
but one brick building in Riverside at the time when he there took up
his residence and the place is now one of the most beautiful little cities
of southern California. For a time Mr. Holbrook held the office of
superintendent of the Riverside water-works, and in Mpy, 1883, he re-
moved to the newly established Ontario Colony, in San Bernardino
county. Here he purchased twelve and one-half acres of land on the
corner of the present D street and San Antonio avenue, and he thus
became one of the original settlers of the new colony, in which he was
among the first to plant a citrus orchard. He built the residence which
is now owned by Dr. Henry T- Rose and which is now occupied by the
latter's daughter, Mrs. Neals, and this was the third permanent dwell-
ing built in the colony. Mr. Holbrook has been prominently -concerned
in the development and progress of this now favored section of the state,
and has identified himself with every interest that has conserved such
advancement along material and civic lines. On his original tract of
land he developed a fine orange grove and he continued to be the owner
of one or more orchards of citrus fruit until 1909, when he disposed of
his interests in this line, since which time he has lived retired in his beau-
tiful home in the city of Ontario. He has been earnest and unflagging
in the promotion of local interests and has viewed with satisfaction the
upbuilding and industrial progress of the colony in which he established
his home so long ago and in which he found no habitation to offer ac-
commodations for the wayfarer at the time when he here located his
permanent residence. In fact, he recalls with humorous appreciation
that his first night in the colony gave him only such sleeping accommo-
dations as were afforded by a lumber pile, and that this lumber was
soon afterward utilized in the construction of the first livery barn in the
village and colony of Ontario. No buildings had been erected at the time
and he slept on carriage robes, under shelter rudely constructed from the
lumber at hand. At one time Mr. Holbrook owned and conducted the
only livery stable in the colony, and he opened and conducted the first
meat market, in a primitive building on the site of the present modern
building of the Mutual Loan & Building Association. He also erected

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 455

the brick building now owned and occupied by Jacob Jesson. the drug-
gist, and this was the second brick building constructed in the village
of Ontario. For a few years Mr. Holbrook owned and conducted the
book and stationery store now owned by E. D. Abrams. He came to
the colony under contract with its projectors, the Chaff ey brothers, and
was made superintendent of the outside interests of the new colony,
in which capacity he continued to serve for nearly two years.

Mr. Holbrook has ever given unswerving allegiance to the cause of
the Republican party and he was formerly an active worker in its local
ranks. He served seven years as justice of the peace in the early days
of Ontario's history, and for nine years he was clerk of the board of
education. Within this period he was identified with the construction
of all but two of the school-houses erected in the colony. He was a
prime factor in effecting the organization of the original school district
and has ever shown a deep interest in educational affairs. For two
years Mr. Holbrook held the important office of auditor of San Bernar-
dino county, and for eight years thereafter he was a valued member of
its board of supervisors. Within this period was completed the present
fine courthouse, at a cost of two hundred and forty thousand dollars.
After his retirement from this office the board of supervisors appointed
him a member of the county board of horticultural commissioners, and
he retained this incumbency three years, during which time he did much
to further the development of the industrial interests of the county.

Mr. Holbrook is a charter member of Ontario Lodge, No. 301, Free
and Accepted Masons, and in this time-honored fraternity he is also
affiliated with the Chapter, Commandery, Eastern Star, and Ancient
Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He and his wife
hold membership in the Unitarian church and he contributed liberally
to the erection of the church edifice of this denomination in Ontario a
number of years ago. The congregation was too small to maintain the
church, however, and regular services have not been held in later years.

On the 2ist of November, 1875, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Holbrook to Miss Emma Augusta Starkey, who was born at Adamsville,
Franklin county, Massachusetts, on the 131)1 of March, 1857, and who is
a daughter of Samuel and Esther Ann (Lombard) Starkey, the former
a native of New Hampshire and the latter born on the old Lombard
homestead in Franklin county, Massachusetts. Mr. Starkey became a
successful contractor and builder in Adamsville, Massachusetts, where
he continued to reside until his death, on the 8th of October, 1889, at
the age of fifty-nine years. He was a valiant soldier of the Civil war,
as a member of a Massachusetts volunteer regiment, and as he was a
fine mechanic the major part of his service was in this capacity, so that
he took part in few active engagements. His wife was summoned to
eternal rest on the 8th of March, 1893, at the age of fifty-seven years.
The celebrated New England drama, "The Old Homestead," written
and presented by the late Denman Thompson, and with scenes and inci-
dents drawn from real life, takes cognizance of the Starkey family. Two
sisters of Samuel Starkey, — Betsy F. and Mary, twins, — were born and
reared in the Thompson neighborhood and in the cast of characters in
"The Old Homestead" the twin sisters are said to represent the Starkey

456 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND

twins, with whom the author was familiarly acquainted. Samuel Starkey
was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic and his . 'It of the
Woman's Relief Corps of the same, while she was also a devoted mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal church.

In conclusion is entered brief record concerning the children of Mr.
and Mrs. Holbrook: Mattie L., who was born at Adamsville, Massa-
chusetts, was married, in California, to Frederick >M. Hatch, a native
of Concord, Massachusetts, and she died at Berkeley, California, Janu-
ary 9, 1904, at the age of twenty-seven years, leaving no children; Guy
A., who was born at Riverside, California, on the 24th of August, 1881,
is conducting a carriage and implement business in Ontario ; Jay, asso-
ciated with his younger brother, Roy C., in the dry cleaning and dyeing
business, in the thriving little city of Ontario, was born at Redlands, this
state, on the 4th of March, 1883, and is married and resides in Ontario ;
Roy C., who is engaged in business with his elder brother, as already
noted, was the first male child born in the Ontario Colony, where he was
ushered into the world on the 2Qth of April, 1885, and he is married
and is one of the enterprising young business men of the city of Ontario ;
and Leo C., who was born on the loth of December, 1896, is a student
in the public schools of his home city, where the family is one of promi-
nence in the best social activities of the community.

J. A. ROBISON. The productiveness of the Imperial Valley has been
manifested in various ways, viewing it from an agricultural standpoint,
but in no way has this manifestation been more pronounced than in the
dairy industry. Ever since scientific investigation has proven the im-
portance and necessity for having pure dairy stuffs, the production of
these articles has been an important factor in the agricultural life of
this section. One of those who has had a long and varied experience
in this line of work here is J. A. Robison, treasurer and general manager
of the Imperial Valley Creamery Company. Mr. Robison was born in
Fairmont, Marian county. West Virginia, in 1875, and is the third in
order of birth of the eight children born to James Z. and Martha E.
(Floyd) Robison, natives of that state, where his father was extensively
engaged in farming.

Mr. Robison was reared and educated in his native state, and in 1894
entered the agricultural department of the University of Wisconsin,
from which institution he was graduated four years later. He decided
to follow the creamery business as his life work, and subsequently en-
gaged therein in Wisconsin, there gaining valuable experience in butter-
making which has stood him in good stead in his later operations. Later
he removed to the state of Arizona, where he followed the same line for
five years, and then took a position with the De La Val Dairy Supply
Company and remained in their employ two years. Eventually Mr. Robi-
son established a creamery at Brawley, in the Imperial Valley, and con-
tinued to be the proprietor thereof until the organization, in 1911, of
the Imperial Valley Creamery Company, at El Centro, when with three
other small plants he merged with the present concern. At the time of
its incorporation, in 1911, the officers elected were as follows: A. C.
Smithers, president : W. B. Covington, vice-president ; W. K. Crawford,

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 459

secretary ; and Mr. Robison, treasurer and general manager. The main
office and creamery are located at El Centre, and branch stations are
situated at Holtville and Brawley, Mr. Robison still retaining a one-
fourth interest in his creamery at the latter point. The El Centra plant
covers a floor space forty by eighty feet, in addition to an acre of ground
used for various purposes pertaining to the business. A force of eight-
een hands is employed, and the average output per day of the plant is
six thousand pounds. As one of the business men who are doing so
much to advance the interests of this new country, Mr. Robison holds
a prominent position in the industrial world of the section, and he has
found time from his business cares to assist in advancing movements that
have for their object the betterment of conditions here in every way. He
is a member of the Commercial Travelers Association, and is fraternally
connected with the Knights of Pythias, but he has given his attention
to his business rather than to social life, and has never interested himself
in politics beyond the extent of taking a good citizen's interest in public
matters.

In 1908 Air. Robison was united in marriage to Miss Florence A.
Stewart at Phoenix, Arizona. Of their marriage there is one son, Ray-
mond Stewart Robison, born December 18, 1911. Mrs. Robison was
born in Boston, Massachusetts.

EDWARD W. REID, M. D. A resident of the Cucamonga district of
San Bernardino county for more than a quarter of a century, Dr. Reid
figures as one of the pioneers in the development of the citrus-fruit in-
dustry in this favored section of the state, where his labors from the
start have been timely and effective, and where he has gained success of
the most unequivocal order. He is one of the representative citizens of
the thriving little city of Cucamonga, where he is president of the First
National Bank, and while he has retired largely from the practice of
his profession he is known as a physician and surgeon of fine ability.
He has been an influential factor in public affairs of a local order and has
teen one of the foremost supporters of those measures and enterprises
through which has been compassed the splendid development of his sec-
tion of the state along both civic and industrial lines. Such progressive
and honored citizens are specially worthy of recognition in this publica-
tion, which thus justifies its assigned functions.

Dr. Edward Winfield Reid was born in Madison county, Illinois, on
the i6th of December, 1852, and is a son of William J. and Maria (Cox)
Reid, both of whom were likewise born and reared in that county, where
they passed their entire lives and where the respective families settled in
the early pioneer days. The lineage of the Reid family is traced back
to sturdy Scotch origin and the first representatives of the name in
America settled in North Carolina, in the colonial epoch. In that com-
monwealth was born Thomas Reid, grandfather of the Doctor, and after
his marriage he removed with his family to Madison county, Illinois,
where he secured a tract of government land and reclaimed a valuable
farm. Much of the land was heavily timbered and he lived up to the
full tension of the pioneer epoch, the while he was a citizen of promi-
nence and influence in his community. He continued to reside on his

460 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

homestead until his death, when venerable in years, and his cherished
and devoted wife soon followed him to the life eternal. Both were zeal-
ous members of the Baptist church and in politics he was a staunch
whig of the old-line type.

William J. Reid was the youngest in a family of three sons and
three daughters, and he passed his entire life as a farmer in Madison
county, Illinois, where he commanded secure place in popular confidence
and esteem and where he gained independence and definite prosperity
through his well directed efforts. He was in the very prime of his use-
ful manhood at the time of his death, which occurred in a government
hospital in the city of Louisville, Kentucky, in 1865, shortly before the
close of the Civil war. He had enlisted, in 1864, in an Illinois regiment
of volunteers and his death was the result of a fever contracted while
in the service of the LTnion. He was thirty-seven years of age at the
time of his demise and his wife survived him by many years, her death
having occurred in Pomona, Los Angeles county, California, in 1892,
at which time she was about sixty years of age. She located in Cali-
fornia in 1882. Of the three children, the first born, a daughter, died in
infancy; Dr. Edward W., of this review, was the second in order of
birth ; and Albert W. died in 1886, at Pomona, California, where he had
located a short time previously, in the hope of recuperating his health.
The mother, Mrs. Maria (Cox) Reid, was a daughter of Isaac and
Nancy (Starkey) Cox, who were natives of South Carolina, and who
were numbered among the early settlers of Madison county, Illinois,
where they established their home about the time the state was admitted
to the Union. Mr. Cox there developed a farm from the wilderness and
he became a prominent factor in public affairs of a local order. He was
originally a whig and later a republican in politics and was implacable
in his opposition to the institution of slavery. He continued to reside
in Madison county until his death, in 18/7. at the age of seventy-seven
years, and his name is enrolled on the list of the honored pioneers of that
section of Illinois, His first wife died when comparatively a young
woman and he later contracted a second marriage.

Dr. Reid was reared to the sturdy discipline of the home farm and
after duly availing himself of the advantages of the public schools of his
native county he was matriculated in Shurtleff College, at Upper Alton,
Illinois, in which excellent institution he was graduated as a member
of the class of 1875 and from which he received the degree of Bachelor
of Arts. For one year after his graduation he was an instructor in the
academic department of his alma mater and in the meanwhile he began
the study of medicine.^ In preparation for the work of his chosen pro-
fession he then entered the St. Louis Medical College, in which he was
graduated in 1878, with the well earned degree of Doctor of Medicine.
For the ensuing five years he was engaged in the successful general prac-
tice of his profession at Bethalto, a village in his native county, and in
the meanwhile his health became impaired, with the result that, in the
autumn of 1882, he came to California, in search of relief through change
of climatic conditions. He passed a few months at Santa Ana, Orange
county, and in January of the following year he purchased a tract of
land in what is now known as the loamosa district of Cucamonga in

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 461

San Bernardino county. He was the first to make permanent settlement
in that district, and though a few houses had been erected at Cuca-
monga, Pomona was the market town of the locality in those days. On-
tario Colony was then in process of platting and was marked only by
the camps of the promoters. Soon after coming to Cucamonga the
Doctor erected a small house of primitive order, — the first in- his neigh-
borhood,— and he then set himsef vigorously to bringing the wild land
into subjugation. Water for irrigation was not yet available, and no
trees or other vegetation, save cacti and sage-brush, were visible in a
section that is now a veritable garden of luxurious foliage. By careful
methods, close application and well directed industry Dr. Reid developed
a fine farm, which comprises at the present time sixty acres and which
is devoted to the raising of citrus and deciduous fruits. Through his
identification with this most gracious line of industrial enterprise he
has accumulated a competency, and a beautiful home, with all modern
accessories and appointments, has replaced the modest little dwelling in
which he first established his Lares and Penates. The Doctor has been
one of the most enthusiastic and indefatigable workers in connection
with the development and upbuilding of this section of the state and has
done well his part in bringing about the wonderful transformation. He
was one of the organizers of the first fruit-growers' association in the
Ontario-Cucamonga district and later became one of the prime factors
in the organization of the Cucamonga Citrus Fruit Association, in
which he was a director and active executive in the earlier days, doing
much to further its effectiveness as an agency for promoting the pros-
perity of the fruit industry in the district. He became one of the organ-
izers and original stockholders of the First National Bank of Cucamonga,
was later made a member of its directorate, and after serving for some
time as its vice-president he was elected president of the institution,
upon the death of the former incumbent, O. H. Stanton, in 1910. He
has proved a most discriminating executive and gives close attention to
the affairs of the bank of which he is the administrative head.

In politics Dr. Reid has been unswerving in his allegiance to the Re-
publican party, in whose local ranks he has given yeoman service. He
has served continuously as a member of the board of supervisors of San
Bernardino county since 1902, having been re-elected in 1906 and 1910,
and he was the valued chairman of the board from January, 1905, until
January, 1911. In this connection he was unflagging in his support of
progressive measures and did much to forward the social and material
interests of his own district and the county at large, his efforts as a
public-spirited citizen having been unmarked by partisan bias or expe-
diency. He is a member of various professional organizations and
keeps in touch with the advances made in medicine and surgery. In the
city of Ontario he is affiliated with the organizations of the Independent
Order of Foresters, and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and at
Pomona he is a member of the lodge of the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.

On the 1 8th of November, 1876, Dr. Reid was united in the bonds
of wedlock to Miss Bary Rennick, who was born and reared in St.
Francois county, Missouri, and who is a daughter of George W. and

462 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Priscilla (Barry) Rennick, the former a native of Hamilton county,
Ohio, and the latter of St. Francois county, Missouri. George W. Ren-
nick was reared in his native county and as a young man he accompanied
his parents on their removal to St. Francois county, Missouri, in 1842.
There he devoted the remainder of his active career to agricultural pur-
suits and. there he died in 1896, at the age of seventy-six years. His
loved wife pased to the "land of the leal" in 1886, at the age of sixty-
seven years. She was a daughter of Wilson Barry, who was one of the
pioneer settlers of St. Francois county and a representative of a family
prominent in connection with the history of South Carolina and Ken-
tucky. Dr. and Airs. Reid, whose attractive home is a center of gracious
hospitality and much social activity, have two children, — Gertrude, who
remains at the parental home, and Eunice, who is the wife of Robert C.
Owens', a representative member of the bar of the city of San Francisco.
Airs. Reid and the elder daughter are members of the Baptist church,
and Mrs. Owens holds membership in the Congregational church.

RUFUS A. HOLT. During the ten years that he has spent in the Im-
perial Valley, Rufus A. Holt has been identified constantly with the
development of its industries. Coming here as a pioneer in 1902, he
immediately saw the possibilities of the section and displayed his faith in
its future by investing in real estate when there was not a house in Holt-
ville. He has lived to see the district grow and develop into a thriving
commercial center, assisting in various ways to advance this growth and
development, and is now numbered among its most substantial business
men and ranch owners. Mr. Holt, like many residents of the Imperial
Valley, is a native of Kentucky, and was born June 9. 1862, the youngest
of the four children of W. B. and Rebecca (Clark) Holt, natives of the
Blue Grass state, and both of whom died in their native state.

Mr. Holt was educated in the public schools of his native place and
reared to the life of an agriculturist on his father's farm. As a young
man he visited Honolulu, where he was engaged in the lumber business
for a short period, but subsequently returned to Kentucky, and did not
come to California until 1900, at which time he located in Redlands,
where he continued to engage in lumbering. The i/th of July, 1902.
saw Air. Holt's arrival in the Imperial Valley, where he took the contract
for the grading of the H. & I. Railroad, this being before the water had
been distributed. He was obliged to haul water for his one hundred
head of horses a distance of four miles, at a cost of $35.00 per day, but
this was only an incident in the obstacles and difficulties that had to be
overcome by the pioneers who blazed the way for civilization. Taking
up a one-half section of land on the southern boundary of the valley, ad-
joining Alexico, he started to develop a ranch, and the property is now
in an excellent state of cultivation, thoroughly irrigated and devoted to
Alfalfa. Air. Holt purchased in 1903 the first lots on the present site
of Holtville, there being at this time no houses erected at this point and
only 300 acres of land under cultivation east of the Alamo river. These
four lots, for which he paid $2,000, he sold in 1906 for $3,000. In 1907
he engaged in the real estate business, with an office in Holtville, and he
has enjoyed his share of success. He performs with fidelity all the duties

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 465

of citizenship, and freely gives aid to every good enterprise, helping to
build up and develop the resources of the country. His ranch is a model
of thrift, neatness and prosperity, and the upright manner in which he
has conducted his real estate dealings has won him the confidence and
esteem of his business associates.

In 1885 Air. Holt was united in marriage with Miss Lena Holt, the
daughter of Oscar and Josie Holt, also natives of Kentucky, and to
this union there have been born two children : Oscar L. and Rufus A.

HENRY ALBERT. For two score years has Mr. Albert maintained his
home in California, and his memory thus links the pioneer epoch with the
latter days of opulent prosperity and advancement. He has been closely
identified with the development of the natural resources of the state,
where his activities have been varied and disseminated over various parts
of the state, and for more than fifteen years past he has resided at Cuca-
monga, San Bernardino county, where he developed one of the finest fruit
ranches in this favored section of the state and- where his success has
been on a parity with his indefatigable and well directed efforts. He has
recently sold a considerable portion of his land and will henceforth enjoy
a modicum of leisure and retirement, the just reward for former years
of earnest endeavor. He is one of the representative citizens of Cuca-
monga and is here held in high regard as a man of marked ability and
sterling character.

Henry Albert, who has been in the most significant sense the artificer
of his own fortunes, was born on a farm in Perry county, Pennsylvania,
and the date of his nativity was November n, 1853. He is a son of
George W. and Elizabeth (Foose) Albert, both of whom were likewise
born in Perry county, where the respective families were founded in an
early day. The Albert family lineage is traced back to staunch German
origin and the name has been identified with American history since the
early colonial epoch. Three brothers of the name immigrated from Ger-
many in 1620 and were numbered among the early settlers of New Am-
sterdam, the nucleus of the city of New York. Of the brothers two were
killed by Indians soon after their arrival in the New World, and the re-
maining brother thus figures as the founder of the family in America,
as the other two brothers left no descendants. He whose name initiates
this review has in his possession and prizes as a valuable family heir-
loom, a book of catechisms published in the German language, under
date of the year 1563, and the same was brought by his ancestor upon
the latter's immigration to America, in 1620. An inscription in the book
shows that it has been handed down from one generation to another in
the family. John Albert, great-grandfather of Mr. Albert, came into
possession of this ancient volume, which he gave to his son Jacob, who
in turn gave the same to his son, George W., by; whom it was be-
queathed to Henry Albert, his son and the subject of this review. The
volume, through its inscription, fully establishes the family lineage and
gives authenticity to the statements that have been here entered. The
ancestors were a family of clockmakers for many generations, both in
Germany and America, and in this country, there are still in existence
ancient clocks, whose cases and mechanism were carved out of wood

466 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

by representatives of the family. One of these ancient and interest-
ing timepieces, of fine workmanship, is preserved in the Philadelphia
Academy of Science. It is of immense size and is supposed to have
been made by Jacob Albert, grandfather of the subject of this sketch.
The Alberts have been industrious, God-fearing and home-loving folk,
and the ancestral history of Henry Albert is one in which he may well
take pride.

George W. Albert was reared to manhood in Perry county, Pennsyl-
vania, where he was born on the old homestead farm, on the I5th of May,
1827. He received such educational advantages as were afforded in the
somewhat primitive schools of the locality and period and he not only
carried on agricultural pursuits, but also learned and followed the tinner's
trade, for the work of which he maintained a shop at his home for a
number of years. His patriotism was of the most fervent order and
when the dark cloud of civil war cast its pall over the national horizon,
he promptly tendered his services in defense of the Union by enlisting
in the Forty-seventh Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, in which he be-
came corporal of Company H. He enlisted at Newport, Perry county,
Pennsylvania, on the igth of September, 1861, and his regiment was for
a long period assigned to guard duty at Key West, Florida. There illness
finally incapacitated him for further service, and, upon the physician's
certificate of disability, he there received his honorable discharge on the
i8th of April, 1864. He was placed on board the steamship "Yazoo,"
for transportation to his home, but he died en route and was buried at
sea, on the 2Qth of April, 1864. He was active in the service of his
regiment and ever found at the post of duty until he contracted the dis-
ease which caused his death. His brother Alexander was, likewise, a
valiant soldier of the Union, having enlisted in a Pennsylvania regi-
ment at the inception of the war and having re-enlisted at the expiration
of his original term, so that he served during practically the entire period
of the great conflict, in which he participated in many important en-
gagements.

Elizabeth, the wife of George W. Albert, was born in Perry county,
Pennsylvania, and was a daughter of Michael and Eliza (Comp) Foose,
representatives of sterling German families founded in Pennsylvania in
a very early day. Mr. Albert of this review has in his keeping an old
spinning wheel that was formerly the property of his maternal grand-
mother and the same is an interesting relic of the days long past. Mrs.
Elizabeth Albert long survived her husband and continued to reside
in Perry county, Pennsylvania, until her death, in 1905, at the age of
seventy-four years. She was a devout member of the German Lutheran
church, as was also her husband. They became the parents of two
children, of whom Henry is the elder, and Mary C., the younger, is now the
wife of Dr. John W. Bealor, a representative physician and surgeon of
Shamokin, Pennsylvania. On the monument marking the last resting
place of Mrs. Elizabeth Albert, at Little Germany, Perry county, Penn-
sylvania, appears the following inscription : "In memory of George W.
Albert, born May 15, 1827; corporal Company H, Forty-seventh Regi-
ment, Pennsylvania Volunteers, War of the Rebellion. Died on board

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 467

steamship Yazoo and buried at sea, April 29, 1864. And Elizabeth, his
wife, born February 24, 1831 ; died March 7, 1905."

Henry Albert was a lad of about ten years at the time of his father's
death and his mother was in such financial circumstances as to be unable
to make adequate provision for his education and maintenance, owing to
the loss of her husband and the ravages of the war. When he was eleven
years of age, therefore, Mr. Albert became a student established at Mc-
Allisterville, Pennsylvania, for -orphan children of soldiers of the 'Civil
war. Born of German parents, he had at the time no knowledge of the
English language, in which he received excellent instruction in this school,
which also afforded him good advantages in other lines of academic
learning. That he was specially receptive and ambitious as a student, is
evident from the fact that when but sixteen years of age he became a
teacher in the institution. He was thus engaged for fifteen months
and through this medium earned the money to defray the expenses of
his journey to California, to which state he had determined to come in
search of opportunities for gaining independence and success through his
own efforts.

In a reminiscent way, as touching his experiences at the school at
McAllisterville, Mr. Albert states that after establishing his home in
San Bernardino county, he lived for nearly ten years as a neighbor of
Colonel James L. Paul, before it transpired that the two had found recog-
nition of each other in years long past. Colonel Paul, who had made a dis-
tinguished record as an officer in a Pennsylvania regiment in the Civil
war, became the author of an historical work for the state of Pennsyl-
vania, and in the same he wrote in considerable detail concerning the
schools there maintained for orphan children of veterans of the war. In the
context he mentioned the name of Mr. Albert as a student and teacher in
the school at McAllisterville and also gave a reproduction of an original
declamation rendered by him while a student in the institution. In the
same article mention is also made of Mary L. Nesbitt, who was at the time
a teacher in the school and who later became the wife of Mr. Albert. The
latter had retained in his possession for many years, a copy of Colonel
Paul's history, in which appeared a portrait of the author, but, as already
stated, neither the Colonel nor Mr. Albert identified themselves in the
connection until they had been neighbors in California for nearly a decade.

In 1871, at the age of eighteen years, Mr. Albert resigned his position
as teacher in the school in which he had received his education and set
forth for California, whither he came on the first overland railroad con-
structed. He made the journey in a typical emigrant train, in which the
passenger coaches were interspersed with freight cars. Fourteen days
were consumed in making the trip from Perry county, Pennsylvania, to
San Francisco, where Mr. Albert arrived in May, 1871. He had at the
time a cash capital of five dollars, the remainder of his savings having
been expended for his transportation and incidental expenses. He se-
cured work on a farm soon after his arrival but returned to San Francisco
for the winter. In the following spring he joined others in the work of
driving cattle and horses over the Humboldt hills to the Klamath river,
in Del Norte county, and one hundred miles of trail were traversed.
The stock thus transferred was of high grade and the cattle were util-

468 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

ized for the establishing of a dairy. He remained in Del Norte county
about a year and then secured employment on a dairy ranch in Sonoma
county. Mr. Albert has distinctive inventive genius, and while otherwise
employed he had invented an extension car-step. He returned to San
Francisco and arranged for the patenting of his invention, and within
the following year he perfected several other ingenious inventions, while
working on ranches in Sonoma county. For these devices he made all
his own drawings, which he still preserves/ Among his inventions was the
Albert can-labeling machine, for the placing of labels on all kinds of
canned goods, and on this device he received three patents, the machine
proving successful in practical operation. He has received patents on a
total of about twelve devices, a number of which are in practical usage.

In 1876, Mr. Albert visited his old home in Pennsylvania and at-
tended the Centennial exposition, in the city of Philadelphia. On his
return to California, his exchequer showed a total of sixty dollars, and
he decided to devote no more time to inventive problems. He borrowed
money and purchased a government homestead of one hundred and sixty
acres in the wilds of Del Norte county, where he set to himself the task
of developing a dairy farm. He brought the property into good order,
with a total of forty milch cows, during a period of four years of indefati-
gable work, and during this time he kept bachelor's hall in a primitive
cabin, eight feet square. With increasing prosperity, his ambition to
found a home was quickened into decisive action, even as it had previously
been spurred on by appreciative affection for one who had been a fellow
school-mate and teacher in the orphans' school of Pennsylvania. His
importunities to the woman of his choice met with favorable reception
and she came to California. They met each other in San Francisco, where
their marriage was forthwith solemnized, and they then proceeded by
steamboat up the coast a distance of two hundred and eighty miles to
Crescent City, f ronv which point they made the trip on horseback the
remaining twenty-two miles to his ranch, on which he had in the mean-
while erected a comfortable house and other good buildings. With the
aid of his devoted wife, Mr. Albert was successful in his ranching and
dairying enterprise, and in the spring of 1883, he disposed of his property
advantageously. He then went to Colorado, with the intention of buying
a large tract of land in that state, but the advantages and attractions of
California led him to return to her gracious borders. He soon afterward
purchased one hundred and sixty acres of land in Placer county, about
thirty acres of the tract having been set out with peach and pear trees
and grape vines. He later sold this property and located near Crescent
City. Del Norte county, where he again engaged in dairy farming, to
which he there gave his attention for the ensuing decade. In 1895 he
sold his property and removed to the Cucamonga district of San Bernar-
dino county, where he bought sixty acres of land, one-half of which was
devoted to deciduous fruits, one-fourth to citrus fruits and the remainder
to figs. He removed the fig trees and planted in their place orange trees,
and he has developed the place into one of the most productive and valua-
ble fruit ranches in this favored section of the state, the while his efforts
have been attended by gratifying financial success. He recently sold
nearly one-half of the original ranch, at a splendid figure, in order that

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 471

he might retire measurably from the active toil and endeavor to which
he had devoted himself for so many years.

Progressive and public-spirited has been the attitude of Mr. Albert
as a citizen of California, and he has given his influence and aid in the
support of measures tending to foster civic and industrial prosperity. In
politics he is unswerving in his allegiance to the republican party and
has been an active worker in its local ranks. For years he served as a
member of the republican county committee of San Bernardino county,
and for five years he was secretary of the Hermosa Water Company,
of which he is still a director. He is president of the Cucamonga Citrus
Fruit Growers' Association, of which he was one of the organizers, and
he has also served as president of the Cucamonga Chamber of Commerce.
He is a stockholder and director of the Big Sespe Oil Company, which
is developing its valuable oil interests in Ventura county and the general
offices of which are maintained in Los Angeles. He and his wife are
popular factors in the social life of their home community and both are
zealous members and supporters of the Presbyterian church at Cucamonga.

On the ist of October, 1881, Mr. Albert was united in marriage to
Miss Mary L. Nesbitt, who was born in the city of Philadelphia and who
was educated at Bellefonte, that state, after her father had sacrificed his
life in the Civil war. She became a teacher in the soldiers' orphans' school
at McAllisterville, Pennsylvania, where she formed the acquaintance of
her future husband, who was likewise a teacher in the institution, as
has already been noted. Mr. and Mrs. Albert have four children, —
Eleanor H., Henry Lincoln, Alary Beaver and Margaret. Eleanor H.
had the distinction of being the second white child born on the Klamath
river in Del Norte county, California.

IRA L. WILSON. Xo man, it is safe to say, is more familiar with the
topography of Imperial Valley, or has a more definite knowledge of the
desert land and its possibilities, or a clearer comprehension of the re-
markable increase in the value of lands within the last decade than Ira
L. Wilson, an enterprising and extensive real estate dealer of Imperial.
A native of New York, he was born February. 13, 1860, in Franklin
county, where he was reared and educated. His parents, E. N. and
Alice Wilson, natives of the Empire state, came to California with their
family of three children in 1880, and now, in 1912, are living in Los
Angeles, having moved to that city from Redlands.

On first coming to the Golden state Ira L. Wilson began life for
himself in Redlands as a contractor and builder, and was thus success-
fully employed for a score of years. In 1901 he visited Imperial county,
which was then simply a stretch of dreary desert land, and being firmly
convinced that the greater part .of it could be reclaimed, he invested in
several parcels ere the railroad had been put through. Traveling in this
part of the country was then uncertain, unsafe and expensive. Leav-
ing the railway train at Imperial Junction, Mr. Wilson found that the
stage for Imperial had gone, and it cost him fifty dollars for a team to
take him there, and, missing the stage again, walked back. He had many
thrilling experiences in common with others of the early pioneers, among
other things finding it a most easy matter to lose one's way, at one time

472 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

being forced to camp out through the night on the desert and wait for
daylight before the lost trail could be picked up. The land upon which
he and his friends spent that long and lonesome night was a strip of
sand owned by the Government and for sale at $1.25 an acre. The same
land is now under a high state of cultivation, and cannot be bought for
less than $200 an acre.

Mr. \Yilson owns several tracts of valuable land, one containing three
hundred and twenty acres; another of one hundred and thirty acres; and
two tracts of forty acres each, one of which is devoted to the growing
of oranges, while the remainder of his land, all of which he took up as
desert land, is used for the growing and grazing of stock. Mr. \Yilson
deals extensively in land, in 1910 having sold property in Imperial \ al-
ley amounting in round numbers to 8163,000. a fine record. He was the
first man to bring an automobile into the Imperial Valley, and in the
interests of his real estate business he has since worn out more than six
machines.

Mr. Wilson married, in 1893, Z. X. daughter of C. C. Crum, of Texas.

H. ORIX WARD. One of the representative citizens of San Bernar-
dino county who claims the fine old Wolverine state as the place of his
nativity is the efficient and popular cashier of the First National Bank of
Cucamonga, one of the thriving little cities of the beautiful San Bernar-
dino valley and a center of much industrial and commercial activity in
connection with the propagation of citrus fruits. Mr. Ward is a repre-
sentative of a family whose name has been identified with the annals of
American history since the colonial epoch, and the lineage is traced back
to staunch English origin. The paternal great-grandfather of Mr. Ward
came from England to America and established his home in Massachu-
setts, where the name became worthy of representation in succeeding
generations. In Massachusetts was born Edwin F. Ward, the grand-
father of him whose name initiates this review, and he became one of
the pioneers of Michigan. In an early day he located at Grand Rapids,
that state, which was then but a straggling lumber town, and he became
one of the prominent and influential factors in the development of the
lumber and furniture industries in that section. He organized the firm
of Ward & Skinner, which built up a prosperous business in the manu-
facturing of furniture in Grand Rapids, and with the expansion of the
enterprise the business was incorporated, under the title of the New
England Furniture Company. The plant of the corporation became one of
extensive order and Mr. Ward remained the executive head of the com-
pany for many years. Employment was given to a large force of opera-
tives and the trade of the concern extended into the most diverse sections
of the Union. Through his connection with this splendid industry. Mr.
Ward gained a competency and also did much to further the commercial
prestige of Grand Rapids, now recognized as the leading furniture-
manufacturing city in the country. The enterprise has been continued
under the corporate title of the Grand Rapids Furniture Company since
the death of the honored founders, and it represents one of the impor-
tant industries of Michigan's second city. Edwin F. Ward attained to
the age of more than three score and ten years and continued to reside

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 473

in Grand Rapids until his death, which occurred in 1901. His first wife
died when comparatively a young woman and his second wife still resides
in Grand Rapids. Of the two sons of the first marriage Frank L., father
of the subject of this review, was the first born, and Orin A. has long
been successfully identified with the manufacturing of and wholesale
dealing in furniture supplies in Grand Rapids, where his success has
been of unequivocal order and where he is still actively engaged in
business.

Frank L. Ward was born at Orange, Franklin county, Massachusetts,
and was a boy at the time of the family removal to Grand Rapids, Michi-
gan, where he was reared to manhood and received good educational
advantages. He was a musician of much talent and in this line gained
high reputation, especially as a church organist. He was leader of a band
in Grand Rapids, and was also a skillful performer on the violin and piano,
as well as the pipe-organ, — in fact his versatility was such that he could
play practically all types of musical instruments with much facility. He
devoted the major portion of his time and attention to the teaching of
music and other phases of musical work, and was but thirty-seven years
of age at the time of his death, in 1882. When but sixteen years of age
he manifested his loyalty and youthful patriotism by tendering his ser-
vices in defense of the Union. Soon after the inception of the Civil
war he enlisted as a musician in the Twenty-first Michigan Volunteer
Infantry, with which he served as a drummer boy until the close of the
war, having been actively concerned in many of the important engage
ments marking the progress of the great fratricidal conflict.

As a young man of about twenty-three years, Frank L. Ward was
united in marriage to Miss Etta Robinson, who was born in Kent county,
Michigan, and who still resides in Grand Rapids, that state, where she
was reared and educated. She is a daughter of the late Judge Robert R.
Robinson, who settled in Grand Rapids in the pioneer days and who
became one of the representative members of the Michigan bar, besides
which he served many years on the bench of the circuit court in Kent
county. He continued to maintain his home in Grand Rapids until his
death. Frank L. and Etta (Robinson) Ward became the parents of two
sons and two daughters, all of whom are now living; H. Orin, of this
review, being the youngest of the four.

H. Orin Ward was born in the city of Grand Rapids on the 26th of
August, 1880, and thus was a child of about two years at the time of his
father's death. He was afforded the advantages of the excellent public
schools of his native city and after his graduation in the high school he
was employed about two years in the Grand Rapids office of the great
Bradstreet Commercial Agency. He then assumed a clerical position in
the Old National Bank of Grand Rapids, with which institution he con-
tinued to be connected for two years, within which he added materially
to his technical knowledge of financial affairs. In October, 1903, he came
to California and secured the position of bookkeeper in the First National
Bank of Los Angeles, with which institution he continued to be identi-
fied for six years, in various capacities. At the time of his retirement he
held the office of assistant paying and receiving teller. In August, 1909
he accepted his present office of cashier of the First National Bank of

474 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Cucamonga, and here he has proved a most discriminating, successful
and popular executive. He has done much to further the upbuilding of
the substantial business of this representative banking institution of San
Bernardino county and is a popular factor in both the business and social
circles of his home city. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and
the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, is a staunch supporter of
the cause of the republican party, and is a communicant of the Protestant
Episcopal church, Mrs. Ward holding membership in the Methodist Epis-
copal church.

On the 27th of September, 1904, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Ward to Miss Harriet E. Brooks, who likewise was born and reared at
Grand Rapids, Michigan, and who is a leader in the social activities at
Cucamonga. Mr. and Mrs. Ward have a winsome little daughter, Vir-
ginia, who was born on the 1st of March, 1908.

FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF CUCAMONGA. Among the well conducted
institutions contributing to the financial stability and prestige of San
Bernardino county is the First National Bank of Cucamonga, which was
organized in the latter part of the year 1903 and which initiated business
in April, 1904. The bank was incorporated with a capital stock of
twenty-five thousand dollars and the personnel of its original executive
corps was as here noted : David S. Barmore, president ; O. H. Stan-
ton, vice-president ; and G. C. Bushnell, cashier. On the directorate
were also included C. F. Thorpe, J. M. Elliott, and Secundo Guasti. The
institution proved notably successful in its operations from the start and
it has afforded general banking facilities which have not lacked appre-
ciation in the thriving community in which it is located. The present
officers are: E. W. Reid, president; E. H. Barmore, vice-president;
and H. Orin Ward, cashier. The board of directors includes, in addi-
tion to these executive officers, F. A. Lucas, C. B. Motsinger and J. M.
Elliott. David S. Barmore and O. H. Stanton, representative citizens of
San Bernardino county, were influential factors in the organization and
early administration of the bank, and at the close of the second year a
dividend of six per cent, was paid to stockholders. Later eight per cent,
annual dividends were declared and at the present time semi-annual
dividends of five per cent, are given. According to the official statement
made by the bank under date of June 7, 1911. the loans and discounts
were shown to be $142,704.81 ; surplus fund, $11,000; undivided profits,
$5,463.96; and deposits of more than $190,000. On other pages of this
work individual mention is made of various officers who have been
identified with the upbuilding of this solid and popular monetary insti-
tution.

GEORGE A. LONG. An eminently useful and highly esteemed citizen
of Imperial, George A. Long is one of the most extensive landholders of
the Imperial Valley, and a substantial and worthy representative of its
successful business men, being widely and favorably known as a whole-
sale butcher and packer, and as a successful agriculturist and'stock raiser.
A son of Thomas N. Long, he was born in 1871, in Susanville, Lassen
county, California, coming on the paternal side of southern ancestry.

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 477

Thomas Newton Long was born in Jackson county, Alabama, June
30. 1833, a son of George W. and Mary (Roberts) Long. His father
was born in Kentucky and was killed by a halfbreed Indian about 1843.
in the Cherokee Nation. He was a trader. The mother was born in
Tennessee and died in Madison county, Arkansas, at about seventy-six
years of age. Thomas X. Long left Alabama as a very small boy and
went with the family to Marian county, Tennessee, and in that county
attended the private schools. When he was about ten years of age the
family moved to Arkansas where he continued his schooling. He came
to California in 1854 an<i settled in Butte county, near Chico, where he
engaged in teaming and farming. On October i, 1861, he settled in
Susanville, California, becoming one of the pioneers of that place. He
was a county official of Lassen county for thirty years, serving two terms
as sheriff, then as county treasurer and for twenty years was county
supervisor. He still resides at Susanville.

Mr. T. X. Long married in September, 1869, Mary Jenison, born in
Oregon, and of the thirteen children of their union eight are living:
George A., Thomas H., Arthur E., Helena, Edith, Ellen, Grover C., and
Stella. In politics the father is a Democrat.

Brought up in Susanville, George A. Long obtained a practical edu-
cation in its public schools, and subsequently, while working with his
father, gained a thorough knowledge of everything connected with cattle
raising and dealing. In 1905, trying the hazard of new fortunes, he
came to the Imperial Valley, where he felt assured there were grand op-
portunities awaiting the men of brain and courage. Purchasing a half
section of desert land. Mr. Long began its improvement, and embarked
in the cattle business on a rather modest scale, feeding at first but three
hundred cattle and two thousand hogs. Meeting with most satisfactory
results in his venture, he purchased seven acres of land in Imperial,
where he erected a large, modernly constructed slaughter house, which
he keeps in a perfectly sanitary condition, and has since built up a very
lucrative business as a wholesale butcher and packer of meat. His main
business office is in Imperial, and he has a branch office in Calexico. Xow,
in 1912, Mr. Long feeds ten thousand cattle and as many hogs each
year, while he slaughters two hundred and fifty cattle, two hundred and
fifty hogs, and two hundred sheep each month. He supplies Imperial
Valley with fresh meat, and on his own ranch raises about seven hun-
dred turkeys each year for the domestic market, this branch of industry
being a side issue with him. Aside from caring for his own ranch of
three hundred and twenty acres, Mr. Long leases three thousand, seven
hundred acres for grazing purposes.

He married, in 1906, Catherine Glaude, of Phoenix, Arizona.

JOHN H. RUPP. Of the progressive and public-spirited citizens ol
San Bernardino county none is more worthy of representation in this
publication than John Henry Rupp, the present popular and efficient
postmaster of the flourishing little city of Cucamonga. Mr. Rupp claims
the Hawkeye state as the place of his nativity and is a representative of
one of its sterling pioneer families. He was born at Keota, Keokuk
county, Iowa, on the 9th of November, 1870, and is a son of John T.

478 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and Mary (Hach) Rupp, both of whom were born in Germany. John
J. Rupp is a son of Rev. John Rupp, who immigrated with his family
to America in 1854 and whose father was a native of Switzerland, whence
the latter removed to Germany, where he passed the residue of his life.
At the time of his immigration to the United States Rev. John Rupp
came in company with about forty other German families, all of whom
settled in Lee county, Iowa, where he was a leader and counselor of the
pioneer colony. With the assistance of his sons Rev. John Rupp re-
claimed in the county mentioned a homestead farm of one hundred and
sixty acres, and there he continued to reside until 1868, when he re-
moved to Washington county, that state, where he purchased a half-
section of wild land, on what was known as the Ridge. He initiated the
improvement of this large tract of land but in 1874 he disposed of the
same and removed to McPherson county, Kansas, where he purchased
six hundred and forty acres of prairie land, seventeen miles southeast
of McPherson, the judicial center of the county. There he repeated
his pioneer experiences and on this homestead he continued to reside
until his death, which occurred when he was about eighty-six years of
age. This honored patriarch was for several years pastor of a German
Mennonite church while a resident of Iowa and after his removal to
Kansas he preached in various churches of this denomination. He was
a man of sublimated integrity and honor, generous and kindly and ever
ready to aid those in affliction or distress. He was most generous in
assisting others during the pioneer days in Iowa and through this me-
dium he met with considerable financial loss, though he accumulated,
through well directed industry, a competency before his death. The
maiden name of his loved and devoted wife was Mary Hirschler and
her brother, Christain Hirschler, was the first representative of the
Hirschler family in America, to which country he came from the old
home in Germany when he was a youth of seventeen years. He resided
in various eastern states and from Kansas he came to California and be-
came one of the early settlers of San Diego. He is still living and now
maintains his home in the city of Los Angeles. Mrs. Mary Rupp sur-
vived her honored husband by about a decade and died on the old home-
stead in Kansas at a venerable age. Of the thirteen children, John J.
was the fifth in order of birth, and of the number two sons and two
daughters are now living.

John J. Rupp was a lad of fourteen years at the time of the family
immigration to the United States and was reared to maturity under the
influences of the pioneer homestead in Iowa, where he eventually became
the owner of a farm, in Washington county. In March, 1876. he sold
this property and removed to McPherson county, Kansas, where he ef-
fected the purchase of three hundred and twenty acres of prairie land,
which he developed into one of the fine farms of the Sunflower state.
He still owns the old homestead and at one time held in Kansas a landed
estate of eight hundred acres. He was indefatigable in his labors, en-
dowed with good judgment and marked business acumen, and as an
agriculturist and stock-grower he gained success of noteworthy order.
He gave much of his land to his children and in 1909 came with his
cherished wife to California. He purchased an attractive home at Up-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 479

land, San Bernardino county, and has since divided his time between
this place and the old homestead farm in Kansas, in the enjoyment of
former years of earnest toil and endeavor. His wife was about eight-
een years of age when she came to America and she lived for some time
in the home of an aunt, in the state of New York. Later she went to
Iowa, where she met and married Mr. Rupp, to whom she has ever
proved a devoted companion and helpmeet. Of their eight children
seven are living, and concerning them the following brief data are
entered: Emma E. is the wife of Richard R. Williams, a successful
contractor and builder at Upland, California ; John H. is the immediate
subject of this review ; Edward \V. is a resident of Mound Ridge, Kan-
sas, where he is engaged in farming; William H. resides near Cucamonga
and is an orange grower ; Clara M. is the wife of Frank Welty, of Ta-
coma, Washington, where both are successful teachers of music, in
which they received the best of training in Germany ; Otto C. is a resi-
dent of McPherson county, Kansas, where he is devoting his attention
to farming and stock-growing, as is also David O., the next in order of
birth and the youngest of the children. Esther died at the age of one
year.

John Henry Rupp, postmaster of Cucamonga, was reared to the
sturdy discipline of the home farms of his father in Iowa and Kansas,
to which latter state his parents removed when he was six years of age.
He was afforded the advantages of the public schools of Kansas and
continued to be associated in the work and management of the home-
stead farm until 1892, when he came to California, where he passed
seven months for the purpose of recuperating his health. He then re-
turned to Kansas but he found that the climate again impaired his health,
and in June, 1894, he came again to California. He resided for a few
years at Ontario and Upland, San Bernardino county, and then pur-
chased land at Cucamonga, where he planted twenty acres to oranges.
Irrigation facilities at that time were meager, and he drilled a well from
which to secure the necessary water for his orange grove. Later he
sold his property and for two years he was in the employ of the govern-
ment as forest ranger in the San Gabriel valley. He then returned to
Cucamonga, where he has since maintained his home and where he
owns a fine orchard adjacent to the business center, as well as an attract-
ive modern residence and buildings devoted to business purposes. He
has taken a lively interest in all that has tended to advance the material
and civic prosperity of his home community and is a citizen who com-
mands secure place in popular confidence and esteem. He was engaged
in the livery business in Cucamonga about two years and in April, 1908,
he was appointed postmaster of the village, an office in which he has
since continued to give careful and acceptable service. In politics Mr.
Rupp is aligned as a stalwart in the local ranks of the republican party
and he has given effective service in behalf of its cause.

On the gth of March, 1899, Mr. Rupp was united in marriage to Miss
Nancy Spangler, who was born in the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Seven children were born of this felicitous union : Florence Naomi,
Vera Rebecca, Lucile Spangler, Mary Graham, John George, Joy Moy-
ser and Charles Jared, and all are living except the last named, who

480 AMKRICAX BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

died in infancy. Mr. and Mrs. Rupp are members of the Xazarene
church at Cucamonga.

George C. Spangler, father of Mrs. Rupp, was born at Columbus,
Ohio, and is a scion of an old colonial family of German lineage. Mr.
Spangler was engaged in the plumbing and gas-fitting business in Pitts-
burgh for many years, and his father, George Spangler, conducted in
that city for a protracted period two large tailoring establishments.
George C. Spangler, who still resides in Pittsburgh, married Miss Nancy
Jane Graham, daughter of Robert Graham. She was born in England
and was a child at the time of her parents' removal to America, her
mother dying soon afterward, at Hillside, Pennsylvania. Mrs. Spangler
died in Pittsburgh, on the loth of June, 1885, having been the mother of
eight children, of whom three are deceased.

L. O. HARVUOT. Identified with lines of industrial enterprise which
have important bearing on the business advancement of any community
— abstracts and titles — L. O. Harvuot, manager of the Peoples Abstract
and Trust Company, of El Centro, California, has been associated with
one of the strongest institutions of this kind that have been promoted
in this section of the state, and the record of his career stands as ample
evidence of his capability as a business man. Even as the Imperial Val-
ley is still in its youth, so have its industrial activities been placed in the
control of young men, who constitute the virile and vital elements which
make for consecutive progress and substantial development, and among
this class Mr. Harvuot stands pre-eminent. He was born in Indiana,
in 1877, and is a son of William C. and Margaret I. (Best) Harvuot,
and the sixth in order of birth of their seven children.

Mr. Harvuot was reared and educated in his native state, and is a
high school graduate. His life has been largely devoted to clerical pur-
suits, and his advent in California was in 1901, at which time he located
in Riverside and soon became interested in the abstract business. For
five years his services were given to the Riverside Abstract Company,
after leaving which he went to San Diego and entered the office of the
Union Title and Trust Company, where he remained two years, eventu-
ally returning to Riverside, where he assisted in organizing the Union
Title and Abstract Company, and became its manager. The Peoples
Abstract and Trust Company took over the interests of the Imperial
Valley Abstract Title and Trust Company, and was first incorporated in
Riverside county, California, in 1897, but eventually sold its interests
there to the Riverside Title and Trust Company, some of the stock-
holders of the old organization, however, still retaining their holdings.
The present company, organized in 1908, is governed by the following
officers : Philo Jones, president ; John B. Baker, secretary ; D. W. Lewis,
assistant secretary ; L. O. Harvuot, manager ; and these gentlemen, with
Leroy Holt, F. B. Fuller, D. R. Crawford, R. E. Wills and W. W. Apple,
are directors. Mr. Harvuot's ten years of experience well qualify him
for his present position, and his efficiency is evidenced by the order and
dispatch with which the office business is handled. On the books of this
company may be found some of the most desirable business done in
this section of the state, and the firm bears a high reputation in its field.

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 483

Mr. Harvuot is alert and progessive and his marked executive ability
has been the dominating force in conserving the success and expansion of
the important enterprise in charge of whose affairs he is placed.

In 1901 Mr. Harvuot was united in marriage with Miss Lula Smith,
and to them one child has been born : Merlynn. In business and social
circles Mr. Harvuot has high standing. He is looked upon as one of the
leading young business men of the Imperial Valley, and is always found
at the front when an enterprise for the advancement of the community
is started or contemplated. He has breadth of view, unyielding energy,
public spirit of a high order, and generosity in every good cause.

CUCAMONGA VINEYARD. As a matter of historical expediency and
consistency the flolowing interesting data are incorporated in this volume,
and the above title is given to the article by reason of its historical im-
port as well as for the purpose of perpetuating the subject matter under
an appropriate heading. The name signifies to those familiar with the
annals of San Bernardino county much of pleasing reminiscence in re-
gard to the early stages of development and progress in this now favored
section of southern California, and the accompanying record will be
gratifying to all settlers as well as to those who have here estabished
homes in later years.

Among the Cucamonga hills and on the mesa below was established
in the early days a rancheria of Indians who had never come directly
under the benignant influences of the Catholic missions whose history
constitutes so interesting and picturesque a part of the annals of Cali-
fornia. These Indians had occupied the lands noted at the time when
the Spanish pioneers first came into the country, and the history of their
existence is but the common history of the American aborigines.

In 1839 Governor Alvarado granted this tract of land to Tiburcio
Tapia, a wealthy and influential citizen of Los Angeles. Concerning the
latter, Robinson, the well known historical writer of the early days,
wrote as follows : "We stopped at the house of Don Tiburcio Tapia,
the alcalde constitutionale (constitutional judge) of the town, who was
once a common soldier but who, by honest and industrious labor, had
amassed so much of this world's goods as to make him one of the
wealthiest inhabitants of the place. His strict integrity gave him credit
to any amount (with the trading vessels which Robinson represented),
so that he was the principal merchant and only native one in el Puebo
de Los Angeles." Don Tiburcio employed the unsuspecting natives to
aid him in building a house, which was practically a fortress, upon one
of the highest hills of the grant. The Indians also assisted in setting
out vineyards and orchards and in caring for live stock. Some Mexicans
were brought in as the live stock increased, and as the settlement grew
the Indians were gradually driven from their fields back into the hills
and canons. When their crops failed them it was only natural that they
should seize occasionally on a beef fattened on their own lands Senor
Tapia was at last forced to employ guards to protect his cattle, and
finally the depredations grew so frequent that his ranchmen went out
in force and precipitated a fierce battle, which resulted in the extinction

Vol. 1—24

484 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

of the greater part of the Cucamonga Indians, whose existence as a
separate rancheria was thus ended.

Many tales of battles, of buried treasure, of love and hatred, are
told in connection with the old and almost feudal house on the red hill
and the estate of Cucamonga. One of these tales is to the following
effect : Don Tiburcio amassed a large amount of property and especially
of gold coin, — something astounding for those days. When rumors of
American occupation began to disturb the country he feared that this
coin might not be safe in Los Angeles, and he accordingly transferred
it to his ranch home. But even here he became uneasy, and one night,
so the story goes, he packed the gold into an iron-bound chest, loaded it
into his cart, and, taking a blindfolded Indian with him, went off into
the hills. He returned without the chest and shortly afterward he died
suddenly. When his daughter came, some years later, to live in the old
house she was constantly troubled by a mysterious light moving about
and finally stopping on one particular point on the wall of the room
formerly occupied by her father. At last her husband determined to
satisfy her of the idleness of her imagination, and he accordingly dug
into the clay wall. To his own discomfiture he found a small skin purse,
in which was a sheet of parchment containing some tracing and writing,
together with a Spanish coin. This was supposed to be the key to the
hidden treasure, but the document was already so disfigured that it was
not decipherable. The Indian held the word he had given to his old
master as inviolable, and intimated only taat the box was buried at the
foot of an old oak tree. Credulous searching parties, from the death of
Senor Tapia down to the present day, have excavated at the roots of
oak trees or places where oak trees were supposed to have stood, all
through that section, but no treasure trove, so far as known, has ever
been discovered.

After the death of Senor Tapia the estate was managed for the
daughter, Maria Merced, by his old major-domo and campadre. Jose
M. Yaldez. Lender the supervision of Valdez the "mother" vineyard of
the Cucamonga estate, containing twelve rows of forty-seven vines each,
was planted, and from this stock other vineyards were started. A
winery and a distillery were put up. The daughter, who had been
reared in the home of a French family in Los Angeles, married a French
settler of that city, Leon Y. Prudhomme.

In 1857 the rancho land came into the hands of John Rains, through
his marriage with Maria Merced, the daughter of Isaac Williams, of
Chino rancho. Rains, who was an enterprising and progressive young
American, at once began improving the place, by planting more vines
and adding more live stock. A correspondent of the Los Angeles Star,
in 1859. after stating that one hundred and twenty-five thousand addi-
tional vines had been set out. thus describes the Cucamonga vineyard :
"This vinevard is laid out in ten-acre lots, with roads two rods wide
traversing it. In the center of the vineyard is a lot two acres square, to
be reserved for wine-press, cellars and' necessary buildings, which are
enclosed by fruit and ornamental trees. The plans were made under the
supervision of F. P. Dunlap."

Mr. Rains abandoned the old fortress on the hill and built a house

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 487

which was complete in every respect and which became a center for the
social activities of the country round about. The winery, shops and
stage station gave employment to many men, and Cucamonga became
the most important point between San Bernardino and Los Angeles, the
while its wines were known for their fine quality all over the state, — a
reputation maintained to the present day. John Rains filled a prominent
place in the business and political life of the time. In 1860 he and John
Bidwell were delegates to the democratic national convention at Charles-
ton, South Carolina. In 1861 occurred the terrible tragedy of his assas-
sination. While he was driving from his fine estate to Los Angeles he
was held up and shot to death by a gang of outlaws and bandits, who
were intent upon robbery. His body was hidden away in a cactus patch
upon the desert and it was nearly a week later before it was found and
given interment.

Since the days of John Rains' ownership and the settlement and de-
velopment of the Cucamonga district many changes have been wrought,
but the old and historical property has been owned for more than thirty
years by I. W. Hellman, of Los Angeles, and others, he holding the
controlling interest. Portions of the original land grant have been di-
vided and sold for the propagation of citrus fruits and for vineyard
purposes, and now a large and prosperous population is found in the
district whose romantic history must ever be of more than passing inter-
est. The new village of Cucamonga occupies a part of the original
grant. The original site of the old winery and stage station is on San
Bernardino avenue, near what is known as the "Big bridge" over the
Cucamonga creek, and between the villages of Cucamonga and LTpland.
The old winery is still used for its original purpose and in this district
there are vines which were planted by the missionaries more than
seventy-five years ago and which are still producing grapes.

JUDGE FRANKLIN J. COLE. There are no rules for building character;
there are no rules for achieving success. Thus it is that a man who can
rise from a lowly station to one of honor and marked responsibility
is he who can discern and make fit utilization of the opportunities that
present themselves. The life of the Hon. Franklin J. Cole, judge of
the superior court of Imperial county, has been marked by consecutive
advancement, and today he is recognized as one of the able jurists of the
Golden state. As the law is the conservator of the rights and best in-
terests of all men, so must we look for its administration to men of
thorough technical learning and utmost probity of character, and among
those who have conferred honor and dignity in the exercise of high
judicial functions, as well as in the active practice of the law, Judge
Cole stands pre-eminent.

Judge Cole is a native of the state of Iowa, and was born in Mason
City, in 1874, a son of John E. and Sarah J. (Sangwin) Cole. The great-
grandfather of the Judge was Nathaniel Cole. He was a soldier in
the war of the Revolution, and his residence was near Peekskill,
New York, where his son, Ebenezer Cole was born about the year 1809,
the latter being the grandfather of Judge Cole. John E. Cole was born
in Broome county, New York, July 14, 1838, and on December 5, 1861,

488 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

was married to Sarah J. Sangwin, who was born in the state of Pennsyl-
vania, of English parentage. Eight children were born to this union, as
follows : W. E., cashier of the Bank of Ashton, South Dakota ; Mrs. C.
I. Tenny, of Des Moines, Iowa; Charles C., a general insurance agent of
Seattle, Washington ; Perry O., principal in the schools of Pasadena,
California; Judge Franklin J. ; Mrs. G. M. Yirmilya, of Holtville, Cali-
fornia ; Elmer J., a resident of Milwaukee, Wisconsin ; and Mrs. Grace
Johnson, of Springfield, Massachusetts.

Franklin J. Cole was reared and educated in his native state, and
after attending for two years the Nora Springs Seminary began to de-
vote his energies to various occupations as they came to hand. Even-
tually he secured employment in a lumber yard in Mason City, where he
worked four years, and during the quiet seasons attended a commercial
school and was given a position in the office of the firm. Rising step
by step, he eventually was promoted to the managership of the company,
which had yards in the various large cities of the country, and his duties
finally took him to Minneapolis, where he held a responsible position with
a large milling and lumber company. At the outbreak of the Spanish-
American war. being a member of the Iowa National Guard, Mr. Cole
resigned his position as traveling salesman for the Iowa department and
went with Company A, of the Fifty-second Iowa Regiment, to Chick-
amauga Camp. On his return to Iowa he was stricken with typhoid
fever, and on his recovery took the management of a steam laundry at
Mason City, Iowa, where he remained two years.

During this time Mr. Cole accumulated the means to turn his atten-
tion to the study of law, to which profession his mind had been turned
for some time. In September, 1901, he entered the Iowa State Univer-
sity, taking a three-year course in the law department, was admitted to
the Phi Delta Phi fraternity, became president of his class, and was
graduated with honors in 1904. In the same year he began the practice
of his profession in Mason City, but during the following year removed
to California, and for the next two years practiced at Holtville, where
he also held the position of secretary of Imperial Water Company Xo. 5.
In 1907, when Imperial county was formed, Mr. Cole was nominated
for the office of judge of the superior court, on the citizens' ticket, and
elected for a short term, and in 1908 was an independent candidate for
reelection. A strenuous campaign followed, but Judge Cole received the
support of the farming contingency, and a sweeping majority returned
him to the office he had honored. His present term will expire in 1914.
He has gained the confidence and respect of all classes of citizens, and
his retention in his important office implies the conservation of the best
interests of the state so far as regulated by his judicial acts in his dis-
trict. He is thoroughly read in the science and technicalities of law,
having a comprehensive knowledge of jurisprudence and precedents, and
his rulings have been at all times signally fair and impartial and have
seldom met with reversal. A man of fine intellectual attainments, he has
the confidence and esteem of the people of his adopted community and
the warm friendship of a host of admirers. On January i, 1911, he was
elected vice president of the First National Bank of El Centro.

In 1906 Judge Cole was married to Miss Lou Etta Richards, daugh-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 489

ter of John T. and Selena Richards, of Mason City, and a graduate of
Iowa College. The father of Mrs. Cole died at Mason City, Iowa, in
1903, when sixty-seven years of age. Two children have b.een born to
this union, Hortense C. Cole, born November 17, 1908, and Marjorie
Cole, born December 31, 1911. Judge Cole in politics is a Progressive
Republican and was born a Republican. He is a member of El Centro
Lodge, No. 384, A. F. & A. M., and both he and his wife are members of
the Methodist Episcopal church of El Centro. The family moves in
those social circles where gracious refinement is ever in evidence.

JOHN T. BRADY. Well entitled to recognition in this publication as
one of the representative citizens and influential business men of the
beautiful little city of Pomona, Los Angeles county, Mr. Brady has been
long and prominently identified with banking and other financial inter-
ests, and he has been an influential factor in furthering the development
and upbuilding of the city in which he maintains his home and in which
he has a secure place in popular confidence and esteem.

John Thomas Brady is a representative of one of the sterling pioneer
families of Cass county, Illinois, where he was born on the i/th of Octo-
ber, 1834. He is a son of Charles and Mahala (Graves) Brady, both of
whom were born and reared in Washington county, Kentucky, both the
Brady and Graves families having been founded in America in the co-
lonial period of its history and both having been for many years repre-
sented as prosperous landholders and planters in Kentucky. Charles
Brady and Mahala Graves were reared in their native state, where their
marriage was solemnized and where their two eldest children were born.
In 1818 they removed to the wilds of what is now Cass county, Illinois,
then a part of Morgan county, where Mr. Brady secured a tract of
government land, near the present site of Virginia, the county seat of
Cass county. The land was partly prairie and partly timbered, and he
reclaimed the same into a productive farm, with incidental prosperity.
He was one of the honored pioneers of -that section of Illinois and con-
tributed his quota to its civic and material development and upbuilding,
the while he was an influential factor in public affairs of a local order. He
was a whig in politics and both he and his wife held membership in the
Christian church. Of the eleven children nine attained to years of ma-
turity and three sons and one daughter are now living, the subject of
this review having been the sixth in order of birth. The father died at
the age of fifty-four years, at Virginia, Cass county, and the mother, long
surviving him, was summoned to the life eternal at the venerable age
of eighty-eight years.

John Thomas Brady was reared to the sturdy discipline of the pio-
neer farm of his parents and early began to aid in its work, the while he
availed himself of the advantages of the somewhat primitive schools of
the locality and period. He remained at the parental home until he had
attained to the age of twenty-four years, when he removed to Brown
county, Kansas, where he secured government land and where he
eventually became an extensive farmer and stock-grower, through which
basic lines of industrial enterprise he laid the foundation for his large
financial success. He was numbered among the earliest settlers of that

490 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

section of the Sunflower state, where he took up his abode in 1859, and
his present status as a man of affairs and large capitalistic interests
represents the concrete results of his assiduous and well directed ef-
forts as one of the world's productive workers. In 1882 Mr. Brady
effected the organization of the Citizens' State Bank of Sabetha,
Nemaha county. Kansas, of which he became president, and to the active
supervision of which he gave his attention. The enterprise proved suc-
cessful and in 1884 the institution was consolidated with the First Na-
tional Bank of Sabetha. which had originally been organized as a state
bank. He continued as president of the First National Bank, which
gained wide prestige and marked success under his administration, and
in the meanwhile he continued to give personal supervision to the affairs
of his extensive landed estate. In 1890 he disposed of his varied inter-
ests in Kansas and removed to California, within whose gracious borders
he had previously passed two winters. He purchased a tract of partially
improved land in the Ontario colony of San Bernardino county and there
engaged in the propagation of oranges. Later he purchased and sold
many orange groves, and through his extensive operations in this line he
has contributed greatly to the development of the citrus fruit industry in
southern California. In the autmun of 1891 Mr. Brady established his
home at Pomona, where he soon afterward organized the National Bank
of Pomona, which was incorporated with a capital stock of fifty thou-
sand dollars and of which he became president, the other members of
the original executive corps having been Dr. M. B. Campbell, who was
vice-president, G. A. Lathrop, who was cashier, and T. W. Johnson, as-
sistant cashier. The bank paid a dividend after six months and it be-
came one of the strong and important financial institutions of southern
California under the able administration of Mr. Brady and his valued
colleagues. He continued president of the institution for fifteen con-
secutive years, and in 1902 the interests of the Peoples' State Bank were
purchased and consolidated with the National Bank of Pomona, which
was reorganized two years later, under its present title of the American
National Bank, the capital stock being simultaneously increased to one
hundred thousand dollars. This is now the most substantial and pros-
perous banking concern in this section of the state, with large resources
and wide ramification of business. In January. 1906. Mr. Brady retired
from the presidency of this bank, in order to give his supervision to his
other large and varied interests, but he still continues to be one of the
largest stockholders of the institution.

In 1892 Mr. Brady was one of those primarily instrumental in ef-
fecting the organization of the Mutual Building & Loan Association of
Pomona, which has been a most potent force in furthering the develop-
ment of the city and surrounding country and which has exercised espe-
cially benignant functions in enabling hundreds of citizens to secure for
themselves desirable homes in this beautiful section. Mr. Brady is now
the only one of the original directors of this corporation who is still
serving as such, and he has been president of the association since 1895,
directing its affairs with consummate discrimination and progressiveness.
His career as a financier and business man has been a most admirable one
in every respect', and has shown his integrity of purpose, his considera-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 491

tion for others and his broad-minded attitude. In the operations of
the Building & Loan Association it has never met with losses, has never
brought suit against any person, and every investment made by others
through its interposition has paid them more than they invested. Only
one piece of property has been taken over in settlement in all these years,
and the same was later sold at a profit. The association began operations
with a capital of more than one-half million dollars, with assets of a
similar amount.

There were formerly two corporations furnishing water for Pomona
for domestic and other purposes, and the activities of these opposing
interests were a cause of constant annoyance and trouble in connection
with service. Lender these conditions Mr. Brady was one of those who
brought about a consolidation of the two companies, in 1896, under the
present title of the Consolidated Water Company of Pomona. The
amalgamation of interests proved of inestimable benefit to the city and
Mr. Brady became one of the original stockholders of the consolidated
corporation, of which he was a director for many years and of which
he has been president since 1903. No water concern in the state has a
more admirable equipment and service, the supply of water being
brought from the mountains in a fine tunnel and a pressure of one hun-
dred and twenty pounds being afforded for protection from fire. In 1910
the water company expended thirty-five thousand dollars in the install-
ing of the fine new fire-protection system which places Pomona on a
parity with the best metropolitan centers in this respect.

While his large private interests have placed heavy demands upon
his time and attention .Mr. Brady has been insistently liberal and pro-
gressive as a citizen and his public spirit has been of the highest type.
In politics he is aligned as a staunch and effective supporter of the prin-
ciples and policies of the Republican party, and while he has had no de-
sire for public office he was appointed by Governor Pardee to succeed
Chairman Longdon of the board of supervisors of Los Angeles county
in 1906, to fill out the unexpired term of the original incumbent, who
died about that time. This is the only public, office Mr. Brady has held
and he continued in tenure of the same as a director about fourteen
months, until his successor was elected.

At this juncture it is pleasing to revert to an earlier phase of the
career of Mr. Brady, for it was his to accord loyal service in defense of
the Union in the Civil war, by reason of which fact he is eligible for and
holds membership in Pomona Post, No. 75, Grand Army of the Repub-
lic. On August 15, 1861, Mr. Brady enlisted as a private in the Seventh
Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, known as the "Jayhawkers," and commanded
by Colonel Jamieson and Lieutenant Colonel D. R. Anthony, the latter
a brother of that noble woman and philanthropist, the late Susan B.
Anthony. The regiment was assigned to the Fifteenth Army Corps,
under General Sherman, and in this gallant command Mr. Brady was in
active service for more than three years, within which he lived up to the
full tension of the great conflict between the north and south. He took
part in the battles of Corinth and luka, Mississippi, and many minor en-
gagements, but the most of his service was in Tennessee. On account
of illness and consequent incapacitation he was left with others at Holly

492 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Springs, Mississippi, and later he was captured by General Price's raid-
ers, but was soon released. He received his honorable discharge at
Leavemvorth, Kansas, in October, 1864, and his record as a soldier is
one that will ever be to his honor. Mr. Brady, when twenty-two years
of age, served as a member of a jury at Beardstown, Illinois, before
which Abraham Lincoln defended and secured the acquittal of one of
his boyhood playmates, who had been charged with a criminal offense,
and of that jury, judge and officers of the court Mr. Brady is now the
only surviving member. His recollection of the appearance and earnest,
plea of the martyred president is of the most vivid order. Mr. Lincoln
used a James almanac for reference to prove that the evidence of the
only witness for prosecution for the state was not competent, as it was
stated by the witness that he saw him struck by a slung shot at a distance
of ten feet. .Mr. Lincoln, however, proved from the almanac that the
moon was so nearly gone that it was impossible to see. Mr. Brady has
been affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows for nearly
sixty years, and he is also a member of Pomona Lodge, No. 789, Be-
nevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He and his wife are members
of the Unitarian church and are liberal supporters of its various activities.
On the 22d of December, 1870, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Brady to Miss Emily E. Collins, who, like himself, was born and reared
in Cass county, Illinois, where her father, Thomas Collins, was a repre-
sentative agriculturist and pioneer settler.

J. L. McGuiRE. Adjoining the city of El Centre, California, is the
handsome and profitable ranch of J. L. McGuire. It is one of the best
in the vicinity of the famous Imperial Valley, and represents the ac-
cumulation of patience and industry, notable characteristics of its owner,
whose life has been busy and useful, furnishing an example of honor-
able effort, steadfast purpose and fidelity to principle. J. L. McGuire is
an Arkansan, and was born in 1857, a son of \Yilliam and Mary (At-
kins) McGuire, natives of Tennessee, of whose ten children he is the
oldest.

Mr. McGuire was reared in his native state and there secured his
education, and as a youth worked on a cotton plantation. In 1880 he
migrated to Texas, where he became a successful ranch owner and stock
raiser, owning eight sections of land and handling as many as six hun-
dred head of cattle at a time. In 1906 he followed the example of many
of the citizens of the Lone Star state and came to the Imperial Valley,
where his subsequent success amply justified the move. He is at pres-
ent the owner of three hundred and forty acres of land, all of which
is under cultivation and is devoted to alfalfa and barley. Mr. McGuire
cuts seven crops of alfalfa per season, harvesting his crops every six
weeks, and raises from fifteen to thirty-five sacks of barley per acre.
He owns a modern threshing outfit, complete in every detail, and not only
threshes his own barley but also that of the neighboring ranch owners.
A practical and progressive ranchman, up-to-date methods have always
found favor with him, and his intimate knowledge of the science of till-
ing the soil has given him a distinct advantage over those who still ad-
here to the old hit-or-miss style. His land has all been cultivated by

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 495

himself, and the appropriate and convenient manner in which its build-
ings are situated may serve as an example worthy of emulation by those
who desire a model ranch.

On December 7, 1877, Mr. McGuire was married to Miss Maggie
Bradley, a native of Texas, and nine children have been born to this
union, namely: Roy, William, Henry, Robert, Irene, Susan. Raymond,
Richard and Earl. Roy, the second born, is now deceased. The father
of Mrs. McGuire, J. P. Bradley, is now deceased, but the mother sur-
vives and resides in Holtville, California. Mr. McGuire is a member
of the Masonic fraternity, and is popular with the members of the local
lodge, as he is, in fact, with all who have come in contact with him.
Public-spirited to a high degree, he is always ready to assist in advancing
movements for the benefit of the community, and holds a prominent
place among those who have made and are making the Imperial Valley
one of the garden spots of the Golden West.

GEORGE FROST. Far removed from the land of his nativity is the
present beautiful home of this well known citizen of San Bernardino
county, who is living virtually retired, at Etiwanda, and to whom must
be attributed special credit and distinction for the effective part he
has taken in the development of this beautiful section of California.
He holds as his own the confidence and high regard of those who know
him, and his standing in the community is such as to well justify his
representation in this publication.

Mr. Frost was born in the historic old city of Plymouth, England,
on the 22d of May, 1846, and is the only representative of the family
in America. He is a son of John and Mary (Stephens) Frost, repre-
sentatives of families that have been for many generations identified
with agricultural pursuits in England, where its members have been
sturdy yeomen and citizens of sterling character. John Frost was identi-
fied with the great basic industry of agriculture through practically his
entire active career, and he died at the age of seventy years, his widow
being summoned to eternal rest about two years later, at the age of sev-
enty-two years. Of the ten children, seven attained to adult age, and of
the entire number, George, of this review, was the seventh in order of
birth.

Under the invigorating discipline of the old homestead farm in
Devonshire, England, George Frost was reared to maturity, and in the
meanwhile he was not neglectful of the advantages offered by the common
schools of the locality, so that he well fortified himself for the active
duties and responsibilities of life, — developing a sound mind in a sound
body. At the age of twenty-five years he severed the ties that bound him
to home and native land and immigrated to America. At Belleville,
province of Ontario, Canada, he secured a position in the employ of Hon.
Robert Reed, a member of the provincial senate, and he there attended
a commercial college for nearly two years. For about two years thereafter
he was employed on the farm of an institution for the deaf and dumb
at Belleville, and he then went to Kingston, on the St. Lawrence river,
one of the oldest cities of the province of Ontario. There he was em-
ployed for six years in connection with the market-gardening and florist

496 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

business of Joseph Xicoll, a member of a family of expert florists and
landscape gardeners. It is interesting to record that one of the repre-
sentatives of this family had the supervision of planting trees along the
beautiful Euclid avenue, in the Ontario colony of San Bernardino county,
California, in the early days. It is due to the admirable training he
secured as a gardener in his native land and later in Canada that Mr.
Frost developed such fine ability along the lines of gardening and flori-
culture.

In the autumn of 1882, Mr. Frost left Canada and came to California,
and, making the southern part of the state his destination, he had to come
by the only railroad route then in existence. Proceeding by the Grand
Trunk Railroad from Canada to Chicago, and thence to Topeka, Kansas,
he there took a train on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe system to
Deming, New Mexico, from which point he came over the Southern
Pacific to Colton, San Bernardino county. He was eleven days en route
and from the Missouri river westward was in an immigrant car attached
to a fast freight train. It was a long and dreary trip across the plains,
and the train was greatly delayed on account of the many stops, day and
night, to rid the train of tramps who were attempting to steal rides by vari-
ous surreptitious means. Soon after his arrival in California, Mr. Frost
located in the Etiwanda colony, which was then marked principally by a
desert waste of sage brush and cacti. He entered the employ of Chaffey
Brothers, who had previously platted the colony and sold portions of the
land to settlers. In the summer of 1884, Mr. Frost began taking super-
vision of lands here owned by non-residents and others, and during the
several years which he devoted to this line of work he cleared and im-
proved much land, including the planting of many orchards and vine-
yards. In the meanwhile, he purchased twenty acres of land, which was
largely devoted to vineyard purposes in the early days and fifteen acres
of which he ultimately devoted to the propagation of citrus fruits, re-
taining the remaining five acres as a vineyard. Here he has maintained
his home during the long intervening years and he has developed the
property into one of the best in the district. He has been distinctively
successful in connection with fruit culture and also in the buying and sell-
ing of real estate in this district. In 1887 Mr. Frost purchased a small
general store in Etiwanda. and he enlarged the store and stock, in which
connection he built up a most flourishing business. He conducted this,
the only store in the village, for ten years and also served during this
period as postmaster, having the postoffice in his store. At the expira-
tion of the period noted he sold his interest in the mercantile business to
his sons. William H. and John, who have since continued the business
very successfully. For many years Mr. Frost has been a stockholder
in the Etiwanda Water Company, a mutual organization that supplies
water for irrigation purposes to the landholders interested, at less cost
than in any other portion of the San Bernardino valley. The facilities
controlled by the residents of the district in this line are unexcelled in
southern California. Land-owners of the district formed the co-operative
organization known as the People's Improvement Company, and this
organization purchased all stock covering water rights in the Etiwanda
district. Mr. Frost was secretary and a director of this company from

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 499

the time of its organization until it went into voluntary liquidation, after
having compassed the object for which it was formed. He was also one
of the organizers of each of three different fruit-growers' associations,
for the protection of the interests of fruit-growers in the Etiwanda dis-
trict, and he served as president of one of these, besides having been a
director of each of the other two. He has shown himself zealous and
liberal in the promotion of measures and enterprises projected for the
general good of the community and he and his family are held in high
esteem in the community to whose upbuilding he has contributed in
generous measure. Though never an aspirant for political office, Mr.
Frost accords staunch allegiance to the Republican party, and his wife
holds membership in the Congregational church.

In the year 1876 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Frost to Miss
Venelia Utman, who was born and reared in the province of Ontario,
Canada, and they have four children, of whom three were born in
Canada and the youngest after the removal to California. The names
of the four sons, all of whom are sterling young men, are as here noted :
George Edgar, William Henry, John and'Charles Nelson. William H.
and John succeeded their father in the mercantile business, as already
noted ; George E. and Charles N. are also both residents of Etiwanda,
and engaged in the fruit industry.

D. G. WHITING. In the United States there has ever been that tend-
ency to press forward, even when there are serious dangers to be en-
countered, for the people are essentially home-seekers and when one
locality becomes congested the more adventurous leave for those that
promise better things. History continually repeats itself, and in nothing
more than in the great migrations which take place from one section to
another less civilized, therefore no history of the Imperial Valley would
be completed did not it contain the names and sketches of the pioneer
settlers. Among these may be mentioned D. G. Whiting, whose ranch
is located three miles due southeast of El Centra, at a point where the
Southern Pacific Railroad crosses the county road, one of the show places
of the valley. Mr. Whiting was born in 1847. in the state of Vermont,
and was there reared and educated, the eldest of the five children of
Calvin and Caroline Whiting, natives of New Hampshire and Vermont,
respectively.

In 1870 Mr. Whiting came to California, taking up stockraising and
driving cattle into Idaho and Nevada for two years. He came to south-
ern California in 1877 and located near San Bernardino, where he lived
for twenty-five years before coming to Imperial Valley, in 1902. In
the spring of that year he filed on his present property, when the valley
was first attracting attention, it being than a vast desert with many pos-
sibilities, but few probabilities. He had his choice of the thousands of
acres then to be selected, and it is evidence of his good judgment that he
selected three of the best quarter-sections in the county. The land is
as level as a billiard table, and of the four hundred and eighty acres,
three hundred have been seeded to alfalfa and have a remarkably fine
stand. The remainder of the ranch is in barley, corn, etc., while a fine
family orchard demonstrates that the land is specially adapted to the

500 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GEXEALOGY

production of deciduous and citrus fruits. He has a herd of sixty pure
bred Jersey cows, and as much more young stock, all registered or
eligible to register, purchasing his hulls from Eastern breeders, who im-
port direct -from the Island of Jersey. The milk is separated on the
farm and the cream sold to local creameries. Mr. Whiting still owns
ranching properties within a mile of the city limits of San Bernardino,
where he resided before coming to his present place, situated about one
and one-half miles from Heber.

In December. 1872, Mr. Whiting was married to Miss Jeanette Moss-
man, who died in 1909, having been the mother of the following chil-
dren: Arthur C. ; Mrs. Edith F. Dickson; Cora B., who is a trained
nurse; and Walter C. Mr. Whiting was married (second) to Mrs.
Emily Keltz. He is a member of the Ancient Order of United Work-
men, which he joined in 1878, and in which he is very popular. A
scientific and practical farmer, stockman and'dairyman, a business man
of much ability, a public-spirited citizen who has found time to devote
a part of his energy and influence towards advancing movements for the
benefit of his community, and a benevolent and charitable man who is
ever ready to assist those who have been less fortunate, Mr. Whiting is
a prominent figure in the life of his community, and belongs to that class
that is typical of the best American citizenship.

PETER SMITH. Sweden has given to California a due quota of ster-
ling citizens who have done well their part in the furtherance of indus-
trial and civic progress, and of this number is Mr. Smith, who is one
of the enterprising and prosperous orange growers of the Cucamonga
district, in San Bernardino county, where he has gained a well estab-
lished place in popular confidence and esteem.

Mr. Smith was born in the laen of Malmohus, or Malmo, Sweden, on
the nth of March, 1856, and is a son of Lars and Catherine Smith, who
passed their entire lives in that section of Sweden, where the father was
a substantial agriculturist. He died in December, 1909, at the venerable
age of eighty-eight years, his loved and devoted wife having been sum-
moned to eternal rest in 1885, at the age of sixty-six years. Of their
seven children, six attained to years of maturity, and of- the number the
subject of this review was the fourth in order of birth.

Peter Smith was reared to the sturdy discipline of the old homestead
farm in the far northland and received a common-school education. As
a youth he entered upon a five years' apprenticeship to the trade of stone
cutter, and he became not only a skilled workman but also a successful
contractor in his native place, where he gave employment to a large
force of men. In the meanwhile he had learned much concerning the
manifold attractions and advantages of the United States, within whose
gracious borders so many of his countrymen had established Jiomes and
won worthy success, and' he finally determined to come to this country.
Accordingly, in 1880, he disposed of his business in Sweden and came
to America, as a young man of twenty-four years. His financial resources
were limited and after coming to this country he experienced some hard-
ships, which he met unflinchingly, the while he was gaining valuable
experience. He resided for varying intervals in Chicago, Geneva and other

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 503

places in the state of Illinois, and in the meanwhile he learned and de-
voted his attention to the cooper's trade. In 1886, Mr. Smith came to
California, and for a time he was employed on farms in the vicinity of
San Francisco and San Jose. In March of 1887 he came to Cucamonga,
where he purchased a team and engaged in caring for the lands and or-
chards of others. Later he rented land and finally he effected the pur-
chase of ten acres, the improvement of which he instituted in 1890. He
planted the tract to citrus fruits and on the place he now has trees that
are twenty-one years old and in full bearing. He has been careful in all
departments of his enterprise, showing much discrimination in the de-
velopment of his fine orchard and in the handling of its products, and
thus he has gained independence and definite prosperity. He is ranked
among the early settlers of this now favored district and his is one of the
model fruit farms of this section. His integrity and genial personality
have gained him many staunch friends in the community and he and
his excellent wife have a home of which they may well be proud. Though
never active in the domain of practical politics, Mr. Smith is ever ready
to lend his support to measures projected for the general good of the
community and his allegiance is given to the Republican party. He is a
liberal supporter of the Methodist Episcopal church, of which Mrs. Smith
is a zealous member.

On the 3 ist of August, 1898, was performed the marriage ceremony
which united the life destinies of Mr. Smith and Miss Josephine Jepson.
Mrs. Smith was born and reared in Sweden and is a daughter of Nels
and Cecelia (Thorstonson) Jepson, who still reside in their native land,
where the father is a prosperous farmer. Mrs. Smith came to the United
States in 1884 and accompanied some of her relatives to Kansas City,
Missouri, where she maintained her home about two years. She was
there employed at dressmaking by a family whom she accompanied to
California and later to Illinois, where she continued to reside until 1898,
when she came to California and became the wife of Mr. Smith, having
previously made a visit to her old home in Sweden. The only child of Mr.
and Mrs. Smith was Nels Lawrence, who died at the age of three years
and seven months.

WILLIAM R. KELLY. Worthy of special consideration as one of those
able and honored men who have lent dignity to the bar of California, the
late William R. Kelly gained special distinction as legal representative
of important railroad interests, and at the time of his death, which oc-
curred at his home in Los Angeles, on the 8th of March, 1911, he was
incumbent of the office of general counsel for the Salt Lake Railway, a
position which he had assumed five years previously. He was a man of
impregnable integrity in all the relations of life and he brought to the
work of his exacting profession the admirable resources of a well trained
mind and marked versatility as an advocate and counselor. He left a
definite and worthy impress upon the annals of jurisprudence in Califor-
nia, where he commanded inviolable place in the confidence and high
regard of his professional confreres. His health had been impaired for
about a year prior to his demise and during the last six months of his
life he was confined to his home. Mr. Kelly gave, when a young man,
the loyal and valiant service of a soldier of the Union, and in all the

504 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

relations of his after life he exemplified the same stability and fervent
patriotism which had thus prompted him to lend his aid in perpetuating
the integrity of the nation. Sincere, steadfast and essentially genuine,
if the term be permitted, he had the qualities that make for the best
type of citizenship, and he left the record of worthy labors well per-
formed ; of a career that was circumspect and honorable in every way.

William R. Kelly was born in the state of Ohio, on the 26th of Janu-
ary, 1849, and was a son of Colonel Joseph J. Kelly, who served with dis-
tinction as colonel of the One Hundred and Seventh Illinois Volunteer
Infantry in the Civil war and who passed the closing years of his life in
California, as did also his cherished and devoted wife. He whose
name initiates this article was a boy at the time of the family removal
from the old Buckeye state to Illinois, where he was reared to adult
age and where he continued his studies in the public schools until his
youthful patriotism was roused to responsive protest and he subordin-
ated all other interests to tender his services in defense of the Union.
In 1864, at the age of fifteen years, he enlisted as a member of Company
E, Twentieth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, with which he served until
the close of the war and with which he participated in a number of the
important engagements marking the progress of the great conflict be-
tween the north and the south. After receiving his honorable discharge
he formulated definite plans for his future career and set himself with
characteristic vigor to the work in hand. At Clinton, Illinois, he read
law under effective preceptorship, under Judge Green, making rapid
and substantial progress in his assimilation of the science of jurispru-
dence and in due time being admitted to the bar, at Clinton, where he
initiated the practice of his profession and soon won prestige as a skill-
ful trial lawyer and well fortified counselor. His eligibility for public
office was promptly recognized and within a short period after he began
the work of his profession he was elected county attorney of Dewitt
county. In 1880 he removed to Lincoln, Nebraska, where he added
materially to his professional laurels and where he was soon chosen city
attorney. Later he became attorney in that city for the Union Pacific
Railroad. \Yhile at Lincoln he was a member of the prominent and
leading law firms of Hawood, Amer & Kelly. In 1888 he was trans-
ferred to Omaha, where he succeeded Senator J. H. Thurston as gen-
eral solicitor for the Union Pacific corporation. This important office
he retained until 1906, when he resigned his position and accepted that
of general counsel for the Salt Lake Railway Company, with headquar-
ters in Los Angeles, where he passed the residue of his life. Concerning
his precedence as a legal representative of such important interests the
following statements were made in a Los Angeles paper at the time of
his death, and the same are worthy of perpetuation in this memoir :

"He was considered a high authority on all matters concerning rail-
way traffic and inter-state commerce. In October, 1910, he was to have
argued a traffic arrangement between the Salt Lake and Southern Pacific
Railways before the inter-state commerce commission, but failing health
compelled him to relinquish preparation of the case. This was the sub-
ject of his only regret, expressed some time prior to his death, when he
said that the importance of the litigation would make it the crowning

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 505

event of his career. He realized then, and so told his family, that he
had argued his last case."

Mr. Kelly's devotion to his profession was of the most insistant order
and none had greater appreciation of its dignity and responsibilities, so
that he was ever a close observer of the unwritten ethical code and re-
tained high vantage ground in the confidence of the judiciary and the
bar. He never consented to become a candidate for any public office
save in the direct line of his profession, but he was an effective and loyal
advocate of the principles and policies for which the Republican party
stands sponsor. He was affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and was
a valued member of the California Club of Los Angeles. He retained a
deep interest in his old comrades of the Civil war and signified the same
by his membership in the Grand Army of the Republic and the Military
Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States. He was a Presbyterian
in his religious affiliations. Mr. Kelly was a man of most gracious and
winning social qualities, generous, affable and of buoyant temperament,
and he gained and retained the staunches! of friends. His strength was
as the number of his days and this strength was one of intrinsic rectitude
and worthy ideals.

On the 8th of May, 1873, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Kelly
to Miss Eleanore S. Kerman, of Macomb, Illinois, daughter of William
H. Kerman. Mrs. Kelly still retains her home in Los Angeles, in whose
social activities she has taken a prominent part, and the only surviving
child, Ura Louise is the wife of R. M. Welsh, of Cucamonga, California,
where they have a fine orange ranch. Mr. and Mrs. Welsh have three
children: William Merritt, Raymond Marvin, Jr., and Eleanor Elizabeth.
The greatest pleasure of Mr. Kelly's life was gained among his books in
his private library, consisting of some four thousand volumes, this was
his chief recreation. He had besides his extensive law library his own
private library.

AMMI STINCHFIELD. He who has his home in the beautiful and
opulent Cucamonga district of San Bernardino county, may well con-
sider himself favored, and this privilege belongs to the well known and
venerable citizen whose name initiates this review and who has been a
prominent factor in connection with the development of the citrus
fruit industry.

In a land "where every prospect pleases" Mr. Stinchfield finds himself
compassed by most gracious environment and influences, but his present
home is far removed from his native heath, as the old Pine Tree state
figures as the place of his nativity. He was born in the picturesque city
of Lewiston, the metropolis of Androscoggin county, Maine, on the loth
of February, 1836, and is a son of Samuel and Mary (Finson) Stinchfield,
both of whom wece likewise born and reared in that state, where the
respective families were founded in the early pioneer epoch of its history.
John Stinchfield, great-grandfather of him whose name initiates this re-
view was born in Leeds, England, on the I2th of October, 1715, and as
a young man he came to America, about 1735. He settled at Gloucester,
Essex county, Massachusetts. While on shipboard in crossing the At-
lantic he formed the acquaintance of Miss Elizabeth Burns, who was

506 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

born in the north of Ireland, in 1713, of Scotch parentage, and the friend-
ship thus initiated ripened into something closer and more enduring after
the young folk had arrived in the new world, as is evidenced by the fact
that, about two years later, their marriage was solemnized at Gloucester.
These honored ancestors figure as the founders of the American branch of
the family of which our California citizen is a scion. They continued their
residence at Gloucester for a number of years and there six of their chil-
dren were born. They finally removed to the present state of Maine,
and were numbered among the early settlers of New Gloucester, Cum-
berland county, where they passed the residue of their long and useful
lives.

John Stinchfield, eldest son of John and Elizabeth ( Burns )Stinchfield,
was born at Gloucester, Massachusetts, on the 23d of October, 1738, and
he accompanied his parents on their removal to New Gloucester, Maine,
in 1755. There he was reared to manhood and there was solemnized
his marriage to Miss Mehitabel Winship, this being the first marriage
ceremony performed in the new settlement. Mrs. Stinchfield atained to
the venerable age of ninety-two years and was a resident of Danville
Maine, at the time of her death. John Stinchfield (II) became one of the
extensive farmers of the Pine Tree state, where he also developed one of
the largest apple orchards within the borders of that commonwealth.
He was a man of industry and sturdy integrity and was influential in pub-
lic affairs of a local order. He preceded his wife to eternal rest by a
number of years, and of their nine children, Samuel, father of him
whose name introduces this article, was the second in order of birth.

Samuel Stinchfield was born at New Gloucester, Maine, where he was
reared to maturity and where his educational advantages were those af-
forded in the common schools of the day. There he wedded Miss Mary
Finson, daughter of Major Finson, who was a gallant soldier and officer
of the Continental line in the war of the Revolution. Of the nine chil-
dren of this union, eight attained to years of maturity and Ammi, of this
review, was the eighth in order of birth. The parents continued to reside
in Maine until they were summoned from the scene of life's mortal en-
deavors, secure in the high regard of all who knew them. Samuel Stinch-
field was a fine mechanic, and for many years owned and operated a saw
mill, a grist mill and a blacksmith shop at Danville, Maine, where he
gained prosperity through his own well directed endeavors. He was a man
of well fortified opinions and of inflexible integrity in all of the relations
of life. He was a prominent and influential factor in public affairs in
his community, was a staunch supporter of the cause of the Democratic
party, but was sternly and implacably opposed to human slavery. He
was, for many years, one of the selectmen of his district and also served
several terms in the state legislature. Both he and his wife were earnest
and zealous members of the Universalist church. He was eighty-two years
of age at the time of his death and his loved and devoted wife passed
to the life eternal at the age of about eighty-five years.

Ammi Stinchfield early learned the lessons of practical industry
through his association with his father's various business operations and
in the meanwhile he duly availed himself of the advantages of the com-
mon schools of the locality and period. Early in 1860, when about twenty-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 507

four years of age, he severed the home ties and set forth in search of
fortune and adventure on the Pacific coast. From New York city he
made the voyage by steamship to the Isthmus of Panama on the steamship
Atlantic of the old Collins Line and, after crossing the isthmus he pro-
ceeded up the Pacific coast to San Francisco on the steamship Golden Age.
He disembarked at the Golden Gate on the loth of February, iS6o,_his
birthday anniversary. After passing about a week in visiting various
points in the vicinity of San Francisco, he again heeded the wanderlust
and sailed for Oregon, where he passed about seven years working in
shipyards. He was head sawyer for two years and later became a drafts-
man, in which capacity he was concerned in the building of many mills
in Oregon and California, a number of the same having been of large
capacity. In 1868 Mr. Stinchfield assumed charge of the largest saw
mills at Eureka, California, and he was identified with this line of industry
for many years, within which he drafted plans and specifications for
many large mills. In 1870 he entered into partnership with eight others
and purchased a large redwood saw mill, at Eureka, California. He be-
came engineer of the mill and also general superintendent of its opera-
tions, which proved very successful. He disposed of his interest in the
business at the expiration of two years and realized a very substantial
profit from this transaction. He then went to San Francisco, where he
purchased a half interest in well established iron works, which he operated
successfully for several years. He then sold his interest in the business
and went to Tombstone. Arizona, where to a certain extent he overtested
his versatility by engaging in the hotel business, of which he made a total
failure, though much of his financial loss was entailed by the disastrous
fire which practically destroyed the town. Under these depressing con-
ditions, but with courage and determination unimpaired, Mr. Stinchfield
returned to California and resumed his labors as mill superintendent.
In the autumn of 1888 he established his home at Cucamonga. where he
had previously purchased a tract of twenty acres of unimproved land,
lie planted this tract to oranges and peaches the following spring, and
thus became one of the pioneers in the fruit industry in this section,
where his ranch is now one of the best improved and most productive in
the entire district. He later purchased and improved another tract, of
fourteen acres, which he recently sold at an appreciable profit.

Mr. Stinchfield brought to bear in his operations here a wide and
varied experience and most progressive ideas, so that his success has been
of most substantial order. He was one of the organizers of the Cuca-
monga Citrus Fruit Growers' Association, of which he was a director for
twelve years and vice-president for several years. He is now living
virtually retired on his original homestead, where he and his wife have
a most attractive home and are enjoying peace and prosperity, the while
they are surrounded by friends who are tried and true, so that their lines
are, indeed, "cast in pleasant places." Mr. Stinchfield was reared in the
faith of the democratic party but in later years its deviation from its
generic principles has caused him to assume an independent attitude, with
incidental support of men and measures meeting the approval of his judg-
ment.

Mr. Stinchfield has been twice wedded. In 1870 was solemnized his

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508 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

marriage to Miss Ruby Ann McFarland, who was born and reared in
Maine and who was summoned to eternal rest in January, 1902, at the
age of sixty years. Of the two children of this union, one died in in-
fancy and the other, Dr. Herbert Colfax Stinchfield, is now one of the
representative physicians and surgeons of Los Angeles, where he has
been chief surgeon for the Edison Electric Company for several years.
On the 8th of April, 1905, Mr. Stinchfield married Mrs. Minnie L.
(Birge) Root, widow of George H. Root.

STEPHEN FRANCIS KELLEV, the present efficient and popular post-
master of the city of San Bernardino, is a native son of California and
a member of one of its sterling pioneer families, his father having es-
tablished a home in this state in 1843, several years prior to the great
discovery of gold that brought the ever increasing hegira from the east.
The father became a prominent and influential citizen and Stephen F.
himself has likewise been able to make due contribution to the civic and
material development of his native state. He was long and prominently
identified with railroad interests and he is now serving his fourth con-
secutive term as postmaster at San Bernardino, where he stands ex-
emplar of the most loyal and public-spirited citizenship and where he
has the confidence and high esteem of the entire community.

Stephen Francis Kelley was born* in San Francisco, California, on
the 26th of December, 1859, and thus became a slightly belated Christ-
mas guest in the home of his parents, John and Maria (Tarpey) Kelley,
both of whom were born on the old Emerald Isle, the father having been
a native of county Galvvay. The Kelley family as represented by the
line to which the subject of this review belongs is a branch of the
historic old Irish family of O'Kelley Mor, identified with Irish history
for centuries. Representatives of the family figures in different gen-
erations as rulers of one of the provinces of Ireland, where ruins of the
old family castle still remain. The father of John Kelley came to
America when a young man and established his home in Massachusetts,
just prior to the war of the Revolution. His loyalty to the land of his
adoption was of characteristically perfervid order, as was shown by
his prompt enlistment for service in the cause of the oppressed colonies.
He became a member of the organization known as the Emerald Green
Company, composed of young men from Ireland, and these gallant
sons of the Emerald Isle made a most meritorious record as soldiers in
the Continental line. Young Kelley served throughout virtually the
entire period of the war and became a valued officer of his command.
After the boon of independence had been gained to the country he con-
tinued to be identified with agricultural pursuits in Massachusetts for a
period of about a quarter of a century. There he married a Miss Camp-
bell, who was born in Scotland, and soon afterward he returned to Ire-
land, in company with his wife. He had inherited an estate in his na-
.tive land, and there both he and his wife passed the residue of their
lives. They became the parents of three sons and one daughter and of
these John, father of the postmaster of San Bernardino, was the eldest.

John Kelley was reared on the old ancestral homestead in county
Galway, Ireland, and was afforded the advantages of the common schools

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :>11

of the locality and period. In 1838, when about nineteen years of age,
he came to America, and after remaining for a short time in the state
of New York he made his way westward. He tarried a brief interval
in Ohio and then joined other ventursome spirits in setting forth on
the long and dangerous journey across the plains and over the moun-
tains to Oregon. This company set forth on this expedition in 1830,, and,
after many hardships and perils, they reached their destination. Mr.
Kelley located near the present town of Ashland, Jackson county, Ore-
gon, where he learned the carpenter's trade, to which he there devoted
his attention until 1843, when he came to California and located in
San Francisco, where he became one of the pioneer contractors and
builders of the state. A man. of alert mentality and independent views,
he was a natural leader in thought and action, and he soon became in-
fluential in connection with the various affairs of the pioneer commun-
ity. In 1846 he became one of the original members of the "Bear Flag"
party, at Sonoma. After the discovery of gold he joined others in the
quest for the precious metal, and in this connection he continued his
labors in various mining camps, in which he lived up to the full ten-
sion of that picturesque and interesting period in the history of the
state. In 18^0 he resumed his operations as a contractor and builder
in San Francisco, which city was then rapidly increasing in population
and industrial importance. There he built up a large and prosperous
business and he accumulated a property of no inconsiderable value, in-
cluding a farm across the bay from San Francisco, — property now in-
cluded within the corporate limits of the city of Oakland. He con-
tinued to maintain his home in San -Francisco until his death, in 1884,
at the age of sixty-five years, and his sterling character and worthy
accomplishment justify most fully the enrollment of his name on the
roster of the honored pioneers of California. Mr. Kelley was a staunch
Union man during the Civil war and was uncompromising in his allegi-
ance to the Republican party, in which he was one of those who ef-
fected the party organization in San Francisco.

In Oregon was solemnized the marriage of John Kelley to Miss
Maria Tarpey, who likewise was a native of Ireland and who was a
child at the time of her parents' immigration to America. Her father,
Daniel Tarpey became one of the pioneer farmers of Oregon, where
both he and his wife, Honora. continued to reside until their death.
John and Maria Kelley became the parents of two sons and three daugh-
ters, and of the two now living Stephen F., of this review, is the elder;
Julia is the wife of Gustavius LeConte, who is a representative merchant
at Amiens, France; he was formerly engaged in business in San Fran-
cisco, where his marriage occurred, and he eventually returned to his
native land. Mrs. Kelley was summoned to the life eternal in 1909,
at the venerable age of eighty-four years. John T. Kelley, the elder
of the two sons, was graduated in St. Mary's college, in San Francisco,
and soon afterward became clerk in the extensive importing house of
Rogers, Meyer & Company, of this city. He was later sent by this
concern to British India, in the capacity of purchasing agent, and he
maintained his residence in Calcutta for a period of about twelve years.
He then assumed a position in the employ of the British government,

512 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

at Somerset House, in the city of London, and there he continued to
reside until his death, which occurred in 1902. He was a man of excep-
tional literary ability and gained more than local reputation as an author
of both poetry and prose composition, especially touching Ireland and
its people. He was deeply appreciative of the history of the land of
his ancestors and was a close student thereof. A number of his manu-
scripts are now in the possession of his only brother, Stephen F., by
whom they are greatly treasured, both by reason of their associations
and also on account of their literary excellence.

Stephen F. Kelley was reared to maturity in the city of San Fran-
cisco, where he attended the parochial and public schools, and after
leaving the high school he continued his academic studies in St. Mary's
College, though he was not graduated in this institution. After leav-
ing school he held a clerical position in the employ of a mining com-
pany at Tombstone, Arizona, for a period of about one year, and he
then went to San Diego, where he entered the employ of the Southern
California Railway Company, in which connection he checked out the
first carload of wharf and bridge material used in connection with the
early construction work on the line that is now a part of the Atchison,
Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad system. This was in December, 1879, and
Mr. Kelley continued to be identified with the engineering and material
department of the service of the company mentioned until 1882. When
the Southern Pacific Railroad Company opened its station at El Paso,
Texas, he went to that point, where he had charge of the terminal
facilities of the road, under C. A. Harper. At this time one of the
employes working under his direction was Eugene V. Debs, who later
gained national prominence in connection with union labor affairs. In
1883 Mr. Kelley assumed a confidential position with the secretary and
general manager of the Sonora Railroad, in which connection he was
located at Hermosillo, in the state of Sonora, Mexico, for nearly one
year, during which he had charge of supplies and the construction de-
partment, at the time of the building of the Sonora Railroad. While
he was thus engaged that section was visited with a scourge of yellow
fever, and among the one hundred and thirty Americans who were at-
tacked by the dread disorder, Mr. Kelley was one of only twenty-eight
who survived, among the unfortunate ones having been Mr. Seeley,
the secretary and general manager of the company by which he was
employed. As scon as he had sufficiently recuperated his strength after
this attack. Mr. Kelley returned to California, and he located at San
Diego, where he became bookkeeper for Wing Brothers & Osborn, prom-
inent contractors and builders. In this capacity he had charge of the
firm's books during the completion of their contract in connection with
the building of the line of the Southern California Railroad, now a
part of the Santa Fe system. Upon the completion of this contract
Mr. Kelley came to San Bernardino, where he continued in the service
of the railroad company, in the capacity of cashier, about one year. He
then joined the firm of Kirk & Potter, for whom he was bookkeeper
during the time the firm was engaged in the construction of grades and
bridges on the extension of the Santa Fe Railroad to Los Angeles.
LTpon the completion of this work, in 1889, Mr. Kelley engaged in the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY :>i:;

wood business at Hesperia, San Bernardino county, with headquarters
in the city of San Bernardino, where he has maintained his home dur-
ing the intervening years. In 1896 he became general agent for the
Newport Wharf & Lumber Company and the Santa Ana & Newport
Railway Company, allied corporations which have since been absorbed
by the Southern Pacific Railway Company. In this important office
Mr. Kelley had charge of the establishing of all the yards of the two
corporations in southern California and in Arizona, besides which he
had also direct supervision of all interior business affairs. When the
Southern Pacific Company acquired the various properties it was largely
due to the efforts of Senator Perkins and the chief stockholders of the
companies thus absorbed that Mr. Kelley secured appointment to the
office of postmaster at San Bernardino. He received his commission
on the 4th of April, 1898, and by successive reappointments he has con-
tinued incumbent of this office during the intervening period. His ad-
ministration has been careful and progressive and has secured to him
uniform popular commendation, the while he has done all in his power
to bring the local service up to the best possible standard. His first
appointment was made by President McKinley ; he was twice reap-
pointed by President Roosevelt; and his appointment for his present,
and fourth, term, was made by President Taft.

It is needless to say that Mr. Kelley gives a stalwart allegiance to
the Republican party, and he has been an active worker in its ranks,
especially since establishing his permanent home in San Bernardino.
For the past sixteen years he has represented San Bernardino county as
a member of the Republican state central committee and also as a dele-
gate to the state conventions of the party. In the Masonic fraternity
Mr. Kelley is affiliated with the lodge, chapter and commandery bodies,
as is he also with the allied organization, the Ancient Arabic Order of
the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also affiliated with the Knights
of the Maccabees, the Independent Order of Foresters, and the Na-
tional L'nion.

In the year 1898 Mr. Kelley was united in marriage to Miss Charity
Swarthout. who was born and reared in San Bernardino county. She
is a daughter of George and Elizabeth ( Brayne) Swarthout the former
of whom was born in the state of New York and the latter in New Eng-
land. Mr. Swarthout was a member of a battalion that gave valiant
service in the Mexican war, and after the same had been disbanded, in
San Francisco, he located in San Bernardino county, where he became
a pioneer farmer and stock-grower and where he developed a fine
ranch. He continued to reside on this homestead until his death and
his widow now resides in San Bernardino, at the venerable age of more
than three score years an ten. Mr. and Mrs. Kelley have four children,
George S.. who is assistant bookkeeper for the Braun Chemical Com-
pany, in the city of Los Angeles ; and Grace E., Nora and James F.,
who remain at the parental home.

LABEN T. E. TYLER. One who has been prominently concerned with
the development of the citrus-fruit industry in the Upland district of
San Bernardino county, Mr. Tyler there maintained his home until the

514 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

autumn of 1911, when he removed to the vicinity of Big Pine, Inyo
county, where he will give his attention to the improving and cultivation
of an extensive ranch which he there purchased. He is a citizen of
sterling character and genial personality.

Laben Jehiel Elmer Tyler was born in Iowa county, Iowa, on the
27th of April, 1862, and is a son of Jehiel and Rachel (Veach) Tyler, the
former of whom was born in the state of New York and the latter of
whom was a native of Burlington, Iowa, of which state her parents were
early pioneer settlers. Benoni Tyler, grandfather of him whose name
initiates this review, removed from New York state to Michigan, but
soon afterward removed to the vicinity of Burlington, Iowa, in the pio-
neer epoch of the history of the latter commonwealth. He secured a
tract of government land and turned his attention to reclaiming the same
into a productive farm, the while he and his family experienced the
trials and deprivations that ever attend the pioneer settlers. Indians
were numerous in the state at that time and settlers were widely scat-
tered. Benoni Tyler died within a few years after establishing his home
in Iowa, and his son continued the work of improving the home farm.

Jehiel Tyler was an infant at the time of his parents' removal from
the old Empire state to the west and was but six years of age at the
time of the death of his father. He was reared to maturity on the old
homestead near Burlington, Iowa, and early began to assist in its work,
the while his educational advantages were limited to those of the pio-
neer schools of the locality. He was the eldest of the three children
and the only son, so that he early assumed practical responsibilities and
became head of the family in the management of the affairs of the home
farm. His mother finally contracted a second marriage and he soon
afterward initiated his independent career. He made his way to other
points in the west and finall> came to California, where he was identified
with mining operations, in Shasta county, for a period of about eight-
een months. He then returned to the old home in Iowa and effected
the settlement of his father's estate, in which he received his due share.
He soon afterward married and removed to Iowa county, that state,
where he purchased one hundred acres of timber and prairie land, par-
tially improved. He continued to devote his attention to the improve-
ment and cultivation of his farm until he felt called upon to respond to
the call of higher duty and to thus go forth in defense of the nation's
integrity. On the 22d of August, 1862, he enlisted as a private in the
Twenty-fourth Iowa Volunteer Infantry, with which he participated in
the White River expedition, pursuing bushwackers in . Arkansas. He
was finally attacked with pneumonia while in service with his regiment,
and he died on the I5th of February, 1863, his remains being interred
in the Mississippi River National Cemetery, at Nashville, Tennessee.
His wife survived him by many years, contracted a second marriage and
reared a large family of children. She continued to maintain her home
in Iowa until her death, at the age of seventy-one years. Of the three
children of the first marriage, Flora died in 1866, at the age of eight
years ; John is a prosperous merchant at Ladora. Iowa : and Laben J. E.,
of this review, is the youngest of the number.

Laben J. E. Tyler was reared to adult age in his native county,

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AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 517

where he duly availed himself of the advantages of the public schools
and where he learned the lessons of practical industry in connection with
the work of the home farm. At the age of nineteen years he left the
maternal home and for a short time thereafter worked as hired man for
farmers. In the autumn of 1881 he came to California, passing the
winter in Pasadena and returning to Iowa in the following March. He
purchased in his native state a farm of eighty acres, in Iowa county, and
to the supervision of the same he continued to give his attention for the
ensuing five years. At the expiration of the period noted he sold his
farm and returned to Pasadena, California, and gave his attention to
varied occupations. He finally engaged in business as a grading contrac-
tor, and in 1888 he removed to the Ontario colony, in San Bernardino
county, where he continued successfully in the same line of enterprise,
in connection with which he graded many of the early streets of the
present thriving city of Ontario. He successfully continued his contract-
ing business in this district for six years, and gave employment to many
men. In 1894 Mr. Tyler purchased ten acres of rough and unimproved
land, one and one-half miles distant from the present business center ot
the city of Upland, and he planted this tract to lemon and orange trees.
He developed the property into one of the fine and valuable fruit or-
chards of this favored locality and through his well directed efforts
gained substantial prosperity. He paid one hundred and thirty-five
dollars an acre for his land, including the water rights, and in June, 1911,
he sold the tract, with its excellent improvements, for two thousand and
one hundred and fifty dollars an acre. He and his family gained secure
place in the confidence and regard of the community in which they so
long maintained their home and to the development of which he con-
tributed his due quota. After disposing of his property in San Bernardino
county Mr. Tyler purchased a ranch of two hundred and forty acres
near Big Pine", Inyo county, to which place he removed in September,
1911. His energy, discrimination and well directed industry in past
years give ample assurance that he will develop his new property into
one of the model ranches of the county in which it is situated, and said
county will find in him a progressive, loyal and public-spirited citizen.

In politics Mr. Tyler maintains an independent attitude and exer-
cises his franchise in support of the men and measures meeting the ap-
proval of his judgment, irrespective -of partisan lines. He had the dis-
tinction of serving as the first city marshal of Ontario, and he is still
affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows at Upland, another of the thriving towns of the Ontario
colony. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church and active
in the various departments of its work.

On the igth of October, 1884, was solemnized the marriage of Mr.
Tyler to Miss Belle Hall, who was born in Keokuk county, Iowa, and of
the six children of this union all are living except the second, Arnold,
who died at the age of thirteen months.

WALTER F. HAAS. Closely identified with the civic and material
interests of the beautiful city of Los Angeles and recognized as one of
the representative members of the California bar, Mr. Haas has been

518 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

a resident of the state from his boyhood days and here he has found
an engaging field for successful effort in the profession of his choice
and in connection with various other lines of activity.

Mr. Haas was born at California, Missouri, the county seat of Moni-
teau county, on the I2th of November, 1869, and he has had no oc-
casion to regret that a greater California than his native town of the
name has been the stage of his endeavors from his youth to the pres-
ent time. He is a son of John B. and Lena (Bruere) Haas and is of
German and French lineage, the father having been born in Germany
and the mother in the town of Cologne, German}- — a representative of
an old and influential French-Huguenot family that long maintained ex-
tensive shipyards and had other extensive interests at Cologne. The
paternal grandfather of Mr. Haas was born in the Palatinate of Germany
and became one of the representative business men of his native city of
Landau of which he also served as mayor. In 1845 he immigrated with
his family to America and established his home in St. Louis, Missouri.
where he passed the residue of his life, lohn B. Haas, father of him
whose name initiates this review, was engaged in mercantile pursuits at
St. Louis for a time, when a young man, but in 1853 he became one of the
argonauts who came across the plains to California, the long, weary and
hazardous journey having been made with ox teams. He located in
Eldorado county, where he was engaged in mining and merchandising,
with a fair measure of success until 1866, when he returned to Missouri.
There his marriage was solemnized and thereafter he was engaged in
business at California, that state, until 1884, when, after the lapse of main
years, the lure of the state of California again drew him within its
borders. He established the family home in Los Angeles, where it was
maintained until 1907, and they then moved to Alhambra, where they
still reside. "While a resident of Missouri, John B. Haas was a prominent
and influential citizen of Moniteau county, which he represented in the
state legislature, and he was otherwise prominent in connection with
political activities.

Walter F. Haas is indebted to the public schools of his native town for
his early educational training and was about fifteen years of age at the
time of the family removal to California. He was graduated in the
Los Angeles high school as a member of the class of 1889, and soon after-
ward began the work of preparation for his chosen vocation by entering
the law office of the firm of Houghton, Silent & Campbell, under whose
effective preceptorship he continued his studies until he proved himself
eligible for practice, his admission to the bar of the state having oc-
curred on the /th of April, 1891. From that time to the present he has
given close attention to the work of his profession, in which he has
gained unequivocal success and distinctive prestige. He is known as a
most resourceful and effective trial lawyer and has appeared in connec-
tion with many important litigations in both the state and federal courts
of California, the while his close observance of professional ethics and
his sterling integrity of purpose have gained and retained to him the
confidence and esteem of the members of the bench and bar of his
home city and state. He is most scrupulous in the preparation of every
cause presented by him before court or jury, and thus is ever found to

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXU GENEALOGY :,]'.!

be admirably fortified when be brings a case up for adjudication. In
1898 Mr. Haas was elected city attorney of Los Angeles, and gave a most
effective administration of the duties of this municipal office, of which
he remained the incumbent for one term, declining to become a candi-
date for a second term, as he preferred to give his undivided attention
to the private work of his profession. Of the many important cases with
which Mr. Haas has been concerned, it is impossible to make detailed
mention in an article of such circumscribed order as the one here pre-
sented, but special reference may well be made to his able interposition,
as attorney for the plaintiff, in the case of the City of Los Angeles versus
the West Los Angeles Water Company. The trial of this cause celebre
began on the I2th of November, 1900, and the litigation continued until
May 30, 1901, — seventy-six days. He won a decisive victory for the
city, to which were thus saved the entire water resources of the San
Fernando valley, — resources of inestimable value to the rapidly growing
metropolis of southern California. This was one of the most important
causes ever brought before the courts in Los Angeles and through his
connection with the same, Mr. Haas' professional reputation was es-
tablished on a high plane, without reference to other splendid work
done in his chosen vocation. For his service in this one case alone, the
city of Los Angeles and its people must ever owe to him a debt of appre-
ciation. In 1902 he was a member of the committee assigned to effect a
revision of the city charter, and his broad and liberal views and fine legal
knowledge proved of great value in formulating the new municipal char-
ter.

In politics Mr. Haas has ever given unswerving allegiance to the
Republican party and has contributed of his energies and powers to the
furtherance of its principles and policies, of which he is an effective
advocate.

In 1901 Mr. Haas formed a professional partnership with the late
Frank Garrett, under the firm name of Haas & Garrett, and on the I2th
of April. 1906, Harry L. Dunnigan was admitted to the firm, the title
of which then became Haas, Garrett & Dunnigan. This effective alliance
obtained until the death of Mr. Garrett, in 1910, and since that time the
firm of Haas & Dunnigan has continued in control of the large and
representative law business, with well appointed offices and comprehen-
sive law library in the Coulter Building. Mr. Haas marks with appre-
ciation the character and ability of his late and honored coadjutor, Mr.
Garrett, who was a man of high professional attainments and one of the
most popular members of the Los Angeles bar. His generous, sincere
and noble character gained to him the confidence and esteem of all who
knew him, and the friendship between him and Mr. Haas was of the
closest and most appreciative order.

Mr. Haas is a member of the directorate of the German-American
Savings Bank of Los Angeles ; is vice-president of the C. J. Kubach
Company, engaged in the building business : and is an interested princi-
pal in various other enterprises which are contributing to the industrial
and commercial supremacy of Los Angeles. He has been affiliated with
the Masonic fraternity since 1903. when he was raised to the sublime
degree of Master Mason in Palestine Lodge. Xo. 351. Free and Accepted

520 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Masons, of which lodge he is a past master and is now a thirty-second
degree mason. He is a member of the Los Angeles Chamber of Com-
merce and is in full sympathy with its high civic ideals and progressive
policies. He holds membership in the LTnion League Club and is one of
the loyal, public spirited and distinctively popular citizens of Los An-
geles, a city in which he has gained success and established vantage
ground through his own ability and well ordered endeavors. He main-
tains his home at Alhambra, one of the attractive suburbs of Los Angeles.

HENRY L. KUNS. The president of the First National Bank of
Lordsburg, one of the fine little cities of Los Angeles county, has been
prominently concerned with the industrial and civic development and
upbuilding of southern California, as was also his father, and he is one
of the influential citizens of the county in which he maintains his home
and in which his capitalistic interests are of wide scope and importance
Mr. Kuns is of staunch Holland lineage on the paternal side and the
family was founded in America prior to the war of the Revolution. The
ancestral history of Henry L. Kuns, especially in its connection with the
record of the American representatives, is one in which he may well
take pride, thus showing due appreciation of the worthy lives and worthy
deeds of sterling forebears. The name which he bears has touched closely
the pioneer development of at least four of the sovereign common-
wealths of the American republic and has ever stood exemplar of pro-
ductive industry and true worth of character, as one generation has fol-
lowed another on to the stage of life's activities. In the ancestral record
there has been little of dramatic order, but it gives evidence of worthy
accomplishment along normal lines of industrial and civic progress, evi-
dence of loyalty and patriotism, and exposition of strong and noble man-
hood and gentle and gracious womanhood. Such an heritage is not to
be held in light esteem, and thus is justified the preceding, statement to
the effect that Mr. Kuns may well be proud of his ancestry.

Henry Le Bosquette Kuns was born on the old homestead farm on
the banks of the beautiful old Wabash river, seven^ miles below the
city of Logansport, Cass county, Indiana, on the icjth of November,
1847, and is a son of David and Margaret S. ( Lamb') Kuns. He is now the
only surviving representative of the immediate family and is the only child
of his parents as well as the next to the oldest male in his generation of
the Kuns family in America. His father was born at Dayton, Montgom-
ery county, Ohio, and the mother was born in the vicinity of the city of
Wheeling. West Virginia. The original representatives of the Kuns
family in America came from Holland to this country about two hun-
dred years ago. They settled in Pennsylvania and as they were Dun-
kards in their religious faith and thus opposed to war, none of the mem-
bers of the family, so far as is known, took part in the great struggle for
national independence during the Revolution. The original orthography
of the name was Kunsz. but the present spelling was adopted fully two
generations prior to that of which the subject of this review is a mem-
ber. The name has ever stood sponser for the deepest Christian faith,
and the same has been exempified by both lives and labors in the various
generations. John Kuns, grandfather of him whose name initiates this

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 521

review, was a youth at the time when he set forth with his parents down
the Ohio river, about the year 1815, to establish a home in the wilds of
Montgomery county, Ohio, in the vicinity of the present city of Dayton.
There he remained about a decade, at the expiration of which, in 1826,
he removed with his parents to Indiana, and secured a tract of land in
Carroll county, on the Wabash river, where his father, George Runs,
passed the residue of his life, his remains being laid to rest in a
pioneer cemetery on Rock creek. John Kuns built the first grist mill
ever placed in operation in that county and the same was located in the
little pioneer village of Delphi. He continued to own and operate this
mill for many years and was one of the influential and honored citizens
of that section of the fine old Hoosier state. He became the father of
eleven children, of whom eight attained to years of maturity.

It was while he was en route down the Ohio river to the new home
in the Buckeye state that John Kuns formed the acquaintance of Miss
Hannah Wolf, and the mutual attraction reached its denouement in
short order, as their marriage was solemnized before he reached his
destination. His wife was likewise born in Pennsylvania and was of
Holland-Dutch ancestry. Both the Kuns and Wolf families removed
from Ohio to Indiana, and in that state occurred the death of Mrs.
Hannah (Wolf) Kuns. Her husband later contracted a second mar-
riage and he finally removed to Piatt county, Illinois, where he repeated
his pioneer experiences and where he continued to reside until his death,
at the age of seventy years. He and other representatives of his genera-
tion were concerned successfully with the great basic industry of agri-
culture, and were noted for sterling character, strong individuality,
marked pragmatic ability and indefatigable industry, — sturdy yeomen
such as constitute the bulwarks of our national prosperity.

• David Kuns, father of him to whom this sketch is dedicated, was
the eldest son and was reared to maturity under the sturdy discipline of
the old hometsead farm in Indiana, the while he broadened his mental
horizon by availing himself of the advantages of the schools of the lo-
cality and period as well as through effective self-application, so that
he became a man of broad views and well fortified opinions. He ini-
tiated his independent career as a farmer in Indiana, where he remained
until 1853, when he disposed of his property in that state and removed
to Piatt county, Illinois, where he became the owner of a valuable tract
of four hundred acres of prairie land. This fine estate is now owned by
his only child, Henry L., of this sketch, and is one of the most valuable
in Piatt county. On the place are many magnificent black-walnut trees,
which were among the first planted on the prairies of that county and
which stand as stately monuments to David Kuns, whose enterprise and
good judgment led him to give this glowing heritage to future genera-
tions. He continued to reside on his homestead in Piatt county, one of
the well known and highly honored citizens and pioneers of that favored
section of the state, until 1892, when he came to California and estab-
lished his home at Lordsburg, Los Angeles county, where he lived in
large measure retired until his death, though he found ample oppor-
tunity for productive effort in this new place of residence. Here he
became associated with four others in the establishing of Lordsburg Col-

522 AMHK1CAX BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

lege, and under the original plans the institution was conducted for the
ensuing decade. Of those originally concerned in the benignant enter-
prise at the expiration of this period only David Runs and his nephew,
John S. Kuns, were left to meet the expenses of operation^ and they ac-
cordingly rlosed the college and paid all indebtedness resting upon the
same. Substantial buildings had been erected and an excellent equip-
ment had been installed, and finally the two interested principals gave,
with the majority consent of the stockholders, the property, now valued
at seventy-five thousand dollars, to the German Baptist Brethren of the
district of Southern California and Arizona, with the provision that this
organization should use the property for the maintenance of a collegiate
institute, in default of which provision the property should revert to
the estates of the original owners. Under these conditions the owner-
ship of the property is now vested in the religious denomination men-
tioned, as comprised in the district of California and Arizona, and a pros-
perous educational institution is maintained, — a valuable contribution to
the educational facilities of southern California. The institution stands
as a noble monument to the generosity of David Kuns. who continued to
reside at Lordsburg until his death, on the I2th of March, 1906, at the
venerable age of eighty-six years. His life was gentle and gracious
and he was animated by the most impregnable integrity of purpose
throughout the course of his long and useful career as one of the world's
great army of productive workers. His cherished and devoted wife
preceded him to t!'e life eternal by only four months, as her death occurred
in October. 1905, at which time she was seventy-six years of age. She
was a daughter of Elliott Lamb, who was born in the city of Boston,
Massachusetts, where his parents established their home upon their
immigration from England. About the year 1840, after an intermediate
residence of several years near Wheeling, West Virginia, Mr. Lamb re-
moved to Indiana, where he passed the residue of his life and where his
death occurred in 1858. He was a man of much mechanical and in-
ventive genius, and as a practical mechanician he erected and placed in
operation many saw mills in Indiana in the early days. David Kuns was
a stanch Republican in his political proclivities and both he and his win-
were zealous and devout members of the German Baptist Brethren
church.

Henry LeBosquette Kuns. the only child of David and Margaret S.
(Lamb) Kuns, was reared to the age of six years in Cass county. Indi-
ana, and the family then removed to Piatt county, Illinois, as has already
been noted. In that county he grew to manhood and in the meanwhile
he early began to contribute his quota to the work of the home farm,
under whose invigorating discipline he waxed strong in mind and body.
After completing the curriculum of the district school he continued his
studies for two years in the high school at Monticello. the judicial center
of his home county, and further advantages were afforded him through
two years passed as a student in Wabash College, at Crawfordsville, In-
diana. At the age of twenty-four years he married and engaged in farm-
ing on his own responsibility in Piatt county. In 1874 he came to Cali-
fornia and after a six months' tour of the state he became thoroughly-
convinced that it was only a matter of time before he would here estab-

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 523

lish a permanent home, so deeply impressed had he become with the ad-
vantages and manifold attractions of this most favored of common-
wealths. He returned to Illinois and about four years later he realized
his desires by removing with his family to California, in 1878. He se-
cured thirty-three acres of land in the immediate vicinity of Gilroy, Santa
Clara county, for the purpose of making an experiment in the propagat-
ting of deciduous fruit-trees. He proved the experiment a distinctive
success and his original fruit farm is now one of the most valuable in
that section of the state. There he continued to reside until 1892, when
he removed to 'Merced county, where he had previously acquired a large
tract of land in the beautiful San Joaquin valley. There he developed a
magnificent stock and agricultural ranch, including the devotion of one
thousand acres to the propagation of alfalfa. He accumulated five
thousand acres of land in that fine valley and there continued to main-
tain his home for fourteen years, within which he compassed a most
notable work in the furtherance of industrial and civic development and
progress. He retained the ownership of his ranch property in the San
Joaquin valley until 1906, when he disposed of a part of the same at a
very appreciable profit, though he had expended a large amount of money
in the erection of buildings and in making proper irrigation provisions,
He was one of the pioneers in the development of that section of the
state and for many years his father was associated with him in enter-
prises through which they aided materially in the advancement of the
best interests of the locality along industrial and social lines, their well
directed efforts serving as an inspiration and example for others. In 1904
Mr. Kuns met with a severe injury while assisting in the handling of
cattle on his ranch, and it was finally necessary to remove his broken rib.
Hi.- was seriously ill for some time thereafter and though he retained his
ranch he found it expedient to remove to Lordsburg in 1906, his parents
having here maintained their home for a number of years prior thereto.
The rapidly failing health of the loved father and mother prompted him
to assume care of them in their declining years, and it is a matter of en-
during satisfaction to him that he was thus enabled to give his filial
solicitude during the short period that they remained with him, their
only child, to whose welfare their devotion had ever been of the deepest
order. Both of the parents passed away within a year after he had re-
moved to Lordsburg and in this attractive little city he has since con-
tinued to reside. He has identified himself thoroughly and helpfully
with local interests, though he has been retired from general business
activities since he established his residence at Lordsburg. He has given
effective service, however, in the supervision of his substantial capitalis-_
tic interests. In 1909 he was prevailed upon to become one of the or-
ganizers of the First National Bank of Lordsburg. in which he became
one of the principal stockholders and of which he has served as presi-
dent from the time of its incorporation, with a capital stock of twenty-
five thousand dollars. His broad experience and mature judgment have
made him a most valuable factor in defining and regulating the policies
of the institution, and as chief executive of the same he has done much
to make it one of the solid and popular monetary concerns of Los
Angeles county.

524 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

The well ordered generosity and benevolent spirit of Mr. Kuns and
his wife found exemplification in the founding of a noble memorial to
his honored parents and his deceased son. Near Lordsburg he purchased
a tract of eighteen acres of land upon which had been constructed a
large hotel at the time of the somewhat fictitious boom in this locality,
and this hotel which had never been used as such, he improved by the
expenditure of several thousand dollars, in the making of improvements
to fit it for the designed purpose. He then presented the entire property
to the Women's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal
church of California, to be used for the maintenance of a home for or-
phaned children. The institution has proved a noble benefaction and is
a power for good in the aiding of its little wards, whose educational
training is secured in the public schools of Lordsburg and Lavere.
Greater than "sculptured urn or animated bust" is such a memorial,
and an enduring evidence of the generosity and humanitarian spirit of
Mr. Kuns and wife is also given through this splendid benefaction. He
and his family are zealous members of the Methodist Episcopal church
and he has contributed liberally to the various departments of its activ-
ities. In politics Mr. Kuns is unswerving in his allegiance to the pro-
hibition party and he has been active in its councils as well as liberal in his
material contribution to its cause, as his opposition to the liquor traffic in
all forms is of the most implacable order.

On the 28th of March, 1870, in Sciota county, Ohio, was solemnized
the marriage of Mr. Kuns to .Miss Mary E. Pearce, who was born in
Highland county, that state, and who is a daughter of Joseph and Mary
(Silcott) Pearce, representatives of families early founded in Yirginia,
where the Silcott family has been one of marked prominence, the Pearce
lineage being traced back to staunch Holland-Dutch origin. The parents
of Mrs. Kuns continued to reside in Ohio until their death and the father
devoted the major part of his active career to agricultural pursuits. In
conclusion of this review is- entered brief record concerning the children
of Mr. and Mrs. Kuns : Henry Arthur is a civil engineer by profession
and is now identified with important mining enterprises at Berkeley, Cali-
fornia ; Margaret M. is the wife of Warren Williams, a representative
business man of Lordsburg : Lena is the wife of John Neher. who is a
prosperous agriculturist of Merced county, this state ; David died in
1905, at the age of twenty years ; and Ora is the wife of James M.
Johnson, a leading business man of Lordsburg.

FRANK C. DUNHAM. There are few of the eastern and middle
states that have not contributed a generous quota to the population of
California, and among the native sons of the fine old Hawkeye state who
have here gained secure vantage ground stands Frank Clark Dunham,
who is one of the representative younger members of the bar of Los
Angeles county and who is now serving most acceptably in the office of
justice of the peace in his beautiful home city of Pasadena. His acad-
emic and professional education represents essentially the concrete re-
sults of his own well directed .efforts, as he depended almost entirely
upon his own resources in pursuing his higher studies, and the same
intensive ambition and self-reliance have contributed to his success in

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

nis chosen profession, in which they offer substantial presage of further
advancement. Steadfast in character and of high ideals, Air. Dunham
is a worthy representative of a dignified profession, and his status in
the community is such as to entitle him fully to recognition in this pub-
lication.

Frank Clark Dunham was born at Estherville, Emmet county, Iowa,
on the 1st of April, 1884, and is the third in order of birth of a family
of five sons. He is a son of Henry A. and Anna Bell (Lowe) Dunham,
both of whom were born in Minnesota, where the respective families
were founded in the pioneer days. The father has been identified with
railroad work during practically the entire course of his active career
and by the time this publication is issued from the press he will have
had to his credit thirty years of consecutive service in the capacity of
locomotive engineer. For many years he was in the employ of the
Burlington, Cedar Rapids & Northern Railroad Company, but he is now
an engineer on the Chicago & Rock Island Railroad. He and his wife
maintain their home at Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to which city they
removed after many years' residence in Iowa. Of the five sons four
are living, and of this number Frank C, of this sketch is the only one that
has not followed in the footsteps of the father and entered railway
service. Two of the sons are locomotive engineers, and the remaining
son is in line for similar responsibility, as he is now acting as fireman.

It may be readily understood that Frank C. Dunham showed his
independent cast of mind when he decided to find a sphere of endeavor
radically different from that in which his honored father has served so
long and efficiently, and after formulating definite plans he pressed
steadily forward to the mark which he has set before him. He gained
his preliminary educational discipline in the public schools of his na-
tive state and then entered the Iowa City Academy, at Iowa City, in
which he was graduated as a member of the class of 1904. In the same
year he won the oratorical contest for the college literary societies by
delivering an original address entitled "The True American." In the
autumn of 1904 Mr. Dunham was matriculated in the University of
Iowa, at Iowa City, and in this fine institution he was graduated in
1908, with the well earned degree of Bachelor of Arts. Soon after his
graduation he came to California, and in the autumn of the same year
he entered the law department of the University of Southern California,
in which he completed the prescribed technical course and in which he
was graduated as a member of the class of 1910. He received at this
time his degree of Bachelor of Laws, but he had been admitted to the
bar of the state on the 2yd of July of the preceding year.

The professional novitiate of Mr. Dunham was marked by his asso-
ciation in practice with the well known law firm of Valentine & Newby,
of Los Angeles, and he continued his practice under these conditions
until the ist of August, 1911, when he established his office in Pasadena,
having been a resident of this city since May, 1911. By the board of
supervisors of Los Angeles county Mr. Dunham was appointed justice
of the peace for Pasadena township, to fill out an unexpired term of
three and one-half years, this vacancy having been caused by the death
of the regular incumbent, Judge Klamroth. There were eight candi-

528 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

dates in the field for appointment to this office, and therefore there is
much of significance in the fact that the preferment came to Mr. Dun-
ham, whose special eligibility was recognized by the appointing board,
which took cognizance of his superior education, professional ability and
sterling attributes of character.

In politics Mr. Dunham maintains as independent attitude, is well
fortified in his opinions as to matters of public polity and gives his sup-
port to men and measures meeting the approval of his judgment. While
residing in the city of Los Angeles he was actively identified with the
work of the good-government organization. He holds membership in
the Zetagathian Literary Society of his alma mater, the University of
Iowa, and he and his wife are popular factors in the social activities of
their home city.

On the 22d of June, 1910, Mr. Dunham was united in marriage to
Miss Amy L. Atwood, who was born in the state of Illinois and who
is a daughter of M. W. and Carrie (Tindell) Atwood, now residents
of Pasadena. Mr. Atwood has been for many years one of the most
influential figures in the work of the Prohibition party, and none has
been more earnest in fighting the liquor traffic and supporting the cause
of temperance.

Juiix E. HUBBLE, ,M. D. Established in the successful practice of
his profession at Lordsburg, Dr. Hubble is one of the representative
physicians and surgeons of Los Angeles county, with professional and
personal popularity of unequivocal order. He is a scion of staunch old
southern stock, though the original representatives of the family in
America settled in the northern part of the country, presumably in New
England. Joel Hubble, grandfather of the Doctor, was the founder of
the family in the south, as he took up his abode in Smyth county, Vir-
ginia, upon his arrival from his native state of New York. In the Old
Dominion commonwealth, that cradle of so much of our national history,
he was wedded, the maiden name of his wife having been Jones and she
having been a member of one of the representative families of Smyth
county, Virginia. They became the parents of five sons and one daughter
and all of the sons except Robert H., father of the subject of this review
eventually removed to Missouri in the early '405, one or more becoming
physicians and all having been concerned with the agricultural industry
in that state. Joel Hubble and his noble wife continued to reside in Vir-
ginia until they were summoned to the life eternal, and in that state all
of their children were born and reared.

Robert Henry Hubble, father of him whose name initiates this review,
was reared to maturity on the old homestead plantation in Smyth county,
Virginia, and received good educational advantages in his youth. He
became one of the extensive agriculturists and stock-growers of his na-
tive county, where he was the owner of a fine landed estate of twelve
hundred acres. He gave special attention to the propagation of corn and
was one of the most successful growers of this product in his home state,
devoting many acres to corn each year. He was a man of well fortified
opinions and sterling integrity, and thus he was an influential factor in
public affairs of a local order. His political allegiance was given to the

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 529

Democratic party and both he and his wife held membership in the Mis-
sionary Baptist church. At the climacteric period culminating in the Civil
war he was greatly opposed to the secession of the southern states, but
when definite action was taken for secession and the war was precipitated
he was loyal to the cause of the section in which he had been born and
j-eared. He promptly enlisted as a member of a Virginia regiment, with
which he gave valiant service during the greater part of the great conflict
between the states. He was never wounded or captured and in the last
year of the war, by supplying a substitute, he was enabled to return to
his plantation and put in a crop of corn, his property having suffered from
the devastations of the war. in connection with which he met with severe
financial reverses, as did nearly all property-holders in the south, but
with the return of peace and the rehabilitation of the country he gained
definite prosperity through his well ordered efforts in connection with
the basic industry of agriculture. He ever retained a deep interest in his
old comrades of the Civil war and signified the same by his membership
in the United Confederate Veterans' Association. He continued to reside
on his fine old homestead until his death, in 1898, at the age of seventy
years, and his cherished and devoted wife was summoned to eternal rest
on the 1 5th of March. 1901, at the age of seventy-two years. Her maiden
name was Freelove Blessing and she was born and reared in \ irginia,
where the Blessing family was founded in an early day. Robert H. and
Freelove (Blessing) Hubble became the parents of twelve children, of
whom ten survive, the other two having died in infancy and Dr. Hubble,
of this review, having been the ninth in order of birth.

Dr. John Edgar Hubble was born on the old homestead plantation in
Smyth count}-, Virginia, on the i8th of June, 1864. and thus his boyhood
days were passed during the period of the so-called "reconstruction" in
the south. He gained his preliminary educational discipline in the pub-
lic schools, including a course in the high school at Holstein Mills, and he
then entered Emory & Henry College, at Emory, Virginia, in which he
continued higher academic studies for a period of two years. Having
formulated definite plans for his future career, he entered the medical de-
partment of the historic old University of Virginia, at Charlottsville, in
which he completed the prescribed curriculum and was graduated as
a member of the class of 1891. receiving his well earned degree of Doctor
of Medicine of the ist of July of that year. Thereafter he served for
three months as interne in an institution known as the Retreat for the
Sick, in the city of Richmond, Virginia, in which connection he gained
valuable clinical experience. In iniating the active work of his profession
as a general practitioner. Dr. Hubble located in the village of Chilhowie,
in his native county, and in the building up of a large and representative
practice he proved that in his case no application could be made of the
scriptural aphorism that "a prophet is not without honor save in his own
country." After twelve years of successful work as a general practitioner
in Smyth county, Virginia, Dr. Hubble came to California in 1904, after
having been engaged in practice for a few months at San Bernardino he
removed to Lordsburg, Los Angeles county, where his large professional
business and marked personal popularity afford the best voucher for his
technical abilitv and sterling attributes of character. The Doctor is a

530 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

member of the Virginia and California State Medical Societies, the Amer-
ican Medical Association and the Los Angeles County Medical Society.
He is a close and appreciative student and thus keeps in touch with the
advances made in both departments of his profession, availing himself
of the most approved methods and remedial agents. While reared in
the faith of the democratic party, and naturally supporting its cause
while a resident of his native state, the Doctor has pursued an indepen-
dent course in politics during the period of his residence in California,
giving his support to candidates and measures meeting the approval of
his judgment. He and his wife and their four oldest children hold
membership in the First Baptist church at Pomona.

On the 22d of June, 1893, was solemnized the marriage of Dr. Hubble
to Miss Lauuna Carner, who likewise was born and reared in Smyth
county, Virginia, and they have six children, the first four of whom were
born in Virginia and the other two in California. The names of the chil-
dren are here entered in respective order of birth : Edgar Page, Lucile
Vivian, Mattie Freelove, Jean Elizabeth, James Henry Harris and John
Douglas. The family is one of prominence and marked popularity in the
social activities of the community, and the attractive home of the Doctor
is a center of gracious hospitality, — suggestive of the fine old southern
regime.

JOHN PERRY WOOD. Of Judge Wood it may well be said, in the
words applied by Disraeli to one of his distinguished contemporaries, —
"He has risen by very appreciable merits." There is much significance
in the fact that within a decade of residence in California he has at-
tained to the high office of judge of the superior court of Los Angeles
county. This preferment bears distinctive evidence of his professional
attainments and popular appreciation of his sterling attributes of char-
acter. Judge Wood brings to his office the well disciplined forces of a
strong intellect and thorough knowledge of the science of jurispru-
dence, reinforced by an integrity of purpose from which there can be no
deviation. As one of the representative legists and jurists of the state
of his adoption he is well entitled to recognition in this history.

John Perry Wood was born in the city of Baltimore, Maryland, on
the 3Oth of March, 1879. and is a son of Rev. John A. and Ida L.
( Perry) Wood. The father is a prominent member of the clergy of
the Methodist Episcopal church and has served many important charges,
mainly in the state of Pennsylvania. The mother is a woman of broad
education and exceptionally high attainments.

Judge Wood was but two weeks old when his parents moved from
Baltimore to the state of Pennsylvania, within whose gracious borders
he was reared to adult age and in the mountains of the central part of
which commonwealth he early found diversion and healthful exercise in
hunting and fishing, thus quickening an enduring appreciation of those
sports of forest and stream of which he is now an ardent follower. In
the meanwhile he duly availed himself of the advantages of the public
schools, and in 1895 he was graduated in the high school at Everett,
Bedford county. In the pursuance of higher academic studies he com-
pleted a course in Dickinson College, at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in which

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 533

he was graduated as a member of the class of 1900 and from which he
received the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy. Later his alma mater
conferred upon him the degree of Master of Arts.

In preparation for the work of his chosen profession Judge Wood
entered the law school of Yale University, from which he was gradu-
ated as a member of the class of 1902, with the degree of LL. B. In
August of the same year he came to California, and after spending a
year in the law office of Hunsaker & Britt, of Los Angeles, he removed
to Pasadena, where he engaged in the practice of his profession in an
individual way and where he has since maintained his home. His marked
ability and ambition made his professional novitiate of brief duration.
Within a brief interval he built up a prosperous practice, with a client-
age of representative order. His sterling character and his distinctive
civic loyalty soon marked him as specially eligible for public office, and
in May, 1905, he was appointed judge of the police court of Pasadena.
In the following year he became city attorney, and this incumbency he
retained four years, within which he represented the municipality in
much important litigation, — especially that involving the respective rights
and obligations of municipalities and public-service corporations. In
this connection he gained recognition as an able and fearless advocate
of the rights of the people.

In 1910 Judge Wood was put forward by the Lincoln-Roosevelt
League as a candidate at the direct primaries for the Republican nomina-
tion for judge of the superior court of Los Angeles county. He received
the nomination, as well as a gratifying majority in the ensuing general
election. He entered upon the discharge of his duties on the superior
bench in January, 1911, and has already justified the popular choice which
placed him in this important office. So emphatic and well merited was
the endorsement of Mr. Woods' candidacy by leading papers of the county
that it is but consistent as showing the esteem in which he is held
and the reason therefor, that in this connection be reproduced, with minor
paraphrase, an article which appeared in the Pasadena Daily News of
August 6, 1910:

"John Perry Wood, of Pasadena, has been selected for endorsement
by the Lincoln-Roosevelt League for superior court judge, for the ex-
cellent reason that his candidacy stands for the kind of sterling personal
integrity which makes for judicial character on the bench. Although com-
paratively young, Mr. Wood has had the kind of legal experience that
seasons men rapidly and develops moral and legal fibre. As city attorney
of Pasadena under two successive administrations he has had to grapple
with some of the hardest legal problems, and, measured either by the
ability demonstrated or the success of his efforts in the city's behalf,
his record has placed him among the leading members of the bar of
southern California. There is force of character all through the record
of this litigation. Some of the heaviest of municipal problems have kept
Mr. Wood busily employed in the various higher courts, including the
supreme court of the United States. Rent by factional differences at
times, as well as contention with powerful utility corporations, Pasadena
has now weathered her legal storms well, owing to the firm, fair and
tireless work of Mr. Wood. Vigor and courage, coupled with calmness

:,;;4 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

and clearness of mind, have been brought into these civic duties and
responsibilities, and they have counted in the line of success.

City Attorney Wood has had a strenuous record for a man of thirty-
two, and in many a bitterly contested case he has shown the right mettle
and constitutional fibre. I7ew lawyers of his age are gifted with equal
judicial discretion. The foundation of .Mr. Wood's legal training was
laid at the Yale law school, in which he was graduated, and seldom is a
man so quickly brought face to face with the heavy litigation and respon-
sibility which have been his lot. He has stood the test. In the words of
Victor Hugo, he 'can toil terribly.' Pasadena has had a record in recent
years of almost uninterrupted litigation over the conflicting claims of
the people and the utility corporations which serve them. In all this
record but one case has been lost by City Attorney Wood, — a record diffi-
cult to beat. Keen and alert of mind, calm of judgment, guided by a na-
tive attachment for what is right in principle, viewing the law as a means
of establishing justice for the sake of justice, John Perry Wood has sub-
mitted his candidacy to the public at the solicitation of lawyers and other
citizens who believe in an independent, courageous judiciary.

An emphatic and cordial endorsement of the candidacy of Judge Wood
for the office of which he is now the incumbent was given above the
signatures of a large number of representative citizens of Pasadena, and
the following extracts are certainly worthy of perpetuation, as defining
a noteworthy incident in his career as a lawyer and as a public-spirited
citizen :

Mr. Wood is best known for his fearless and active management of
his office as city attorney of Pasadena. During his incumbency under
two administrations he has shown himself possessed of a keen legal
mind and an exact judgment. In his official capacity he has always stood
for a square deal, not only for the individual but also for the people as
a whole. * ' * To the office of city attorney Mr. Wood brought not

only his high ability, but also an enthusiasm for a righteous public ser-
vice and an incessant and self-sacrificing labor, which has made his work
extraordinarily successful. . = His conduct of all the intricate

and nationally important telephone and telegraph litigation between the
city and the Sunset and Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Companies, in-
volving labors in all the state and federal courts, has in itself assured him
an enviable reputation at the bar. Two suits involving the Edison Com-
pany lighting contract-, which he conducted have been decided in favor
of the city in the United States circuit court and the United States circuit
court of "appeals. In his defense of the city in its municipal lighting
matters, three suits with the Edison Company, involving important con-
stitutional questions, were won by the city in the state and federal courts.
To him is largely due the success of the municipal electric-lighting project,
of which he has' always been a stout champion, not only for his successful
work in the courts, but also for the legal machinery he has constructed
and the work he has done to advance its administration and resist the
attacks which have been made upon it. His success in these matters and
in connection with the business affairs, negotiations and bond issues of the
city and the general administration of his office, and his attitude toward
public affairs generally, stamp him as a man of that determined but broad

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 535

judgment which one holding a judicial office should possess. Above all,
he has demonstrated that he is a man of unimpeachable and uncompromis-
ing integrity.

A further local estimate of the character of Judge Wood is that
given in an editorial in the Pasadena Star of August 2, 1910, and from
the same the following pertinent statements are taken: "Personally Mr.
\Yood is conspicuously clean-charactered, high-minded, genial and af-
fable. His escutcheon is immaculate. He is highly esteemed by all
who know him. Mr. Wood is modest and unostentatious in manner and
enjoys the confidence of the community."

Judge Wood has been closely associated with the movements for
political reform in southern California during the entire period of his
residence in the state, and his generic political allegiance is given to the
Republican party. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, of the
Overland Club and the Anandale Country Club, of Pasadena, and the
L'nion League Club of Los Angeles.

JOHN M. FUOUA. As one of the representative citizens of Pomona,
Li is Angeles county, as a native son of California and a member of one
of the most honored pioneer families of the southern part of the state,
Mr. Fuqua is well entitled to special consideration in this publication.
He is a scion, in both the paternal and maternal lines, of families that were
founded in Yirginia in the colonial era of our national history, and the
name which he bears has been prominently and honorably linked with
the civic and industrial annals of the nation.

In San Diego county, California, soon after the arrival of his parents
on their immigration from Texas to that county, John M. Fuqua was born,
on the 3d of October, 1853. He is a son of Rev. Isham and Joanna
(Hathaway > Fuqua, the former a native of Yirginia and the latter of
Missouri. The ancestry of the Fuqua family is of French and Scotch
derivation, and representatives of the name were numbered among the
early settlers of the historic Old Dominion state, — Virginia. In that com-
monwealth was bora John Fuqua, grandfather of him whose name intro-
duces this review, and he became one of the extensive planters and slave-
holders of his native state, where he was a citizen of prominence and in-
fluence and of large wealth. He and his wife were most devout members
of the Baptist church, of the order known commonly as the "hard-shell"
Baptists, and he was a local preacher in the same for many years, serving
as such throughout the section in which he so long maintained his home.
He died on his fine old homestead plantation, at the patriarchal age of
one hundred and four years, his wife having preceded him to eternal rest
and having likew-ise been of venerable age at the time of death. They
became the parents of five sons and one daughter, all of whom were born
and reared on the old homestead plantation in Virginia, their names being
as here noted : Nathan, Isham, Peter. Joshua, John and Mary.

Isham Fuqua, the second in order of birth, was born on the second of
January, 1815, and he early became associated with the work and manage-
ment of the home plantation, the while he availed himself of such ad-
vantages as were afforded in the schools of the locality and period. As
a young man, in company with his younger brother, Joshua, he set forth

536 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALot.Y

for a tour of investigation and adventure on the western frontier. They
proceeded to Missouri and from that state later went into Texas, about the
time of the beginning of the Mexican \var. They both enlisted in a Texas
regiment of volunteers, in 1847, and with the same they served in the
command of General Zachary Taylor until the close of the war. They
participated in the capture of the City of Mexico and took part in other
important engagements. The younger brother passed the closing years
of his life in Honey Grove, Lamar county, Texas. While thus serving
as a soldier, Isham Fuqua gained considerable information concerning
southern California and determined to visit this section at some future
time. He returned with his brother to Texas and soon after went to
Missouri, where his marriage was solemnized. He returned with his bride
to Texas, where he and his brother previously received grants of land
in recognition of their services in the Mexican war. In the Lone Star
state he became widely known as a pioneer missionary preacher of the
Baptist church, and he labored with all of consecrated zeal and devotion
in ministering to the widely separated settlements. In 1853. as already
noted, he came with his family to California, and he settled in the San
Isabelle valley, in San Diego county. In the autumn of the same year,
however, he removed to Los Angeles county and established his home on
a farm neal El Monte. At that period most of the settlements in this sec-
tion of the state were Spanish, the greater number of the inhabitants hav-
ing received their land grants from Mexico. The Spanish people received
the American settlers most kindly and hospitably and assisted in many
wnys in establishing their homes, and the Fuqua family was much in-
debted to them for such generous consideration. Isham Fuqua con-
tinued to maintain his home in Los Angeles county until the autumn of
1867, when he settled at El Rincon Rancho, in San Bernardino county,
where he became the owner of a ranch of three hundred acres. There
he was actively engaged in farming and stock-growing until 1888, when
he sold his land and live stock and removed to Pomona, Los Angeles
county, where he erected a three-story hotel and residence, to the con-
ducting of which he continued to devote his attention until his death,
on the 5th of April, 1890, at the age of more than seventy-six years.
His widow survived him by several years and was seventy-nine years
of age at the time of her demise.

Rev. Isham Fuqua was one of the best known and most honored
pioneers of southern California, and not only did he contribute his quota
to its civic and industrial development but he also continued his earnest
labors as a minister of the Baptist church. He was the founder of a
number of churches and served in numerous p'astoral charges, includ-
ing those at El Monte. Downey, Azusa and Rincon, being numbered
among the most influential pioneer clergyman of the Baptist church in
the state. He was a man of broad mental ken and strong individuality,
was a forceful speaker and as a preacher his sincerity and zeal made
him a potent force in the work of the church, the while his abiding sym-
pathy kindliness and tolerance gained and retained to him the affectionate
regard of all with whom he came in contact. He was popularly known
as Parson Fuqua, and his intimate friends usually addressed him by his
Christian name, Isham. His wife was born in Missouri and was a

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 537

daughter of \Yilliani Hathaway, who was likewise a native of that state
and a member of one of its early pioneer families. Mr. Hathaway was
a representative planter and farmer, operated cotton mills, etc., and was
one of the prominent and influential citizens of his native state, where
he continued to reside, on his fine plantation, until his death, at the age
of eighty-two years. His wife, Susan, was likewise a native of Mis-
souri and was eighty-six years of age when she was summoned to the
life eternal. Isham and Joanna (Hathaway) Fuqua became the parents
of three sons and five daughters. One of the daughters, Susan met an
accidental death when an infant, having been drowned in an old irri-
gating ditch of the Ben Barton ranch in San Bernardino county, — a
water course over which there has been much litigation in later years. Of
the sons, Benjamin F. died at the old family homestead in Pomona, on
the I4th of December, 1909, at the age of fifty years. He had previ-
ously resided for several years on his ranch in Tulare county. The
other children survive the honored parents and brief record concerning
them is here given : Dora B. is the wife of Reason M. Thurman, of
Long Beach, California ; Mary C. is the widow of George R. Vines and
resides in the city of Los Angeles ; Serena D. is the wife of Otis Hid-
den, of that city; Tennie Ann is the wife of Sam M. Bowers, of Lemon,
this state, where her brother William J. also maintains his home; and
John M., of this review, was the second in order of birth of the eight
children.

John M. Fuqua has shown the typical progressiveness and energy of
the true native son of California and none is more loyal to the state and
its varied interests. He early began to assist his father in his farming
and stockgrowing operations and gained his preliminary education in
private schools conducted in the various localities in which the family
resided at different times. He reverts with appreciation to these pri-
mative educational institutions, which would seem an impossibility to
the youth of the present day, when the schools of southern California
are found to be of the highest standard. He attended school in build-
ings rudely constructed of poles, with dirt floor and with slabs for
benches. No glass was supplied for the windows, and over these aper-
tures for light boards were placed when the buildings were closed or
when storms prevailed. After public schools had been established Mr.
Fuqua was enabled to attend such a school, at Rincon, for one year, and
he still takes pride in referring to the fact that in this school he was
presented by the teacher with a fine steel engraving, awarded as first
prize for the best writing in the copy books supplied to the pupils. At
that time Henry Goodcell, Jr., was county superintendent of the public
schools of San Bernardino county and the father Henry Goodcell, Sr.,
served on the committee of awards for the schools, as did also John
Gregory, another of the well known pioneers of the county.

In the autumn of 1873 ^r- Fuqua. severed the gracious home ties and
went to the home of his brother-in-law, Reason M. Thurman, whom he
assisted in the work of the latter's farm, near Los Angeles. He finally
purchased of his brother-in-law a tract of twenty acres, and to the cul-
tivation and management of this place he continued to devote his atten-
tion until 1882, when he sold the property and removed to El Rincon, San

538 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

Bernardino county, where he purchased a tract of two hundred acres,
adjoining his father's old homestead. There, amidst the scenes of his
childhood and youth, he developed a most prosperous agricultural and
stock-growing business and made the farm one of the model places of
that section. In the autumn of 1907 he disposed of this valuable estate
and established his permanent home in Pomona, where his wife and
children had lived for several years previously, in order to afford the
children better educational advantages. Since his return to Pomona
Mr. Fuqua has conducted, as a lodging house, the old hotel erected by his
father many years ago, and the same has been kept in good repair, be-
sides which many improvements have been made on the property. The
house has twenty-eight rooms and receives an appreciative patronage, as
had it also under the regime of Mrs. Fuqua, who had assumed charge
of the same in 1901. In politics Mr. Fuqua accords stanch allegiance
to the Democratic party and thus holds to the faith of his ancestors.
\Yhile he has shown the utmost loyalty and public spirit and has served
in various public offices of minor order, in both Los Angeles and San
Bernardino counties, he has not been ambitious for political office or the
honors or emoluments pertaining thereto. He is affiliated with the local
lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and he and his wife hold
membership in the First Baptist church of Pomona. Their attractive
home is known for its generous hospitality and the family is popular in
connection with the leading social activities of the community.

On the igth of September, 1878, was solemnized the marriage of
Mr. Fuqua to Miss Sarah A. Neighbours, who was born in Tishomingo
county, Mississippi, and who is a daughter of the late Allen Washington
Neighbours, one of the sterling pioneers in the vicinity of Downey, Los
Angeles county, California, where he was actively and successfully iden-
tified with the ranching industry for forty-one years. He died in the
city of Los Angeles, after having been in impaired health for a number
of years. He was a native of North Carolina and was a resident of
Mississippi for a number of years. He served under General Taylor in
the Mexican war and was also a valiant soldier of the Confederacy in
the Civil war, in which he was taken captive on the Arkansas river.
After his release he came to California, where both he and his wife pas-
sed the residue of their lives. Concerning the children of Mr. and Mrs.
Fuqua the following brief record is given in conclusion of this sketch :
Isham W. is superintendent of the American Petroleum Oil Company at
Coalinga. Fresno county ; Mary M. is the wife of Henry L. Boutell, of
Ontario. San Bernardino county; Tennie E. is the wife of Fred J. Paine,
of Clifton, Arizona, where he is superintendent of the local business of
the Standard Oil Company ; Henry S. resides in Pomona ; Ida May is
the wife of Ray Solmink, who is a railway conductor and who resides
in San Francisco; and John A., William B., Celia C. and Florence M.
remain at the parental home.

RUFUS \V. L. HORTON. In a publication of this order there is a
definite didactic value in the records offered concerning those who have
gained prestige and success along varied lines of endeavor, and it is espec-
ially gratifying to be able to present such data touching the careers of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 7.4 1

those who stand as representative members of the California bar. Well
entitled to such consideration is Mr. Horton. who has been engaged in the
practice of his profession in Los Angeles since 1887, and who has won
high prestige as a constitutional lawyer and in the civil branch of prac-
tice, besides which he is known and honored as a man of high civic ideals
and as a citizen of utmost loyalty and public spirit, — qualities that have
found beneficent exemplification along divers lines. He is a scion of a
family whose name has been identified with the annals of American his-
tory since the first half of the seventeenth century, and the lineage is
traced back to patrician English origin. Mr. Horton has shown deep

RUFUS W. L. HORTOX

appreciation of the dignity and value of his profession and has been ex-
ponent of its highest ethical code. He has brought his powers to bear
in the conserving of civic reforms and the upholding of those measures
and enterprises that foster the best interests of the community. Holding-
extraneous matters subordinate to the exacting demands of his profes-
sion, he has manifested no ambition for political office, but he has found
ample opportunity for effective work in behalf of good government and
wise legislation in the state of his adoption. He stands as a type of the
best American citizenship, strong and loyal in all the relations of life,
and he has secure vantage place in popular esteem in the city and state
with whose interests he has so closely and effectively identified himself.
The original progenitor of the Hortnn family in America was Joseph

AMKRICAX BIOGRAPHY AXD GENEALOGY

Horton, of Mouseley, Leicestershire, England, who was born on the I3th
of July, 1600, a son of \Yilliam Horton, of Barkisland. This worthy an-
cestor immigrated to the American colonies in 1635, on the ship "Swallow,"
and it is supposed that he originally settled in Long Island, whence repre-
sentatives of the name eventually proceeded to other sections, the name
having been early identified with the history of Southold, Long Island,
and with that of Westchester county, New York. To this parent stock
may be traced the lineage of citizens of prominence in the most diverse
sections of the Union at the present time. The English arms of the Hor-
ton family are shown in the College of Heraldry and may here be defined :
Arms — Gules : a lion rampant argent, charged on the breast with a boar's
head couped azure ; a brodure engrailed of the second. Crest : a red rose
seeded and barded, proper, surrounded with two laurel branches, vert.
Motto : "Pro rege et lege."

Rufus William Landon Horton, to whom this brief sketch is dedi-
cated, was born at Xiles, Berrien county, Michigan, on the 2nd of Septem-
ber, 1861, and is a son of Richmond Barney Horton and Anne Mary
(Smith) Horton, the former of whom was born in Ohio in 1828, and the
later of whom was born in Xew Jersey in 1824. The father devoted the
major part of his active career to the lumber business and was numbered
among the pioneer settlers of Michigan. He finally removed to Wauseon,
Fulton county, Ohio, and died in Dallas, Texas, while on a visit to that
state. The mother came originally from the Hubbards and is of German-
English descent. She now resides in Columbus, Ohio. Of their children,
five sons and four daughters are now living.

He whose name initiates this review was about five years of age at
the time of the family removal from his native place to Wauseon,
Ohio, where he was afforded the advantages of the public schools, includ-
ing the curriculum of the high school. In 1876 Mr. Horton went to Texas
and there he finally entered the literary department of Dallas College and
at the same time he began reading law. He completed his law course un-
der the effective preceptorship of Judge Lucien Shaw, a member of the
supreme court of California, and he was admitted to the Superior Court
in 1888 and to the Supreme Court in April, 1889.

On the ist of May, 1887. Mr. Horton established his home in Los
Angeles, where he has since devoted himself earnestly and with marked
success to the work of his chosen profession, in which he has confined
himself almost exclusively to civil practice, with no desire for criminal
causes. He has been a close and appreciative student of the science of
jurisprudence and his knowledge of the same is broad and accurate, the
while his facility in application of this knowledge is exceptional. He has
appeared in connection with many important litigations during the vir-
tual quarter of a century of his residence in Los Angeles and has been
counsellor for varied concerns of representative character. Versatility
and sureness have marked his labors as an advocate and he is recognized
as one of the leading corporation lawyers of the state. He is an author-
ity on law relating to liens and real estate, and in this connection his client-
age has been of large and important order. He was joint author of the
amended bill which was enacted as the mechanic's lien law of the state

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 543

by the general assembly of 1911, said law having become operative on the
3Oth of June, 1911. He had a large part in formulating the provisions
of this admirable law, which assures justice and equity to all concerned,
and while it is not within the province of this edition to enter into details
concerning the matter it is but consistent to say that there has been pub-
lished, in neat pamphlet form the full text of the new law, with explana-
tory comments by Mr. Horton. Incidentally the concluding statement
made by Mr. Horton in the pamphlet is worthy of reproduction in this
article, as the law was one in which he not only manifested deep interest
but is also one in the formulating of which he made most valuable contri-
bution. His words are as follows : "The intent of the legislature is to be
carried out by liberal construction of the law, unhampered by trivial and
immaterial technicalities. A square deal for all is the underlying prin-
ciple, and its interpretation is to be along the lines which will best secure
that end."

Mr. Horton is a director in and attorney for a large number of impor-
tant corporations, and represents large property interests and estates. As
attorney for the Westlake Improvement Association he prepared the ordi-
nance that confined oil wells and drilling operations to the district north of
Ocean View avenue in beautiful Westlake, Los Angeles City. Mr. Horton
has taken advanced ground in furthering of those undertakings and re-
forms that have touched the general welfare of his home city and state. He
served one term as a member of the Los Angeles board of education, in
1900-2, and was chairman of the committee that introduced the admirable
innovation of school savings banks in this city. For several years he was
secretary of the Citizen's League, which accomplished excellent reform
work in Los Angeles between the years 1894 and 1900, and since that time
he has in no wise abated his interest in municipal and general civic affairs.
As has already been intimated, Mr. Horton has manifested no predilec-
tion for political preferment, but he nevertheless accords a staunch alle-
giance to the Republican party and is an effective advocate of its princi-
ples and policies. He lends a hand in progressive movements and is an
active member of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce. He is iden-
tified with the Los Angeles Bar Association, the Masonic fraternity, the
California Club and the University Club, of which last mentioned he served
as secretary for two years. Mr. Horton is a man of fine physique, marked
vitality and commanding presence, and his genial manner and unfailing
courtesy denote the intrinsic kindliness and tolerant judgment which have
gained to him hosts of friends in the community which has long represent-
ed his home and been the stage of his well directed endeavors.

On the I5th of July, 1896, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Hor-
ton to Miss Millie Kurtz, daughter of Dr. Joseph Kurtz, a representa-
tive physician and surgeon of Los Angeles, and the two children of this
union are Joseph Kurtz Horton, who was born on the roth of December,
1903 ; and Rufus William Landon Horton, Jr., who was born on the
1 8th of December, 1909. The attractive family home is located on
West Twenty-fifth street and here a generous hospitality is dispensea
under the gracious direction of Mrs. Horton, who is a popular factor in
the social activities of the community.

.-.44 A.MKK1CAX I'.lOl .RAl'Il V AXU CiEXEALOGY

[mix H. SCOTT. To this well known and highly esteemed citizen
of Etiwanda, San Bernardino county, is to be ascribed much credit for
the part he has taken in connection with the development of this sec-
tion of the state along both industrial and civic lines. He is one of the
representative fruit-growers of the county and is a citizen whose influ-
ence is ever given in support of measures and enterprises tending to
advance the material and social prosperity of the community.

John Harriman Scott was born in Cumberlandshire. England, near
the border of Scotland, on the 6th of August, 1847, and is a son of
fohn and Ann (James) Scott, representatives of sterling old English
families. At the time of difficulties that culminated in the war of the
American revolution a Miss Harriman was living in this country,
whither she had come from England, and when the war became immi-
nent she returned to her native land, where she later married the pa-
ternal great-grandfather of the subject of this review, thus having been
the first of the family to come to America. In her honor John Harri-
man Scott received his second personal name. The father of John
Scott acquired an appreciable property in England, and the greater por-
tion of the same passed into the hands of the son, who became a cab-
inetmaker by trade and who continued to maintain his home in Cum-
berland until 1854, when he immigrated with his family to America.
He established his home in the city of Toronto, Canada, where he be-
came foreman in a large furniture establishment. He later purchased
land in the Muskoka District, Ontario, and turned his attention to ag-
ricultural pursuits, in which he was duly successful. He there con-
tinued to reside until his death, at the age of sixty-six years, and his
wife, who survived him by about two years, was likewise sixty-six
years of age when summoned to eternal rest. Of the six children five
attained to maturity and of the number John H., of this sketch, was
the fourth in order of birth. The only other one of the. children now
living is Harry, who is now a resident of the state of Tennessee.

John H. Scott was a lad of six years at the time of the family im-
migration to Canada, where he was reared to maturity and where he
was afforded the advantages of the common schools. At the age of
seventeen years he severed the gracious home ties and set forth to
make his own way in the world. His possessions at the time were vir-
tually summed up in a suit of clothes and seventy-five cents in money.
1 luring the summer of 1865 he was employed on a farm in Ontario and
in September of that year he made his first visit to the United States.
He returned to his home a few months later and remained in the pro-
vince of Ontario, devoting his attention principally to farm work for
about three years. He then identified himself with steatnboating op-
eration on the Muskoka lakes, since developed into one of the finest and
most popular summer-resort districts of the province of Ontario. He
continued in the employ of one company for thirteen years, beginning
his service in the capacity of quartermaster and two years later being
promoted to the office of master of steamers. For eleven years he was
captain of various steamers operated by the company and for the last
six years of this period was thus in command of the finest steamboat
of the popular line, devoted to both passenger and freight transporta-

AMERICAN BIOGRAIMIV AND GENEALOGY :.i:>

tion. In December, 1881, Captain Scott resigned his office and re-
tired from the service of the company with which he had been so long
identified. As a mark of appreciation of his efficient services, supe-
rior qualities of seamanship and unvarying courtesy, he was presented
with a most elaborate and beautiful silver set, comprising water pitcher,
trays, goblets, cake basket and a call-bell patterned as a pilot wheel.
The larger pieces of this fine set have the following inscription: "Pre-
sented to Captain J. H. Scott by the employes of Muskoka and Nipis-
sing Navigation Company: A. D. Cockburn, general manager; J. A.
Link, secretary and treasurer, December, 1881." It may be noted that
Mr. Cockburn was for many years a prominent member of the Parlia-
ment of the Dominion of Canada, and for several years, in the press
of other duties, he relegated to Captain Scott the supervision of the
outfitting of the entire fleet of vessels at the opening of the navigation
season, — a time when parliament was in session and he was unable to
give his personal attention to the important duties regularly devolving
upon him. In this connection Captain Scott prizes most highly the
beautiful silver set, which is in daily use in his household.

In January, 1882. Captain Scott came to California and estab-
lished his home in the Etiwanda colony, which was then being p'atted
and in which practically no improvements had been made. He was one
of the first settlers of the colony and has continued to reside continu-
ously on the tract of land which he secured upon coming to the count)-.
His was the first house erected after the organization of the colony ;-nd
he planted one of the original orange groves of this district, in the
spring of 1882. He purchased twenty acres of land at the start, but
soon afterward sold five acres, owing to the hard times experienced in
the early days of the colony's settlement. He paid for his land one
hundred dollars per acre, including ten shares of water, and when In-
here established his home the district was a veritable desert. - He re
claimed his original homestead into one of the finest orange groves and
vineyards in the colony, and the buildings on th'e same are of the most
substantial and attractive order, including1 a spacious and beautiful
residence. The Captain later purchased additional land and improved
the same, and he is now the owner of seventy-two acres, of which sixty-
five are in full bearing, yielding oranges, lemons and other fruit of the
finest type. Captain Scott was one of the organizers of the Etiwanda
Water Company, in the autumn of 1882. and has been one of its stock-
holders during the long intervening years, within which he has served
as director, vice-president and president of the company. He resigned
May, 1911. from his official position. The owners of land in the Eti-
wanda colony also own all water rights which are controlled by the
Etiwanda Water Company, which protects the interests of all con-
cerned and supplies water for irrigation purposes at lower cost than
can be secured in any other part of the beautiful San Bernardino Val-
ley. Captain Scott "is also a director of the Etiwanda Citrus' Fruit
Association, the Etiwanda Fruit Company and the Etiwanda Raisin
Growers' Association. He is representative of the Etiwanda district
in the Ontario-Cucamonga Fruit Exchange, one of the largest in the
state, and is also a mejnber of its directorate.

546 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

In politics Captain Scott is non-partisan and gives his support to
the men and measures meeting the approval of his judgment, the while
he is essentially progressive and public-spirited as a citizen. He is still
actively affiliated with Gravenhurst Lodge, No. 80, Ancient Order of
United Workmen, at Gravenhurst, province of Ontario, Canada, of
which he became a charter member at the time of its organization, in
1880. He was reared in the faith of the Church of England but is not
actively identified with any religious organization, .Mrs. Scott holding
membership in the Congregational church.

On the 6th of December, 1871, Captain Scott was united in mar-
riage to Miss Catharine McKenzie, who was born and reared in the
province of Ontario, Canada, where her father, the late Charles Mc-
Kenzie, was a prosperous farmer, his lineage being traced back to the
staunchest of Scotch stock. Captain and Mrs. Scott became the parents
of seven children, of whom Charles, the firstborn, died at the age of
fifteen years, and the second, Catharine Ann, died in infancy. John is
a successful fruit-grower of Etiwanda and Harry is engaged in the
same line of enterprise at Rialto, San Bernardino county ; Margaret
Elizabeth remains at the parental home : William is employed in a hard-
ware establishment in the city of Los Angeles ; and Eleanor remains at
the parental home, which is a center of generous hospitality.

GILBERT D. Muxsox. The patent of nobility which rested its hon-
ors and distinction in the person of the late Colonel Gilbert D. Munson
came from high authority, since it was based upon fine character,
marked ability and intrinsic loyalty. His life was marked by valuable
and generous accomplishment in the legal profession, of which he was
a distinguished representative ; he was a gallant soldier of the L'nion
in the Civil war ; and his course was ever guided upon the highest plane
of integrity and honor, the while deep human sympathy and broad in-
tellectuality denoted the man as he was. His career was such as to ad-
vance the welfare of others as well as of himself, and he had a high
sense of his stewardship. With a reserve that indicated fine mental
and moral fiber, he never sought the light of mere publicity, and he was
essentially democratic, unostentatious and kindly in his relations with
his fellow men. Such a life is a benefaction, and its influence is cumu-
lative to a degree not commonly appreciated. With great heart and
noble mind, he made his life count for good in its every relation, and,
now that he has passed from the stage of mortal endeavors, there re-
mains the gracious heritage of an unblemished escutcheon, of a prolific
and worthy life. In the year 1900 Colonel Munson came from Ohio to
California and established his home in Los Angeles, where he continued
in the practice of his profession until his death. He held status as one
of the representative members of the bar of this state and prior to his
removal to the same had served on the bench of the circuit court.

Colonel Gilbert Dwight Munson was born in the little village of
Godfrey, Madison county, Illinois, on the 26th of September, 1840, and
thus he was seventy years and eight months of age at the time when
he was summoned to the life eternal, on the 2ist of May, 1911. He
was a son of Horace D. and Mary Burt (Griggs") Munson, both of

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 549

whom were representatives of staunch old families founded in Xe\v
England in the colonial era of our national history. Members of the
Munson family were numbered among the early settlers of Hartford
and New Haven, Connecticut, and Colonel Munson himself, taking
marked pride in his worthy ancestry, was an active member of the
Munson Association, of New Haven, an organization effected for the
purpose of cementing closer associations among the scions of this his-
toric family and 'for perpetuating records concerning past generations.
He was vice-president of this association at the time of his demise.
Horace D. Munson was a pioneer of both Ohio and Illinois, and the
major part of his active business career was one of close identification
with agricultural pursuits. He was an officer in an Ohio regiment in
the Civil war and both he and his wife passed the closing years of their
lives in that state.

When Colonel Munson was a lad of six years his parents removed
from Illinois to Muskingum county, Ohio, and located on a farm near
Zanesville, the judicial center of the county. On this old homestead he
was reared to maturity and he early began to lend his aid in the work
of the farm, the while he attended the winter terms of the common
schools until he had attained to the age of seventeen years, when he
secured, a certificate as a teacher, — a fact indicative of the excellent use
he had made of such scholastic advantages as had been accorded to him.
It was but natural that a youth of such distinctive ambition and alert
mentality should formulate definite plans for a future career, and thus
it was that Colonel Munson decided to prepare himself for the profes-
sion in which he was destined to gain so much of success and distinc-
tion. As a means to an end, he taught for some time in the schools of
Ohio, and in the meanwhile he began reading law under effective pre-
ceptorship. Soon, however, there came the call of higher duty, and his
intrinsic loyalty and patriotism prompted him to tender his aid in de-
fense of the nation's integrity. The first battle of Bull Run took place
in July. 1861, and soon afterward young- Munson, who had but recently
attained to his legal majority, enlisted as a private in Company G,
Fifteenth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, with which command he took part
in General Buell's campaign to Green River. He was then transferred,
with the rank of second lieutenant, to the Seventy-eighth Ohio Volun-
teer Infantry, and through gallant and meritorious service he thereafter
won promotion through the various -official grades to that of lieutenant
colonel, in which office he commanded his regiment with marked ability,
and took part in many of the important battles and campaigns of the
great conflict between the north and the south. He participated in the
battles of Donelson, Shiloh (or Pittsburg Landing), luka, Corinth, and
Vicksburg; took part in the Atlanta campaign, including the battle of
Atlanta, on the 22d of July, 1864, and thereafter accompanied Sherman
on his ever memorable march from Atlanta to the sea and thence on-
ward to the national capital. Colonel Munson commanded his regi-
ment on the march through the Carolinas and with the same participated
in the Grand Review of the victorious armies in the city of 'Washing-
ton. He thus served during virtually the entire period of the war,
and in the same he made a splendid record as a faithful soldier and gal-

.-,;,(> AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY

lant officer. He was mustered out with his regiment and duly received
his honorable discharge.

Colonel Munson ever manifested a deep interest in his old comrades
in arms and he perpetuated the more gracious memories of his military
service by his membership in the Grand Army of the Republic, the
Society of the Army of the Tennessee and the .Military Order of the
Loyal Legion of the United States, in each of which organizations he
was a prominent and honored figure for many years. He was a valued
companion of the Southern California Commandery of the Loyal Legion
and also represented the same in the national commandery of the order.
He served as president of the Southern California Association of the
Loyal Legion.

After the close of the war Colonel Munson entered the Columbia
Law School with the result that he soon gained admission to the bar.
He engaged in the practice of his profession in Zanesville, where his
character and talents soon gained to him a substantial and representative
clientage, in connection with which he appeared in much important liti-
gation in both the state and federal courts. He was finally called upon
to serve on the bench of the first subdivision of the Eighth judicial dis-
trict of Ohio, an incumbency which he retained for five years. He
had the true judicial cast of mind, a broad and accurate knowledge of
law and precedent, and an impartial and mature judgment, with the re-
sult that none of his decisions while on the bench met with reversal by
courts of higher jurisdiction. He continued in the active work of his
profession at Zanesville until 1900, and was known as one of the strong
and essentially representative members of the Ohio bar, as well as a
jurist of great circumspection and ability. In the old Buckeye state his
name is held in enduring honor, and in the old family cemetery at
Zanesville his mortal remains were laid to rest, beside those of his hon~
ored parents and other members of the family. He had a wide ac-
quaintanceship among the leading public men of Ohio, as well as with
many of those most distinguished in connection with the Civil war.
including Generals Grant, Sherman and Logan.

In politics General Munson gave an unequivocal allegiance to the
Republican party, and, while he had no desire for purely political office,
he was a zealous and effective worker in behalf of the principles and
policies for which the "Grand Old Party" stands sponsor. He had
naught of intellectual bigotry or intolerance and was ever mindful of
those in affliction and distres's. the while he did all in his power to aid
and uplift his fellow men. As a citizen he was loyal, broad-minded and
public-spirited, and as a man his character was the positive expression
of a true and noble nature. In IQOO Colonel Munson removed with
his family to Los Angeles, where he soon assumed a place of prom-
inence at the bar and where he continued in the active and successful
practice of his profession until his death. He formed a partnership al-
liance with Henry A. Barclay, under the title of Munson & Barclay,
and the same continued until he passed to the life eternal, in the fulness
of years and well earned honors.

At Zanesville. Ohio, on the 6th of June. 1872. was solemnized the
marriage of Colonel Munson to Miss Lucy Sturges Potwin, who was

AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY AND GENEALOGY 551

born and reared in the fine old Buckeye state and who is a daughter
of the late Charles W. Potwin. Her father was numbered among the
pioneer settlers of Zanesville, where he was for many years prominently
identified with banking interests, in connection with which he served
for a long period as president of the First National Bank. During the
climacteric period of the Civil war Mr. Potwin did all in his power to
further the cause of the Union and was specially zealous and liberal
in aiding the families of soldiers who were at the front. Mrs. Munson
still resides in Los Angeles, and has a beautiful home at 2717 West
Eighth street, the same being known for its gracious hospitality. Col-
onel Munson is survived by one daughter, Sarah, who is the wife of
Ernest Northcote, of Montecito, Santa Barbara county, California. His
mortal life is ended, but the angle of his influence is ever widening in
beneficence through its having compassed and affected the lives of others. /

."cil. 1-27

MAR 2 8 i 350