An illustrated history of Sacramento County, California : containing a history of Sacramento County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future portraits of some of its most eminent men, and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also prominent citizens of today, Part 95

Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 916

USA > California > Sacramento County > An illustrated history of Sacramento County, California : containing a history of Sacramento County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future portraits of some of its most eminent men, and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also prominent citizens of today > Part 95

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his term in the Legislature he came prominently to the front as an unyielding opponent of the so-called " gag-law," and contributed signally to its final defeat. As a member of the Senate he was chairman of the committees on the Chinese and Chinese Immigration, on irrigation, water rights and drainage, and a leading member of those on judiciary, education, the State prison and the State library. In reference to this period of Mr. Johnson's life, we will quote snb- stantially from the Evening Post of San Fran- cisco, published at the time: Fierce struggles, deadly conflicts, great indecorum, restless wait- ing, bitter complaining, exaltation, defiant toil, tender feeling have been that man's portion in life, as one will see through his strange voice. This characteristic voice accounts for much of his power over men. Men strike hands with him and swear to stand by him, because his voice tells them that he has lived their life of pain and conflict. But this same voice in bitter sarcasm vibrates like the sting of a bee. His intense nature is of course variable. in expression. While he is affable and accessible to all, whether friend or foe, he can confront harsh natures and cold-blooded critics with an icy coldness; his inner man hibernates in an alabaster cave. A cold-blooded calenlation might silently torture Johnson, but a thousand enemies could never move him from a position. In debate he is nt- terly irresistible; in retort he surpasses all the attorneys of the State; in fact, in sudden re- partee he is terrible. His industry is appall- ing, and he is evidently a man of destiny. For two terms Mr. Johnson was president of the old volunteer fire department, and took an act- ive part in the founding of the Exempt Fire- men's Association, in November, 1872. In 1873 he became secretary of the association and served seven years; since then he has been its president. In the Odd Fellows' Order he has been grand representative to the Sovereign Lodge of America; of the Red Men, he has been grand sachemn; of the Druids, past noble arch; of the Knights of Pythias, past chancellor; of the United Workmen, past masterworkman; of

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HISTORY OF SACRAMENTO COUNTY.

the Knights of Honor, past protector, etc. He was married at Syracuse, New York, in 1861, to Miss Anne de Monfridy, a native of Onon- daga Connty, New York, and Mr. Johnson, after his first trip to this State, returned via Panama for her, and bronght her West by the Nicaragua route. Their children are: Albert M. and Hiram W., associated with their father in legal business, and three danghters.

EORGE W. MORSE, a farmer of San Joaquin Township, was born August 10, 1838. His parents, Lyman and Harriet Morse, were natives of Vermont, and emigrated from New York State to Rock County, Wis- consin, in pioneer times, and remained there until the father's death, at the age of sixty-two years. He was a farmer by occupation, but was running a hotel at the time of his death, having leased his land. In his family were two sons and one daughter: Harriet, deceased; George W. and Lucien H. Harriet married Alonzo Bowman, and has since died. George W. is said to be the first white child born in that county. He was reared on a farin, and after the death of his father he went, at the age of eleven years, to live with Jerome Vaughn, and remained with him until he was of legal age for the transaction of business for himself. April 10, 1860, he came across the plains and monn- tains to California with horse teams, and arrived in Sacramento September 1. The journey was a very pleasent one, the principal accident being a loss of five horses in a stampede. In the train were twenty wagons and about forty men, be- sides the women and children. On arrival here Mr. Morse at once began freighting from Sac- ramento to the mines, and followed that business ten years. The last trip was made from Elko to the White Pine country, where were mines. In 1870 he came down and settled in San Joa- quin Township, this county, on which there was not a stroke of improvement. Now his place of 800 acres is one of the best in the county. He

purchased the land in 1862, about nine years prior to his location upon it. It is about six miles from Elk Grove, eighteen from Sacra- mento, and three and a half from the upper Stockton road. Mr. Morse was married in Sep- tember, 1870, to Miss Emma Russell, a native of Arkansas. Her people came to this State in 1860, locating in Sacramento. Mr. and Mrs. Morse have two sons and two daughters: Eg- bert, born in April, 1877; Mand, June 14, 1879; Archie, August 26, 1881; and Eva, July 12, 1885.

DOLPH JEAN, farmer, Brighton Town- ship, was born in France, December 29, a son of Frank and Francoice (Goubert) Jean. The former died in 1854 at the age of sixty-seven years, and the latter a few years later. They had four sons and three daughters. One of these, Adolph Jean, was brought up on the farm, and in 1867-'71 he followed farming on the Island of Jersey, near the coast of France, and then came to America, landing at Quebec; he worked on a farm near Toronto, Canada, four months; went to Detroit, where a friend helped him to obtain employment in the Saginaw Ium- ber camps; but one winter's experience there made him long for California, and hither he came, stopping first in San Francisco a few days endeavoring to find work, but in vain. Coming on to this county, he immediately found employ- ment in Brighton Township, entting and putting np hay, receiving $40 for the month he was employed. The gentleman who gave him this employment was John Boey, now deceased. The rest of the summer he worked in a hay press for Charles Baker, and during the winter worked upon a farm. The next season he was engaged by John Scofield, who bought Mr. Baker's place; next he was employed by Dr. W. S. Manlove, on his farm, until March 1 1874. During the twenty-two months he worked out he saved $900 from his earnings, and this capital enabled him at the date mentioned to rent the farm of

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HISTORY OF SACRAMENTO COUNTY.

Charles Baker. He remained on that place tive years, when Mr. Baker was compelled to vacate the ranch. Mr. Jean then purchased the place where he now resides at $100 per acre, and during the last part of January he moved upon it into a small house hastily put up. His present handsome residence was erected three years ago. This farm contains sixty-six acres of as good land as can be found in the State. It borders the American River, and is on the Coloma road, nine miles from Sacramento. There are thirty aeres in orchard, comprising prunes, plums, peaches, apricots and pears, and twenty-three acres in vineyard, in a good bearing condition. In September, 1888, Mr. Jean bought another ranch of 180 acres, on the Sacramento River, in Yolo County, above El Cajon. It is good pas- ture and dairy land.

DMUND G. MORTON, Sr., is from " Rev- olntionary stock." His father, William, a millwright and general mechanic, was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, about the time of the battle of Bunker Hill. It is related of his grandmother that during the battle she had to apply to General Gates for permission to leave the city. The father, being a skilled workman, was in demand throughout New Eng- land for his services as millwright, which occu- pation he followed for many years. He died at Salmon Falls, New Hampshire, at an advanced age. The subject of this sketch was born in Portsmonth, New Hampshire, July 24, 1824; attended the common schools of his native city, and graduated at the Berwick Academy in Maine. Not inheriting the mechanical genius of his father-whose mantle in this respect seems to have fallen upon his younger brother, Albert, now a resident of Florida-Edmund went to Boston, where his uncle, Edmund R. Griffith, was a dealer in paints and oils, and with him served an apprenticeship; afterward he had charge of a portion of his uncle's work. In 1847 he started in his business for himself,

in the same line, at the corner of Bedford and Columbia streets, and continued for six years. In May, 1852, he came to California, in the clipper ship "Staffordshire," Captain Richard- son, around Cape Horn, being 101 days on the journey. Captain Richardson was afterward wrecked on Sable Island, in 1856, losing both his ship and his own life. After his arrival in San Francisco, Mr. Morton suffered from agne for a considerable time. Before the expiration of the year 1852 he came to Sacramento, and after the fire erected a building at the corner of Seventh and J streets. The structure was hardly completed when the floods came and he lost every dollar he had. Returning to San Francisco, he engaged in the produce business for about a year. Then he went to " Indian Gulch," in Mariposa County, where his brother, James A.,-who had come to the Coast in 1849, -- was located as a trader, and joined him in busi- ness. Soon afterward they engaged together in mining on the Marseilles River and in assisting on the construction of a coffer dam of 1,200 feet, which was destroyed by a storm about the time it was completed. In mining their suc- cess was varied. They then went to the San Joaquin River and engaged in quartz mining for several years. Next, for the sake of better school advantages, Mr. Morton concluded to change his localitv. At this time he had three chil- dren. Accordingly he came and purchased a ranch of 300 acres on the American River, moved his family there and thea engaged in farming until 1884, when he sold the place and bought a ianchi of 500 acres near Hickman, five miles from Colusa. This ranch is peculiarly situated with regard to facilities for irrigation, and is devoted to the culture of alfalfa, which matures in about three weeks' time, by irrigation, giving an average of ten tons to the acre per annum. Mr. Morton's wife, nee Adaline HIicks, was a daughter of William Hicks, a farmer and trader of Yarmouth, Maine. Her granfather Hicks was one of the survivors of the battle of Bunker Hill, and was present at the dedication of the Bunker Hill monument in 1848. Mr. Morton

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HISTORY OF SACRAMENTO COUNTY.

has five daughters and two sons. The second daughter is the wife of B. F. Howard, the superintendent of the schools of Sacramento County. The youngest dangliter, Mollie, grad- uated at the high school, and is now at the State University at Berkeley, completing her educa- tion. The eldest son, Edmund, Jr., has charge of the ranch.

ILLIAM ROBINSON GRIMSHAW, deceased, was born in the city of New York, his parents being John and Emma (Robinson) Grimshaw. The father was English, and of a family interested in manufacturing in Manchester. The mother was American for at least five generations, being of the Robinson family of Rhode Island. The father dealt in cotton or cotton goods and traveled much. William R. was taken to England when two years old, remaining three years, and again at the age of six, when he remained five years at school. Losing his father early in life, he was mueh indebted to Thomas Minturn, an uncle by marriage, for his support and education. On his return from England he was sent to Mobile, Alabama, where he lived four years in some school or college. Again returning to New York, he is known to have spent some time in Burlington, Vermont, and at some point in the interior of the State of New York, and again in New York city-in all six years, for the most part, as is supposed, spent in completing his education. He is also known to have been a drug clerk for a time before he came of age. At the age of twenty-one he " shipped before the mast" on the Isaac Walton, owned wholly or in part by his uncle Minturn, and bound for Cali- fornia. Arriving at Monterey, he shipped on the Anita, a naval tender, which he left in Oc- tober, 1848, to accept the position of book- keeper for S. Brannan & Co. at Sutter's Fort, at a salary of $400 a month. In November, 1849, he went into partnership with William Daylor, and kept a store on his ranchi on the

Cosumnes. Mr. Daylor died of cholera in 1850, leaving no issue. In April, 1851, Mr. Grimshaw was married to Mrs. Sarah P. (Rhoads) Daylor, the widow of his late part ner, to whom she had been married four years before, at the age of seventeen. After some years they lived in Sacramento for a time, where Mr. Grimshaw was a law clerk with Winans & Hyer in 1857. By private study and from such experience of legal business as he had gathered in a law office and his superior general education he was deemed qualified to become a lawyer, and was admitted to the bar in 1868. He, however, quit the practice of law in the spring of 1869, not finding it as congenial as he had anticipated. He was a justice of the peace for fourteen years, and a teacher of the district school for six years, toward the close of his life. In 1876 he made a voyage to China for his health, but with no marked improvement. He died September 14, 1881. Mr. and Mrs. Grim- shaw were the parents of twelve children, nine sons and three daughters, of whom seven, with their mother, are now living: William R., born March 31, 1852; Emma G., November 26, 1853, now Mrs. William D. Lawton, of Sacramento; Thomas Mintnrn, August 15, 1856; George R., October 8, 1858; John Francis, June 1, 1862; Frederick M., May 9, 1866; and Walter S., Janu- ary 15, 1868. The mother was born in 1830 in Edgar County, Illinois, being a daughter of Thomas and Elizabeth (Foster) Rhoads. She has been a resident of the Cosumnes, with but little interruption, since the arrival in California of her parents, with their fourteen living chil- dren and two or three grandchildren, in 1846.

ILLIAM R. GRIMSHAW, oldest child of William R. Grimshaw, Sr., was born in Sacramento, March 31, 1852. He was educated in the district school, also to some extent at home by his father, and in no small measure by self-education in later years. At the age of fifteen he began to help on the family

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HISTORY OF SACRAMENTO COUNTY.

ranch, and has ever since been engaged in farmi- ing. He now owns a very comfortable home and a small farm of forty acres, to which he gives his undivided attention. He was married in July, 1877, to Miss Alice Bean, a native of Mis- souri, but who was reared in this State, and is a daughter of Russell T. Bean. They are the parents of four living children: Emma, born February 7, 1880; William R., December 5, 1881; Sarah, April 17, 1884; Agnes, July 11, 1887. They lost their first born in infancy.

ALTER ABOILE MILLER was born October 9, 1833, in Onondaga County, New York. His boyhood was spent on the home farmn. In 1846 when he was thirteen years of age, the family moved to Wisconsin and located in Walworth County, in the south- ern part of the State and adjoining the Illinois line, where they remained four years; thence to Columbia County near Ft. Winnebago, where Mr. Miller, father of Walter, bought 260 acres of land, and here they remained until 1860. The family emigrated to California in 1863 with the exception of one daughter. After seeing the family located, HI. D. Miller returned to Wisconsin, settled his business there and returned, bringing with him the afore-mentioned daughter. On reaching California, Walter M. carried on the business of hauling freight from Sacramento to Placerville (then known as Hang- town) for two months. He then had sufficient money to purchase the necessary implements to start in farming, and provide for the family who, during this time, had no special place of residence or ready means to live on. For the first two months he rented land in Brighton Township, but in the spring of 1862 he and his brother, W. B. Miller, bought a squatter right to 160 acres of land and worked it together for two years, up to 1864, when W. B. Miller re- ceived a title to it from the Government. W. A. Miller bought and moved upon land adjoining it, and afterward found it to be railroad land

and received title from the railroad company to 320 acres. Of this Mr. H. D. bought eighty acres, paying the same price for it as had been paid to the railroad company. Walter A. bought 160 acres more in 1875, making 400 in all. The farmn is about one-half bottom land, of a dark loamy soil, particularly adapted to fruit and grapes; twenty acres are planted in orchard consisting of a general variety of fruit; thirty acres with grape, all in heavy bearing, there being somne vines that have yielded 150 pounds to the vine; 100 of the vines are twenty- seven years old. For about seventeen seasons Mr. Miller had run a machine, the first six or seven seasons with horse power, and since that time steam power has been used. He has threshed from the Joaquin pretty nearly to the Red Bluff. He was married in Syracuse, New York, August 22, 1871, to Miss Florence H. Hall, a native of Syracuse and daughter of Upson S. and Jane C. Hall. Mr. and Mrs. Miller have two children: Carolina A., born May 29, 1872, wife of Frank Dahn; and Leroy H., born October 8, 1875.

- EORGE BUCKMAN GREENE was born in Leesburg, Virginia, March 4, 1849, his parents being Josiah B. and Caroline (Beale) Greene, natives of New Hampshire. The father was in the jewelry business in Lees- burg for some years. In the winter of 1849-'50 he came to California, but returned East in 1852 and brought out his wife and child. In due time the boy attended the district school and afterward a private school at Petaluma. As lie approached his majority he became familiar with the farm work and dairy interests of his father. He went into business on his own ac- count in 1871, renting his father's dairy farm. He owns the place he occupies, which he bought of his father in 1886, and of which he received the deed two years later, having been on the place since 1877. It contains 114 acres, with a very neat home and well-kept grounds. Sixty

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HISTORY OF SACRAMENTO COUNTY.

acres are orchard, on which he raises pears, peaches and apricots, a few cherries and plums. Ten acres are devoted to vegetables, and the re- mainder is tnle or swamp land, of which some fractional parts are being reclaimed from year to year. Mr. Greene was married January 1, 1875, to Miss Alice Stanley, a native of Cali- fornia, daughter of Harvey and Harriet (Hoag- land) Stanley. The father was born in Vermont in 1812, came to California in 1849, and died in 1862. The mother is still living. Mr. and Mrs. Greene are the parents of two boys: George Albert, born in August, 1876; Arthur Edison, March 16, 1885. A pretty and well designed two-story house, with carefully kept grounds and neatly trimmed hedges, constitute the home of the Greene family. Mr. Greene is a school trustee and a member of the Board of Swamp Land Trustees in District No. 150. He is a man of special talent in the line of mechanics and engineering. Without any formal training or apprenticeship he has constructed a small steam launch, which is the pride of this section, and of which he is the able commander and engineer.

LBERT DE FOREST MILLER, farmer, Brighton Township, arrived here with his father, Henry Miller, October 12, 1860. He was born in Onondaga County, New York, February 7, 1844. His father was also a native of New York and his mother, nee Julia Adams, was a native of Connecticut. In 1846 his parents emigrated to Walworth County, Wisconsin, and in 1848 into Columbia County, that State, in which county one of his neighbors, G. W. Scott, was keeping a general store, and is now a promi- nent citizen of Yolo County, living two and a half miles from Madison, having come to this State in 1851. The Miller family, numbering thirteen individuals, came to California overland with five wagons. Leaving their Wisconsin home May 7, 1860, they arrived in this county October 12 following. In the party were W. B.

Miller with three children, now living in Ven- tura County, this State; and one married sister, Mrs. James Powderly, with husband and three children. On his arrival here, Mr. Miller, Sr., located in Brighton Township, renting two years. In the winter of 1862-'63 he re- turned East for a year, and from 1864 till his death made his home here. Both finished their days at the residence of their son, the subject of this sketch. Their children were: W. B., now of Ventura County, a farmer and stabler at times; Mrs. Schaper, whose sketch appears elsewhere; W. A., who lives in Brighton Township; Sophia, who first married Mr. Pow- derly and afterward Mr. Townsend, and is now deceased; Allen De Lorin, of Sacramento; Sarah, who died in New York State between two and three years of age; the next in order of birth was the subject of this sketch; Sanford De Lorin, who died in Wisconsin, at the age of fifteen years, from poison given ignorantly by a drunken physician; George Alonzo, residing near Yreka, this State, when last heard of, about ten years ago. Frederick, a farmer in Oregon; Miner Adelbert, a farmer in El Dorado County; Henry, living at Salmon Falls, same county, also a farmer; Josephine Elizabeth, wife of Henry West in Sacramento; and Sarah, now the wife of Charles Robinson of Sacra- mento. When his father went East, the sub- ject of this sketch was left in charge of the family, all younger than he, farming on the river near Brighton. During the flood of 1861 -'62 he was on a piece of land rented from Mc- Cloy of Sacramento. A wind moved the house ten or twelve feet, upsetting everything within and carrying the kitchen fifty yards away, but injuring no one, although eight persons were in the house. They were rescued by boats. Mr. Miller plowed and sowed between floods and raised 1,700 bushels of wheat and barley that season, hanled it to Folsom and sold it at the low rate of seventy-five cents a cental (100 lbs.). In 1862 he moved upon the farm of A. B. Davis just south of Brighton. From 1863 to 1867 he followed teaming, using six horses to

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the wagon. In 1864 Mrs. Bennett, now Mrs. Schaper, came here a widow from Wisconsin with four children, making the family to be supported abont thirteen in number. That year he was cultivating 160 acres, and it proved a hard year, the barley yielding only twelve bushels to the acre and bringing only four and a half cents a pound. During the fall of that year he worked on the canal in Yolo County, employing two teams; but, finding it unremu- nerative, quit it at the end of sixty days. In 1866 he purchased eighty acres of land in Brighton Township, built a house upon it and followed farming and teaming for others. In the fall of 1867 his mother died. Afterward he followed his agricultural pursuits and speculated in live- stock, hay, ete., and made money,-the founda- tion of his present good fortune. In 1868 he rented 320 acres in Yolo County, which he also cultivated. His farm in Brighton Township now consists of 240 acres, largely devoted to stock- raising. December 28, 1868, he married Mrs. Margaret J. Lea, who was born on Prinee Ed- ward's Island July 4, 1848, reared in Boston, Massachussetts, and came to California in 1862. By her first husband she had one daughter, in 1867, named Annie R. Mr. and Mrs. Miller have five children, besides one who died in childhood, namely: Mina Alberta, born Novem- ber 13, 1869; Arthur Eugene, February 27, 1872; Amy Elizabeth, July 23, 1874; Bertha Belle, September 9, 1877; Ruby May, who died February 19, 1885, aged twenty months; and Leland Stanford, born January 27, 1886.

ENRY WILLIAM MYERS was born in Hanover, Germany, February 22, 1834, his parents being Henry and Josephine (Klingenberg) Myers, originally Meyer. The father died in 1847, aged fifty-two. Grand- father William Meyer reached the age of 103, and his wife was nearly eighty. II. W. Myers while quite young went to live with his father's brother, Frederick. He received the compul-

sory education of that country, and learned farming with his unele. In 1854 he came to this country, where his first employment was as a farm hand on Long Island. In 1855 he moved to Ohio, where he worked two years, and on March 10, 1857, he left New York for Califor- nia, coming out by the Panama ronte. On his arrival on this coast he tried mining for one month, and on June 15, 1857, he came to work on Grand Island at $45 a month, on the ranch he has now owned for a quarter of a century. They raised vegetables chiefly, the soil yielding heavy crops, for instance 11,000 saeks of pota- toes, of 140 pounds to the saek, on forty-five aeres. After eight months he bought, in part- nership with another, a place on Sutter Island for $700, which he worked three years. In 1864 he rented the 250 acres on which he now lives, and bought it in 1865. In 1866 he paid a visit to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he had some relations, and was there married to Miss Sophia Kruhoff, also a native of Germany. On his re- turn he was accompanied by his brother Fred- erick, to whom he sold seventy-eight acres of his ranch, reducing his own holding to 178 aeres. Some twenty years ago he began to plant fruit trees, and has now abont forty acres in orchard, besides fifteen acres on his 120-aere ranch on Miner Slough in Solano County. The greater part of his home place has been over- flowed since February, 1881, but the levee now being erected or repaired will, it is to be hoped, soon make overflowed lands on Grand Island a thing of the past, and transform its whole area into one of the garden spots of the earth. Mr. Myers built the present house, a comfortable and substantial residence of eight rooms, in 1876. Besides his ranches he owns considera- ble realty in San Francisco. Mr. and Mrs. Myers are the parents of four living children: Louis William, born October 27, 1869; Edward Henry, September 21, 1871; Dora Sophia, March 4, 1873; Wilhelmina Carolina, June 12. 1877. The sons are now following a course at Atkinson's Business College in Sacramento, and the elder daughter is at the Irving Institute in

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Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 916

Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 916