An illustrated history of San Joaquin County, California. Containing a history of San Joaquin County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its future prospects;, Part 41

Author:
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 726

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At the time of the organization of St. John's Protestant Episcopal Church, in 1851, he was elected vestryman, and he has been elected every year since, making a service for the extra- ordinary period of thirty-nine years.

HIe belongs to other organizations for char- itable and humane objects, and has held official stations therein. Bnt, they not being public in

their operations, a detailed recount of his con- nection therewith may be without interest or importance to the general community.

Dr. Shurtleff has been an occasional contrib- utor to the literature of his profession for many years, especially to that branch of it which has so long been his specialty.

His communication already alluded to, de- signed to convey more full and correct informa- tion concerning the State Insane Asylum and the climate of its locality, to the Legislature of 1864-'65, was published by that body. His address before the _State Medical Society in 1873 on the subject of " Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity," was ordered published for distri- bution by a vote of the society without reference to the neual committee, to the extent of 3,500 copies. In 1876 he read a paper before the same society on the " Obscure Forms of Epi- lepsy and the Responsibility of Epileptics," which was published in the proceedings in full. In 1877 he read a paper before the San Joaquin County Medical Society on " Snicide," which was published by the society.

In 1878 he delivered the annual address in behalf of the faculty at the commencement exercises of the Medical Department of the University of California, taking for his subject the " Elements of Professional Success," which was published in the medical journals and in pamphlet form by request.

His official Asylum Reports, respectively, either as director, in behalf of the board, or as medical superintendent, in all cover a period of twenty-one years, his first being the directors, report for the year 1856.

During the time embraced in the above state- ment he contributed a number of other papers, reports and communications to the State and to the county medical societies, and to other chan- nels of publication, on medical and sanitary subjects. But his systematic and more import- ant services of this kind, were performed in the delivery of his annual courses of lectures, while filling the chair of Mental Diseases and Medical Jurisprudence, in the Medical Department of

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HISTORY OF SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY.

the University, between the years 1874 and 1883, as before stated.

The Doctor was married August 5, 1846, to Mary Jane Nye. His wife was the daughter of Rev. Jonathan Nye. She was born in Clare- inont, New Hampshire, in 1822: but her father was a native of Wareham, Massachusetts, a graduate of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, and a clergyman, settled in Cler- mont at the time of hier birth. Her mother was English or Anglo-Canadian, whose maiden name was Rhodes. Mrs. Shurtleff died in Stockton April 13, 1882. She was a devoted and efficient member of St. John's Protestant Episcopal Church. She was prominent in the organization and dispensation of non-sectarian aid to the poor and needy.

Since his withdrawal from the labors and respon- sibilities of his great charge, Dr. Shurtleff lias lived retired from business cares, enjoying a well- earned repose. Having lived in Stockton since the pioneer days and been intimately associated with the city and its people during all that time, he has a place in the hearts of hier people suchi as is held probably by no other man, and on ac- count of his many noble traits of character, is regarded with an esteem amounting almost to affection.

AMES WASLEY, of Linden, was born March 13, 1819, a son of James and Nancy (Trebilcock) Wasley. They settled in Ohio on a farm owned jointly by Mr. Wasley and his brother-in-law, Frank Trebilcock. Mr. Wasley was a miner in Peru and Brazil, a number of years, and in 1836 moved to Mineral Point, Wis- consin, where he died about 1840, aged under fifty, though belonging to long-lived families, his parents reaching the age of eighty. The widow, by her second marriage, Mrs. Richard Crocker, and again a widow by his death, also at Mineral Point, came to California in 1852 by the Panama route, accompanied by some female members of her family, the others being already on this

coast. She died in Linden in 1868, aged seventy- seven. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Wasley were first, John, born in 1816, afterward a super- visor and county clerk of this county, died in 1879, leaving a widow, still living in Oakland, and three children,-Frank A., of that city; Delate, a dentist of Chico, and Emma, the wife of Fred H. Bushy, a glove manufacturer of San Francisco. Second, James, the subject of this sketch. Third, Mary A., afterward Mrs. C. C. Rynerson and since the death of Mr. Rynerson in 1885 known as Mrs. Mary A. Rynerson of Santa Barbara. Fourth, Thomas T., born Feb- ruary 15, 1824, and still living with his brother James in Linden. Fiftli, Emma, now the wife of I. S. Hasley, a dentist of Oakland.

James Wasley, the subject of this sketch, re- ceived a fair education for the times and is re- garded as a well-informed man, having supple - mented the deficiencies of formal education by personal effort in an extensive course of reading. With his wife, one brother and one sister and others not related he left Mineral Point, Wis- cousin, about the first of April, 1849, for Cali- fornia. At Council Bluffs a company of from eighty to 100 persons was organized and they set out to cross the plains. They encountered no trouble from the Indians or other disaster, except two deaths, one by cholera and the other by accidental drowning. Seven men and Mrs. Wasley crossed the Sierra Nevada, October 13, 1849, having separated from the others at Salt Lake City. In November, 1849, James Wasley went to mining at Weaverville, where he was rejoined by his brothers, John and Thomas T., that winter. In 1850 all three went to Feather river and mined on Nelson creek a few months. In the fall of 1850 James Wasley came down on the Sonora road, and about three-quarters of a mile below what is now Farmington he built the Wisconsin House, having as a partner in the enterprise A. J. Holmes, a carpenter, now of San Francisco. They ran it as a wayside inn for two years, and there Mrs. James Wasley, by birth Miss Clarinda Pleas, died, aged only twenty-four. The building was afterward re-

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moved to Peters, where it is still used as a board- ing-house. Being rejoined by his brother John in Farmington in 1851, he left him in charge of the hotel and went with his cousin, William Trebilcock, to start a miners' store at Mokel- umne Hill. In the summer of 1852 he struck some mining which he devoloped and sold out the store, having previously sold his interest in the Wisconsin House. In the fall of 1852 he came down the plains to the Fifteen-Mile House, now Linden, and with his brothers took up 160 acres of land, three miles above, now known as the Lewis ranch, on the Calaveras. They worked it about four years, raising barley chiefly. In 1856 or '57 he returned to mining in Mariposa County, on the Maxwell creek, a tributary of the Merced. He did not remain long, being Iriven down to the plains by rheumatism. Again in the mines one season in Amador County, one in Calaveras and one in Tuolumne, he kept on mining, in all about five years. With his brother John and brother-in-law C. C. Ryner- son, he bought out the Foreman ranch, originally founded by his cousins, William and John Tre- oilcock, about 1850. The name was changed to Linden. James Wasley was interested in it with Mr. Rynerson and John Wasley for several years. Rynerson started the first mill in Linden, and in this also Mr. Wasley became interested, as was also his brother John. Finally the mill interest was sold to a mill company of which John Wasley was the manager and in which the other owners of the old mill became stockhold- ers. Of late years the mill has been standing idle, and Mr. Wasley has turned his attention once more to ranching, in which he is joined by his brother, Thomas T. Wasley.

DWARD DAVIS, deceased July 28, 1866, was born in Ohio, in 1834, a son of Nathan and Susan (Griggs) Davis. The father, accompanied by his two oldest sons, came to California about 1849. The mother with Ed-

ward and the other members of her family fol- lowed abont 1851.

Arriving at man's estate in California, Mr. Edward Davis was quick to appreciate the valne of land, and in 1858 he became owner of 320 acres of bottom land on the Calaveras, about three miles above Linden. In 1863 he par- chased fifty acres more. In January, 1859, he was married in this township to Miss Martha A. Freeman, born in Illinois, in 1839, daughter of Dr. Hugh K. and Susannah (Brooks) Free- man. The Freeman family came to California in 1857. The mother, born in Kentucky in 1818, daughter of Samnel Brooks, died in this township in 1864. Dr. Freeman, born in Mis- souri, in 1816, died in Linden, in 1889. His father, Richard, who was a son of Ainos, was a native of South Carolina, accompanied the fam- ily to this State, in 1857, and died in Rio Vista, Solano County, California, in 1865, aged eighty. His wife, Mary (l'atterson) Freeman, a native of North Carolina, was over sixty at her death in 1855.

Mr. and Mrs. Edward Davis are the parents of four children, viz .: Maria, born April 12,- 1860, died November 29, 1879; Alice, born November 2, 1861, now the wife of Wilson R. Ellis, editor of the Woodland Mail, has one boy, Ralph Freeman, born in 1885.

Albert N. Davis, the oldest son, born October 4, 1862, was educated in Linden and worked on his father's ranch. November 1, 1884, he be- came the junior. partner of the firm of Green & Davis, of Linden. They carried on the business of general merchants with fair success until January 17, 1889, when they sold out, and Albert Davis returned to farming. With a partner he purchased 200 acres of bottom land, adjoining the estate left by his father, in which he is a joint owner with his two brothers.

Edgar Lee Davis, the second son, born March 9, 1865, was educated in Linden and brought up to farming exclusively. He owns an undivided third of his father's ranch of 370 acres. He was married, October 20, 1887, to Miss Laura Middlekauff, born in Ogle County, Illinois, a

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daughter of Hiram Edward and Elizabeth ( Roher) Middlekauff, both natives of Maryland and now residents of Linden. They came to California in 1879. Grandfather Jacob Middlekauff was ninety-two, and Grandfather Elizabeth (Poffen- berger) Middlekauff was eighty-four at death. Mr. and Mrs. E. Davis are the parents of one child, Myrtle May, born August 24, 1888.

Edward Freeman Davis, third son of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Davis, was born February 16, 1867, and educated at Linden, works on the paternal estate of which he is joint owner with his two brothers.

Mrs. Martha A. Wootten. In 1869 Mrs. M. A. Davis was married to John Bivins Wootten, a shoemaker of Linden. Mr. Wootten was born in Delaware in 1822, a son of William and Nancy (Bivins) Wootten. His ancestry is be- lieved to have been American for several genera- tions. John B. Wootten, the son of William, the son of Elijah, the son of Jolin, the son of Peter, the son of Jacob, the son of Edward, who came from England in the year of 1632 and settled in the colony of Lord Delaware. John B. Wootten came to California in 1864. After his marriage he gave attention to farming and came to his. death by a kick from a horse. He died September 24, 1887, leaving two children, viz .: Joseph Bivins, born April 15, 1870, and Frank Bivins, born January 17, 1872. After Edward Davis' death Mrs. Wootten bought fourteen acres in Linden, on which she has erected a pretty house for herself and children. She also owns ninety acres of the Davis ranch.

BASILIO .- Among the well-known pio- neers of California now residing in Stock- ton is the gentleman withi whose name this sketch commences. He was born at Nice, Sardinia (now a part of France), March 6, 1820. His name has become known as Basilio through incorrect interpretation (by English- speaking people) of its transposition, and the surname should be Laogier, his Christian uatne

being Basilio. However, as the latter is gen- erally understood as his surname it will be used as such for the purpose of this sketch. His father, Charles Laogier, was a wholesale and re- tail merchant and hotel-keeper. His mother's maiden name was Josephine Moisin.

Mr. Basilio, the subject of this sketch, was engaged three years in the French governinent arsenals in Africa, and remained at that place in Africa three years longer on his own account in business, as a locksmithı and gunsmith. He then returned to France, and after a month in the city of Marseilles, started on a tour of travel. He sailed to Rio Janeiro, and subse- quently went to Valparaiso. After one month there he continued his travels to California on the ship La Princesa Belgoiosa, arriving at San Francisco January 22, 1850. He remained in the city one month, then went to Mokelninne Hill and mined seven months. He then re- turned to San Francisco, reaching there the day after the fire. After spending six months in the city he went back to the mines, and was there engaged for the seven months following. He then came to Stockton and opened a lock- siniti's establishment. This engaged his at- tention until 1858, when he embarked in the pack-train business, hauling goods to Murphy's, Virginia City, etc. In 1864 his mules cost him for feed alone $300 a month, and the business became unprofitable. For three nights he worried and studied over his future course, and then determined to change his location. He crossed over to Sacramento, thence to Red Bluff, Colusa, Tehama and Yreka. He then took an Indian trail to Klamath lake; but after camping there two days the Indians drove himn away, bothering him for food, etc. Then he journeyed via the lava beds, Warm Springs and Fort Dalles, to Dalles. From that point he sent his pack-train overland to Umatilla, while he himself took a steamer for the same point. He carried a cargo from Umatilla to Bannock City, and subsequently made two more similar trips. He then proceeded to Placerville, to Centerville and to Organs, and on the 25th of

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HISTORY OF SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY.

November arrived at Walla Walla during the progress of a heavy snow storm. There he sold his pack-train to some Canadians, in December. He then took a steamer for San Francisco, ar- riving there about January 10, 1865. He then had his gold dust coined at the mint and re- turned to Stockton. He embarked in business here, and was for years a broker, a dealer in real estate, and a grocer He is now to a great ex- tent retired from active business pursuits.

Mr. Basilio was married in Stockton, March 27, 1869, to Miss Dionicia Ponce, or, to use the full surname, Ponce de Leon, she being a direct descendant of the great Spaniard, whose name will ever live in history for his great and re- markable achievements. She was born in Chi- lınahua, Mexico, and is a daughter of Nemesio Ponce de Leon, an extensive inerchant and trader during his lifetime. He acquired the black fever, and died in 1847. His widow sur- vived him nntil 1881, her death occurring in this city. Mrs. Basilio is a lady of rare ac- complishments and education, and is quite a linguist, having a superb control of several languages. Mr. Basilio is a member of the San Joaquin Society of California Pioneers. He is a liberal-minded man, and has the mature judg- ment of one who has traveled much and been much thrown in contact with the world.

ENRY WILLIAM BECKMAN, a rancher of Donglass Township, was born in Prus- sia in 1851, a son of William Francis and Lonisa (Remnart) Beckinan. The mother died in Germany in 1866, aged forty; the father, born in 1821, came to this country in 1881. He is a tailor by trade, but is now too old to work and spends his time in visiting his five children, three of whom are farmers in this county, and two are married danghters in San Francisco, which gives him an agreeable change from country to city life, as inclination prompts. Grandfather William Beckinan, a fariner, was at

the battle of Waterloo, on the side of Napoleon' being opposed to him until the conquest of Westphalia. He was in America from 1852 to 1866, and died in his native land abont 1870, at the age of eighty. Two of his sons are ranch- ers near Lodi, in this county.

HI. W. Beckman came to this country at the age of thirteen, with an uncle, who is a rancher at Lodi, then on a visit to Europe. He worked on his uncle's ranch until 1866, and on other ranches until 1872. HIe then rented land and did fairly well, making some money, besides getting together some stock and implements. In 1880 he bought 305 acres on the plains, raised four crops and sold at an advance. In 1884 lie bought his present place of 240 acres, on the north bank of the Calaveras, of L. L. Rumrill, which has advanced about fifteen per cent. on the purchase price. It is all first-class wheat land, with a small orchard chiefly for home use. It reaches the river at one corner. In 1889 he had 190 acres in wheat yielding twenty bushels to the acre. He raises a few head of cattle for the market annually. He has made one visit to Germany, in 1881, and brought out his father.

Mr. Beckman was married in 1881 to Miss Henriette Bohne, a native of Germany, who liad come to this country that year. The father died in Germany in 1888, aged sixty years, and the mother, Mrs. Louisa (Kohomore) Bohne, born about 1839, is still living in Westphalia. Mr. and Mrs. Beckman are the parents of two living children, having lost their first born, twins, and one since. The living are: Louisa, born December 18, 1884, and Henrietta, born October 2, 1888.

EORGE KLINGER, a rancher of Donglass Township, was born in Würtzburg, Bava- ria, December 4, 1824, the youngest son of Michael and Barbara (Ott) Klinger. The father lived to be eighty-three, dying in 1847;

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HISTORY OF SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY.

the mother died in 1837, aged forty-nine. The father served in the thirty years' war, was a harness- maker by trade, as was also the grand- father, Franz Klinger. Mr. Klinger received a good education and was graduated from a poly- technical school, learning the trade of his father at the same time. He then spent three years in Switzerland, and became enthusiastic for liberty. He thinks the unification of Germany a step in that direction, as "it is easier to re- duce one throne than thirty-six" when the peo- ple are ready to assert their rights. His father's influence with the military officers enabled him to escape conscription, and he came to America in 1844. He traveled westward to Albany, Buffalo and Chicago,working at his trade in each place. In 1845 he was in Milwaukee, where he made a somewhat longer stay; in Whitewater, Wisconsin, from 1846 to 1848; thence he went to Janesville, where he first opened a shop on his own account in the spring of 1848. This promised more permanence, but the discovery of gold in California somewhat changed all that.

In the spring of 1849, with a company of gold-seekers from Milwaukee, he started for the El Dorado. At St. Joseph, Missouri, the united adventurers organized under the title of the Batcher Rangers, numbering seventy-five men, with twenty-two wagons drawn by ox teams. The men were all from Wisconsin, and were all . under thirty years of age. At the sink of the Humboldt Mr. Klinger and fourteen others, de- taching themselves from the main body, took the Lassen route and entered California at the head of the Sacramento valley, above Chico, Oc- tober 8, 1849. Descending the valley, they crossed Feather river at what is now Oroville, and went thence to Bidwell's Bar. Mr. Klinger now went to mining at that point, and there spent the winter. The following season he mined at High Rock, four miles below. When the dry season of 1851 suspended active opera- tions, he with three of liis old comrades traveled north, reaching Yreka. Here with one partner he carried on a freighting business by pack inules, about three months, receiving 50 cents

a pound for conveying goods from Salem, Ore- gon, or Shasta, California, to Yreka. On the last trip from Shasta they lost twelve mules with their packs, stolen by Indians, and the mule- back freighting company was wound up. Mr. Klinger then went prospecting on Shasta river, west of Mount Shasta, but finding no encouraging indications, he conelnded to return to civilization and the liarness business.

About August, 1851, he arrived in Sacra- mento and went to work at the bench. The work in those days was mostly repairs and the making of pack-saddles. Probably the first horse-collar made on the coast was made that year (1851) by Mr. Klinger. It cost $25, or about eight times what it would cost now; but the block had to be made as well. The firm for which he worked had a shop at Marysville also, and a dissolution of partnership occurring, Mr. Klinger was offered $45 a week, with board, by the partner who took the Marysville shop. The offer was accepted, and he went to work in that town about a month before the place was de- stroyed by fire, and he lost all his tools, of which he had two complete sets. He also lost all immediate prospect of being paid what he had earned, or the $500 he had loaned his em- plovers. Returning to Sacramento, he went to work in the old shop, but a disagreement arising, he left and went to San Francisco. Not finding work to snit him, he came to Stockton and found a job which lasted all winter. In May, 1852, in partnership with Joseph Harrison, he pur- chased the shop. In 1854 he bought out his partner, and in 1855 sold out the business. In 1855 he bought the 160-acre ranch on which he still resides, about two miles south of Linden, and afterward 140 acres, which he again sold. He had taken out two or three crops, when in 1858, the prospect being poor and he somewhat in debt, he went back to his trade and was fore- man in a shop in Stockton until 1869, the fam- ily meanwhile living on the ranch. In 1869 he started a shop in Linden, which he carried on until 1887. He still does a little at his trade for himself and special friends, and has

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had abundant reasons to recognize the value of learning a trade.

Mr. Klinger has been deputy assessor for two separate terms, between 1878 and 1885, and has done some insurance, especially for the old Hartford Company (of 1794), since 1882. He has been a school trustee fifteen years. In poli- tics he is a Republican, having been converted by the firing on Fort Sumter. He was a men- ber of the county convention in 1878, and chair- inan of the Linden primary.

Mr. Klinger was married in Stockton, Sep- tember 6, 1853, to Miss Maria Augusta Hell- mert, of Eisenach, in Saxe-Weimar. Her father died in that city, the home of liis ancestors for inany generations, aged ninety. Mrs. Klinger came to California direct from Bremen, around Cape Horn, with her mother in 1853. She still treasures as an heirloom a gold watch pre- sented by the grand duke as a token of personal regard, to her father, who was glazier to his highness. His grandfather, Henry, was also in the same liue, and lived to about the same age. The mother of Mrs. Klinger died at the home of the latter, June 23, 1889, aged eighty-four. Mr. and Mrs. Klinger are the parents of nine children, viz .: William Henry, born April 19, 1856, married to Miss Belle Goncher, a native of this State, her parents now resident of this township, has a boy and two girls; Sarah, born March 6, 1858, now Mrs. Gischel, of Stockton, mother of one child; Wilhelmina, born July 4, 1859, now Mrs. L. E. Grimsby, mother of three boys and one girl; Mary A., born October 20, 1861, now the wife of Harry A. Little, engineer of Angel's Camp, mother of two girls; John, born July 28, 1863, married to Miss Ora Goncher, resident of Oakland; Matilda, born Jnne, 1865, now Mrs. August Welcher, of Cop- peropolis, mother of one girl; George Washing- ton, born Angust 16, 1875, and Charles A., born December 18, 1877. None of the boys have learned their father's trade, though the Klinger family dates back 400 years, witlı a harness-maker in every generation. That hered- ity of physical traits is more positive is shown

by the fact that one of the daughters is an exact representation of her French great-grandmother. One child died in infancy.

RED YOST, one of the pioneers in Stock- ton, is a native of Womelsdorf, Berks County, Pennsylvania, born October 3, 1828, his parents being John and Margaret (Lauer) Yost. His father, a native of Frankfort- on-the-Main, came as a child to Womelsdorf, where, on growing up, he became well-to-do, building a large brewery, which he operated until his deatlı, in 1888, at the age of ninety-two years. The mother of our subject was also born in Germany, and also came to Pennsylvania when a child, living there till her death in 1852. The Laners are a prominent Pennsylvanian family.

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An illustrated history of San Joaquin County, California. Containing a history of San Joaquin County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its future prospects;, Part 41

Author: Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 726

Author:
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 726